even pained expression of her face

"Well, listen to me. I have planned for you, my daughter, a most delightful and profitable journey. Assured that you possess musical talent of the highest order, I desire that talent to be most highly cultivated. The culture you need cannot be obtained in this country; so I have written to my cousin, Baron von Rosenberg, to have you become a member of his distinguished family for a time. Under his care and direction, your studies can be pursued to the greatest advantage. What do you think of the arrangement?" As Mr. Mordecai was unfolding what he supposed would be a pleasant surprise to his daughter, he marked the serious, even pained expression of her face, and wondered at it. Leah was silent. Then, with an air of surprise and disappointment, her father repeated the inquiry. "What do you think of my plan? You cannot possibly dislike it, my daughter!" "Saxony is a great way off from you, dear father-I believe the baron lives in Saxony. I do not think I could be happy so far away from you, the only living human being who loves me truly in this cold world." The last words were spoken bitterly. "Your words astonish me, my child; they savor of ingratitude, and are strange words for your lips. What can you mean?" Leah trembled that so much had escaped her hitherto silent lips, betraying even faintly the true feeling of her heart; and repressing the words that would have followed had her father not offered his rebuke, she replied quickly: "Forgive me, dear father, if I seem ungrateful; perhaps I do not appreciate the love I enjoy; but I do not wish to go so far away from you. And you will not send me, will you?" "Never trouble about me, my daughter; go and stay a year, if no longer; that's a short period of time, when it is past. Go for the improvement you will get. Go and become distinguished, my child;" and the ambitious parent's eye kindled with a new light at the thought. Leah made no reply, and the father, releasing the delicate hand he had so tenderly held, said again and again, "Never mind me, child, never mind me; a year's a short time. Go and become distinguished." The banker went to his counting-house that day, elated with the project for his daughter's pleasure and improvement, little dreaming where, or for what purpose, this plan was conceived; and Leah spent its lonely hours in sorrow and in tears.