?"

"Yes, I think I understand your distinction; but I am not quite sure
if it applies. To most things that affect the spirits she is not more
sensitive than other girls, perhaps less so; but she is certainly very
impressionable in some things."

"In what?"

"She is more moved than any one I ever knew by objects in external
nature, rural scenery, rural sounds, by music, by the books that she
reads,--even books that are not works of imagination. Perhaps in all
this she takes after her poor father, but in a more marked degree,--at
least, I observe it more in her; for he was very silent and reserved.
And perhaps also her peculiarities have been fostered by the seclusion
in which she has been brought up. It was with a view to make her a
little more like girls of her own age that our friend, Mrs. Poyntz,
induced me to come here. Lilian was reconciled to this change; but she
shrank from the thoughts of London, which I should have preferred. Her
poor father could not endure London."

"Miss Ashleigh is fond of reading?"

"Yes, she is fond of reading, but more fond of musing. She will sit by
herself for hours without book or work, and seem as abstracted as if in
a dream. She was so even in her earliest childhood. Then she would tell
me what she had been conjuring up to herself. She would say that she had
seen--positively seen--beautiful lands far away from earth; flowers and
trees not like ours. As she grew older this visionary talk displeased
me, and I scolded her, and said that if others heard her, they would
think that she was not only silly but very untruthful. So of late years
she never ventures to tell me what, in such dreamy moments, she suffers
herself to imagine; but the habit of musing continues still. Do you not
agree with Mrs. Poyntz that the best cure would be a little cheerful
society amongst other young people?"

"Certainly," said I, honestly, though with a jealous pang. "But here
comes the medicine. Will you take it up to her, and then sit with her
half an hour or so? By that time I expect she will be asleep. I will
wait here till you return. Oh, I can amuse myself with the newspapers
and books on your table. Stay! one caution: be sure there are no flowers
in Miss Ashleigh's sleeping-room. I think I saw a treacherous rose-tree
in a stand by the window. If so, banish it."

Left alone, I examined the room in which, oh, thought of joy! I had
surely now won the claim to become a privileged guest. I touched th