“I think so, papa: unless you want me. It is such a bonnie morning, and Mr. Glen is going to begin his sketch. He thinks,” said Margaret, with a little hesitation, “that it will be a better lesson for me to see him drawing than doing the straight lines; they were not very straight,” she added, with blushing candor, “I was not clever at them, though I tried--” “Mr. Glen,” he said, with a little annoyance. “Mr. Glen again; did you not have enough of him yesterday?” “Oh!” cried Margaret, half alarmed; “but yesterday it was to let you see the pictures, and to-day it is to learn me--” “I hope he will not learn you--as you call it--too much,” said the old man. “I wish somebody would learn you English. I have a great mind--” But here he stopped and looked at her, and seeing the alarm on Margaret’s face, was melted by the effect which ought to have made him stern. Perhaps it might be so short a time that she would have any one to indulge her. “Well, my little Peggy! run, run away, since you wish it, and learn.” He ought to have been all the more determined because she wanted it so much. This was a lesson which his daughters Jean and Grace could both have taught him; but an old man with a young girl is proverbially weak. It just crossed his mind, though, that he ought to write to Jean and Grace, and invite them to hasten their usual visit. On the whole, they would take more trouble about his little Peggy than Ludovic could, to whom the old house would go. Sir Ludovic had no particular feeling one way or another about these middle-aged people. They were people whom he knew very well, of course, belonging to the family; but there was no special sympathy between them and himself. Ludovic had a large family, and “a good deal to do.” It was all he could manage to make his ends meet, to keep up his position, to do the best he could for his own children. And Jean and Grace would be very fussy, they would worry his little girl out of her life; but still they would be kind to her, too kind--no more of her own way for poor little Peggy. He could not but smile as this aspect of the future rose before him; they would watch her so that she would be unable to put in a pin that they did not know of. And perhaps, in a way, it would be better for her; perhaps she had done too much as seemed right in her own eyes. This Rob Glen, for instance-- Sir Ludovic was by no means sure that he was doing exactly as was right about Rob Glen. He would see to it, he would speak to Bell about it; and with this he floated away again on his own vague stream of thought, which was not thought.