she would imagine that the girl was in love with Colston. And sometimes she would conclude that Mary's heart had not been touched at all. Miss Lou herself preferred Colston, but she was not opposed to Preston. Colston had a solid fortune, and Preston—well, Connecticut knows very well how many long days and how many hard licks are necessary to lay up a fortune. Young people may put up True Love as their candidate and pout at Hard Cash as much as they please, but if they had to go through the experience that Connecticut and the neighboring States went through sixty odd years ago (to go back no farther), they would come to the conclusion that Hard Cash has peculiar merits of its own.
Nevertheless, Miss Lou was too wise to say anything about the matter. She knew that her husband, although he possessed land and negroes and money, had a certain fine scorn for the privileges and distinctions that mere wealth confers. He was emphatically a man of the people, and he would have tolerated no effort to implant false notions in his daughter's mind. Moreover, Miss Lou had great confidence in Mary's sound judgment. It was one comfort, the mother thought, that
