ing or not. But
besides the reading there is now and then some talking, and persons
talking in an arbor do not always remember that latticework, no matter
how closely the vines cover it, is not impenetrable to the sound of the
human voice. There was a listener one day,--it was not one of The
Teacups, I am happy to say,--who heard and reported some fragments of a
conversation which reached his ear. Nothing but the profound intimacy
which exists between myself and the individual reader whose eyes are on
this page would induce me to reveal what I was told of this conversation.
The first words seem to have been in reply to some question.

"Why, my dear friend, how can you think of such a thing? Do you know--I
am--old enough to be your--[I think she must have been on the point of
saying mother, but that was more than any woman could be expected to
say]--old enough to be your aunt?"

"To be sure you are," answered the Tutor, "and what of it? I have two
aunts, both younger than I am. Your years may be more than mine, but
your life is fuller of youthful vitality than mine is. I never feel so
young as when I have been with you. I don't believe in settling
affinities by the almanac. You know what I have told you more than once;
you have n't 'bared the ice-cold dagger's edge' upon me yet; may I not
cherish the"....

What a pity that the listener did not hear the rest of the sentence and
the reply to it, if there was one! The readings went on the same as
before, but I thought that Number Five was rather more silent and more
pensive than she had been.

I was much pleased when the American Annex came to me one day and told me
that she and the English Annex were meditating an expedition, in which
they wanted the other Teacups to join. About a dozen miles from us is an
educational institution of the higher grade, where a large number of
young ladies are trained in literature, art, and science, very much as
their brothers are trained in the colleges. Our two young ladies have
already been through courses of this kind in different schools, and are
now busy with those more advanced studies which are ventured upon by only
a limited number of "graduates." They have heard a good deal about this
institution, but have never visited it.

Every year, as the successive classes finish their course, there is a
grand reunion of the former students, with an "exhibition," as it is
called, in which the graduates of the year have an opportunity of