“I don’t think I shall, Mr. Fraser, unless I am meant to. God looks after me as much when I am up a tree as when I am upon the ground.”
Once more he had nothing to say; he could not venture to disturb her faith.
“I will walk home with you, my dear. Tell me. Angela, would you like to learn?”
“Learn!—learn what?”
“Books, and the languages that other nations, nations that have passed away, used to talk, and how to calculate numbers and distances.”
“Yes, I should like to learn very much; but who will teach me? I have learnt all Pigott knows two years ago, and since then I have been trying to learn about the trees and flowers and stars; but I look and watch, and can’t understand.”
“Ah! my dear, contact with Nature is the highest education; but the mind that would appreciate her wonders must have a foundation of knowledge to work upon. The uneducated man is rarely sensitive to the thousand beauties and marvels of the fields around him, and the skies above him. But, if you like, I will teach you, Angela. I am practically an idle man, and it will give me great pleasure; but you must promise to work and do what I tell you.”
“Oh, how good you are! Of course I will work. When am I to begin?”
“I don’t know—to-morrow, if you like; but I must speak to your father first.”
Her face fell a little at the mention of her father’s name, but presently she said, quietly—