His head was small, and flat at top, with huge ears, large green glassy eyes, and a long snipe nose, so that it looked like a weather-cock, perched upon his spindle neck, to tell which way the wind blew. To see him striding along the profile of a hill on a windy day, with his clothes bagging and fluttering about him, one might have mistaken him for the genius of famine descending upon the earth, or some scarecrow eloped from a cornfield.His school-house was a low building of one large room, rudely constructed of logs; the windows partly glazed, and partly patched with leaves of old copy-books.
Sapagkat ang kanyang apat na anak ay nakapagtapos sa kolehiyo ng may "titulo," tutol si Aling Rosa sa pagkuha ng kursong edukasyon ng kanyang bunso, dala na rin ng kaisipang hindi titulong maituturing ang pagiging "titser", bukod pa sa kakarampot na sweldong nakukuha ng anak. Gayunpaman, nakahanap ng pag-asa si Aling Rosa sa katauhan ni Osmundo, isang binata mula sa pamilya ng mga asendero na sumusuyo kay Amelita. Subalit nabigo muli si Aling Rosa sapagkat iba ang iniibig ng kanyang dalaga, at ito'y walang iba kung hindi si Mauro, isang ring guro sa pampublikong paaralan.