"I should like to see them books," said Sarah. "I'll be bound that they
are only prayer-books."

"I don't mind what you say to me, but you shall not insult my religion."

"Insult your religion! I said you never had read a book in your life
unless it was a prayer-book."

"We don't use prayer-books."

"Then what books have you read?"

Esther hesitated, her manner betrayed her, and, suspecting the truth,
Sarah said:

"I don't believe that you can read at all. Come, I'll bet you twopence
that you can't read the first five lines of my story."

Esther pushed the paper from her and walked out of the room in a tumult of
grief and humiliation. Woodview and all belonging to it had grown
unbearable, and heedless to what complaint the cook might make against her
she ran upstairs and shut herself into her room. She asked why they should
take pleasure in torturing her. It was not her fault if she did not know
how to read. There were the books she loved for her mother's sake, the
books that had brought such disgrace upon her. Even the names she could
not read, and the shame of her ignorance lay upon her heavier than a
weight of lead. "Peter Parley's Annual," "Sunny Memories of Foreign
Lands," "Children of the Abbey," "Uncle Tom's Cabin," Lamb's "Tales of
Shakespeare's Plays," a Cooking Book, "Roda's Mission of Love," the Holy