Carpenter only smiled at him when he appeared with new tokens of his thoughtfulness and care. Rotha did not accept him quite so easily. She was somewhat jealous of his favour and of the authority he exercised; for without making the fact in any way obtrusive, a fact it was, that Mr. Digby did what he pleased. It pleased Mrs. Carpenter too; it did not quite please Rotha. Yet in the matter of the lessons it was as much a fact as anywhere else. Mr. Digby had it quite his own way. To Mrs. Carpenter this 'way' seemed a marvel of kindness, and her gratitude was unbounded. A feeling which Rotha's heart did not at all share. She got her lessons, it is true; she did what was required of her; it soon amused Mrs. Carpenter to see with what punctilious care she did it; for in the abstract Rotha was not fond of application. She was one of those who love to walk in at the doors of knowledge, but do not at all enjoy forging the keys with which the locks must be opened. And forging keys was the work at which she was now kept busy. Rotha always knew her tasks, but she came to her recitations with a sort of reserved coldness, as if inwardly resenting or rebelling, which there is no doubt she did. "Mr. Digby, what is the good of my knowing Latin?" she ventured to ask one day. "You know a little about farming, do you not, Rotha?" was the counter question. "More than a little bit, I guess." "Do you? Then you know perhaps what is the use of ploughing the ground?" "To make it soft. What ground are you ploughing with Latin, Mr. Digby?" "The ground of your mind; to get it into working order." This intimation incensed Rotha. She was too vexed to speak. All this trouble just to get her mind into working order? "Is that all Latin is good for?" she asked at length. "By no means. But if it were--that is no small benefit. Not only to get the ground in working order, but to develope the good qualities of it; as for instance, the power of concentration, the power of attention, the power of discernment." "I can concentrate my attention when I have a mind to," said Rotha. "That is well. I am going to give you something else to do which will practise you in that." "What, Mr. Digby?" With all her impatience Rotha was careful to observe the forms of politeness with her teacher. He silently handed her an arithmetic. "Oh!--" said the girl, drawing out the word"--I have done sums, Mr. Digby." "How far?" It turned out that Rotha's progress in that walk of learning had been limited to a very few steps. And even in those few steps, Mr. Digby's tests and questions gave her a half hour of sharp work; so sharp as to bar other thoughts for the time. Rotha shewed in this half hour uumistakeable capacity for the science of numbers; nevertheless, when her teacher went away leaving her a good lesson in arithmetic to study along with her Latin grammar, Rotha spoke herself dissatisfied.