"So it would, but you may not be able to fit in two hours' reading with
your duty to your neighbour! On any day that you could honestly be only a
half-timer, you are far less likely to get careless, and to despair of
regularity, if you get a bit of your day's subject, than if you have to
leave one of your subjects entirely undone."

Even Aunt Rachel's good advice came to an end at last, as in course of
time did Urith's visit, and also the Midsummer term, after which she left
school with the best possible intentions, and announced them at home with
much dignity. But, far from being allowed to carry on her course of study,
it became a study with her two small brothers to prevent such morbid
fancies from taking effect. They won golden opinions from the servants
those holidays, who said that the young gentlemen had never been so little
trouble before. They suddenly became as full of "resources within
themselves" as Mrs. Elton herself, to the admiration of the whole family,
except of the unfortunate Urith, who might have unravelled the mystery,
since the cultivation of her domestic virtues by startling and unexpected
interruptions of her reading, occupied such of their spare time as was not
devoted to the mental exercise of devising new plans for her discomfiture
on the morrow.

But, happily for Urith, holidays are terminable, and when the boys left
she hoped to do great things. But visitors came to stay in the house,
special friends of her own, with strong theories as to the value of
co-operation in the matter of brushing their hair at night.

Midnight conversations did not conduce to work before breakfast or to much
energy after it. It was, therefore, with very mingled feelings that Urith
welcomed Aunt Rachel, her outside conscience, whose yearly visit was
usually an unmixed pleasure to her.