Why, monsieur, it is just so. In Switzerland I have done but little,
learnt but little, and seen but little; my life there was in a circle;
I walked the same round every day; I could not get out of it; had I
rested--remained there even till my death, I should never have enlarged
it, because I am poor and not skilful, I have not great acquirements;
when I was quite tired of this round, I begged my aunt to go to
Brussels; my existence is no larger here, because I am no richer or
higher; I walk in as narrow a limit, but the scene is changed; it would
change again if I went to England. I knew something of the bourgeois of
Geneva, now I know something of the bourgeois of Brussels; if I went to
London, I would know something of the bourgeois of London. Can you make
any sense out of what I say, monsieur, or is it all obscure?"

"I see, I see--now let us advert to another subject; you propose to
devote your life to teaching, and you are a most unsuccessful teacher;
you cannot keep your pupils in order."

A flush of painful confusion was the result of this harsh remark; she
bent her head to the desk, but soon raising it replied--

"Monsieur, I am not a skilful teacher, it is true, but practice
improves; besides, I work under difficulties; here I only teach sewing,
I can show no power in sewing, no superiority--it is a subordinate
art; then I have no associates in this house, I am isolated; I am too a
heretic, which deprives me of influence."

"And in England you would be a foreigner; that too would deprive you
of influence, and would effectually separate you from all round you; in
England you would have as few connections, as little importance as you
have here."

"But I should be learning something; for the rest, there are probably
difficulties for such as I everywhere, and if I must contend, and
perhaps: be conquered, I would rather submit to English pride than to
Flemish coarseness; besides, monsieur--"

She stopped--not evidently from any difficulty in finding words to
express herself, but because discretion seemed to say, "You have said
enough."

"Finish your phrase," I urged.

"Besides, monsieur, I long to live once more among Protestants; they are
more honest than Catholics; a Romish school is a building with porous
walls, a hollow floor, a false ceiling; every room in this house,
monsieur, has eyeholes and ear-holes, and what the house is, the
inhabitants are, very treacherous; they all think it lawful to tell
l