After all, Winifred's chief charm lies in her voice. For myself, I confess to a peculiar sensitiveness in the matter of voices,--an unfortunate peculiarity for one condemned to spend her life in a sea-board town of the United States. Like Ulysses, I have endured greatly, have suffered greatly; but when this girl speaks, I am repaid. I often lose the sense of what she is saying, in the pure physical pleasure of listening to her speech. It has in it a suggestion of joy, and little delicate trills of hidden laughter which, after all, is not laughter, but rather the mingling of a reminiscence and an anticipation of mirth. I cannot conceive where she picked up such a voice, any more than where she came by that carriage of the head, and that manner, gracious, yet imperative like a young queen's. Professor Anstice is a worthy man and a learned scholar; but the grand air is not acquired from books. "How glum you all look!" Winifred exclaims, as she looks in upon us. At his daughter's entrance, the face of Professor Anstice relaxes by a wrinkle or two; but he answers her words as academically as though she had been one of his class in English. "_Glum_ is hardly the word, my dear; it conveys the impression of unamiability." "Precisely," persists Mistress Winifred, not to be put down, "that is just the idea you all convey to me." "Why shouldn't we be unamiable," answers Ben, eager to get into the conversation, "when there is nothing to amuse us, and you go off upstairs to write letters?" "You should follow my example, and _do_ something. When I went upstairs Miss Standish was in a terrible temper, scowling at the ace of spades as if it were her natural enemy; but since she has taken to writing in that little green diary that she never will let me peep into, she has a positively beatified, not to say sanctified, expression. And there is Ellen Davitt hard at work too, and as cheerful as a squirrel--just listen to her!" With this the girl stands still, and we listen. The waitress in the next room, apparently in the blithest of spirits, is setting the tea-table to the accompaniment of her favorite tune, sung in a high, sharp, nasal voice, and emphasized by the slapping down of plates. "Tell me _one_ thing--tell me trooly; Tell me _why_ you scorn me so. Tell me _why_, when asked the question, You will always answer '_No_'-- No, sir! No, sir! No-o-o, sir--No!" The voice is lost in the pantry. Smiles dawn upon all our faces. "A beautiful illustration of the power of imagination!" says Dr. Cricket. "Ellen is contentedly doing the housework because she fancies herself an heiress haughtily repulsing a host of suitors. It is the same spirit which keeps the poet cheerful in his garret, or a young Napoleon in his cellar, where he dines on a crust and fancies himself an emperor." "Steep an illustration and apply it over the affected part!" drawls Ben.