she was in the common youthful case of being a much better judge of other people’s affairs than of her own.  At the fellow-student who adored some Henry or Augustus, not from the drivelling sentimentality which the world calls love, but because this particular Henry or Augustus was a phoenix to whom the laws that govern the relations of ordinary lads and lasses did not apply, Agatha laughed in her sleeve.  The more she saw of this weakness in her fellows, the more satisfied she was that, being forewarned, she was also forearmed against an attack of it on herself, much as if a doctor were to conclude that he could not catch smallpox because he had seen many cases of it; or as if a master mariner, knowing that many ships are wrecked in the British channel, should venture there without a pilot, thinking that he knew its perils too well to run any risk of them.  Yet, as the doctor might hold such an opinion if he believed himself to be constituted differently from ordinary men; or the shipmaster adopt such a course under the impression that his vessel was a star, Agatha found false security in the subjective difference between her fellows seen from without and herself known from within.  When, for instance, she fell in love with Mr. Jefferson Smilash (a step upon which she resolved the day after the storm), her imagination invested the pleasing emotion with a sacredness which, to her, set it far apart and distinct from the frivolous fancies of which Henry and Augustus had been the subject, and she the confidant.

“I can look at him quite coolly and dispassionately,” she said to herself.  “Though his face has a strange influence that must, I know, correspond to some unexplained power within me, yet it is not a perfect face.  I have seen many men who are, strictly speaking, far handsomer.  If the light that never was on sea or land is in his eyes, yet they are not pretty eyes—­not half so clear as mine.  Though he wears his common clothes with a nameless grace that betrays his true breeding at every step, yet he is not tall, dark, and melancholy, as my ideal hero would be if I were as great a fool as girls of my age usually are.  If I am in love, I have sense enough not to let my love blind my judgment.”

She did not tell anyone of her new interest in life.  Strongest in that student community, she had used her power with good-nature enough to win the popularity of a school leader, and occasionally with unscrupulousness enough to secure the privileges of a school bully.  Popularity and privilege, however, only satisfied her when she was in the mood for them.  Girls, like men, want to be petted, pitied, and made much of, when they are diffident, in low spirits, or in unrequited love.  These are services which the weak cannot render to the strong and which the strong will not render to the weak, except when there is also a difference of sex.  Agatha knew by experience that though a weak woman cannot understand why her stronger sister