Here the road became narrow, and as the western sky showed indications
of a storm, the coachmen were told to drive home as soon as possible.

Mrs. Campbell's advice with regard to Mary, made no difference
whatever with Mrs. Mason's plans. She had always intended doing for
her whatever she could, and knowing that a good education was of far
more value than money, she determined to give her every advantage
which lay in her power. There was that summer a most excellent school
in Rice Corner, and as Mrs. Mason had fortunately no prejudices
against a district school, where so many of our best and greatest men
have been educated, she resolved to send her little protegé, as soon
as her wardrobe should be in a suitable condition. Accordingly in a
few days Mary became a regular attendant at the old brown
school-house, where for a time we will leave her, and passing silently
over a period of several years, again in another chapter open the
scene in the metropolis of the "Old Bay State."




CHAPTER XV.

THE THREE YOUNG MEN


It was beginning to be daylight in the city of Boston; and as the gray
east gradually brightened and grew red in the coming of day, a young
man looked out upon the busy world around him, with that feeling of
utter loneliness which one so often feels in a great city where all is
new and strange to him. Scarcely four weeks had passed since the notes