t see that we need
either." Number Five did not press the matter further. So the young
Tutor and Number Five read together pretty regularly, and came to depend
upon their meeting over a book as one of their stated seasons of
enjoyment. He is so many years younger than she is that I do not suppose
he will have to pass par la, as most of her male friends have done. I
tell her sometimes that she reminds me of my Alma Mater, always young,
always fresh in her attractions, with her scholars all round her, many of
them graduates, or to graduate sooner or later.

What do I mean by graduates? Why, that they have made love to her, and
would be entitled to her diploma, if she gave a parchment to each one of
them who had had the courage to face the inevitable. About the
Counsellor I am, as I have said, in doubt. Who wrote that "I Like You
and I Love You," which we found in the sugar-bowl the other day? Was it
a graduate who had felt the "icy dagger," or only a candidate for
graduation who was afraid of it? So completely does she subjugate those
who come under her influence that I believe she looks upon it as a matter
of course that the fateful question will certainly come, often after a
brief acquaintance. She confessed as much to me, who am in her
confidence, and not a candidate for graduation from her academy. Her
graduates--her lambs I called them--are commonly faithful to her, and
though now and then one may have gone off and sulked in solitude, most of
them feel kindly to her, and to those who have shared the common fate of
her suitors. I do really believe that some of them would be glad to see
her captured by any one, if such there can be, who is worthy of her. She
is the best of friends, they say, but can she love anybody, as so many
other women do, or seem to? Why shouldn't our Musician, who is evidently
fond of her company, and sings and plays duets with her, steal her heart
as Piozzi stole that of the pretty and bright Mrs. Thrale, as so many
music-teachers have run away with their pupils' hearts? At present she
seems to be getting along very placidly and contentedly with her young
friend the Tutor. There is something quite charming in their relations
with each other. He knows many things she does not, for he is reckoned
one of the most learned in his literary specialty of all the young men of
his time; and it can be a question of only a few years when some
first-class professorship will be offered him. She, on the other h