catechist, and of many another book with a story besides; even of her
Hume, Gibbon, Goldsmith, and Rollin, and of her Scott, perennially
delightful. She was, in fact, no dunce, though she had not been
disciplined in the conventional routine of education; and as for
training in the higher sense, she could not have grown into a more
upright or good girl under any guidance, than under that of her tender
and careful mother.

And in appearance what was she like, this Bessie Fairfax, subjected so
early to the caprices of fortune? It is not to be pretended that she
reached the heroic standard. Mr. Carnegie said she bade fair to be very
handsome, but she was at the angular age when the framework of a girl's
bones might stand almost as well for a boy's, and there was, indeed,
something brusque, frank, and boyish in Bessie's air and aspect at this
date. She walked well, danced well, rode well--looked to the manner born
when mounted on the little bay mare, which carried the doctor on his
second journeys of a day, and occasionally carried Bessie in his company
when he was going on a round, where, at certain points, rest and
refreshment were to be had for man and beast. Her figure had not the
promise of majestic height, but it was perfectly proportioned, and her
face was a capital letter of introduction. Feature by feature, it was,
perhaps, not classical, but never was a girl nicer looking taken
altogether; the firm sweetness of her mouth, the clear candor of her
blue eyes, the fair breadth of her forehead, from which her light
golden-threaded hair stood off in a wavy halo, and the downy peach of
her round cheeks made up a most kissable, agreeable face. And there were
sense and courage in it as well as sweetness; qualities which in her
peculiar circumstances would not be liable to rust for want of using.

The mistiness of tears clouded Bessie's eyes when her mother, without