West we did not know, but since his return he had brought the
perseverance and judgment of middle life to the studies of his youth,
and in his last ten years of leisure had made himself that rarest of
things among Americans, a scholar, one worthy of the name.

Under his guidance our studies took life, and Alice threw herself into
them with all the energy of her nature. In vain papa pished and
pshawed, and mamma grieved, and begged John not to spoil the girls by
making bookworms of them; in vain "Laura C. and the rest of them"
entreated us to join this picnic or show ourselves at that party; in
vain the young men professed themselves afraid of us, and the girls
tossed their heads and called us blue-stockings. Alice's answer to all
was, "I like studying; it is a great deal more entertaining than going
to parties; Uncle John's study is pleasanter than Mrs. C.'s parlor,
and a ride on his little Winnebago better fun than dancing." And so
the years went on. We were not out of society,--that could not be in
our house,--but our associates changed; young men of a higher standing
frequented the house; we knew intimately the cultivated women, to
whom, before, we had simply bowed at parties; and mamma and papa grew
quite satisfied.

Not so Alice; the spirit of unrest was on her again, but this time it
was not because of the weariness of life, but that she was oppressed
by the fulness of her own happiness. She had waked up to life in
waking up to love, and had poured out on Herbert B. the whole wealth
of her heart. There was everything in her engagement to satisfy her
friends, everything to gratify papa and mamma; and if I sometimes
thought Herbert's too feeble a nature to guide hers, or if Uncle John
sometimes talked with or listened to him as if he were measuring his
depth and then went away with an anxious expression of face, who shall