efully his
patient's symptoms. These were very largely the mental experiences which
most boys pass through in their early twenties, save, perhaps that, as in
a belated season, the transition from winter to spring was more sudden,
and the contrast more violent. Jim was now thrown every day into contact
with his fellows. He was no longer a lay monk, but an active member of a
very human group. He was becoming more of a boy, with the boys, and still
more was he developing into a man with the women. The budding womanhood of
Calista Simms and the other girls of his school thrilled him as Helen of
Troy or Juliet had never done. This will not seem very strange to the
experienced reader, but it astonished the unsophisticated young
schoolmaster. The floating hair, the heaving bosom, the rosebud mouth, the
starry eye, the fragrant breath, the magnetic hand--all these disturbed
the hitherto sedate mind, and filled the brief hours he was accustomed to
spend in sleep with strange dreams. And now, as he gazed at Jennie, he was
suddenly aware of the fact that, after all, whenever these thoughts and
dreams took on individuality, they were only persistent and intensified
continuations of his old dreams of her. They had always been dormant in
him, since the days they both studied from the same book. He was quite
sure, now, that he had never forgotten for a moment, that Jennie was the
only girl in the world for him. And possibly he was right about this. It
is perfectly certain, however, that for years he had not consciously been
in love with her.

Now, however, he arose as from some inner compulsion, and went to her
side. He wished that he knew enough of music to turn her sheets for her,
but, alas! the notes were meaningless to him. Still scanning him by means
of her back hair, Jennie knew that in another moment Jim would lay his
hand on her shoulder, or otherwise advance to personal nearness, as he had
done the night of his ill-starred speech at the schoolhouse--and she rose
in self-defense. Self-defense, however, did not seem to require that he be
kept at too great a distance; so she maneuvered him to the sofa, and
seated him beside her. Now was the time to line him up.

"It seems good to have you with us to-day," said she. "We're such old, old
friends."

"Yes," repeated Jim, "old friends .... We are, aren't we, Jennie?"

"And I feel sure," Jennie went on, "that this marks a new era in our
friendship."

"Why?" asked Jim, after consi