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132 liberty to ride about the country and enjoy all the pleasures of home while they were learning.

"Nae doot," said Mrs. Lindsay, "she's got the skill and the wit, and as for the piano, the way she makes the lifeless thing speak is just astonishing; but I misdoot ye'll no mind a wee body like her that Isabel could mak' twa o,' after the first novelty o' the thing is worn off."

"But Allan is bigger than we are, and he minds what she says, mother," said Isabel.

"Oh! but ye hae na Allan's sense or discretion," said Mrs. Lindsay, "and there's none of ye sae keen for learning as he is, an' it would be hard on Amy, poor lassie, to gie her sic a pair o' gilpies to manage."

"Oh! but we've asked her, and she said she would like it, and I am sure it costs father a lot of money to keep us at the school."

"That's true, but we didna tak' Amy to Branxholm to mak' a profit of her. Na, that might befit the like of Mrs. Hammond, but it's no our fashion."

"But we don't like the school, mother," said Phemie.

"I'm thinking that's the plain English of it," said Mrs. Lindsay.

"I'm sure there's no need for us being kept so strict and never allowed to go out anywhere but