conviction. She refrained from explaining that a girl like
Milly, with no social background, might marry "to advantage" on her
looks, but she would need something more to maintain any desirable
position in the world. Such ideas were getting into the air these days.

"I'm going to take some music lessons," Milly yawned.

"You have a good mind," her friend persisted flatteringly. "Do you know
French."

"A little," Milly admitted dubiously.

"German?"

Milly shook her head positively.

"Latin?"

"Latin! What for?"

"I had two years of Latin. It's ... it's cultivating."

Milly glanced at the load of new books on the library table. She knew
that the Kemps read together a great deal. They aspired to "stand for
the best things" in the ambitious young city,--for art, music, and all
the rest. She was somewhat awed.

"But what's the use of a girl's knowing all that?" she demanded
practically.

If a woman knew how to "write a good letter," when she was married, and
could keep the house accounts when there were any, and was bright and
entertaining enough to amuse her wearied male, she had all the education
she needed. That was Milly's idea.

"French, now, is so useful when one travels," Mrs. Kemp explained.

"Oh, if one travels," Milly agreed vaguely.

Later Mrs. Kemp returned to the attack and extolled the advantages,
social and intellectual, that came with a Good Education. She described
the Ashland Institute, where she had completed her own education and of
which she was a recently elected trustee.

"Mrs. Mason, the principal, is a very cultivated lady--speaks all the
modern languages and has such a refining influence. I know you would
like her."

Milly had always attended public school. It had never occurred to her
father that while the state was willing to provide an education he
should go to the expense of buying one privately for his daughter. Of
course Milly knew that there were fashionable boarding-schools. She
wanted to attend a Sacred Heart convent school where one of her
intimates--a Louisville girl--had been sent, but the mere idea had
shocked Mrs. Ridge, senior, unutterably.

It seemed that the Ashland Institute, according to Mrs. Kemp, was an
altogether superior sort of place, and Milly was at last thoroughly
fired with the idea that she should "finish herself" there. Her
grandmother agreed that more schooling would not hurt Milly, but
demurred at the expense. Horatio was easily convinced that