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Howells, William Dean, 1837-1920

"The Minister's Charge"

And I
want you should hold yourself high, Lem. You're as good as anybody.
And don't you go with any girls, especially, that ain't of the best.
You're gettin' to that time o' life when you'll begin to think about
'em; but don't you go and fall in love with the first little poppet
you see, because she's got pretty eyes and curly hair."
It seemed to Lemuel as if she must know about Statira, but of course
she did not. He lay still, and she went on.
"Don't you go and get engaged, or any such foolishness in a hurry,
Lem. Them art-student girls you was tellin' about, I presume they're
all right enough; but you wait a while. Young men think it's a kind
of miracle if a girl likes 'em, and they're ready to go crazy over
it; but it's the most natural thing she can do. You just wait a
while. When you get along a little further, you can pick and choose
for yourself. I don't know as I should want you should marry for
money; but don't you go and take up with the first thing comes
along, because you're afraid to look higher. What's become o' that
nasty thing that talked so to you at that Miss Vane's?"
Lemuel said that he had never seen Sibyl or Miss Vane since; but he
did not make any direct response to the anxieties his mother had
hinted at. Her pride in him, so ignorant of all the reality of his
life in the city, crushed him more than the sight and renewed sense
of the mean conditions from which he had sprung.


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