ie said right off
that we couldn't do it there. I am learning at a Domestic Science
School, and Mother is going with me. I didn't mind so much when she
said she'd go, too. And, really, it is quite a lot of fun--really it
is. But it _is_ queer--Mother and I going to school together to learn
how to make bread and cake and boil potatoes! And, of course, Aunt
Hattie laughs at us. But I don't mind. And Mother doesn't, either.
But, oh, how Aunt Jane would love it, if she only knew!

* * * * *

_May_.

Something is the matter with Mother, certainly. She's acting queerer
and queerer, and she _is_ getting to be like Aunt Jane. Why, only this
morning she hushed me up from laughing so loud, and stopped my
romping up and down the stairs with Lester. She said it was noisy and
unladylike--and only just a little while ago she just loved to have me
laugh and play and be happy! And when I said so to her this morning,
she said, yes, yes, of course, and she wanted me to be happy now, only
she wished to remind me that very soon I was going back to my father
in Andersonville, and that I ought to begin now to learn to be more
quiet, so as not to trouble him when I got there.

Now, what do you think of that?

And another thing. What _do_ you suppose I am learning about _now_?
You'd never guess. Stars. Yes, _stars_! And that is for Father, too.

Mother came into my room one day with a book of Grandfather's under
her arm. She said it was a very wonderful work on astronomy, and she
was sure I would find it interesting. She said she was going to read
it aloud to me an hour a day. And then, when I got to Andersonville
and Father talked to me, I'd _know_ something. And he'd be pleased.

She said she thought we owed it to Father, after he'd been so good and
kind as to let me stay here almost three whole months of his six, so
I could keep on with my school. And that she was very sure this would
please him and make him happy.

And so, for 'most a week now, Mother has read to me an hour a day
out of that astronomy book. Then we talk about it. And it _is_
interesting. Mother says it is, too. She says she wishes _she'd_ known
something about astronomy when she was a girl; that she's sure it
would have made things a whole lot easier and happier all around, when
she married Father; for then she would have known something about
something _he_ was interested in. She said she couldn't help that
now, of course; but she