Our visit at my uncle's was cut rather short from two circumstances, I fancy. One was that he was displeased my mother should have taken Mr. Pepys' advice about selling her jewels. My lady herself had a fancy for these same jewels, and would have bought them on credit, which we could ill afford. Besides which my mother told Andrew and me that it was not well to have money transactions between near relatives. "They are sure to lead to misunderstanding and coldness, if not to open rupture," said she. "Moreover, from what I have seen, I believe my brother to be already embarrassed with debts." "I know it for a fact," said Andrew; "and I believe you have done wisely. Mr. Bakewell is now returned, and is ready to treat with you for the jewels at any time." "Then we will finish the affair as soon as may be, that we may turn our faces homeward," replied my mother. "I long for the sight of green trees and running streams, and, above all, for a cup of cold water from St. Monica's well. I can see it now, bubbling up under the ruined arch," she added musingly, with that far-away look which had lately come to her eyes. "Some day, Andrew, you must restore that arch." "I will," said Andrew, with a certain solemnity, and they were both silent a moment. Then he added, more cheerfully, "Then I will tell the good woman at our lodgings that you will return to-morrow." "This afternoon," said my mother; and so it was settled. I believe another reason why my mother was willing to cut her visit short was that she saw the influence my aunt and her way were beginning to have upon me. I shall never forget how she looked at me when, in some fit of impatience with my work; I gave vent to one of my aunt's modish oaths. Those of the Religion in France looked upon all such expressions with as much abhorrence as the Puritans of England or America. "Genevieve," said she sternly, "what would your father say?" "I did not mean anything," said I, abashed and vexed at the same time. "And there is just the fault," returned my mother. "Against what is the commandment aimed, if not at the use of sacred names without meaning anything?" I did not reply, of course, and I was more careful in future, but inwardly I murmured at my mother's strictness and Puritanism, as I called it. I had learned this phrase from my uncle and his friends, with whom everything serious or reverent was Puritanism.