This was beyond him. Yet strange! the same characteristics did not surprise nor shock him in her mother--never had surprised or shocked him; indeed he had rather loved her for those qualities, so unlike his own. Perhaps it was that he thought it strange, his child should, in any mood, be so unlike himself; or perhaps it was the contrast between the two sides of the same character that moved his wonder when he saw it in his child. He might forget that her mother was her parent as well as himself; and that she had an inheritance from each. In his thoughtful, considering, theoretical way, he determined studiously to seek a remedy for what he considered the defect in his child--to cultivate with all the zeal and perseverance of paternal affection, supported by his own force of character, those qualities which were most like his own--those, in short, which were the least womanly. But nature would not be baffled. You may divert her to a certain degree; but you cannot turn her aside from her course altogether. He found that he could not--by any means which his heart would let him employ--conquer what he called the frivolity of the child. Frivolity! Heaven save us! There were times when she showed no frivolity, but, on the contrary, a depth and intensity far, far beyond her years. Indeed, the ordinary current of her mind was calm and thoughtful. It was but when a breeze rippled it that it sparkled on the surface. Her father, too, saw that this was so; that the wild gayety was but occasional. But still it surprised and pained him--perhaps the more because it was occasional. It seemed to his eyes an anomaly in her nature. He would have had her altogether like himself. He could not conceive any one possessing so much of his own character, having room in heart and brain for aught else. It was a subject of constant wonder to him; of speculation, of anxious thought. He often asked himself if this was the only anomaly in his child--if there were not other traits, yet undiscovered, as discrepant as this light volatility with her general character: and he puzzled himself sorely. Still he pursued her education upon his own principles; taught her many things which women rarely learned in those days; imbued her mind with thoughts and feelings of his own; and often thought, when a season of peculiar gravity fell upon her, that he made progress in rendering her character all that he could wish it. This impression never lasted long, however; for sooner or later the bird-like spirit within her found the cage door open, and fluttered forth upon some gay excursion, leaving all his dreams vanished and his wishes disappointed.