And Valeria--she had not been as successful as her brother in shaking off the paralyzing fears and lulling hopes of the old religious view. But a new passion had found its way into her secluded life, altering, shaping, imperiously governing it. It was no sudden love for the hero of a girlish dream, no dedication of dawning woman-life to the worship of some man, made saint or savior by imagination's magic, no fairy prince's coming, no Romeo calling under her balcony in the night, that wakened this grave-eyed dreamer of dreams to a thrilling sense of life and service. It was that most blessed or accursed summons to rise and join the ranks of those who follow Art. Here in the Western wilds, among conditions grotesquely unpropitious, barren beyond the telling, sordid, if you like, this keen young vision, searching the horizon of a pent-up life, had seen the signal from afar, shining and beckoning her on. Valeria at nineteen was lamely, impotently following that Will-o'-the-wisp which, under fairest conditions, may "lead to bewilder and dazzle to blind," and of which you shall say in vain, "He lights you to the swamps of death." The happy followers know the swamps of death are waiting all, but many there be who travel thither without the kind-deceiving light. Valeria, in common with some other members of her family, had written little verses, chiefly religious; but that was nothing. It had been said long ago in Maryland that the Ganos were born with a pen in their hands. Like the others, she had given some of her time to music, when her mother was out of ear-shot. She had a smattering of French, a modicum of German, and a few lessons in painting. In the home in New Plymouth there were specimens here and there about the house of work done before she left Maryland: a Melanchthon with a coppery face and a glimpse of hair-shirt, two copies of the portrait of Raphael done by himself, a "Beatrice Cenci," and a "Holy Family." But from the days of inarticulate childhood, with no more than a handful of her native soil and a watering-pot, or a precious lump of putty from the plantation carpenter, she had tasted the tyrannous joy of the creator, fashioning beasts and men. And now, grown up, exiled to the West, living in poverty, and isolated from all art save that in books, she said to herself that she had been sent into the world to model beautiful forms, and express her restless spirit in enduring marble. In vain she prayed to be allowed to go away and study--not to Paris, not to Rome: only to New York. She had a small legacy left her by an aunt. The interest was so little, why not spend the capital in studying sculpture? Her mother, amazed at the proposal, left Valeria no moment in doubt of her determination to crush it.