"That was the meanest trick a gentleman ever played. How did he dare
know I wasn't nearsighted? And what a fool I was to be caught by that
photograph--saw it as plain as day three yards off. I had most made up
my mind to leave them off anyway, though they are awful stylish; they
pinch my nose and make my head ache. But I'll wear them now," and here
the white teeth came viciously together, "if they kill me. Why should
he put me down that way? He made me shy for the first time in my life.
It's a man's business to be shy before me. If I could only get hold of
him somehow! I'd pay him well for making me feel so small. The fact is,
I started wrong. I did not really know what I wanted; and that graven
image of an English butler set me back so; and then I never saw such a
house as that. It is sinful for one man to live there all alone. Powers
alive! How well that house would suit my complexion! But I don't
believe I'd take it with _him_ thrown in."

It is doubtful whether young girls of Miss Matchin's kind are ever
quite candid in their soliloquies. It is certain she was not when she
assured herself that she did not know why she went to Farnham's house
that morning. She went primarily to make his acquaintance, with the
hope also that by this means she might be put in some easy and genteel
way of earning money. She was one of a very numerous class in large
American towns. Her father was a carpenter, of a rare sort. He was a
good workman, sober, industrious, and unambitious. He was contented
with his daily work and wage, and would have thanked Heaven if he could
have been assured that his children would fare as well as he. He was of
English blood, and had never seemed to imbibe into his veins the
restless haste and hunger to rise which is the source of much that is
good and most that is evil in American life. In the dreams of his early
married days he created a future for his children, in the image of his
own decent existence. The boys should succeed him in his shop, and the