Half the girls at the Academy, like myself, came from distant towns. Some had been there three years. They were all younger than myself. There never had been a boarding-house attached to the school, and it was not considered a derogatory thing for the best families to receive these girls as boarders. We were therefore on the same footing, in a social sense. I was also on good terms with Miss Prior. She was a cold and kindly woman, faithful as a teacher, gifted with an insight into the capacity of a pupil. She gave me a course of History first, and after that Physical Philosophy; but never recommended me to Moral Science. When I had been with her a few months, she proposed that I should study the common branches; my standing in the school was such that I went down into the primary classes without shame, and I must say that I was the dullest scholar in them. We also had a drawing master and a music-teacher. The latter was an amiable woman, with theatrical manners. She was a Mrs. Lane; but no Mr. Lane had ever been seen in Rosville. We girls supposed he had deserted her, which was the fact, as she told me afterward. She cried whenever she sang a sentimental song, but never gave up to her tears, singing on with blinded eyes and quavering voice. I laughed at her dresses which had been handsome, with much frayed trimming about them, the hooks and eyes loosened and the seams strained, but liked her, and although I did not take lessons, saw her every day when she came up to the Academy. She asked me once if I had any voice. I answered her by singing one of our Surrey hymns, "_Once on the raging seas he rode_." She grew pale, and said, "Don't for heaven's sake sing that! I can see my old mother, as she looked when she sang that hymn of a stormy night, when father was out to sea. Both are dead now, and where am I?" She turned round on the music stool, and banged out the accompaniment of "_O pilot, 'tis a fearful night_," and sang it with great energy. After her feelings were composed, she begged me to allow her to teach me to sing. "You can at least learn the simple chords of song accompaniments, and I think you have a voice that can be made effective." I promised to try, and as I had taken lessons before, in three months I could play and sing "_Should those fond hopes e'er forsake thee_," tolerably well. But Mrs. Lane persisted in affirming that I had a dramatic talent, and as she supposed that I never should be an actress, I must bring it out in singing; so I persevered, and, thanks to her, improved so much that people said, when I was mentioned, "She sings."