‘But,’ went on Miss Mohun, ‘even you that have been lucky enough to get under your own young ladies know that life here is all new beginnings at the bottom, just as when you were very proud of yourselves for getting out of the infant school, you found it was only being at the bottom of the upper one; and I can tell the twelve-year-olds--I see some of them--that it is often a finer thing to be at the head of the school than the last in the house. Ay, you’ve got to work up there again, and it is a long business and a steady business, but it is to be done. I knew a girl, thirty-five years ago, that my sister-in-law took from school, and she was not a genius either, and I am quite sure she could not do rule-of-three, nor tell what is the capital of Dahomey, as I dare say every one here can do, but I’ll tell you what she did, and that was, her best, and there she has been ever since; and the last time I saw her was sitting up in her housekeeper’s room, in her silk gown, with her master’s grandchildren hanging about her, respected and loved by us all. And I knew another, a much clever girl at school, with prettier ways to begin with, but--I’m sorry to say, her finger were too clever, and it was not very happy ever after, though she did right herself.’ And then Aunt Jane went on to the difficulties of having to deal with such quantities of pots and pans, and knives and forks, and cloths and brushes, each with a use of its very own, just as if she had been a scullery-maid herself; telling how sense and memory must be brought to bear on these things just as much as in analyzing a sentence, and how even those would not do without the higher motive of faithfulness to Him whose servants we all are. Her finish was a picture of the roving servant girl, always saying, ‘I don’t like it,’ and always seeking novelty, illustrated by her experience of a little maid who left one place because she could not sleep alone, and another because the little girl slept with her, a third because it was so lonesome, and a fourth because it was so noisy, and quitted her fifth within a half year because she could not eat twice cooked meat. Aunt Jane varied her voice in the most comical way, and the girls, as well as all her audience, laughed heartily. ‘Bravo, Jenny!’ said a voice close to her, and a gentleman with a rather bald head, a fluffy, light beard touched with white, dancing eyes, and a slim, youthful figure, was seen standing in the group. Lady Merrifield and her sisters cried with one glad voice, ‘Oh! Rotherwood!’ holding out their hands. ‘Yes. I found I’d a few hours between the trains, so I ran down to look you up. I met Harry at the house, and he told me I should find Jane qualifying for the female parliament.’ ‘It’s such a pity you should fall on all this turmoil,’ said Aunt Ada. ‘Pity! I wouldn’t have missed Jenny’s wisdom for the world. What is it, Lily? Temperance, or have you set up a Salvation Army?