436 THE MANSE AND ITS INMATES. 



her but in her native language. Mademoiselle only taught f ranch 

 and some ingenious works. 



The lessons of ]Vliss Crofts, the second teacher, were principally in 

 music, landscape drawing, and painting fruit and flower-pieces. 



It was the business of Ruth, wlio held the third situation, to prepare 

 the pupils for their lessons with these two ladies, while history, geogra- 

 phy, English grammar, and reading, devolved entirely on herself; or 

 she might obtain the subordinate assistance of Miss Povey, who, as yet 

 remained on the lowest step of the professional ladder of learning — - 

 a kind of handmaiden to the rest, who only mounted occasionally to 

 a more important station when her services were specifically called 

 for by some of the superior teachers. 



Here Ruth felt in a new state of existence, and among a new order 

 of beings. She sometimes half doubted her own identity, and the 

 fact that she was to receive a salary of twenty-five guineas a year ; 

 while, so far from becoming conceited and self-important upon the 

 occasion, she only felt grateful to Mrs. Somerive for the confidence 

 reposed in her, and determined to use her best efforts to merit that 

 lady's good opinion, at least to prevent her ever regretting having 

 entertained it. 



Mrs. Somerive was not a woman to choose lightly. She had been 

 struck and pleased by the strong recommendation written by her 

 former employer, Mrs. Carter. She liked Ruth's appearance and 

 manners. Her dress, plain and simple as it was, indicated good taste 

 and a desire to appear as a gentlewoman; while, through all the 

 timidity attendant upon a personal application for a situation so ex- 

 tremely desirable, and which covered her cheeks with blushes and 

 caused her voice to falter, when she answered Mrs. Somerive's ques- 

 tions, or brought forward any thing in her own favour, there was 

 still a modest self-possession which enabled her, though with difficulty, 

 to do justice to herself, and which very much disposed that lady in 

 her favour. 



Perhaps there is no quality so highly advantageous to a young 

 woman having her own way to make in the world as this. There 

 may be confidence, there may be boldness, even stupidity or insen- 

 sibility, want of feeling or delicacy, and many other causes, sufficient 

 to banish diffidence ; but modest self-possession, justly so styled, in a 

 young female whom duty calls upon to act for herself, can scarcely 

 mislead, when taken as the indication of a character combining moral 

 worth with intellectual power, of the existence not only of a mind, 

 but of a mind at the command of its owner, ready to act when re- 

 quired. 



Mrs. Somerive saw in Ruth an absence of all pretension and affec- 

 tation, and she was well aware how frequently among young women 

 of her class such vulgarity was to be found. She did not ask Ruth 

 the amount of her former salary, but she stated what she gave her- 

 self in the situation that was vacant, took Mrs. Carter's address, and, 

 saying that if she received a favourable answer to a few particulars 

 which she wished to ask she would engage her, and that, at all events, 

 she would write immediately, as she could not think of her coming 



