There was a low quick "Oh!" and she was gone, and the curtains
closed over her face. It was rude; but neither ought she to have
called me the old Adam. I have been thinking of one thing: why
should she speak slightingly of _my_ knowledge of birds? What does
_she_ know about them? I should like to inquire.

Late this afternoon I dressed up in my high gray wool hat, my fine
long-tailed blue cloth coat with brass buttons, by pink waistcoat,
frilled shirt, white cravat, and yellow nankeen trousers, and
walked slowly several times around my strawberry bed. Did no see
any more ripe strawberries.


Within the last ten days I have called twice upon the Cobbs, urged
no doubt by an extravagant readiness to find them all that I feared
they were not. How exquisite in life is the art of not seeing many
things, and of forgetting many that have been seen! They received
me as though nothing unpleasant had happened. Nor did the elder
daughter betray that we had met. She has not forgotten, for
more than once I surprised a light in her eyes as though she were
laughing. She has not, it is certain, told even her mother and
sister. Somehow this fact invest her character with a charm as
of subterranean roominess and secrecy. Women who tell everything
are like finger-bowls of clear water.

But it is Sylvia that pleases me. She must be about seventeen; and
so demure and confiding that I was ready to take her by the hand,
lead her to the garden-gate, and say: Dear child, everything in
here--butterflies, flowers, fruit, honey, everything--is yours;
come and go and gather as you like.