"But it is French," objected Betty again, "and she is an English girl now. I am quite sure mother would prefer to have her called Agnes, and Andrew too; wouldn't you, Andrew?" "I should prefer that she should have her own way in the matter," answered Andrew shortly, and there the discussion ended for the time; but we were no sooner in the house than Betty began it again, appealing to her mother to say if it would not be much better for me to be called by my English name now I was come to live in England. "That is for her mother to say," replied Aunt Amy. "I presume she will prefer to call her by the name she has been used to." "I certainly shall prefer to do so, and to have others do so," said my mother. "The name of Agnes was never a favorite of mine." Betty said no more, but she never lost an opportunity of calling me Agnes, till I took to calling her Elizabeth, to which name she had a special aversion. The next morning and for many succeeding days my mother was very unwell, and I naturally spent most of my time with her in her apartment, which was at some little distance from the rest of the house. Jeanne attended on her, and Simon worked in the garden, taking great pleasure in the variety of plants and flowers he found there. He got on very well with his fellow-servants, being of a quiet and sober disposition. He did not at all disturb himself when laughed at for his mistakes in English, but only laughed back, or contented himself with quietly correcting his mistake. But Jeanne's southern blood was more easily stirred, and she more than once came to my mother declaring that she could endure her life no longer. Betty used to take pleasure in teasing her, as indeed she did every one who came within her reach, except her mother and Andrew, of whom she stood in awe. She and I had more than one encounter, in which I can safely say that she met her match, and she did not like me the better for it; but Rosamond was her especial butt, and she made the poor girl's life miserable. Rosamond was of a studious turn of mind, and loved nothing so much as to get away by herself, with a great chronicle, or with her French or Latin books. It was a somewhat uncommon disposition at that time, when the education of women was much neglected, even more than it is now. But the Corbets have always been rather a bookish race, and Rosamond was a true Corbet in all things. She loved acquiring new ideas above any other pleasure in the world. She made Simon tell her all about Normandy and Brittany, and there were several old sailors in the village to whose tales of foreign parts she was delighted to listen for hours, albeit I fear they were sometimes more romantic than reliable.