And then we'll all be sorry I was forced to take lessons of him." "Oh, Lulu, my dear child, I hope you would never do that!" cried Violet in distress.

"How would your father feel?
what would he say when he heard of it ?" "I don't know, Mamma Vi, but I don't believe he would allow that man to strike me; and I dare say he would think I served him right if I struck him back.

However, I don't mean to be understood as having formed the deliberate purpose of doing so; only I feel that that's what I should do without waiting a second to think." Violet thought it altogether likely, and after a moment's cogitation promised that the signor should be told that he could have Lulu for a pupil only with the distinct understanding that he was never, on any account, to give her a blow.
"And, Lulu, dear," she added entreatingly, "you will try not to furnish him the slightest excuse for punishing you, will you not ?" "Yes, Mamma Vi; but I do want to escape taking lessons of him, for fear we might fall out and have a fight," returned the little girl, laughing to keep from showing that she was almost ready to cry with vexation at the very idea of being compelled to become a pupil of the fiery little Italian.
He was a diminutive man of rather forbidding aspect.
"I fear that in that case you would get the worst of it," Violet remarked, with a faint smile.
"He is only a little man, Mamma Vi," Lulu said, shaking her head in dissent; "the professor would make two of him, I think," "And you are only a little girl, and men and boys are, as a rule, far stronger than women and girls," replied Violet.

"But aside from that consideration it would be a dreadful thing for you to come to a collision; and I shall certainly do what I can to prevent it." In pursuance of that end she presently went in search of her mother and grandfather.
She found them and Mrs.Dinsmore seated together on the lawn; the ladies busied with, their needlework, Mr.Dinsmore reading aloud.
As Violet approached, he paused, and laying the open book down on his knee, made room for her by his side.
"Don't let me interrupt you, grandpa," she said, accepting his mute invitation.
"Perhaps grandpa is ready to rest," remarked her mother; "he has been reading steadily for more than an hour." "Yes; I am ready to hear what my little cricket has to say," he said, looking inquiringly at Violet.
"It will keep, grandpa," she answered lightly.
"No," he said, "let us have it now; I see something is causing you anxiety and you have come to ask counsel or help in some direction." "Ah, grandpa," she responded, with a smile, "you were always good at reading faces;" then went on to repeat the conversation just held with Lulu.
"What do you say, grandpa, grandma, and mamma," she wound up, "shall we insist on her taking music-lessons of Signor Foresti ?" "Yes," said Mr.Dinsmore, with decision; "he is an uncommonly fine teacher, and it is desirable that she should enjoy, or rather profit by, his instructions; also it is high time she should become thoroughly convinced of the necessity of controlling that violent temper of hers.
She needs to be taught submission to lawful authority too; and indulging her in this whim would, in my judgment, be likely to have the very opposite effect.

What do you say, Rose and Elsie ?" "I presume you are right, Horace, as you usually are," replied his wife.
"I prefer to leave the question entirely to your decision, papa," said Elsie.