harp bell-peal which we all knew; then the rapid step
familiar to each ear: the words "Voila Monsieur!" had scarcely broken
simultaneously from every lip, when the two-leaved door split (as split
it always did for his admission--such a slow word as "open" is
inefficient to describe his movements), and he stood in the midst of us.

There were two study tables, both long and flanked with benches; over
the centre of each hung a lamp; beneath this lamp, on either side the
table, sat a teacher; the girls were arranged to the right hand and the
left; the eldest and most studious nearest the lamps or tropics; the
idlers and little ones towards the north and south poles. Monsieur's
habit was politely to hand a chair to some teacher, generally Zelie St.
Pierre, the senior mistress; then to take her vacated seat; and thus
avail himself of the full beam of Cancer or Capricorn, which, owing to
his near sight, he needed.

As usual, Zelie rose with alacrity, smiling to the whole extent of her
mouth, and the full display of her upper and under rows of teeth--that
strange smile which passes from ear to ear, and is marked only by a
sharp thin curve, which fails to spread over the countenance, and
neither dimples the cheek nor lights the eye. I suppose Monsieur did
not see her, or he had taken a whim that he would not notice her, for
he was as capricious as women are said to be; then his "lunettes" (he
had got another pair) served him as an excuse for all sorts of little
oversights and shortcomings. Whatever might be his reason, he passed by
Zelie, came to the other side of the table, and before I could start up
to clear the way, whispered, "Ne bougez pas," and established himself
between me and Miss Fanshawe, who always would be my neighbour, and
have her elbow in my side, however often I declared to her, "Ginevra, I
wish you were at Jericho."

It was easy to say, "Ne bougez pas;" but how could I help it? I must
make him room, and I must request the pupils to recede that _I_ might
recede. It was very well for Ginevra to be gummed to me, "keeping
herself warm," as she said, on the winter evenings, and harassing my
very heart with her fidgetings and pokings, obliging me, indeed,
sometimes to put an artful pin in my girdle by way of protection
against her elbow; but I suppose M. Emanuel was not to be subjected to
the same kind of treatment, so I swept away my working materials, to
clear space for his book, and withdrew myself to make roo