that I had been lifted into the life of
mature years, and into just that atmosphere of European life
to which I had before been tending, the thought of sending me
to school filled me with disgust.

'Yet what could I tell my father of such feelings? I resisted
all I could, but in vain. He had no faith in medical aid
generally, and justly saw that this was no occasion for its
use. He thought I needed change of scene, and to be roused
to activity by other children. "I have kept you at home," he
said, "because I took such pleasure in teaching you myself,
and besides I knew that you would learn faster with one who
is so desirous to aid you. But you will learn fast enough
wherever you are, and you ought to be more with others of your
own age. I shall soon hear that you are better, I trust."'

SCHOOL-LIFE.

The school to which Margaret was sent was that of the Misses Prescott,
in Groton, Massachusetts. And her experience there has been described
with touching truthfulness by herself, in the story of "Mariana."[A]

'At first her school-mates were captivated with her ways; her
love of wild dances and sudden song, her freaks of passion
and of wit. She was always new, always surprising, and, for a
time, charming.

'But after a while, they tired of her. She could never be
depended on to join in their plans, yet she expected them,
to follow out hers with their whole strength. She was very
loving, even infatuated in her own affections, and exacted
from those who had professed any love for her the devotion she
was willing to bestow.

'Yet there was a vein of haughty caprice in her character,
and a love of solitude, which made her at times wish to retire
apart, and at these times she would expect to be entirely
understood, and let alone, yet to be welcomed back when she
returned. She did not thwart others in their humors, but she
never doubted of great indulgence from them.

'Some singular habits she had, which, when new, charmed, but,
after acquaintance, displeased her companions. She had
by nature the same habit and power of excitement that is
described in the spinning dervishes of the East. Like them
she would spin until all around her were giddy, while her
own brain, instead of being disturbed, was excited to great
action. Pausing, she would declaim, verses of others, or h