hearts where these qualities had never come to life but
for the circumstance which gave them a being.

"'Twas after Jason left her, no doubt," Lady Castlewood once said with
one of her smiles to young Esmond (who was reading to her a version of
certain lines out of Euripides), "that Medea became a learned woman and
a great enchantress."

"And she could conjure the stars out of heaven," the young tutor added,
"but she could not bring Jason back again."

"What do you mean?" asked my lady, very angry.

"Indeed I mean nothing," said the other, "save what I've read in books.
What should I know about such matters? I have seen no woman save you
and little Beatrix, and the parson's wife and my late mistress, and your
ladyship's woman here."

"The men who wrote your books," says my lady, "your Horaces, and Ovids,
and Virgils, as far as I know of them, all thought ill of us, as all
the heroes they wrote about used us basely. We were bred to be slaves
always; and even of our own times, as you are still the only lawgivers,
I think our sermons seem to say that the best woman is she who bears
her master's chains most gracefully. 'Tis a pity there are no nunneries
permitted by our church: Beatrix and I would fly to one, and end our
days in peace there away from you."

"And is there no slavery in a convent?" says Esmond.

"At least if women are slaves there, no one sees them," answered the
lady. "They don't work in street gangs with the public to jeer them: and
if they suffer, suffer in private. Here comes my lord home from hunting.
Take away the books. My lord does not love to see them. Lessons are over
for to-day, Mr. Tutor." And with a curtsy and a smile she would end this
sort of colloquy.

Indeed "Mr. Tutor," as my lady called Esmond, had now business enough on
his hands in Castlewood house. He had three pupils, his lady and her two
children, at whose lessons she would always be present; besides writing
my lord's letters, and arranging his accompts for him--when these could
be got from Esmond's indolent patron.

Of the pupils the two young people were but lazy scholars, and as my
lady would admit no discipline such as was then in use, my lord's son
only learned what he liked, which was but little, and never to his
life's end could be got to construe more than six lines of Virgil.
Mistress Beatrix chattered French prettily, from a very early age;
and sang sweetly, but this was from her mother's teaching--not Harry
Esmon