immediate duty. She failed to catch the instructor's eye,
and the recitation proceeded without her assistance. Priscilla watched
her from the back seat as she read the Yale letter with a skeptical
frown, and made a grimace over the blue and the yellow; but before she
had reached the Hotel A----, Priscilla was paying attention to the
recitation again. It was coming her way, and she was anxiously forming
an opinion on the essential characteristics of Wordsworth's view of
immortality.

Suddenly the room was startled by an audible titter from Patty, who
hastily composed her face and assumed a look of vacuous innocence--but
too late. She had caught the instructor's eye at last.

"Miss Wyatt, what do you consider the most serious limitations of our
author?"

Miss Wyatt blinked once or twice. This question out of its context was
not illuminating. It was a part of her philosophy, however, never to
flunk flat; she always crawled.

"Well," she began with an air of profound deliberation, "that question
might be considered in two ways, either from an artistic or a
philosophic standpoint."

This sounded promising, and the instructor smiled encouragingly. "Yes?"
she said.

"And yet," continued Patty, after still profounder deliberation, "I
think the same reason will be found to be the ultimate explanation of
both."

The instructor might have inquired, "Both what?" but she refrained and
merely waited.

Patty thought she had done enough, but she plunged on desperately: "In
spite of his really deep philosophy we notice a certain--one might
almost say _dash_ about his poetry, and a lack of--er--meditation which
I should attribute to his immaturity and his a--rather wild life. If he
had lived longer I think he might have overcome it in time."

The class looked dazed, and the corners of the instructor's mouth
twitched. "It is certainly an interesting point of view, Miss Wyatt,
and, as far as I know, entirely original."

As they were crowding out at the end of the recitation Priscilla pounced
upon Patty. "What on earth were you saying about Wordsworth's youth and
immaturity?" she demanded. "The man lived to be over eighty, and
composed a poem with his last gasp."

"Wordsworth? I was talking about Shelley."

"Well, the class wasn't."

"How should I know?" Patty demanded indignantly. "She said 'our author,'
and I avoided specific details as long as I could."

"Oh, Patty, Patty! and you said he was wild--the lamblike Wordsw