Fred had paid a short visit to his sister as soon as his college vacation commenced, but he had made an engagement for the summer as a tutor, and he was obliged to hasten away to his duties before Lucy had said half of what she wished to say, or asked his advice on half the subjects on which she had been longing for it. However, short as his visit was, it was very useful as well as very pleasant, reviving old thoughts and habits of feeling which were in danger of falling into the background, and stimulating her to follow the example of a brother who was so stedfastly bent on following his Lord. As the time for the summer examinations at Mrs. Wilmot's drew near, Lucy, bent on carrying off two or three of the prizes, redoubled her application to her studies; but she allowed her desire to accomplish her object to carry her too far. All her thoughts, all her time, were so engrossed by it, that she had none to spare for anything else. She would not join her cousins in any of their innocent recreations, and became impatient and irritable when she met with claims upon her time that could not be set aside. Even the Lord's day at last began to seem an interruption to the work in which she was so eager. Her too intense application began to affect her health: she was growing so nervous, that Stella would sometimes declare that she was changing her identity, and could not be the same Lucy Raymond as of old. Lucy could indeed feel the change in herself, and this only increased the irritation, instead of leading her to remove the cause, by moderating the ambition which was leading her to a blameable excess in what would otherwise have been praiseworthy diligence. But just at that time the coveted prizes seemed to throw everything else into the shade, and she had no watchful, judicious friend, to point out, in timely warning, the snare into which she was falling. Even little Amy, for the first time, occasionally found herself impatiently put aside, and her requests to be read to met with, "Not now, Amy; I haven't time. Don't tease me now, like a good child;" and would steal away, with a surprised look in her soft eyes, wondering how it could be that Cousin Lucy should not have time to read to her about Jesus. One of the prizes on which Lucy had most set her heart was that to be given for History, one of her favourite studies. In ancient and classical history she had been very thoroughly grounded by her father, and had nothing to fear, most of the principal events being familiar to her as household words. But her knowledge of modern history was not so extensive, and she had a great deal of hard study before she could feel at all at ease in competing with her classmates, some of whom were considerably older than herself, and had given most of their attention to modern history, the division in which the greater number of questions were asked.