e tone of command or
rebuke to one for whom my unexpressed wishes were absolute law, as to
observe the form of request or advice in directing or reproving those
whose obedience depended on the consequences of rebellion. It only
made matters worse that the distinction corresponded but too
accurately to their several deserts. No faults could have been so
irritating to Eveena's companions as her undeniable faultlessness.

The ludicrous aspect of my relation to the rest of the household was
even more striking than I had expected. That I should find myself in
the absurd position of a man entrusted with the direct personal
government of half-a-dozen young ladies was even "more truly spoke
than meant." One at least among them might singly have made in time a
not unlovable wife, and all, perhaps, might severally and separately
have been reduced to conjugal complaisance. Collectively, they were,
as Eveena had said, a set of school-girls, and school-girls used to
stricter restraint and much sharper discipline than those of a French
or Italian convent. They would have made life a burden to a vigorous
English schoolmistress, and imperilled the soul of any Lady-Abbess
whose list of permissible penances excluded the dark cell and the
scourge. Fortunately for both parties, I had the advantage of
governess and Superior in the natural awe which girls feel for the
authority of manhood--till they have found out of what soft fibre men
are made--and in the artificial fear inspired by domestic usage and
tradition. For I was soon aware that even on its ridiculous side the
relation was not to be trifled with. The simple indifference a man
feels towards the escapades of girlhood was not applicable to women
and wives, who yet lacked womanly sense and the feeling of conjugal
duty. This serious aspect of their position soon contracted the
indulgence naturally conceded to youth's heedlessness and animal
spirits. These, displayed at first only in the energy and eagerness of
their every movement within the narrow limits of conventional usage,
broke all bounds when, after one or two half-timid, half-venturous
experiments on my patience, they felt that they had, at least for the
moment, exchanged the monotony, the mechanical routine, the stern
repression of their life in the great Nurseries, not for the harsh
household discipline to which they naturally looked forward, but for
the "loosened zone" which to them seemed to promise absolute liberty.
When