The change
this work made in the boys appeared to James Minturn and his sister as
something marvellous. That the work was also making a change in the heart
of the man himself, was an equal miracle he did not realize.
As each day new avenues opened, he began to understand dimly how much it
would have meant to him in his relations with his wife, if he had begun
long ago under her tuition and learned, at least enough to appreciate the
one thing outside society, which she found absorbing. He began to see that
if he had listened, and tried, and had induced her to repeat to him parts
of the great composers she so loved, on her instruments, when they reached
home, he soon could have come to recognize them, and so an evening at the
opera with her would have meant pleasure to himself instead of stolid
endurance. Ultimately it might have meant an effective wedge with which to
pry against the waste of time, strength and money on the sheer amusement
of herself in society. Once he started searching for them, he found many
ways in which he might have made his life with his wife different, if
indeed he had not had it in his power to effect a complete change by
having been firm in the beginning.
Pages:
616
617
618
619
620
621
622
623
624
625
626
627
628
629
630
631
632
633
634
635
636
637
638
639
640