Some of them always giggle when you
speak to them, others have not got a word to say for themselves; and
it is awfully hard work talking to them even for a single dance.
Still, I like them better than the giggling ones."
"You see, Ralph, girls brought up in a town are naturally different to
one like Mabel. They go to school, and are taught to sit upright and
to behave discreetly, and to be general unnatural. Mabel has been
brought up at home and allowed to do as she liked, and she has
consequently grown up what nature intended her to be. Perhaps some day
all girls will be allowed the same chance of being natural that boys
have, and backboards and other contrivances for stiffening them and
turning them into little wooden figures will be unknown. It will be a
good thing, in my opinion, when that time arrives."
Ralph was often down at the Rectory, where he was always made welcome,
Mr. Withers and his wife being anxious to learn as much of his
disposition as they could. They were well satisfied with the result.
"I fancy I know what is in Penfold's mind," the rector had said to his
wife a few days after Ralph came down. "I believe he has already quite
settled it in his mind that some day Mabel and this lad shall make a
match of it."
"How absurd, John. Why, Mabel is only a child."
"Quite so, my dear; but in another three or four years she will be a
young woman.
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