Unfortunately, the object of our assiduities was a victim to toothache, and therefore rather cold toward our diplomacy, her idea being that by feeding her on sweets we hoped to make her toothache so bad that she would be obliged to give us a holiday. The length of the course was quite uncertain. Whatever was to be learnt had to be learnt, and it depended on your own abilities whether you finished in one, two, or three years. Needlework formed no part of the curriculum, but was left to the mothers, who were usually expert in its practice. Still, I have known some of my sisters to grow up unable to sew on a button.
Public schools exist too, though only for poor people's children.
Everyone who can afford it keeps a governess or tutor. Sometimes the teaching devolves upon the secretary to the head of the family, but of course he would have charge of the girls only while they were extremely young. It is inevitable that, having been brought up where I was, I should make comparisons with the European system, of which my children enjoyed the privileges. But I suppose such sharp differences will never cease, but will persist to the end of the world, as no race appears capable of settling upon a golden mean. Here, at all events, the children have their minds stuffed with a great deal more than they can possibly absorb.