perfection, and wanted to increase in perfection by entering a convent,
and Val had been worrying himself to replace her before the holidays
were over.)

"So you've heard of one? That's good!" I continued.

"Well, not exactly," said Val. "I've heard of a person who is on the
lookout for a place of this kind, and reference seem quite correct,
but----"

"But what? If she is all right, why hesitate? Write at once, my dear
fellow, and snap her up before some one else does!"

Val's eyes twinkled.

"It's not a _she_ at all. That's the difficulty. It's a master who is
applying."

I whistled my astonishment, then shook my head in distrust.

"If he's not a fraud he must be fooling you!" I rejoined irreverently.
"No capable master would come up here."

"Read that before you make a pronouncement," said Val, as he threw a
letter across the table to me.

It proved to be from an old college friend of Val's, and backed up very
warmly the application for our vacant post of a young man who was an
excellent trained teacher, who had tried his vocation as a monk, and
had failed through a breakdown in health. He was in want of an easy