“I am not wealthy, which is the second mistake which you have made about me; neither am I poor, as you supposed when you married me, dear girl. This house, just as it is, was the country-seat of my grandfather, General Raymond, who, holding a high office under the Government, was in the receipt of an ample income that enabled him to keep up this style of living. This income of course died with him. This house, with its grounds of about twenty-five acres, and a small amount of bank stock, was left to me. That money was withdrawn and profitably invested, and its proceeds bring me an annual amount equal to the salary I receive for conducting the Newton School. It is true that it will take every cent of my salary to support this style. And if you ask me, Hagar, why I, a young professor, choose to live in a princely house, with a complete establishment of servants, I tell you that it is not from ostentation—you know me to be too really proud for that—but from a constitutional love and necessity of luxury. I told you before that my senses were keen and delicate—I had almost said intellectual—not strong, or gross. Forms and colors must be agreeably contrasted, or harmoniously blended and grouped for my eye; sounds must be music, or those that are not must come subdued through the hushings of soft carpets and velvet curtains; all scents, but the scent of fresh and growing flowers, must be kept far from the rooms I occupy; my table must be supplied with food delicate and nutritious; and lastly, nothing but soft or elastic substances must come in contact with my touch—at least in my home.” “But how, with your delicate tastes, can you bear your school-room?” asked Hagar. “My school-room, lecture rooms, hall, &c., among which I pass just five hours a day, are each large, airy, clean, and _bare_; that is, bare of every article of furniture not strictly necessary; so that if there is nothing to _delight_, there is nothing to _offend_—for the rest, you know that teaching is my vocation, my passion. I give myself fully up to it during the hours of instruction, and when they are over, I return with revived relish for the luxuries of home—enjoyments that would pall upon the taste if they were not relieved by their absence during the hours of intellectual labor, which goes on in another place, and which is itself another keen enjoyment of a different and higher order; as it is, each relieves and enhances the other.” “But why,” asked Hagar, “keep so many and such expensive servants, to wait on two young people who are not rich?” “For many reasons, Hagar; for one thing it requires all of them, each in his or her appropriate place, to keep the house in the perfect order we wish, and in the second, I like to receive the services and veneration—not of Colonel A, B, and C, or Judge D, E, or F, but of people who live with me—by the way, remember that, love.” “But then,” persisted Hagar, “why keep Mrs. Collins, whose salary must be large?”