“‘No,’ I said, ‘I shall not presume to dictate to you as to the methods which you are to pursue with your children. But I have seen them several times and have an interest in them, and I believe that their character will receive a permanent injury from the irregular life which they are living and the false notions they have imbibed in regard to keeping up a style which they cannot afford. So for their sake, and in addition to paying all your debts, I am willing to send the oldest to good boarding-schools where simple diet, regular hours, and systematic work can help to make of them a stronger man and woman than there is prospect of their becoming now.’ “I could see that it was terribly galling for him to have me sit there and arraign him, as it were, for his conduct; but he clenched his teeth, kept silence, and heard me to the end. Then he cleared his throat, and after a moment said, hoarsely, without looking up: “‘Miss Brewster, you are very kind. With your permission I will call on you to-morrow at eleven.’” The next morning, a half hour after the time appointed, General Lawrence and his wife appeared, both looking as if they had passed a restless night. Mrs. Lawrence, clad in an elegant gown, quite outshone Mildred, who wore a quiet street costume of gray serge. That costly dress and the queenly air of its owner nettled me. “Mildred,” I whispered, as she came back for a pencil, “do think twice before you squander your thousands on saving those people from the just penalty of their folly and sin.” “I am not thinking of them so much as of their children,” said she gravely; “and it is far more folly than sin. Mrs. Lawrence is a Southern woman, sweet-tempered and charming, but despising little economies as petty Yankee meanness, and she will have to submit to receiving instruction from me on that score, or else I shall let the sheriff come.”