no longer so?" was my natural question. Her fore-finger
immediately touched her dimpled chin, with an arch look of prohibition.

"We are still _allies,_" she continued, "bound, like other confederate
powers, by circumstances of mutual interest; but I am afraid, as will
happen in other cases, the treaty of alliance has survived the amicable
dispositions in which it had its origin. At any rate, we live less
together; and when he comes through that door there, I vanish through
this door here; and so, having made the discovery that we two were one
too many for this apartment, as large as it seems, Rashleigh, whose
occasions frequently call him elsewhere, has generously made a cession of
his rights in my favour; so that I now endeavour to prosecute alone the
studies in which he used formerly to be my guide."

"And what are those studies, if I may presume to ask?"

"Indeed you may, without the least fear of seeing my fore-finger raised
to my chin. Science and history are my principal favourites; but I also
study poetry and the classics."

"And the classics? Do you read them in the original?"

"Unquestionably. Rashleigh, who is no contemptible scholar, taught me
Greek and Latin, as well as most of the languages of modern Europe. I
assure you there has been some pains taken in my education, although I
can neither sew a tucker, nor work cross-stitch, nor make a pudding,
nor--as the vicar's fat wife, with as much truth as elegance, good-will,
and politeness, was pleased to say in my behalf--do any other useful
thing in the varsal world."

"And was this selection of studies Rashleigh's choice, or your own, Miss
Vernon?" I asked.

"Um!" said she, as if hesitating to answer my question,--"It's not worth
while lifting my finger about, after all. Why, partly his and partly
mine. As I learned out of doors to ride a horse, and bridle and saddle
him in cue of necessity, and to clear a five-barred gate, and fire a gun
without winking, and all other of those masculine accomplishments that my
brute cousins run mad after, I wanted, like my rational cousin, to read
Greek and Latin within doors, and make my complete approach to the tree
of knowledge, which you men-scholars would engross to yourselves, in
revenge, I suppose, for our common mother's share in the great original
transgression."

"And Rashleigh indulged your propensity to learning?"

"Why, he wished to have me for his scholar, and he could but teach me
that which he knew