not anger enough in her nature for self-preservation."

"Is that true, Helen?" asked the young doctor. "Has your father read
your nature aright?"

"No," answered Helen, looking up with an ingenuous smile. "I have felt
very angry with you, and judged you very harshly several times. Yet I
was most angry with myself for doing what you wished in spite of my
vexation and rebellion."

"Yet you believed me right all the time?"

"I believe so. At least you always said so."

Helen conversed with Arthur Hazleton with the same freedom and
childishness as when an inmate of his mother's family. She was so
completely a child, she could not think of herself as an object of
importance in the social circle. She was inexpressibly grateful for
kindness, and Arthur Hazleton's kindness had been so constant and so
deep, she felt as if her gratitude should be commensurate with the gifts
received. It was the moral interest he had manifested in her--the
influence he exercised over her mind and heart which she most prized. He
was a kind of second conscience to her, and it did not seem possible for
her to do any thing which he openly disapproved.

What Mittie could not understand was the playful, unembarrassed manner
with which she met the graceful attentions of Clinton, after his
fascinations had dispersed her natural shyness and reserve. She neither
sought nor avoided him, flattered nor slighted him. She appeared neither
dazzled nor charmed. Mittie thought this must be the most consummate
art, when it was only the perfection of nature. Because the glass was so
clear, so translucent, she imagined she was the victim of an optical
illusion.

There was another thing in Helen, which Mittie believed the most studied
policy, and that was the affection and respect she manifested for her
step-mother. Nothing could be sweeter or more endearing than the
"mother!" which fell from her lips, whenever she addressed her--that
name which, had never yet passed her own. Mittie had never sought the
love of her step-mother. She had rejected it with scorn, and yet she
envied Helen the caressing warmth and maternal tenderness which was the
natural reward of her own loving nature.

"Poor Miss Thusa!" exclaimed Helen, near the close of the day, "I must
go and see her before the sun sets; I know, I am sure she will be glad
to see me."

"Supposing we go in a party," said Clinton. "I should like to pay my
respects to the original old lady again."

"I should t