180 THERE IS NO- HURRY

but the true cause of the change never occurred
to her. Accustomed to the high-toned courtesy
of well-bred men, which is so little practised in
the middle class of English society, it never sug-
gested itself, that placing her chair, or opening
the door for her to go out, or rising courteously
when she came into a room, was more than, as
a lady, she had a right to expect; in truth, she
did not notice it at all; but she did notice and
feel deeply her cousin’s alternate coldness and
snappishness of manner. ‘I would not,”
thought Mary, ‘“ have behaved so to her if she
had been left desolate ; but in a little time, when
-my mother is more content, I will leave Repton,
and become independent by my talents.”” Never
did she think of the power delegated to her by,
the Almighty without feeling herself raised—ay,
higher than she had ever been in the days of her
splendour—in the scale of moral usefulness ; as
every one must feel whose mind is rightly
framed. She had not yet known what it was to
have her abilities trampled on or insulted; she
had never experienced the bitterness consequent
upon having the acquirements—which in the
days of her prosperity commanded silence and
admiration—sneered at or openly ridiculed.—
She had yet to learn that the Solons, the law-
givers of English society, lavish their attentions
and praise upon those who learn, not upon
those who teach.

Mary had not been six months fatherless, —