anionship throughout the day will always be forming their minds,'
Mrs. Rossall said in one of her earliest conversations with Emily; it
was pleasantly put, and truer than it would have been in the ease of
many instructresses. The twins were not remarkably fond of their
lessons, but in Emily's hands they became docile and anxious to please.
She had the art of winning their affection without losing control over
them; had Mrs. Bossall's rather languid habits of mind allowed her to
give attention to the subject, she would have been struck with the
singular combination of tenderness and reverence which the two
entertained towards their teacher. Little laxities of behaviour arid
phrase upon which their mother's presence would be no check, they did
not venture to allow themselves when with Emily; her only reproof was a
steady gaze, eloquent of gentleness, but it proved quite sufficient. The
twins were in truth submitting to the force of character. They felt it
without understanding what it meant; one ether person in the house
experienced the same influence, but in his case it led to reflection.

Wilfrid was at Balliol when Miss Hood first arrived; he saw her for the
first time when he came to town after his collapse. All hastened away to
The Firs together. Wilfrid suffered no positive illness; he shared in
the amusements of the family, and, with the exception of a good deal of
pishing and pshawing at the restraints put upon him, had the appearance
of one taking an ordinary holiday. There was undeniable truth in
Beatrice Redwing's allusion to his much talking; without social
intercourse he would soon have become ill in earnest; association with
intelligent--all the better if argumentative--people was an
indispensable condition of his existence. In his later school, and early
college, days this tendency to give free utterance to his thoughts made
him not altogether the most delightful of companions to such as were
older than himself; his undeniable cleverness and the stores of
knowledge he had already acquired needed somewhat more of the restraint
of tact than his character at that time supplied. People occasionally
called him a prig; now and then he received what the vernacular of youth
terms 'a sitting upon.' The saving feature of his condition was that he
allowed himself to be sat upon gracefully; a snub well administered to
him was sure of its full artistic, and did not fail in its moral,
effect: there was no vulgar insolence