extenuating circumstances. Mr. Bigler had no idea that he had not made a

good impression on the whole family; he certainly intended to be

agreeable. Margaret agreed with her daughter, and though she never said

anything to such people, she was grateful to Ruth for sticking at least

one pin into him.

Such was the serenity of the Bolton household that a stranger in it would

never have suspected there was any opposition to Ruth's going to the

Medical School. And she went quietly to take her residence in town, and

began her attendance of the lectures, as if it were the most natural

thing in the world. She did not heed, if she heard, the busy and

wondering gossip of relations and acquaintances, gossip that has no less

currency among the Friends than elsewhere because it is whispered slyly

and creeps about in an undertone.

Ruth was absorbed, and for the first time in her life thoroughly happy;

happy in the freedom of her life, and in the keen enjoyment of the

investigation that broadened its field day by day. She was in high

spirits when she came home to spend First Days; the house was full of her

gaiety and her merry laugh, and the children wished that Ruth would never

go away again. But her mother noticed, with a little anxiety, the

sometimes flushed face, and the sign of an eager spirit in the kindling

eyes, and, as well, the serious air of determination and endurance in her

face at unguarded moments.

The college was a small one and it sustained itself not without

161

The Gilded Age