CHAPTER VI.
"Knowledge for them unlocks her _useful_ page, And virtue blossoms for a better age."-- BARBAULD.
A few days after Madame de Fleury had told Victoire the fable of the lion and the mouse, she was informed by Sister Frances that Victoire had put the fable into verse.

It was wonderfully well done for a child of nine years old, and Madame de Fleury was tempted to praise the lines; but, checking the enthusiasm of the moment, she considered whether it would be advantageous to cultivate her pupil's talent for poetry.

Excellence in the poetic art cannot be obtained without a degree of application for which a girl in her situation could not have leisure.

To encourage her to become a mere rhyming scribbler, without any chance of obtaining celebrity or securing subsistence, would be folly and cruelty.

Early prodigies in the lower ranks of life are seldom permanently successful; they are cried up one day, and cried down the next.