But there was no one in my little world that answered to all these things--somewhere, some day, I might meet such a being. I was in no hurry. Enough to know that such things had been and would be again. Poor little Dreamer! silly little Dreamer! and all the time she was pretending, even to herself, that she did not care for love or lovers; that they were never to be a part of her life; that she never wanted to marry, never would; and that she meant to live a much more serious and useful life than one of mere married happiness. It was a perverse, contradictory inner and outer life I lived at the ages of sixteen and seventeen, yes, and on into the twenties; no girl ever thought more about love and possible lovers than I, yet I felt they were never to be really for me. Even my day-dreams had barriers interposed. I wonder if this is not unusual--do not other dreamers dream things as they want them--when everything can be rose-colour for the mere wishing? Is it customary, I wonder, to let dark clouds overcast the dream-sky? As I think of it, I wonder if it was not a kind of prescience of what the reality would be. Anyhow, as far back as I can remember thinking of these things, mingled with the whims, sentimentalities, and insincerities of the adolescent period, was a conviction of these two things: that love was the greatest, the most wonderful thing in the world, and that there would be some barrier always to my knowing all that it might mean. Besides the books I read, I can trace other influences that had their part in bending the twig in the way it was to grow. In the early ’teens Brother and I helped Father in the Post Office, out of school hours, an occupation profitable in many ways. I had much leisure there for reading, was trained to accuracy and alertness in the office-work, and learned a good deal about human nature. The requirements furnished a needed corrective to my tendency to dream--I could still dream, but had to _do_, also. It was a matter of pride between Brother and me to see how rapidly we could distribute the mail; how quickly deliver it when the box-numbers were called out; and how well we could remember just what letters were in the General Delivery.