"My poor child," I exclaimed, with swift compassion, "don't think anything more about what I have said to you. Let it go. It isn't vital." "You don't hate me for not knowing anything?" sobbed Becky. "Nobody ever tried to have me understand, before." "You know enough; quite enough, dear!" I remarked hastily, producing from my trunk a quantity of illustrated magazines. These we looked over together, and when Becky went away, the tears were dried in her eyes, and she was laughing as merrily as ever. With the severely implied reproach of Madeline's words still in my mind, I took pains to assume toward Luther Larkin a more elder-sisterly air even than before. It was true, I felt that I had been unjustly stung, having, amid the press of other duties, undertaken the advancement of that bright youth, from motives, I believed, of an ideal and disinterested nature. It was also true, that, after the first enthusiasm with respect to his lessons had passed away, as well as the natural diffidence he had at first felt in my presence, Luther Larkin, though punctual to the hour of recitation, had gradually fallen into a habit of more lively and discursive inquiry than that furnished within the dull range of his text-books. He had a singularly fearless manner of challenging the inexplicable in thought and life, with a light conversational flow of much brilliancy. Moreover, he was a delightful dreamer. We had our recitation, for quiet, in one of Grandma's gloomy and mysterious keepin'-rooms. The only object inviting to sedentary posture in this room was Grandpa's huge "chist," which occupied a position "along side" the East window. Those sacred window curtains, of green paper, flowered with crimson roses, were never rolled up; but as the light strayed in at one side, and fell on the Cradlebow's fine head, often I reflected that under certain other conditions of life, meaning conditions more favorable to Luther Larkin, I might have regarded him very tenderly, and invested the strength and beauty of his young manhood with heroic meaning. As it was, I assumed that I was years beyond him in the gravest respects. And if there was any truth in what Madeline had intimated, possibly I had been at fault for not impressing this fact more deeply on his mind. "So you are getting sadly behindhand with your lessons, Luther," I said. "I wish you would make a brave effort to catch up. There is no true attainment to be reached without a corresponding degree of effort--of perseverance." I spoke with a serious and gracious air, as though this sentiment, gleaned from a profound experience, had occurred to me as an idea peculiarly my own. "Never mind the lessons!" replied my audacious pupil, brightly. "Teacher," he added presently, having fallen into a gently musing attitude; "how shiny those crimples in your hair look, with that streak of sun lighting on 'em!"