fancied she was even more so to me than to any one else; and I never
looked upon her sunny, cheerful and yet perfectly feminine face,
without a feeling of security and happiness. As for her honest eyes,
they invariably met my own with an open frankness that said, as
plainly as eyes could say anything, there was nothing to be concealed.



CHAPTER II.

"Cease to persuade, my loving Proteus;
Home-keeping youth have ever homely wits;--
I rather would entreat thy company
To see the wonders of the world abroad."
_Two Gentlemen of--Clawbonny._


During the year that succeeded after I was prepared for Yale,
Mr. Hardinge had pursued a very judicious course with my
education. Instead of pushing me into books that were to be read in
the regular course of that institution, with the idea of lightening my
future labours, which would only have been providing excuses for
future idleness, we went back to the elementary works, until even he
was satisfied that nothing more remained to be done in that
direction. I had my two grammars literally by heart, notes and all.
Then we revised as thoroughly as possible, reading everything anew,
and leaving no passage unexplained. I learned to scan, too, a fact
that was sufficient to make a reputation for a scholar, in America,
half a century since. [*] After this, we turned our attention to
mathematics, a science Mr. Hardinge rightly enough thought there was