CHAPTER IV.

Summers and winters came and went, with little to mark them, except the
growth of the trees, and the quiet progress of young creatures. Erminia was
sent to school somewhere in France, to receive more regular instruction
than she could have in the house with her invalid aunt. But she came home
once a year, more lovely and elegant and dainty than ever; and Maggie
thought, with truth, that ripening years were softening down her
volatility, and that her aunt's dewlike sayings had quietly sunk deep, and
fertilized the soil. That aunt was fading away. Maggie's devotion added
materially to her happiness; and both she and Maggie never forgot that this
devotion was to be in all things subservient to the duty which she owed to
her mother.

"My love," Mrs. Buxton had more than once said, "you must always recollect
that your first duty is toward your mother. You know how glad I am to see
you; but I shall always understand how it is, if you do not come. She may
often want you when neither you nor I can anticipate it."

Mrs. Browne had no great wish to keep Maggie at home, though she liked to
grumble at her going. Still she felt that it was best, in every way, to
keep on good terms with such valuable friends; and she appreciated, in some
small degree, the advantage which her intimacy at the house was to Maggie.
But yet she could not restrain a few complaints, nor withhold from her, on
her return, a recapitulation of all the things which might have been done
if she had only been at home, and the number of times that she had been
wanted; but when she found that Maggie quietly gave up her next Wednesday's
visit as soon as she was made aware of any necessity for her presence at
home, her mother left off grumbling, and took little or no notice of her
absence.