“Oh, Gladstone! Well, he is a man of a million. But you take the average New York man. He is worried in business, and kept on the keen jump all the year round. Then he has a vacation, say for a couple of weeks or a month, in summer, and he goes off into the woods with his fishing kit, or canoeing outfit, or his amateur photographic set, or whatever the tools of his particular fad may be. He goes to a book-store and buys up a lot of paper-covered novels. There is no use of buying an expensive book, because he would spoil it before he gets back, and he would be sure to leave it in some shanty. So he takes those paper-covered abominations, and you will find torn copies of them scattered all through the Adirondacks, and down the St. Lawrence, and everywhere else that tourists congregate. I always tell the book-store man to give me the worst lot of trash he has got, and he does. Now, what is that book you have with you?” “This is one of Mr. Howells’ novels. You will admit, at least, that you have heard of Howells, I suppose?” “Heard of him? Oh yes; I have read some of Howells’ books. I am not as ignorant as you seem to think.” “What have you read of Mr. Howells’?” “Well, I read _The American,_ I don’t remember the others.” “_The American!_ That is by Henry James.” “Is it? Well, I knew that it was by either Howells or James, I forgot which. They didn’t write a book together, did they?” “Well, not that I know of. Why, the depth of your ignorance about American literature is something appalling. You talk of it so jauntily that you evidently have no idea of it yourself.” “I wish you would take me in hand, Miss Earle. Isn’t there any sort of condensed version that a person could get hold of? Couldn’t you give me a synopsis of what is written, so that I might post myself up in literature without going to the trouble of reading the books?” “The trouble! Oh, if that is the way you speak, then your case is hopeless! I suspected it for some time, but now I am certain. The trouble! The _delight_ of reading a new novel by Howells is something that you evidently have not the remotest idea of. Why, I don’t know what I would give to have with me a novel of Howells’ that I had not read.” “Goodness gracious! You don’t mean to say that you have read _everything_ he has written?” “Certainly I have, and I am reading one now that is coming out in the magazine; and I don’t know what I shall do if I am not able to get the magazine when I go to Europe.” “Oh, you can get them over there right enough, and cheaper than you can in America. They publish them over there.” “Do they? Well, I am glad to hear it.” “You see, there is something about American literature that you are not acquainted with, the publication of our magazines in England, for instance. Ah, there is the breakfast gong. Well, we will have to postpone our lesson in literature until afterwards. Will you be up here after breakfast?” “Yes, I think so.”