"But I have seen so many beautiful things, and I am learning a great deal that I could never have learned with Granny and Niall."
Her shrewd child's wit had reached this conclusion unaided.
"And you have been so kind; I am grateful, and I do love you."
She said this with such pretty fervor and yet with that sweet condescension that always made me feel as if a little princess were addressing me.
"You are getting to like the convent too?" I said.
"Oh, yes!" she cried; "it is so quiet and peaceful, like a church; and every one speaks nicely, and we hear so many things about God and our Blessed Mother and the saints. I am interested in a lot of things I never knew before; and my teachers are different from any people I ever knew before."
I was well satisfied; and when we returned to the convent parlor I had a talk with the Religious who presided there, while Winifred went off to get her wraps—she having obtained permission to accompany me as far as the gate. The Religious gave a very good account of Winifred. She declared that her training had made her different from other girls, and somewhat wayward and hard to control by ordinary means.
"At first," she said, "the rule and the monotony of convent life seemed most irksome to her, as well as the indoor existence, accustomed as she had been in Ireland to spend nearly all her time in the open air."
I nodded assent.
"Being quite undisciplined, too," she went on, "she was inclined to a certain waywardness of character, which it was hard to fight against."