greatest favour to take you back again. Perhaps he addressed you as a
beggar; it wouldn't be the first time he's done such a thing. I wonder
what would have induced poor Philip Amory to go back. Has he made any
apology in his letter for past unkindness?"

"I do not think he considered any to be needed," replied Gertrude.

"Then he didn't make any excuse for his ungentlemanly behaviour? I
declare it's a shame you should be exposed to any more such treatment;
but I always _did_ hear that women were self-forgetful in their
friendship, and I believe it. Gertrude makes an excellent friend. Mrs.
Jeremy, we must cultivate her regard; and sometime or other, perhaps,
make a loud call upon her services."

"And if ever you do, sir, I shall be ready to respond to it; if there is
a person in the world who owes a debt to society, it is myself. I hear
the world called cold, selfish, and unfeeling; but it has not been so to
me. I should be ungrateful if I did not cherish a spirit of universal
love; how much more so, if I did not feel bound, heart and hand, to
those dear friends who have bestowed upon me such affection as no orphan
ever found before!"

"Gertrude," said Mrs. Jeremy, "I believe that you were right in leaving
Emily when you did, and that you are right in returning to her now; and,
if your being such a good girl as you are is at all due to her, she
certainly has a great claim upon you."

"She has a claim, indeed, Mrs. Jeremy! It was Emily who first taught me
the difference between right and wrong----"

"And she is going to reap the benefit of that knowledge in you," said
the doctor, in continuation of her remark. "That's fair! But if you are
resolved to take this European tour, you will be busy enough with your
preparations. Do you think Mr. W. will be willing to give you up?"

"I hope so," said Gertrude. "I am sorry to be obliged to ask it of him,
for he has been very indulgent to me, and I have been absent from school
two weeks out of the winter already; but as it will shortly be the
summer vacation, he will, perhaps, be able to supply my place."

Mrs. Jeremy interested herself in Gertrude's arrangements, offered an
attic-room for the storage of her furniture, gave up to her a dressmaker
she had engaged for herself, and a plan was laid out, by which Gertrude
could start for New York in less than a week.

Mr. W., on being applied to, relinquished Gertrude, though deeply
regretting to lose so valuable an assistan