'Did she show you that horrid exercise?'
'Yes.'
'Well, I know it was baddish writing, but just listen, Margaret. We promised six of the children to print them each a verse of a hymn on a card to learn. Ritchie did three, and then could not go on, for the book that the others were in was lost till last evening, and then he was writing for papa. So I thought I would do them before we went to Cocksmoor, and that I should squeeze time out of the morning; but I got a bit of Sophocles that was so horridly hard it ate up all my time, and I don't understand it properly now; I must get Norman to tell me. And that ran in my head and made me make a mistake in my sum, and have to begin it again. Then, just as I thought I had saved time over the exercise, comes Miss Winter and tells me I must do it over again, and scolds me besides about the ink on my fingers. She would send me up at once to get it off, and I could not find nurse and her bottle of stuff for it, so that wasted ever so much more time, and I was so vexed that, really and truly, my hand shook and I could not write any better.'
'No, I thought it looked as if you had been in one of your agonies.'
'And she thought I did it on purpose, and that made me angry, and so we got into a dispute, and away went all the little moment I might have had, and I was forced to go to Cocksmoor as a promise breaker!'
'Don't you think you had better have taken pains at first?'
'Well, so I did with the sense, but I hadn't time to look at the writing much.'
'You would have made better speed if you had.'
'Oh, yes, I know I was wrong, but it is a great plague altogether. Really, Margaret, I shan't get Thucydides done.'
'You must wait a little longer, please, Ethel, for I want to say to you that I am afraid you are doing too much, and that prevents you from doing things well, as you were trying to do last autumn.'
'You are not thinking of my not going to Cocksmoor?' cried Ethel vehemently.
'I want you to consider what is to be done, dear Ethel. You thought, last autumn, a great deal of curing your careless habits, now you seem not to have time to attend. You can do a great deal very fast, I know, but isn't it a pity to be always in a hurry?'
'It isn't Cocksmoor that is the reason,' said Ethel.
'No; you did pretty well when you began, but you know that was in the holidays, when you had no Latin and Greek to do.'
'Oh, but, Margaret, they won't take so much time when I have once got over the difficulties, and see my way, but just now they have put Norman into such a frightfully difficult play, that I can hardly get on at all with it, and there's a new kind of Greek verses, too, and I don't make out from the book how to manage them. Norman showed me on Saturday, but mine won't be right. When I've got over that, I shan't be so hurried.'
'But Norman will go on to something harder, I suppose.'
'I dare say I shall be able to do it.'
'Perhaps you might, but I want you to consider if you are not working beyond what can be good for anybody. You see Norman is much cleverer than most boys, and you are a year younger; and besides doing all his work at the head of the school, his whole business of the day, you have Cocksmoor to attend to, and your own lessons, besides reading all the books that come into the house. Now isn't that more than is reasonable to expect any head and hands to do properly?'
'But if I can do it?'
'But can you, dear Ethel? Aren't you always racing from one thing to another, doing them by halves, feeling hunted, and then growing vexed?'
'I know I have been cross lately,' said Ethel, 'but it's the being so bothered.'
'And why are you bothered? Isn't it that you undertake too much?'
'What would you have me do?' said Ethel, in an injured, unconvinced voice. 'Not give up my children?'
'No,' said Margaret; 'but don't think me very unkind if I say, suppose you left off trying to keep up with Norman.'
'Oh, Margaret! Margaret!' and her eyes filled with tears. 'We have hardly missed doing the same every day since the first Latin grammar was put into his hands!'
'I know it would be very hard,' said Margaret; but Ethel continued, in a piteous tone, a little sentimental, 'From hie haec hoc up to Alcaics and beta Thukididou we have gone on together, and I can't bear to give it up. I'm sure I can--'
'Stop, Ethel, I really doubt whether you can. Do you know that Norman was telling papa the other day that it was very odd Dr. Hoxton gave them such easy lessons.'
Ethel looked very much mortified.
'You see,' said Margaret kindly, 'we all know that men have more power than women, and I suppose the time has come for Norman to pass beyond you. He would not be cleverer than any one, if he could not do more than a girl at home.'
'He has so much more time for it,' said Ethel.
'That's the very thing. Now consider, Ethel. His work, after he goes to Oxford, will be doing his very utmost-- and you know what an utmost that is. If you could keep up with him at all, you must give your whole time and thoughts to it, and when you had done so--if you could get all the honours in the University--what would it come to? You can't take a first-class.'
'I don't want one,' said Ethel; 'I only can't bear not to do as Norman does, and I like Greek so much.'
'And for that would you give up being a useful, steady daughter and sister at home? The sort of woman that dear mamma wished to make you, and a comfort to papa.'
Ethel was silent, and large tears were gathering.
'You own that that is the first thing?'
'Yes,' said Ethel faintly.
'And that it is what you fail in most?'
'Yes.'
'Then, Ethel dearest, when you made up your mind to Cocksmoor, you knew those things could not be done without a sacrifice?'
'Yes, but I didn't think it would be this.'
Margaret was wise enough not to press her, and she sat down and sighed pitifully. Presently she said, 'Margaret, if you would only let me leave off that stupid old French, and horrid dull reading with Miss Winter, I should have plenty of time for everything; and what does one learn by hearing Mary read poetry she can't understand?'
'You work, don't you? But indeed, Ethel, don't say that I can let you leave off anything. I don't feel as if I had that authority. If it be done at all, it must be by papa's consent, and if you wish me to ask him about it, I will, only I think it would vex Miss Winter; and I don't think dear mamma would have liked Greek and Cocksmoor to swallow up all the little common ladylike things.'
Ethel made two or three great gulps; 'Margaret, must I give up everything, and forget all my Latin and Greek?'
'I should think that would be a great pity,' said Margaret. 'If you were to give up the verse-making, and the trying to do as much as Norman, and fix some time in the day--half an hour, perhaps--for your Greek, I think it might do very well.'
'Thank you,' said Ethel, much relieved; 'I'm glad you don't want me to leave it all off. I hope Norman won't be vexed,' she added, looking a little melancholy.
But Norman had not by any means the sort of sentiment on the subject that she had. 'Of course, you know, Ethel,' said he, 'it must have come to this some time or other, and if you find those verses too hard, and that they take up too much of your time, you had better give them up.'
Ethel did not like anything to be said to be too hard for her, and was very near pleading she only wanted time, but some recollection came across her, and presently she said, 'I suppose it is a wrong sort of ambition to want to learn more, in one's own way, when one is told it is not good for one. I was just going to say I hated being a woman, and having these tiresome little trifles--my duty--instead of learning, which is yours, Norman.'
'I'm glad you did not,' said Norman, 'for it would have been very silly of you; and I assure you, Ethel, it is really time for you to stop, or you would get into a regular learned lady, and be good for nothing. I don't mean that
