"Don't Sam get along fast with his reading and writing. Mr. Stoutenburgh?" "Always did--" said the Squire; "and with everything else too. What are you talking about? I lost that. I'd gone off to that rascal--" Miss Essie's laugh rang out again and her eyes danced. "That rascal! Now for shame, Mr. Stoutenburgh! You know better. I wonder if you never had young horses yourself, and took Mrs. Stoutenburgh to ride, too. Now I like him very much. Mr. Linden, you know Dr. Harrison, don't you?" "I should--a little." "Well aren't you a judge of character? Do you think he deserves to be called a rascal?" But Squire Stoutenburgh prevented the answer. "I wish you'd just stop and let me catch up with you, Miss Essie," he said. "Now before we go any further, whoever said he _was_ a rascal?--_I_ didn't." "Did you mean somebody else, Mr. Stoutenburgh?" "That's the way you talk over pleasant things!" said the Squire. "If I hadn't hallooed after you, Miss Essie, I should have had a challenge from the doctor before morning--or a shot,--that's getting to be the fashion." "Do you think Dr. Harrison is that kind of man?" said Miss Essie. "Mr. Linden, what kind of man do you think he is? You can tell better than the Squire, and I want to know." "Miss Essie!--he is my friend and I am his,--you cannot expect me to give you Dr. Harrison's components--'each with its Latin label on'!" "Not at all! but in general, how would you characterize him, if asked what sort of a man he was!" "I should perhaps decline." Miss Essie had no chance to push her question, for Sam came with a demand for Mr. Linden himself, which was at once obeyed. A little while passed, and then Mr. Linden came back again; and walked composedly round to the back of Faith's chair. "Mrs. Stoutenburgh," he said, "will you let me take this lady away for five minutes?--Miss Faith, will you come?" Nothing loth, if the truth must be told, Faith rose up to follow his leading; which was out of the parlour and through the hall. "Miss Faith," he said as he shut the door, "have you been conjugating the verb s'ennuyer?" "No," she said. "I was amused to hear you and Miss Essie talk." "What singular ideas people have on the question of pleasant things!" said Mr. Linden. "Come in here, Miss Faith"--and he opened the door of a mingled library, study room, and office--"I want to give you (before we go any further) the whole quotation which I did not dare to give Miss Essie, though it would not have been meant for her, if I had." And he took down one of the books, and read-- "'Her eye,--it seems a chemic test, And drops upon you like an acid; It bites you with unconscious zest, So clear and bright, so coldly placid; It holds--you quietly aloof, It holds, and yet it does not win you; It merely puts you to the proof And sorts what qualities are in you,' &c.