People who predicted trouble were amazed, for, strange to say, Catharine, after the first, never measured swords with Adela so few years her senior; it seemed as though the very intensity of the new wife’s nature was so incomprehensible to her that she shrank from stirring its depths. Three years passed, and John Hewlett’s name was spoken among English scholars as that of a great power, even though not yet at its height. In the fourth a deeper note was struck upon his heartstrings, a note above the joy of which was an instant reverberation of sadness, for the cry of his new-born child had apprehension for its echo,—a sudden and unaccountable fragility that had come upon Adela, against which science and love, though hand in hand, fought in vain. “Her name is Rosalind,” he had said in the first happy days of reaction before, for him at least, the apprehension had taken shape, “for she came to us out of the forest of Arden.” Adela, raising herself by a great effort, put the child into his arms, and folding her in them against his breast, whispered, “Rosalind—that is the name I wished, so that I knew you would say it. Take her, and whatever happens, no matter what else she must lack, let it not be love.” Two months later, in October, the fifth year of the marriage, and he sat alone with the little Rosalind again gathered in his arms, for Adela as a visible presence had gone. * * * * * Catharine, more moved than any one had supposed possible, offered to care for the baby when it became necessary for her father to return to college, while Miss Hewlett fairly begged for the child; but to both he turned a deaf ear. Under no circumstances should the child be separated from him, so Rosalind and a kindly middle-aged nurse, of father’s choosing, went back with Professor Hewlett to the university. During her first five years it seemed that the little girl would be fairly killed with kindness; report of every tooth was carried from house to house, as if it had been the news of the endowment of a new chair. At five, Rosalind had the direct manners of her father enveloped in a bit of coy, feminine charm quite her own. While she was gracious to every one, she belonged only to him, who was also the measure by which she gauged the actions of the outward world. She slept in a crib beside him, breakfasted with him, dined when he lunched, and had a little table and chair in the corner of his study. “It’s all very well for now,” people said, “but wait until she is a few years older, and she will need younger companionship.”