And she was very glad as she wrote her French exercise:

“J'AI DONNE LE PAIN A MON PETIT FRERE.”

In all these things there was the sound of a bugle to her heart, exhilarating, summoning her to perfect places. She never forgot her brown “Longman's First French Grammar”, nor her “Via Latina” with its red edges, nor her little grey Algebra book. There was always a magic in them.

At learning she was quick, intelligent, instinctive, but she was not “thorough”. If a thing did not come to her instinctively, she could not learn it.

And then, her mad rage of loathing for all lessons, her bitter contempt of all teachers and schoolmistresses, her recoil to a fierce, animal arrogance made her detestable.