be trained as I would train my own
child--to be trained in this little simple school, to be educated in
mind and body, not to be thrown into contact with a girl who is in no
way fit to know you. At present, Rosamund, you are under masters and
governors, and have, according to scriptural precepts, to obey them.
By-and-by your time of emancipation will come, and you will owe
allegiance only to God and those whom you love, my dear; but until that
time comes it seems to me scarcely fit or advisable that you should have
anything to do with Irene. I told Lady Jane so this evening."

"You told Lady Jane that?" said Rosamund, rising to her feet, her face
very pale, her eyes dark as night.

"Yes, I did, for I considered it my duty."

"Then you would like me to leave you, Professor? You would like me to
write to my mother and explain all the circumstances to her, and beg and
implore of her to take me away?"

"You must please yourself, Rosamund," said the Professor; and now he
rose and in his turn laid his hand on her shoulder. "You have a generous
heart, I can see. But you have never been subjected to the rigorous laws
of self-control. You showed a sad want of self-control when you
disobeyed me to-day, and again I perceive it breaking out. If you cannot
obey me, Rosamund, you must go. Yes, I shall be sorry to have to say it,
but you must go."

"And does that mean," said Rosamund, "that I am not to see Irene, that I
am not to try to help her, that I am not to be a friend to Lady Jane,
that my mother's wishes in this matter are to be disregarded?"

"It means," said the Professor very gravely, "that, for the present at
least, you are to have nothing whatever to do with Irene
Ashleigh--nothing whatever to do with her. You understand that,
Rosamund. And I give you a week, my dear, to decide. Think over the
advantages of this home. Think what it means to your friends, and will
eventually mean to yourself, and try to discover that I am wise in my
generation, although you doubtless consider me foolish. If at the end of
the week you have found out that you cannot really obey me--or, rather,
that you will not--I shall have, reluctantly, to write to your mother
and ask her to remove you, for the other girls cannot be contaminated
with that most fatal of all sins, the sin of direct disobedience."

Rosamund bowed her head. The tears she could not repress brimmed to her
eyes. Suddenly she flung off the Professor's detaining hand.

"O