down near a window.

"I have not had an opportunity until now, Miss Douglas, to tell you how
deeply I have admired your wonderful courage," began Dexter.

"Oh, pray do not speak of it," said Anne, with intense embarrassment.
For Miss Vanhorn had harried her niece so successfully during the long
day, that the girl really believed that she had overstepped not only the
edge of the cliff, but the limits of modesty as well.

"But I must," said Dexter. "In the life I have lived, Miss Douglas, I
have seen women of all classes, and several times have been with women
in moments of peril--on the plains during an Indian attack, at the mines
after an explosion, and once on a sinking steamer. Only one showed
anything like your quick courage of yesterday, and she was a mother who
showed it for her child. You did your brave deed for a stranger; and you
seem, to my eyes at least, hardly more than a child yourself. It is but
another proof of the innate nobility of our human nature, and I, an
enthusiast in such matters, beg you to let me personally thank you for
the privilege of seeing your noble act." He put out his hand, took hers,
and pressed it cordially.

It was a set speech, perhaps--Dexter made set speeches; but it was
cordial and sincere. Anne, much comforted by this view of her impulsive
action, looked at him with thankfulness. This was different from Miss
Vanhorn's idea of it; different and better.

"I once helped one of my little brothers, who had fallen over a cliff,
in much the same way," she said, with a little sigh of relief. "I am
glad you think it was excusable."

"Excusable? It was superb," said Dexter. "And permit me to add, too,
that I am a better judge of heroism than the people here, who belong,
most of them, to a small, prejudiced, and I might say ignorant, class.
They have no more idea of heroism, of anything broad and liberal, or of
the country at large, than so many canary-birds born and bred in a cage.
They ridicule the mere idea of being in earnest about anything in this
ridiculous world. Yet the world is not so ridiculous as they think, and
earnestness carries with it a tremendous weight sometimes. All the great
deeds of which we have record have been done by earnest beliefs and
earnest enthusiasms, even though mistaken ones. It is easy enough, by
carefully abstaining from doing anything one's self, to maintain the
position of ridiculing the attempts of others; but it is more than
probable--in fact it i