You see, Elsli, she means to keep us with her all our lives, just as if we were her own children.

I'm sure of it, from a great many things that she has said.

We can stay here just as long as we don't do anything to displease her, and of course we sha'n't do that.

Several times when I've said that I should like to be a painter, Mrs.Stanhope has said that it was a very good profession for persons who had no home, and were obliged to live alone, and could travel as much as they pleased in foreign countries.

She said I might paint at Rosemount as much as I chose, but that I must not make it my business, because then I should have to go away to live.