were any larger and more capable than the minds of women would
be if they were properly trained and developed; and she began to dip
into the books they prided themselves on having read, to see if they
were past her comprehension. She studied Pope's translation of the
Iliad and Odyssey indoors, and she also took the little volume out
under her arm; but this was a pose, for she could not read out of
doors, there were always so many other interests to occupy her
attention--birds and beasts, men and women, trees and flowers, land
and water; all much more entrancing than the Iliad or Odyssey. Long
years afterwards she returned to these old-world works with keen
appreciation, and wondered at her early self; but when she read them
first, she took their meanings too literally, and soon wearied of
warlike heroes, however great a number of their fellow-creatures they
might slay at a time, and of chattel heroines, however beautiful,
which was all that Homer conveyed to her; not did she find herself
elated by her knowledge of their exploits. She noticed, however, that
the acquisition of such knowledge imposed upon the boys, and gained
her a reputation for cleverness which made the young university prigs
think it worth their while to talk to her. They had failed to discover
her natural powers because there was no one to tell them she had any,
and they only thought what they were told to think about people and
things, and admired what they were told to admire. In this Beth
differed from them widely, for she began by having tastes of her own.
She did not believe that they enjoyed Homer a bit more than she did;
but the right pose was to pretend that they did; so they posed and
pretended, according to order, and Beth posed and pretended too, just
to see what would come of it.

It was a young tutor in charge of a reading-party who helped Beth with
the Latin grammar. He managed to ingratiate himself with Mrs.
Caldwell, and came often to the house; and finally he began to teach
Beth Latin at her own request, and with the consent of her mother. The
lessons had not gone on very long, however, before he tried to
insinuate into his teaching some of the kind of sophistries which
another tutor had imposed by way of moral philosophy on Rousseau's
Madame de Warens in her girlhood, to her undoing. This was all new to
Beth, and she listened with great interest; but she failed utterly to
see why not believing in a God should make it right and proper