The trivial bits of news about the small doings of her old friends had been delightful.

The home life, with its simple routine and its sweet companionship, had been restful and satisfying.

The very scenes of her girlhood had seemed to welcome her with a spirit of genuineness and steadfastness that had made her feel as one entering a safe home harbor after a long and adventurous voyage to far-away and little-known lands.

And Phil, in the virile strength of his manhood, in the simple bigness of his character, and in his enduring and unchanging love, had made her feel his likeness to the primitive land of his birth.
But when the glad excitement of those first days of her return were past, when the meetings with old friends were over and the tales of their doings exhausted, then Kitty began to realize what her education, as they called it, really meant.

The lessons of those three years were not to be erased from her life as one would erase a mistake in a problem or a misspelled word.