Hallie Bassett had, in fact, little humor of any sort.

She viewed life with a certain austerity, and in literature she had fortified herself against the shocks of time.

Conduct, she had read, is three fourths of life; and Wordsworth had convinced her that the world is too much with us.

Mrs.Bassett discussed nothing so ably as a vague something she was fond of characterizing as "the full life," and this she wished to secure for her children.

Her boy's future lay properly with his father; she had no wish to meddle with it; but Marian was the apple of her eye, and she was striving by all the means in her power to direct her daughter into pleasant paths and bright meadows where the "full life" is assured.