"I wanted to talk with thee a little about thy plans."
"Mother; thee knows I couldn't stand it at Westfield; the school stifled
me, it's a place to turn young people into dried fruit."
"I know," said Margaret Bolton, with a half anxious smile, "thee chafes
against all the ways of Friends, but what will thee do? Why is thee so
discontented?"
"If I must say it, mother, I want to go away, and get out of this dead
level."
With a look half of pain and half of pity, her mother answered, "I am
sure thee is little interfered with; thee dresses as thee will, and goes
where thee pleases, to any church thee likes, and thee has music. I had
a visit yesterday from the society's committee by way of discipline,
because we have a piano in the house, which is against the rules."
"I hope thee told the elders that father and I are responsible for the
piano, and that, much as thee loves music, thee is never in the room when
it is played. Fortunately father is already out of meeting, so they
can't discipline him. I heard father tell cousin Abner that he was
whipped so often for whistling when he was a boy that he was determined
to have what compensation he could get now."
"Thy ways greatly try me, Ruth, and all thy relations. I desire thy
happiness first of all, but thee is starting out on a dangerous path.
Is thy father willing thee should go away to a school of the world's
people?"
"I have not asked him," Ruth replied with a look that might imply that
she was one of those determined little bodies who first made up her own
mind and then compelled others to make up theirs in accordance with hers.
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