"Oh! it's no mystery; ... but I did not know... I will read you the titles, if you please, aunt. Here are Shakspeare, Milton, Spencer, and Gray; ... these are all my English books." "And what are these?" "Racine, Corneille, La Fontaine, and Boileau." "What useless trash!.... And these?" "Dante, Tasso, and Petrarch; ... and these six larger volumes are the 'componimenti lirici' of various authors." "Oh goodness, child!... don't jabber your stupid school jargon to me.... There!... take them all away again; I can't very well see how they are to help you make a governess of yourself: grammars, I should think, and dictionaries, would be more to the purpose for that sort of profitable usefulness." "And I have got them too, aunt, in my clothes trunk; and if you will but be pleased to let me give my time to it, I am quite sure that I shall get on very well." "Get on!... get on to what, child?" "To reading both French and Italian with facility, ... and perhaps to writing both with tolerable correctness." "Well, ... if it will enable you to get your bread one of these days, I am sure that I don't wish to hinder it,--so go to work as soon as you will,--only pray don't let me hear any more about it, for I quite hate the sort of thing,--though of course, my dear, if I was in your situation, I should know it was my duty to think differently. But those whom Providence has blessed with wealth, have a right to indulge their taste, ... and my taste is altogether that of a lady." From this time the aching void in the heart, and almost in the intellect of Agnes, seemed supplied. Her aunt, when she did not want her as a walking companion, suffered her to go on reading and scribbling to her heart's content, and the more readily, perhaps, from its giving her the air of being still a child learning lessons, which was exactly the footing on which she wished to keep her, if possible, for another year or two, as she was by no means insensible to the inconvenience of having a grown-up niece, while still in the pride of beauty herself. In this manner the period allotted for their stay at Exeter wore away; Mrs. Barnaby's wardrobe, embroidery, and all, was quite ready for display; Betty Jacks, alias Jerningham, had learned to look exceedingly like a disreputable young woman, to run of errands, and to _iron out_ tumbled dresses; the bright sun of June had succeeded the lovely temperature of a Devonshire spring, and everything seemed to invite the adventurous widow to a wider field of display. But before she made this onward movement from which she hoped so much, it was necessary to apprize her sister-in-law, Mrs. Peters, of her affectionate intention of passing a few months at Clifton, in order to become acquainted with her and her family. The letter by which this intention was announced, is too characteristic of my heroine to be omitted. "MY DEAREST SISTER,