iss Hempstead was sent to London, and five or six years of the
discipline of a first-class English school have made her quite
different from the fully fledged society queens who graduate from our
Murray Hill _pensionnats_ at sixteen or so. A little English reserve
to tone down somewhat their sparkling natures is all that our
bewitching American girls need to make them perfect, but I fear they
will for several years yet bear the stigma of, "Charming, but too wild."

CHAPTER V.

Sunday in the Country--Proximity of a Meeting-house--How we pass our
Sundays--The House in the Woods--Ida's Glen--Mrs. Greeley's Favorite
Spring--The Children's Play-house--Gabrielle's Pets--Travelling in
1836--New York Society--Mr. Greeley's Friday Evenings--Mrs. Greeley as
a Bride--Her Accomplishments--A Letter concerning Mr. Greeley's Wedding.

_June 16_.

Sunday is, I think, a very _triste_ day in the country (low be it
spoken). I cannot remain longer than an hour at church, for the Mass
is a low one, and the sermon consists of fifteen minutes of plain,
practical instruction, unembellished by rhetoric, to the congregation.
The church, it is true, is four miles distant, but Gabrielle's
aristocratic ponies, Lady Alice and The Duchess, fairly fly over the
ground--up or down hill, it is immaterial to them--and consequently, I
find myself, when my religious duties are over, with many idle hours
upon my hands.

The croquet balls and mallets, our "Magic Rings," and other out-of-door
games, are put away in the "children's play-house," a little white hut
on the borders of the croquet ground, where Ida and dear little Raffie
used to keep their toys, and where Gabrielle in later days housed her
menagerie of pets.

The piano, too, is not only closed, but locked, for the flesh is weak,
and I fear the temptation of the beautiful cold keys. It may be the
baneful effect of a foreign education, but I cannot see that there
would be any evil result from a little music on Sundays. However, we
have a Dissenting church for a next-door neighbor, and the residents of
Chappaqua are chiefly Quakers, who frown upon the piano as an ungodly
instrument; so with a sigh, I replace in my portfolio that grand hymn
that in 1672 saved the life of the singer, Stradella, from the
assassin's knife, and a beautiful Ave Maria, solemn and chaste in its
style as though written by St. Gregory himself, but composed and
dedicated to me by mamma's friend, Professor F. L.