Literature · Short Stories

Fifty-Two Stories For Girls 12

Part 1 · The Passing of Nadine

AnonymousEnglish

Throughout the great house of Whichello Towers there was a hush. Soft-footed servants went to and fro, all the guests save Estella and I went away with many condolences. The Princess Nadine was passing away in the room overlooking the pine woods. She had been thrown from her horse whilst hunting with the Whichello hounds, and the end was not far off.

I was sitting in the library with a great sadness in my heart, when the door opened, and Canon Manningtree, the white-haired rector of Whichello, came into the room.

"Miss Dene," he said gravely, "in the absence of a priest of the Greek Church, I have ministered to Princess Milontine. She is going to meet a merciful Saviour who knows her temptations, and the singular circumstances in which she has been placed. She desires to see you. Do not excite her. Speak to her of the infinite love of God. Will you please go to her now."

Weeping, I went.

Sitting beside the sufferer was Maura, who rose when I came in, and left us two alone, save for that unseen Angel who calls us to the presence of our God.

The princess looked at me with her beautiful wistful eyes, as she had looked when she gave me the amber roses in the narrow street.

"Gloria, little sister, I am going to tell how Irene died."

"No, no, not if it distresses you."

"I would rather tell you. Listen! I have not much time to speak. As you know, we are of a noble Russian family, and Irene and I were the only children. I was ten years older than Irene, and was educated in France; she came to England, and was your schoolmate!

"I was passionately fond of the child I had seen an infant lying in her pink-lined cot, and when she came out and married Prince Alex Laskine, I prayed that God's sunshine might light on my darling's head. Then, I myself married, and travelled with my husband in all kinds of strange, out-of-the-way places; in one of which he died, and I came back to St. Petersburgh, a childless, lonely widow!

"But there was no Irene; her husband had been implicated in a plot, and had been sent to O----, one of the most desolate places in Siberia, and my sister had voluntarily accompanied him!

"When I heard this, I never rested until I too was en route to Siberia! I wanted to take Irene in my arms and to console her as her dead mother would have done. O---- was a fearful place, just a colony of dreary huts by the sea. Behind were the wolf-infested forests; in the midst of it, the frowning fortress prison! When I showed my ukase, and demanded to see my relations, they simply showed me two graves. Irene and Alex rested side by side, in the silent acre, and an exile told me how they had died! Alex had been knouted for refusing to play the part of Judas, and had passed away in the fortress. Irene was found dead inside their small wooden hut, kneeling beside her bed. Her heart had broken! My little Snow Flower had been crushed under the iron heel of despotism.

"He by whose mandate this iniquity was done was General Loris Trakoff, the governor of the province! I was turned to stone by Irene's grave, and afterwards became a partisan of the Nihilists.

"Night and day I pondered upon how I could be revenged upon Trakoff, and at last Fate seemed to favour me.

"The general (so it was reported) was coming to visit a former friend of his. I made up my mind to be there also, and to shoot him, if opportunity served.

"So, two members of our society, a young mechanic and his wife, rented a house in Cherry-Tree Avenue, to which I came, and whilst waiting for my revenge I became acquainted with you."

She paused, whispered, "The restorative," and I gave her the medicine.

The sweet, faint voice spoke again.

"I knew that you were Irene's friend because I saw your name upon the letter that I picked up, and I loved you, Gloria, aye, and was sorry for you."

I laid my cheek next hers.

"Dear, I knew it, and was fond of you."

"Fond of the Nihilist Princess, my little English Gloria! 'Tis a strange world!

"After all, the general did not come, and then we all left. I bided my time. No outsider knew me for a Revolutionnaire, so I mixed in society as before, and accepted the invitation to Whichello, on purpose to meet him here.

"The bonbonniere was filled with poisoned caramels, prepared by a Nihilist chemist, and it was my intention to destroy myself after I had destroyed my enemy. I gave him one chance; I asked him if he repented of anything, and he answered 'No.'

"At the great crisis your little hand, as a hand from another world--as Irene's hand might have done--came between us.

"Your coming saved him. I could not let you share his fate."

"Oh, thank God!" I said. "Nadine, tell me--tell God, that you are sorry, that you repent your dreadful purpose."

"I do, I do," she whispered. "Lying here I see all the sins, the errors, the mistakes. I do not despair of God's mercy though I am myself deserving of His wrath. Irene used to tell me that when she fell asleep, in the new world of school life, it was in your arms. Put them round me, Gloria, and let me fall asleep."

I placed my arm gently, very gently, under her head, and then sat very still.

I heard the big clock in the clock-tower slowly and distinctly strike the hour of twelve, I saw the pale lips move and heard them murmur: "Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, miserere mei."

But save for this, all was silence! And in the silence Princess Nadine slept.

MY YEAR AT SCHOOL.

BY MARGARET WATSON.

I was rather old to start out as a school-girl, for I was seventeen, and had never been to school before.

We lived in the heart of the country, and my education had been rather casual--broken into now for a day's work, and now for a day's play, now for visitors staying in the house, now for a visit to friends or relations; as is the way when you are one of a large family, and do your lessons at home--especially if your tastes lie rather in the line of doing than thinking.

I did not love books. I loved gardening and riding the pony, and making cakes, and minding the baby. My sisters were much cleverer than I, and I had never believed it possible that I could excel in anything requiring study, so I satisfied myself with being rather clever with my hands.

However, I didn't really mind work of any kind, and I worked at my lessons when I was at them, though I was always ready enough to throw them aside for anything else that might turn up. When my mother said I must go away to a good school for a year I was quite willing. I always loved a change.

The school chosen was a London High School, and I was to board with some people we knew. They had no connection with the school, so I was thrown pretty much on my own resources, and had to find my way about for myself.

I had to go up first for the entrance exam., and I shall never forget my feelings that day. The headmistress had a sharp, quick manner, and I thought she set me down as very stupid for my age. I was put in a room with a lot of girls, mostly younger than myself, and given a set of exam. papers to do. The way the questions were put was new to me, I was nervous and worried, but I worked on doggedly with the courage of despair, certain that I was showing appalling ignorance for a girl of seventeen, and that I should be placed in a form with the babies.

Two very pretty girls were working beside me. They had curly black hair, and bright complexions, and lovely dark eyes, and there was a fair girl, who wrote diligently all the time, and seemed in no difficulty. When it was over I asked her how she had got on, and she said she had found it quite easy, and answered most of the questions. We compared notes, and I saw that if she was right I must be wrong, and as she was quite sure she was right I went home very despondent indeed, but determined to work my way up from the bottom if need be.

Next morning I hardened my heart for what was to befall me, and started for school. I had to go by omnibus, and found one that ran just at the right time.

I was met at the school entrance by a tall, thin, small-featured lady, who wore glasses, and spoke in a sharp, clear voice, but quite kindly, telling me that I was in the Fifth Form, and my desk was that nearest the door.

There was a good deal of crush and confusion as there were a lot of new girls, and I sat at my desk and wondered whether the Fifth Form was the highest or the lowest. I could hardly believe I was in the highest form, but the other girls sitting at the desks looked as old as myself. The two pretty dark girls were there, but I saw no sign of the fair girl who had worked so easily.

I sat and watched for her, and presently she came in, but she was moved on to the form behind. She was in the Fourth Form, and I heard her name--Mabel Smith.

I had a good report at the end of the first term, and went home happy--very happy to get home again, for I had never been so long away before, and I found my little brothers grown out of knowledge. But the Christmas holidays were soon over, and I went back in a cold, snowy week; and London snow is a miserable spectacle, not like the lovely pure white covering which hides up all dirt and ugliness in the country.

However, I knew my way about by this time, and found my old familiar bus waiting for me, and the conductor greeted me with great friendliness. He was a most kind man, and always waited for me as long as he could.

This term we had a new mistress for mathematics, and I didn't like her a bit.

I was always very slow and stupid at mathematics, and the new mistress was so quick, she worked away like lightning, and I could not follow her. She would rush through a proposition in Euclid, proving that some figure was, or was not equal to some other figure, and leave me stranded vainly trying to understand the first proof when she was at the last, and I couldn't care, anyhow, whether one line could be proved equal to another or not, I felt it would be much simpler to measure it and have done with it. It was the same in arithmetic; she took us through innumerable step-fractions with innumerable steps, just as fast as she could put the figures down, and all I could do was to stare stupidly at the blackboard and hope that I might be able to worry some sense out of it all at home; and she gave us so much home-work that I had to toil till after ten at night, and then had to leave my sums half done, or neglect my other work altogether.

I was slow and stupid, I knew, but the others all suffered too, though not so much, and presently complaints were made by all the other mistresses that their work was not done, and all the girls had the same reason to give, the arithmetic took so long.

So Miss Vinton made out a time-table for our prep., and said we were to leave off when the time was up, whether we'd finished or not. It was a great relief, my hair was turning grey with the work and worry! But I did not get on at all with mathematics, and in the end of term exam. I came out very badly in that and in French.

As most of us had done badly in those subjects our poor madame and the mathematical mistress did not come back next term.

Miss Vinton gave us mathematics herself, and a splendid teacher she was, letting some daylight even into my thick head, which was not constructed for that kind of work, and her sister gave us French, and we really began to make progress. Some of the girls had done well before, those who sat near madame and talked to her, but most of us had not learnt much from her.

Altogether it was with regret that I saw the end of my school-year drawing near; and I was very anxious to do well in the final exams.

They were to be rather important, as we were to have a university examiner, and there were two prizes offered by people interested in the school, one for the best literature paper, and one for the best history. I did want a prize to take home.

There was great excitement in the school, and we all meant to try our best. The Fourth and Fifth Forms were to have the same papers, so as to give the Fourth Form girls a chance for the prize, and Mabel Smith said she was determined to win that offered for literature.

The exam. week began. Geology, arithmetic, Latin, French, German. We worked through them all conscientiously but without much enthusiasm. Then came the literature, you could hear the girls hold their breaths as the papers were given to them.

I read the questions down the first time, and my head spun round so that I could not understand one.

"This won't do," I said to myself, and set my teeth and clung to my desk till I steadied down. Then I read them through again.

I found one question I could answer right away, and by the time I had done that my brain was clear, and I knew the answers to every one.

Alice Thompson was sitting next me, she was one of the pretty dark girls, and very idle.

"What's the date of Paradise Lost?" she whispered.

I didn't know what to do. I wouldn't speak, and of course I knew that it was very mean of her to ask, but I was sure of the date, and I thought it would be mean of me not to tell her. Just then Miss Vinton walked up the room and glanced round at us.

Alice bent over her work, writing diligently. Miss Vinton went down the room again, and Alice edged up to me, questioning me with her pretty dark eyes.

I hesitated, then I pushed the sheet I had just finished close to the edge of my desk so that she could read the date, which she did quickly enough. After that she looked over my papers freely whenever Miss Vinton wasn't looking.

I was rather worried about it, but I didn't think she could win the prize, for I knew she hadn't worked at the subject at all, and if she didn't I thought it couldn't matter much to any one.

I had answered all the questions a good while before the time was up, I thought we had been allowed too long, and was surprised to see Mabel Smith and one or two more scribbling away for dear life till the last minute. However, the time was up at last, and we all gave in our papers.

"How did you get on, Margaret?" asked Miss Vinton, smiling kindly at me.

"I think I answered all the questions right," I replied.

"That's good," she said.

The history paper was given us next day, and it filled me with despair. The questions were so put that short answers were no use, and I was afraid to trust myself to write down my own ideas. However, after a bit the ideas began to come, and I quite enjoyed scribbling them down.

Alice had been moved to another desk, so I was left in peace, for Joyce, who was a friend of mine, was next to me, working away quietly.

I was getting on swimmingly, when all at once the bell rang, and I had only answered three quarters of the questions.

I was vexed, for I could see one or two more I could have done. However, there was no help for it. The papers must be given up.

"I wish I had had a little more time," I said to Miss Vinton, as I gave in my work.

"You had as much as the rest," she answered, rather sharply, and I went away feeling sad and snubbed.

The exams. were over, and we were to know the result next day.

I don't think any of us wanted that extra half hour in bed in the morning, which generally seemed so desirable; and we were all waiting in the cloak-room--a chattering throng, for discipline was relaxed on this occasion. When the school-bell rang, and we hurried in to take our places, Miss Vinton made us a speech, saying that the general results of the examinations had been very satisfactory. Our term's work had been on the whole good.

We could hardly listen to these general remarks when we were longing for particulars. At last they came:

Alice Thompson was awarded the literature prize. Her work was so very accurate, and her paper so well written.

There was a silence of astonishment.

Alice turned scarlet. I felt horrified to think what mischief I had done by being so weak-minded as to let her copy my work. Mabel Smith was white. But Miss Vinton went on calmly:

"Mabel Smith comes next. Her paper was exceptionally well written, but there were a few blunders which placed it below Alice's."

Then came Nelly, Joyce, and the rest of the Fifth Form, and one or two of the Fourth--and I began to get over the shock of Alice's success and to wonder what had happened to me. At last my name came with just half marks.

My cheeks were burning. I was dreadfully disappointed and ashamed. Miss Vinton saw what I was feeling and stopped to explain that the examiner had not wanted mere bald answers of dates and names, but well-written essays, showing thought and intelligence. This was how I had failed, while Alice, cribbing my facts, had worked them out well, and come out first. I felt very sore about it, and almost forgot the injustice done to Mabel Smith.

There was still the history prize, and a hush of excited expectation fell on us when Miss Vinton began again:

"The history prize has been awarded to Nelly Gascoyne for a very good paper indeed. Margaret and Joyce have been bracketed second. Their papers were excellent, and only just behind Nelly's in merit."

I gasped with surprise. I had left so many questions unanswered that I had had no hope of distinction in history.

This was some consolation for my former disgrace--and then my mind went back to the question of what was to be done about the literature prize.

As soon as the business of the morning was concluded Mabel Smith touched my arm. She was still quite white, and her eyes were blazing.

"I must speak to you," she said.

"Come to the cloak-room," I answered, "we can get our books after."

"You know Alice Thompson cheated," she said, the moment we were alone. "I sat just behind, and I saw you push your papers over to her, and she leant over, and copied whatever she wanted."

"I never dreamt she'd get the prize," I answered, "I only wanted to help her out of a hole."

"Well, she did get it--and it's my prize, and what are you going to do about it?"

"I don't know, I'm sure. Of course I oughtn't to have let her copy--but I thought it wouldn't hurt any one."

"You'll have to tell Miss Vinton now. It's not fair I should be cheated out of the prize I've honestly won, and I'd worked so hard for it too. I can't think how I came to make those mistakes."

"I wish to peace you hadn't!"

"But, anyhow, Alice could never have got it if she hadn't cheated, and you must tell Miss Vinton."

"Oh! that's too much," I cried. "It's for Alice to tell Miss Vinton, I can't. I'm willing to tell Alice she must."

"And if she won't?"

"Then I don't quite see what's to be done."

"You'll let her keep my prize?"

"Well, you can tell Miss Vinton if you like."

"It's you that ought to tell her. It was all your fault, you'd no right to help Alice to cheat."

"I know that's true. But it makes it all the more impossible for me to tell on her."

Just then Alice came in:

"Oh, Margaret!" she cried.

Then she saw Mabel and stopped.

"Are you going to tell Miss Vinton you cheated?" said Mabel, going up to her with flaming eyes.

"Margaret, did you tell?" said Alice.

"I saw you!" said Mabel, "I sat just behind and saw you! You're not going to try to keep my prize, are you?"

"No, of course not," said Alice, "I never thought of getting the prize. I only wanted to write a decent paper and not have Miss Vinton pitching into me as usual. You're welcome to the prize, if that will do."

Mabel said nothing.

"I'm afraid that won't quite do," I said. "It would be too difficult for Mabel to explain at home without telling on you. You'd much better tell on yourself."

"I can't," said Alice, "I'm as sorry as I can be, now, that I did it--but I can't face Miss Vinton."

She looked ready to cry.

"Well, I shall have to confess too," I said. "It was partly my fault. Let us go together."

"I daren't," said Alice.

But I could see she was yielding.

"Come along," I said, taking her arm. "It's the only way out. You know you won't keep Mabel's prize, and it's as bad to keep her honour and glory. This is the only way out. Let's get it over."

She came then, but reluctantly.

Fortunately we found Miss Vinton alone in her room, and between us we managed to stammer out our confession.

Miss Vinton, I think, was not surprised. She had feared there was something not quite straight. But she was extremely severe with us both, as much with me as with Alice, and as it was to be my last interview with her I was heart-broken.

However, I lingered a moment after Alice, and then turned back and said:

"Please forgive me, you can't think how sorry I am."

"Remember, Margaret," she replied, "that it is not enough to be honourable in your own conduct--you must as far as possible discourage anything dishonourable in other people. I know you would not cheat yourself, but if it is wrong to cheat, it is equally wrong to help some one else to cheat--don't you see? Will you remember this in future--in big things as well as in small? You must not only do right yourself. Your influence must be on the right side too. Certainly, I forgive you. You've been a good girl all this year, and I'm sorry to lose you."

So I went away comforted.

And I came home with never a prize to show. But I had what was better. I had acquired a real love of study which I have never lost. I don't know what became of Alice Thompson, I only hope that she never had to earn her living by teaching. Nelly Gascoyne went home to a jolly family of brothers and sisters and gave herself up to the pleasures and duties of home. Joyce became assistant mistress in a school, and Mabel followed up her successes at school by winning a scholarship at Cambridge a year later.

And I--well, I've never come in first anywhere, but I'm fairly contented with a second place.

THE SILVER STAR.

BY NELLIE HOLDERNESS.

Maysie Grey had set her heart on the Drawing Society's Silver Star. She kept her ambition to herself as a thing too audacious to be put into words. That she possessed talent, the school fully recognised. She was only thirteen, and by dint of steady perseverance was making almost daily progress. Her painting lessons were a source of unmixed pleasure to her, for hers was a nature that never yielded to discouragement, and never magnified difficulties.

"You must aim at the Bronze Star this year," her science mistress had said to her, while helping her to fix the glass slides she was to paint from, under the microscope, "and next year you must go on to the Silver----"

"Look, how beautiful the colours are!" Maysie exclaimed in delight. The delicate, varying tints fascinated her. She set to work with enthusiasm, never having done anything of the kind before. "'Mycetozoa,' do you call them?" she asked.

"Yes. Be sure you spell it rightly."

The next day, when the first of her three sheets was finished, Miss Elton came in to examine it. Though she said little, she was evidently more than satisfied. It was nearly tea-time, and Maysie spent the few minutes before preparation was over in tearing up some old drawings. After breakfast, on the following morning, before the bell rang for class, she went over to Ruth Allen's desk to ask her how to spell "Mycetozoa." Ruth was her particular chum, and the best English scholar in the form.

"I've got something to show you, Maysie," she said, when she had furnished the desired information. She brought out a piece of paper as she spoke, and passed it on to her friend behind the cover of her open desk. It was a fragment of one of Maysie's zoological drawing-sheets, evidently picked up out of the waste-paper basket--a wasp with wings outspread, showing the three divisions of an insect's body. The head was roughly altered so as to form a caricature of a human face, and above was printed, in letters that might have done credit to Maysie herself: "Miss E. in a tantrum," and below: "How doth the little waxy wasp rejoice to snap and snarl!"

Maysie did not share Ruth's unreasonable animosity towards Miss Elton, but she could not repress a smile at this specimen of school-girl wit. Just then the bell rang, and she went back to her own desk, while Ruth, letting the lid of hers slip down, was so startled by the noise it made in the sudden silence that she did not see a piece of paper flutter out on to the ground, and gently glide underneath the platform of the mistress's desk, which was just in front of her.

That morning Maysie began her second sheet, and joined the others in the garden after dinner. Molly Brooks, another of her friends, came eagerly running up to her.

"Why didn't you come to botany?" she asked.

"I've been doing my exhibition work."

"Oh, of course! I suppose it's nearly finished?"

"About half. It hasn't to be sent off till next week, so there's plenty of time."

At that moment Ruth Allen linked her arm in Maysie's.

"I'm in my third row," she began casually.

"What, already?" asked Maysie.

"Yes, haven't you heard?" Molly chimed in.

"Oh, it's Miss Elton again!" went on Ruth. "We never can hit it off. You weren't at botany class this morning."

"No, what happened?"

Ruth shrugged her shoulders. Molly looked expressively at Maysie. Ruth seldom got through a botany class without an explosion.

"I hate botany," said Ruth recklessly, "and I hate Miss Elton. I'm supposed to be in silence now, but as Miss Bennet came in and told us all to go out, I thought I'd better not risk another disobedience mark."

Miss Elton, who had been stooping down over some flower-beds, in search of museum treasures, came up at this point. Her face was grave and white, and her manner very stern and quiet.

"What are you doing out here, Ruth?" she demanded.

"Miss Bennet sent us all out; she said it was such a lovely day," answered Ruth carelessly.

"Then you can go and explain to Miss Bennet why I told you to remain in this afternoon."

Ruth looked at Miss Elton, and then looked away; she slowly withdrew her arm from Maysie's, and walked off without a word. At the door she came face to face with Miss Bennet, the headmistress.

"Where are you going to, Ruth?" asked the latter.

"Miss Elton sent me in."

"Why?" There was grave rebuke in Miss Bennet's voice.

"Because I'm in silence."

"I do not understand why you were out at all."

Ruth made no attempt to defend herself.

"You'd better come to my room," continued Miss Bennet. "There is something here that needs explaining.... Now, what were you in silence for?" she continued, seating herself in her chair by the fire.

"I got sent out of botany class."

"And how many times have you been sent out of botany class?"

Ruth did not answer.

"Well, it has come to this, Ruth," Miss Bennet went on gravely, "that a girl of your age--you are fourteen now, I believe--can no longer be allowed to go on setting an example of insolence and disobedience to the younger girls in the school. Now, remember, this is the last time. Let me have no more complaints about you, or it will be my unpleasant duty to write to your mother, and tell her that you cannot remain here."

There was a pause. The colour had left Ruth's face, and she was staring moodily into the fire.

"You will apologise to Miss Elton," added Miss Bennet, rising, "and you will remain in silence at meals for the rest of the week. And try to make an effort over your botany. Your other work is good: you were top last week. Now, promise me that you will make an effort."

Ruth, moved to penitence at the thought of her mother, promised to do her best. That afternoon she apologised to Miss Elton, and made a resolution to keep out of rows for the rest of the term. Maysie and she walked about in the garden as usual, and talked things over. Maysie looked grave when Ruth told her what Miss Bennet had said about sending her away.

"Oh, Ruth!" she said, "you really must be careful! Why, if you got expelled, it would be almost as bad for me as if I were expelled myself. Miss Elton's awfully nice, if you only knew. I had such a lovely talk with her on Sunday, all about home, and drawing. And then she's so jolly at games, and she's never cross when you don't cheek her. And think how horrid it must be for her whenever she comes to botany class, always knowing that you're going to be dense! And you do do it on purpose sometimes, dear, you know you do."

Ruth forced a laugh.

"Oh, I'm going to be awfully good," she said. "You'll see!"

It was Saturday the next day, and Maysie was just settling down to her drawing in the music-room, when Miss Elton appeared. Maysie looked up and smiled at her. It was no unusual thing for her science-mistress to come in and remark on her progress. But on this occasion no answering smile greeted her. Maysie was puzzled. Her inquiring grey eyes fell before Miss Elton's; she began to search her conscience. What had she done?

"I think it is a pity, Maysie," began Miss Elton, "that you put your talents to such an improfitable use."

As she spoke she laid before Maysie the paper that Ruth had exhibited to her in such triumph the day before. Maysie grew scarlet, and remained quite speechless. Her name up in the corner, the neat, even printing, so like her own, the altered diagram that Miss Elton had seen in its original form--they stared her in the face, condemning her beyond hope of appeal. She raised her head proudly, and tossed back the thick curly hair that hung over her shoulder.

"Where did it come from?" she asked.

"I picked it up from under the edge of my platform, but that is of no concern."

"But, Miss Elton----" stammered Maysie, growing suddenly confused.

"You have no excuse," put in Miss Elton, and her voice was all the harder because of the disappointment that she felt. "This is a piece of your paper, is it not?"

Maysie admitted that it was.

"And your diagram?"

"Yes; at least----"

"Is it, or is it not?"

Maysie's voice was very low.

"Yes, it is," she said.

Silence ensued, a brief, awkward silence. It was at this moment that Maysie made up her mind. She would not clear herself at the expense of her chum! Ruth should not be expelled through her!

Miss Elton believed her guilty; she would not undeceive her.

Miss Elton waited with her eyes on Maysie's paintings.

They were done as no other girl in the school would have done them, but the thought afforded her no satisfaction, though she had always prophesied great things of Maysie. Then she glanced at the child's downcast face.

"I am sorry about this, Maysie," she said, with the faintest suspicion of reproach in her voice, "I thought we were better friends."

A lump came into Maysie's throat, and the tears into her eyes. She looked at the microscope, at the tiny glass slides, at her unfinished sheet; but she had nothing to say.

"Of course," continued Miss Elton, "I shall have to show it to Miss Bennet. This comes, no doubt, of your friendship with Ruth. I have always said that she would do you no good."

Maysie listened with a swelling heart. Supposing Ruth should be sent for, and hear the whole story? Miss Elton was at the door; she ran up to her in desperation.

"Miss Elton," she faltered, "don't say anything to the girls, will you?"

Miss Elton made no promise. The petition made her think no better of Maysie.

The Fourth Form girls soon discovered that Maysie was in trouble, but no one could get anything out of her. Ruth was forbidden to join her in recreation, but on Sunday evening she managed to get a few minutes' talk with her.

"Do tell me what the row's about, Maysie," she said.

"Oh, nothing much," said Maysie. "Do let's talk about something else."

"But I always thought you liked Miss Elton?"

"So I do. Can't you get into a row with a mistress you like?"

"Well, I'd apologise, if I were you. She was very nice to me."

"I can't, so it's no good." And Maysie sat silent, confronting this new difficulty with a sinking heart. For how could she apologise, she asked herself, for what she had never done?

"Well, I think you might tell me," Ruth went on. "I told you about my row; and what's the good of being chums if we can't keep each other's secrets?"

But Maysie only sighed impatiently, and took up her library book.

"I wish you'd hurry up and finish those paintings of yours, and come back properly to class," went on Ruth. "Aren't they nearly done?"

Maysie grew white, and turned away her face.

"I'm not going to try this year," she said.

"Why, I thought----" began Ruth. "Oh, I see! What a shame!"

Maysie choked down a sob. After a pause she said:

"Perhaps I shall have more chance of a Star next year."

"You'd have got one this!" said Ruth indignantly. "How mean to punish you like that! And it's the only thing you care about!"

Maysie smiled. "Oh, never mind, dear," she said. "Everything seems mean to us. You don't understand."

"But if you apologised it would be all right?"

"I daresay it might, but I don't think so. Besides, they've got to be sent in by Wednesday, and I should hardly have time to do another sheet."

Things went on like this until Monday evening. Though there was only one day left, Maysie made no attempt to apologise. Miss Elton gave her every opportunity, for she, too, hoped that Miss Bennet might thus be induced to allow Maysie to finish her exhibition work, even at the last moment.

Maysie went to bed early that night. Her head had been aching all day, and by the time tea was over she could hardly hold it up. Ruth was greatly concerned about her, and, as a last resource, determined to speak to Miss Bennet.

Maysie soon got into bed, and, being alone in the dormitory, hid her face under the bed-clothes and sobbed. She was terribly homesick, poor child, and now, for the first time, she began to doubt whether she had done right after all; whether it would not have been wiser to have taken Miss Bennet into her confidence, and trusted to her to set things right. And then, there was that Silver Star! And a year was such a long time to have to wait. But, thinking of Ruth, she grew ashamed of herself, and dried her tears, and tried to go to sleep, though it was still quite light out of doors.

Ruth, meanwhile, was sitting on the floor in front of Miss Bennet's fire.

"It's about Maysie, Miss Bennet," she was saying. "I don't understand what she has done, but I'm sure there must be some reason for her not apologising."

Miss Bennet made no remark.

"She's so fond of Miss Elton, too. I don't see how she could have meant to be rude to her."

"I'm afraid there is not much doubt about that," was the answer.

"It seems to me," went on Ruth nervously, "that there's some mystery about it. Maysie won't tell me anything."

"Maysie has no reason to be proud of herself," replied Miss Bennet coldly.

"It seems so horrid her not going in for the exhibition, and she's so good at painting."

"There are various ways of making use of one's talents," said Miss Bennet, rising. "Now this----"

Ruth jumped to her feet, and stood gazing. There, on Miss Bennet's writing-table, lay the identical scrap of paper that she had shown to Maysie the Friday before. "Miss E. in a tantrum!" There, too, was Maysie's name in the corner. In a moment everything was clear.

"That!" she exclaimed. "Maysie didn't do that!"

Miss Bennet looked at her doubtfully.

"I did it!" she went on. "Oh, if I'd only known! Why didn't some one tell me about it?"

"My dear child," began Miss Bennet.

"Yes, I did it!" repeated Ruth passionately. "It's Maysie's drawing, but I altered it, I made up the words. Poor little Maysie! And she was so keen on trying for the exhibition! It's so horribly unfair, when I did it all the time!" She broke off with a sob, hardly knowing what she was saying.

"But why----"

"I didn't know, and of course she wouldn't sneak about me--catch Maysie sneaking! I told her I should be expelled if I got into another row."

Miss Bennet tried to calm her.

"Come, dear child," she said gravely; "if Maysie has been punished for your fault, we must do our best to set things right at once. Tell me how it happened."

Ruth explained as well as she could.

"And now Maysie's gone to bed," she added regretfully.

"Then I will go up to her. You can go back to your class-room."

Miss Bennet found Maysie asleep, with flushed cheeks, and eyelashes still wet with tears. She stooped down, and kissed her gently. Maysie opened her eyes with a sigh, and then sat up in bed. It had seemed almost as if her mother were bending over her. "I am going to scold you, Maysie," said Miss Bennet, but her smile belied her words.

Maysie smiled faintly in answer.

"Why have you allowed us to do you an injustice?"

The child was overwrought, and a sudden dread seized hold of her.

"Why--what do you mean, Miss Bennet?" she faltered.

"Ruth has explained everything to me. It is a great pity this mistake should have been made----"

Maysie interrupted her.

"It was before she got sent out of class, Miss Bennet," she said. "Oh! don't be angry with her! Don't send her away, will you?"

In her earnestness she laid her hand on Miss Bennet's arm. Miss Bennet drew her to her, and kissed her again.

"Poor child!" she said. "So that's what you've been worrying your little head about. No, I won't send her away, Miss Elton tells me that she has improved already, and I am sure she will forgive her when she knows everything."

Maysie thanked her with tears in her eyes.

"And now, I have one other thing to say," Miss Bennet continued. "You must go to sleep at once, and wake up quite fresh and bright to-morrow morning, and you shall give up the whole day to your painting. What do you say to that?"

"How lovely!" exclaimed Maysie. "I shall get it done after all! Thank you very, very much, Miss Bennet. Oh, I am so happy!" And she put her arms round Miss Bennet's neck, and gave her an enthusiastic hug.

Maysie worked hard at her "Mycetozoa" the next day, and finished her third sheet with complete success. Some weeks afterwards, Miss Bennet sent for her to her room.

"I am glad to be able to tell you, Maysie," she said, "that you have gained the Drawing Society's Silver Star."

Maysie drew a long breath; her heart was too full for words. The Silver Star! Could it be true?

Ruth was one of the first to congratulate her.

"I always said you'd get it, dear," she remarked as they walked round the garden together. "And I'm just as glad as you are about it. I haven't forgotten that it was through me you nearly lost the chance!"

Maysie returned the pressure of Ruth's hand without answering. Was not the Silver Star the more to be prized for its association in thought with those hours of lonely perplexity that she had gone through for the sake of her friend?

UNCLE TONE.

BY KATE GODKIN.

"Mother darling! Is Uncle Tone really coming to see us at last? I heard you tell father something about it," I said to my mother as she sat by my couch, to which I had been tied for some weeks in consequence of a cycling accident.

I had broken my leg, but had now so far recovered as to be able to move cautiously with a stick. It was the first illness that I could remember, and I was an only child, much loved, and I suppose much spoiled by the most indulgent of fathers and mothers. I therefore made the most of my opportunities and called freely on their resources for entertainment.

"Yes, love, I am happy to say he is. He has not been here now since you were quite a little girl, eight years ago. You were just eight."

"Mother," I continued coaxingly, for I loved a story, "why are you so fond of him, he is only your step-brother?"

"Step-brother!" she exclaimed. "He has been more than a brother to me. He has been a father, far far more," she added sadly, "than my own father was. He is, you know, nearly twenty years older than I."

"Will you tell me something about it?" I asked softly.

It was twilight in July, and I lay at the open French window which led from the drawing-room to the lawn, and from which we had a view across the park, far out over the country, bounded by the twinkling lights of Southampton in the distance, for our house was situated on an elevation in one of the loveliest spots in the New Forest. Dinner was over and father was in the library clearing off some pressing work, as he had to leave home for a day or two. It seemed to me the very time for reminiscences.

"I think I will," said my mother slowly and thoughtfully.

She was a small, graceful woman, of about forty then, whose soft, dark hair was just beginning to be touched with grey, but her face was as fresh and dainty-looking as a girl's; a strong, sweet face that I loved to look at, and that now, that she is no longer with me, I love to remember.

"You ought to know what he did for your mother, and how much you owe him indirectly. I should like him, too, to feel that he has his reward in you."

My curiosity was excited, for I had never heard my mother speak like that before, and so I settled myself to listen, and to enjoy what she had to say.

"My childhood was a very wretched one, Cora," she began. "For that reason I have spoken little of it to you, but endeavoured, assisted by your father, to make yours the very opposite to it as far as lay in my power, and that I could do so is due, I may say wholly, to your Uncle Tone, who taught me to be happy myself, and to endeavour to make others so."

I slipped my hand into my dear mother's; she was the best, most loving, and wisest mother that ever lived.

"My mother died when I was born," she continued, "and my father took his loss so to heart that he shut himself off from all society, grew silent and morose, and," she added after some hesitation, "became in time a drunkard."

She brought these words out with such an effort, such difficulty, that the tears came to my eyes, and I whispered, "Don't go on, mother darling, if it hurts you." She continued, however, without appearing to notice my interruption.

"I ran wild till I was twelve or thirteen years of age, I had no society but my father's and the servants', and I got no regular education. He would not send me to school, but the vicar's daughter came over for an hour or two every day to teach me what I could be induced to learn, which was little enough. I was hot-tempered, headstrong, self-willed, accustomed to fight for what I wanted, getting nothing by any other means, and doing without what I could not get in that way. No softening, no refining influence came into my life. My one pleasure even then was music. I had a passion for it. Miss Vincent, the vicar's daughter, taught me to play the piano, and I used to spend hours in the deserted drawing-room, playing what I knew, and picking out tunes by myself, while my father was shut up in his study. We had no near relation, no one who cared enough to take pity on an unruly, troublesome, little girl, with a drunken father. When I was between twelve and thirteen he died, and a godmother who lived in Scotland took charge of me, and sent me to a boarding-school, at which I spent the next four years. Schools were not then what they are now, particularly in Scotland, and between the time spent there and the holidays with Miss Clark, who was a stern, old maid and a confirmed invalid, my life was very dreary; I was becoming harder, and harder. I did not know in fact that I had any feelings; they were not cultivated amongst the people who had to do with me. She, also, died before I was seventeen, and then something happened which was to change my whole life. My step-brother, whom I had never seen, wrote to Miss McDougall, with whom I was at school, saying that my home would, henceforth, be with him. Your Uncle Tone was my father's son by his first marriage, and when his father married my mother, Tone went to live with his maternal grandfather, who, on his death, left him the beautiful place in Derbyshire to which I was to go. He lived there with an old aunt. This news affected me very little; I had never had a happy home, a real home; I did not know what that was, but I presumed I should go somewhere on leaving school.

"My love of music had, in the meantime, increased. I had had a very good master, a real musician, and I had worked hard for him. To me it was a delight, but I never thought nor cared that it could give pleasure to any one else. I used to shut myself up for hours in the holidays, out of hearing of my godmother, who seldom left her room, and play, and play, till my arms ached.

"I remember well the day he came for me. I was ready, waiting, when the maid brought me the message that Sir Tone Wolsten was in the drawing-room. He was standing on the hearth-rug talking to Miss McDougall, and looked so tall to me. He is over six feet. I can see him now as he stood there, erect, broad-shouldered, with bright chestnut hair, clear, keen, dark blue eyes, and bronzed skin, a strong, kind, fearless face. He looked a thorough man, one to be trusted. He greeted me very kindly as his little sister, and took me home with him. Goldmead Park was the loveliest place I had ever seen. His Aunt Evangeline, whom I also called 'aunt,' was a frail, querulous old lady, whom he treated as his mother. He did not marry till after her death, five years later. I was planted in entirely new surroundings, with everything pleasant about me, everything that I could desire, or ought to have desired. Your uncle was kindness itself. He taught me to ride and to drive, supplied me with books, took the greatest interest in me; but the restrictions of every well-ordered home which would have been nothing to a properly trained girl were unendurable to me. I resisted from sheer perverseness and dislike of control. I do not mean to say that I was always ill-tempered; I was lively and merry enough, and your uncle used to tease me, and jest with me, which I enjoyed very much, and responded to willingly.

"Some weeks had passed like this, my step-brother being most kind and indulgent. Frequently Aunt Evangeline had asked me to play to them in the evening after dinner, but I had refused obstinately. I liked to play to myself, but I had never been accustomed to do so before any one, and it never entered my head that it could give them pleasure, or that I was bound to do it out of politeness. At last she became more irritable and frequently made sarcastic remarks about the young people of the present day. This happened again one evening, and I answered sharply, not to say rudely.

"The next morning I wandered through the woods belonging to the park, gathering violets, and had sat down, hot and tired, under a lovely chestnut, with my lap full of flowers which I was arranging and tying up in bunches in order to carry them home more easily. I heard footsteps, which I recognised by their briskness and firmness, and looking up I saw my brother approach, walking, as usual, erect, with his head well thrown back but with stern lines in his face which I had not seen there before. I looked up smiling, expecting his usual kind greeting, but instead of that he strode straight up and stopped in front of me.

"'I was just thinking of you, Elfie,' he said, looking down at me, 'I have something to say to you which I can as well say here as any place else. I don't know why you should be so unamiable and discourteous to my aunt, as you are, and I cannot allow it to continue. I will say nothing of your manner to me. You receive here nothing but kindness. My great desire is to make you happy, but it does not seem as if I succeeded very well. At any rate, Aunt Evangeline must not be made uncomfortable, and I should be doing you a wrong if I allowed you to behave so rudely.'

"'Why can't she leave me alone?' I exclaimed angrily, 'I don't want to play to her.'

"'One does not leave little girls alone,' he answered calmly and sternly, 'and such behaviour from a young girl to an old lady is most unbecoming. It must come to an end, and the sooner the better! To-night,' he continued in a tone that made me look up at him, 'you will apologise to my aunt and offer to play.'

"'I shall do nothing of the sort!' I exclaimed, turning crimson.

"'Oh yes, you will,' he answered quietly, 'I am accustomed to be obeyed, and I don't think my little sister will defy me.'

"And with that he strode away, leaving me in a perfect turmoil of angry feelings. I jumped up, scattering my lapful of violets, and started to walk in the opposite direction. At lunch we met, he ignored me completely, but I did not care, I felt hard and defiant.

"After dinner, he conducted Aunt Evangeline to the drawing-room as usual, and as soon as she was seated he turned and looked at me, and waited. I made no move, though I felt my courage, which had never before forsaken me, ebb very low. He waited a few moments, and then said in a tone, which in spite of all my efforts I could not resist:

"'Now, Elfie!'

"I rose slowly, with his eyes fixed on me all the time, crossed the room to Aunt Evangeline, and stopped in front of her. 'I am sorry, Aunt Evangeline, that I have been so rude to you,' I said in a low, trembling voice. 'If you wish, I will play to you now.'

"I felt as if it were not I myself, but some one outside me that was moving and speaking for me. I wished not to do it, but I was compelled by my brother's force of will, as much as if I had been hypnotised.

"'Do, dear, do!' the old lady exclaimed kindly and eagerly. 'I am so fond of music, we both are, and we rarely have any one here who can play.'

"I chose a piece in which I could give vent to the stormy feelings raging within me. When I had finished I rose from the piano.

"'Thank you, dear,' she exclaimed. 'That was a treat!'

"'Such a treat,' remarked my brother, 'that it is hard to understand the discourtesy and want of amiability that have deprived us of it so long. Play something else, Elfie!' This was said quietly, but I was as powerless to resist as if it were the sternest command.

"So I played three or four more pieces at his request, and then getting up, took my work and sat down in silence at some distance from them, while they 'talked music' In about half an hour he turned to me again and asked me to play a particular piece which they had been discussing. 'Perhaps she is tired,' suggested Aunt Evangeline kindly.

"'It does not tire her to play for hours by herself,' was the quiet rejoinder.

"I went to the piano in a mutinous, half desperate mood, thinking I would go on till they were sick of it, so I played on and on. Presently I forgot them, got lost in my music, and as usual my angry feelings died away. I had no idea how long I had been playing when I became conscious of a feeling of emotion I had never experienced before. I felt my heart swell and my face flush, and with a sudden sob I burst into tears. I was more startled than they were, for I had never, as far as I could remember, shed a tear except with anger, and this was certainly not anger. I started up and was about to leave the room hastily, when Tone said in the same calm tone:

"Stay here, Elfie, you have no need to be ashamed of those tears.'

"At home I should have rushed from the room, banging the door after me: I could give myself no account of my reason for going and sitting down quietly instead; I did so, nevertheless, though I could not suppress my sobs for some time. At last I became, outwardly at least, calm.

"Aunt Evangeline always retired to her room about nine o'clock, and at first I did the same, but then my brother detained me for a game of chess which he taught me to play, and to talk about some books that he had given me to read, so that we usually sat together till ten o'clock. That night, however, I had no mind to sit alone with him for an hour, so I turned to say good-night as aunt was leaving the room. He held the door open for her, bade her 'good-night,' and then closed it as deliberately as if he had not seen my outstretched hand. He then turned to me, and took it, cold and trembling as it was, in his own firm, warm grasp, but with no intention of letting me go. Holding it, he looked searchingly, but with a kind smile, into my face.

"'Is this revenge or punishment, Elfie?' he asked.

"'I don't know what you mean,' I exclaimed in confusion.

"'My game of chess?'

"'You won't want to play with me to-night, and I can't play either,' I said, pressing my disengaged hand to my hot forehead. 'My stupidity would try your patience more than ever.'

"'You must not say that,' he replied quietly, 'you are not stupid, and as I have never felt the slightest shade of impatience, I cannot have shown any. You play quite well enough to give me a very good game, but I daresay you cannot to-night. One wants a cool, clear head for chess. Let us talk instead.' So saying he led me to the chair aunt had just left, put me in it, and drew his own chair nearer.

"'I don't want you to go to your room feeling lonely and upset,' he said, 'I should like to see your peace of mind restored first. I should like you to feel some satisfaction from the victory you have won over your self-will to-night.'

"'The victory, such as it is, is yours!' I blurted out, looking away.

"'You say that,' he replied very gently, 'as if you thought it a poor thing for a man to bully a young girl. Don't forget, Elfie, that I am nearly old enough to be your father, that, in fact, I stand in that position to you--I am your only relative and protector--that I am right and you are wrong, and above all that it is for your own sake that I do it. Poor child! you have had far too little home life and home influence. I want you to be happy here, but the greatest source of happiness lies in ourselves. What Milton says is very true, "The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a hell of heaven, a heaven of hell." You cannot be happy and make those around you happy, as long as you are the slave of your will. A strong will is one of the most valuable gifts we can have, but it must be our servant, not our master, or it will prove a curse instead of a blessing. It must be under our control, or it will force us to do things of which our good sense, good feeling, and our consciences all disapprove. We must be able to use it against ourselves if need be. You are nearly grown up, Elfie, and still such an undisciplined child! What you will not learn with me and let me teach you in the next two or three years, the world will teach you very harshly later. We none of us can go through life, least of all a woman, doing what we like, knocking against every one as we go along. We get very hard knocks back, and they hurt. We miss, too, the best happiness that life can give. It contains none to equal that of making other people happy. As we treat them, they treat us.

"'It is not in the least your fault, little one,' he added very kindly, 'you have had no chance of being different. You have, I am afraid, received very little kindness, but help me to change all this. Don't think for a moment that I want to subdue your will to mine, that I want forced obedience to my wishes--that is the last thing I desire. I want to place your will under your control. I forced you to do to-night what I wanted, to make a beginning, to show you it was possible, to let you feel the pleasure of being agreeable, to stir some gentler, softer feelings in you. They came, much to your surprise, though not to mine. We all have them, and it is not good to crush them.'

"While he was talking, a strange, subdued feeling came over me, such as I had never known before. He spoke gently and impressively, in a deep, soft tone peculiar to him when very much in earnest. I felt I wanted to be what he wished me to be, to do what he wanted, and this sensation was so new to me, that I could not at all understand it. I felt impelled to tell him, but I was ashamed. I had never in my life been sorry for anything I had done, still less acknowledged a fault. It was a new and strange experience, I felt like a dumb animal as I raised my eyes piteously to his.

"'What is it, little one? You want to say something, surely you are not afraid?' he asked gently.

"'Forgive me, Tone,' I gasped, as two big tears rolled down my cheeks, 'I am sorry.'

"'I am glad to hear you say you are sorry,' he said, taking my hand, 'but between us there is no question of forgiveness. I have nothing to pardon, I am not angry, I want to help you.'

"'I never felt like this before,' I muttered, 'I don't understand it, but I will try to do what you want.'

"'You feel like this, Elfie, because you know that I am right, and that I only want what is good for you. I want you to be happy, to open your heart to the kindness we wish to show you, and to encourage feelings of kindness in yourself towards other people. When you feel hard, and cross, and disobliging, try to remember what I have been saying, and let me help. Even if I have to appear stern sometimes, don't misunderstand it.'

"He then talked about my mother, my home, told me something of my father as he had known him, until he actually succeeded in making me feel peaceful and happy.

"From that day he never for a moment lost sight of the object he had in view. He had me with him as much as possible, for long walks, rides and drives. With infinite patience but unvarying firmness, he helped me along, recognising every effort I made, appreciating my difficulties, never putting an unnecessary restriction on me. So he moulded and formed my character, lavishing kindness and affection on me in which, I must say, Aunt Evangeline was not far behind, awakening all that was best and noblest in my nature, never allowing simple submission of my will to his.

"On my wedding-day, as we were bidding each other 'Good-bye!' he said:

"'You will be happy now, little sister, I know it. You have striven nobly and will have your reward.'

"'The reward should be yours, Tone, not mine,' I answered, as I put my arms round his neck and kissed him.

"Do you wonder now, Cora, that I love him so dearly, though he is my step-brother?" my mother asked as she concluded, "and that I should like him to see that I have endeavoured to do for you what he did for me?"

A NIGHT ON THE ROAD.

BY MARGARET WATSON.

The summer holidays had begun, and I was to travel home alone from Paddington to Upperton.

I was quite old enough to travel alone, for I was fourteen, but it so happened that I had never taken this journey by myself before. There was only one change, and at Upperton the pony-cart would be waiting for me. It was all quite simple, and I rather rejoiced in my independence as my cab drew up under the archway at Paddington. But there my difficulties began.

There was a raging, roaring crowd going off for holidays too. The cabman demanded double the legal fare. It was a quarter of an hour before I could get a porter for my luggage, and then I had almost to fight my way to the ticket-office. When at last I had got my ticket the train was due out.

"Jump in anywhere," said the porter; "I'll see that your luggage goes."

The carriages were crammed full. I raced down the platform till I saw room for one, and then tore open the door, an sank into my seat as the train steamed out of the station.

I looked round for sympathy at my narrow escape, but my fellow-travellers were evidently one party. They looked at me coldly, as at an unwelcome intruder, and drew more closely together, discussing the day's doings; so I curled up in my corner and gave myself up to anticipations of the holidays.

These were so engrossing that I took no count of the stations we passed through. I was just picturing to myself the delights of a long ride on the pony, when, to my amazement the stopping of the train was followed by the loud exhortation:

"All change here!"

"Why, where are we?" I asked, looking up bewildered.

"At Lowford," replied one of my fellow-passengers.

But they gathered up their parcels, and swept out of the carriage without a question as to my destination.

I seized on a porter.

"How did I get here?" I asked him; "I was going to Upperton. What has happened?"

"Upperton, was you?" said the man. "Why, you must ha' got into the slip carriage for Lowford. I s'pose 'twas a smartish crowd at Paddin'ton."

"It was," I replied, "and I hadn't time to ask if I was right. I suppose my luggage has gone on. But what can I do now? How far is it to Upperton? Is there another train?"

"Well, no, there ain't another train, not to-night. It's a matter of fifteen mile to Upperton by the road."

"Which way is it?"

"Well, you couldn't miss it, that goes straight on pretty nigh all the way. You've only got to follow the telegraph-postes till you comes to the "Leather Bottle," and then you turns to the right."

"I know my way from there."

"But you could never walk all that way to-night. You'd better by half stay at the hotel, and go on by rail in the morning."

"I'll wire to them at home to drive along the road and meet me, and I'll walk on till they do."

"Well, it's fine, and I dessay they'll meet you more'n half way, but 'tis a lonely road this time o' night."

"I'm not afraid," said I, and walked off briskly.

I bought a couple of buns in a baker's shop, and went on to the telegraph office--only to be told it was just after eight o'clock, and they could send no message that night.

I turned out my pockets, but all the coins I had were a sixpenny and a threepenny piece--not enough to pay for a night's lodging, I was sure. The cabman's extortion, and a half-crown I had given to the porter at Paddington in my haste, had reduced me to this.

What should I do? I was not long deciding to walk on. Perhaps they would guess what had happened at home and send to meet me. The spice of adventure appealed to me. If I had gone back to the porter he would probably have taken me to the hotel, and they would have trusted me. But I did not think of that--I imagine I did not want to think of it. I had been used to country roads all my life, and it was a perfect evening in late July.

My way lay straight into the heart of the setting sun as I took the road. In a clear sky, all pale yellow and pink and green, the sun was disappearing behind the line of beech-covered hills which lay between me and home, but behind me the moon--as yet only like a tiny round white cloud--was rising.

I felt like dancing along the road at first. The sense of freedom was intoxicating. The scent of wild honeysuckle and cluster roses came from the hedgerows. I ate my buns as I walked along; I had made three and a half miles by the milestones in the first hour, and enjoyed every step of the way.

"If they don't meet me," I thought, "how astonished they will be when I walk in! It will be something to brag of for many a day, to have walked fifteen miles after eight o'clock at night."

The daylight had faded, but the moon was so bright and clear that the shadows of my solitary figure and the "telegraph-postes" were as black and sharp as at noonday. Bats were flitting about up and down. A white owl flew silently across the road. Rabbits were playing in the fields in the silver light. It was all very beautiful, but a little lonely and eerie. I hadn't passed a house for a mile.

Then I heard wheels behind me.

If it were some kind person who would give me a lift!

But I heard a lash used cruelly, and a rough, hoarse voice swearing at the horse.

I hurried on, but of course the cart overtook me in a minute.

The man pulled up. He leaned down out of the cart to look at me, and I saw his coarse, flushed face and watery eyes.

"Want a lift, my dear?" he asked.

"No, thank you," I answered, "I much prefer walking."

"Too late for a gal like you to be out," he said; "you jump up and drive along o' me."

"No, thank you," I repeated, walking on as fast as I could.

He whipped his horse on to keep pace with me; then, leaning on the dashboard, he made as though he would climb out of the cart. But just at that moment a big bird rustled out of the hedge--the horse sprang aside, precipitated his master into the bottom of the cart, and went off at a gallop. Very thankful I was to see them disappear into the distance!

I was shaking so with fear that I had to sit down on a stone heap for a while.

I pulled myself together and started on again, but all joy was gone from the adventure--there seemed really to be too much adventure about it.

Three miles, four miles more I walked; but they did not go as the first miles had gone. It was eleven o'clock, and I was only halfway; at this rate I could not be home before two in the morning. If they had been coming to meet me they would have done so before this. They must have given me up for the night, every one would be in bed and asleep, and to wake them up in the small hours would frighten them more than my not coming home had done.

Moreover, the long road over the hill and through the woods was before me. The thought of the moonlit, silent woods, with their weird shadows, was too much for me; I looked about for a place of refuge for the night.

I soon found one.

A splendid rick of hay in a field close to the road had been cut. Halfway up it there was a wide, broad ledge--just the place for a bed. I did not take long to reach it, and, pulling some loose hay over myself in case it grew chilly at dawn, I said my prayers--they were real prayers that night--and was soon asleep in my soft, fragrant bed.

The sun woke me, shining hot on my nest. I looked at my watch, it was six o'clock. Thrushes and blackbirds were singing their hearts out, swallows were darting by, high in air a lark was hovering right above my head, with quivering wings, singing his morning hymn of praise. I knelt, up there on the hayrick, and let my thanks go with his to heaven's gate.

I had never felt such a keen sense of gratitude as I did that summer morning: the dangers of the night all past and over, and a beautiful new day given to me, and only seven miles and a half between me and home.

'Tis true that I was very hungry, but I started on my way and soon came to a cottage whose mistress was up giving her husband his breakfast. She very willingly gave me as much bread-and-butter as I could eat, and a cup of tea. I did not quarrel with the thickness of the bread or the quality of the butter, or even with the milkless tea--I had the poor man's sauce to flavour them.

When she heard my story, the woman overwhelmed me with pity and regrets that I had not reached her house overnight and slept there. But I did not regret it. I would not have given up my "night on the road" now it was over for worlds.

She was grateful for the sixpence I gave her--having learnt wisdom, I reserved the threepenny bit--and I went on.

The air was delicious, with a spring and exhilaration in it which belongs to the early morning hours. The sunlight played hide-and-seek in the woods. Patches of purple heath alternated with lilac scabious and pale hare-bells. The brake ferns were yellow-tipped here and there--a forewarning of autumn--and in one little nook I found a bed of luscious wild strawberries. My heart danced with my feet, and I wondered if the tramps ever felt as I did, in the summer mornings, after sleeping out under a hedge.

I reached home by nine o'clock, and then there was a hubbub, and a calling out of, "Here's Muriel!" "Why, Muriel, where have you sprung from?" "What happened last night? We were so frightened, but they told us at the station that it was an awful crowd at Paddington, and you must have missed the train, and of course we thought you would go back to Miss Black's, but you ought to have wired."

It was ever so long before I could make them believe that I had been out all night, and slept in a hayrick; and then mother was almost angry with me, and father told me if ever I found myself in such a predicament again I was to go to a respectable hotel and persuade them to take me in. But he said he would take very good care that no child of his should ever be in such a predicament again. But I could not be sorry, the beginning and the end were so beautiful.

THE MISSING LETTER.

BY JENNIE CHAPPELL.

The Briars was a very old-fashioned house, standing in its own grounds, about ten miles from Smokeytown. It was much dilapidated, for Miss Clare the owner and occupier, had not the necessary means for repairing it, and as she had lived there from her birth--a period of nearly sixty years--did not like to have the old place pulled down. Not more than half the rooms were habitable, and in one of them---the former dining-room--there sat, one January afternoon, Miss Clare, with her young nephew and niece. They were having tea, and the firelight danced cosily on the worn, once handsome furniture, and the portly metal teapot, which replaced the silver one, long since parted with for half its value in current coin. The only modern article in the room, excepting the aforesaid nephew and niece, was a pretty, though inexpensive, pianoforte, which stood under a black-looking portrait of a severe-visaged lady with her waist just under her arms, and a general resemblance, as irreverent Aubrey said, to a yard and a half of pump water.

Just now Miss Clare was consuming toast in silence, and Kate was wondering if there was any way of making bows that had been washed twice and turned three times look like new; while Aubrey's handsome head was bent over a book, for he was addicted to replenishing mind and body at the same time. Suddenly Miss Clare exclaimed, "Dear me; it is fifty years to-day since Marjorie Westford died!"

Kate glanced up at the pump-water lady, with the laconic remark, "Fancy!"

"It's very likely that on such an interesting anniversary the fair Miss Marjorie may revisit her former haunts," said Aubrey, raising a pair of glorious dark eyes with a mischievous smile; "so if you hear an unearthly bumping and squealing in the small hours, you may know who it is."

"The idea of a ghost 'bumping and squealing,'" laughed Kate. "And Miss Marjorie, too! The orthodox groan and glide would be more like her style." Then her mind wandered to a story connected with that lady, which had given rise to much speculation on the part of the young Clares. Half a century ago there lived at the Briars a family consisting of a brother and two sisters; the former a gay young spendthrift of twenty-five; the girls, Anna, aged twenty, and Lucy, the present Miss Clare, nine years old respectively. With them resided a maiden sister of their mother's, Marjorie Westford, an eccentric person, whose property at her death reverted to a distant relative. A short time before she died she divided her few trinkets and personal possessions between the three young people, bequeathing to Anna, in addition, a sealed letter, to be read on her twenty-first birthday. The girl hid the packet away lest she should be tempted to read it before the appointed time; but ere that arrived she was drowned by the upsetting of a boat, and never since had the concealed letter been found, although every likely place had been searched for it. Lucy never married, and George had but one son, whose wife died soon after the birth of Kate, and in less than a year he married again, this time to a beautiful young heiress, subsequently mother to Aubrey, who was thus rather more than two years Kate's junior.

The younger George Clare, a spendthrift like his father, speedily squandered his wife's fortune, and died, leaving her with barely sufficient to keep herself and little son from want. Yet such was Mrs. Clare's undying love for the husband who had treated her so badly, that in their greatest straits she refused to part with a locket containing his likeness and hers which was valuable by reason of the diamonds and sapphires with which it was encrusted. This locket was the only thing she had to leave her little Aubrey when she died, and he, a lovely boy of nine summers, went with his half-sister (who had a small sum of money settled on her by her maternal grandfather) to reside with their great-aunt, Miss Clare.

Presently the quietness at the tea-table was disturbed by a loud single knock at the front door, and Aubrey bounced out of the room.

"A note from Mr. Green," he said, returning. "I wonder what's up now? No good, I'm afraid."

This foreboding was only too fully realised. The agent for Miss Clare's little property at Smokeytown wrote to tell her that during a recent gale one of her best houses had been so much injured by the falling of a factory chimney, that the repairs would cost quite L30 before it could again be habitable. This was a dire misfortune. So closely was their income cut, and so carefully apportioned to meet the household expenses, that, after fullest consideration, Miss Clare could only see her way clear for getting together about L15 towards meeting this unexpected demand, and three very anxious faces bent around the table in discussion.

Presently Aubrey slipped away and ran upstairs to his own room. He then lit a candle, and pulling a box from under an old horse-hair chair, unlocked it, taking out a small morocco case, which, when opened, revealed something that sparkled and scintillated even in the feeble rays of the cheap "composite." It was the precious locket, placed in his hands by his dying mother four years before. Inside were two exquisite miniatures on ivory--the one a handsome, careless-looking man, the other, on which the boy's tender gaze was now fixed, was the portrait of a lady, with just such pure, bright features, and sweet, dark-grey eyes as Aubrey himself.

"Mother, my own darling," he murmured, pressing the picture to his lips, "how can I part with you?" And dropping his head on the hard, prickly cushion, by which he knelt, he cried in a way that would considerably have astonished the youths with whom he had, a few hours earlier, engaged in a vigorous snowball fight. They only knew a bright, mirthful Aubrey Clare, the cleverest lad in his class, and the "jolliest fellow out;" none but Kate had any idea of the deepest affections of his boyish heart, and she truly sympathised with her half-brother in his love for the only portrait and souvenir remaining of the gentle creature who had so well supplied a mother's place for her. Something in Aubrey's face when he left the room had told her of his thoughts, so presently she followed him and tapped at the half-open door. Obtaining no answer, she entered, and saw the boy kneeling before the old chair with his head bent. The open case lay beside him, and Kate easily guessed what it was held so tightly in his clenched hand. She stooped beside him, and stroked his wavy hair caressingly as she said, "It can't be that, Aubrey."

"It must," replied a muffled voice from the chair cushion.

"It sha'n't be," said Kate firmly. "I've thought of a plan----"

But Aubrey sprang to his feet. "See here, Katie," he said excitedly, but with quivering voice; "I've been making an idol of this locket. It ought to have gone before, when aunt lost so much money by those Joneses; but you both humoured my selfishness."

"Being fond of anything, especially anything like that, isn't making an idol of it, I'm sure," said Katie.

"It is if it prevents you doing what you ought, I tell you, Katie; it's downright dishonest of me to keep this," he continued, with burning cheeks, "living as I am upon charity, and aunt so poor. I see it plainly now. Mr. Wallis offered to buy it of me last summer, and if he likes he shall have it now."

"He is gone to Rillford," said Kate, in whose mind an idea was beginning to hatch.

"He'll be back on Saturday, and then I'll ask him. It won't be really losing mamma's likeness, you know," he added, with a pathetic attempt at his own bright smile. "Whenever I shut my eyes I can see her face, just as she looked when----" but he was stopped by a queer fit of coughing and rubbed the curl of his hair that always tumbled over his forehead; so Katie couldn't see his face, but she knew what the sacrifice must cost him, and, girl-like, exalted him to a pedestal of heroism immediately; but when she would have bestowed an enthusiastic embrace, he slipped away from her and ran downstairs.

Left alone, Kate stood long at the uncurtained window, gazing at the unearthlike beauty of the moonlit snow. When at last she turned away, the afore mentioned idea was fully fledged and strong.

She found her hero with his nose ungracefully tucked into an uncut magazine, and his chair tilted at a perilous angle with the floor, just like any ordinary boy, and felt a tiny bit disappointed. Presently she turned to the piano, which was to her a companion and never failing delight. She had a taste for music, which Miss Clare had, as far as was practicable, cultivated; and although Kate had not received much instruction, she played with a sweetness and expression that quite made up for any lack of brilliant execution. This evening her touch was very tender, and the tunes she played were sad.

By-and-bye Katie lingered, talking earnestly with her aunt long after Aubrey had gone to bed; and when at last she wished her good-night, she added, anxiously, "Then I really may, auntie; you are sure you don't mind?"

And Miss Clare said, "I give you full permission to do what you like, dear. If you love Aubrey well enough to make so great a sacrifice for him, I hope he will appreciate your generosity as he ought; but whether he does or not, you will surely not lose your reward. I am more grieved than I can tell you to know that it is necessary."

Two days later, Aubrey was just going to tear a piece off the Smokeytown Standard to do up a screw of ultramarine, when his eye was arrested by an advertisement which he read two or three times before he could believe the evidence of his senses; it was this,--

"To be sold immediately, a pretty walnut-wood cottage pianoforte, in excellent condition, and with all the latest improvements. Price 15l. Apply at 'The Briars,' London Road."

He rushed upstairs to Kate, who, with her head adorned by a check duster, was busy sweeping (for they had no servant), and burst in upon her with, "What on earth are you going to sell it for?"

There was no need to inquire what "it" was, and Kate, without pausing in her occupation, replied, "To help make up the money aunt wants."

"But if Mr. Wallis buys the locket;" then the truth flashed upon him, and he broke off suddenly, "Oh, Katie, you're never going to----"

"Sell the piano because I don't want the locket to go," finished Katie, with a smile, that in spite of the check duster made her look quite angelic.

Aubrey flew at her, and hugging her, broom and all, exclaimed,--

"Oh, how could you! You are too good; I didn't half deserve it. Was there ever such a darling sister before?" and a great deal more in the same strain, as he showered kisses upon her till he took away her breath, one moment declaring that she shouldn't do it and he wouldn't have it, and the next assuring her that he could never thank her enough, and never forget it as long as he lived. And Katie was as happy as he was.

It was rather a damper, however, when that day passed, and the next, and no one came to look even at the bargain. Aubrey said that if no purchaser appeared before the following Wednesday, he should certainly go to Mr. Wallis about the locket; and it really seemed as if Katie's sacrifice was not to be made after all.

Tuesday afternoon came, still nobody had been in answer to the advertisement. It was a pouring wet day, and Aubrey's holiday hung heavily on his hands. He had read every book he could get at, painted two illuminations, constructed several "patent" articles for Kate, which would have been great successes, but for sundry "ifs," and abandoned as hopeless the task of teaching Caesar, Miss Clare's asthmatic old dog, to stand upon his hind legs, and was now gazing drearily out on the soaked garden, almost wishing the vacation over. Suddenly he turned to his sister, who was holding a skein of worsted for her aunt to wind, exclaiming, "Katie, I've struck a bright!"

"What is it?" she asked, understanding that he had had an inspiration of some sort. "An apparatus for getting at nuts without cracking them; or a chest-protector for Caesar to wear in damp weather?"

"Neither; I'm going to rummage in the old bookcase upstairs, and see if I can come across anything fit to read, or an adventure." And not being in the habit of letting the grass grow under his feet (if vegetation was ever known to develop in such unfavourable circumstances), he bounded away; while Miss Clare observed, rather anxiously, "When that boy goes adventure-seeking, it generally ends in a catastrophe; but I don't think he can do much mischief up there."

Ten minutes afterwards, Katie went to see how Aubrey was getting on, and found him doing nothing worse than polishing the covers of some very dirty old books with one of his best pocket-handkerchiefs. When she remonstrated with him, he recommended her to get a proper, ordained duster, and undertake that part of the programme herself. So presently she was quite busy, for Aubrey tossed the books out much faster than she could dust and examine them. Very discoloured, mouldy-smelling old books they were, of a remarkably uninteresting character generally, which perhaps accounted for their long abandonment to the dust and damp of that unused apartment. When the case was emptied, and the contents piled upon the floor, Aubrey said, "Now lend us a hand to pull the old thing out, and see what's behind."

"Spiders," replied Katie promptly, edging back.

"I'll have the satisfaction of a gentleman of the first spider that looks at you," said Aubrey, reassuringly. "Come, catch hold!"

So Katie "caught hold;" and between them they managed to drag the cumbrous piece of furniture sufficiently far out of the recess in which it stood for the boy to slip behind. The half-high wainscoting had in one place dissolved partnership with the wall; and obeying an impulse for which he could never account, Aubrey dived behind, fishing out, among several odd leaves and dilapidated covers, a small hymn-book bound in red leather. Kate took it to the window to examine, for the light was fading fast. On the fly-leaf was written in childish, curly-tailed letters, "Anna Clare; July 1815," followed by the exquisite poetical stanza commencing,--

"The grass is green, the rose is red; Think of me when I am dead,"

which she read aloud to her brother. A minute afterwards, as she turned the brown-spotted leaves, there fell out a packet, a letter superscribed, "Miss Anna Clare; to be read on her twenty-first birthday, and when quite alone." Katie gasped, "Oh, look!" and dropped the paper as if it burned her fingers. Aubrey sprang forward, prepared to slay a giant spider, but when his eyes fell upon the writing which had so startled his sister, he too seemed petrified. They gazed fixedly into each other's eyes for a minute, then Aubrey said emphatically,--

"It's that!" And both rushed precipitately downstairs, exclaiming, "Auntie, auntie, we've found it!"

Now Miss Clare was just partaking of that popular refreshment "forty winks," and was some time before she could understand what had so greatly excited her young relations; but when at last it dawned upon her, she hastily brought out her spectacles, and lit the lamp, while every moment seemed an hour to the impatient children. When would she leave off turning the yellow packet in her fingers, and poring over the faded writing outside? At last the seal is broken, and two pairs of eager eyes narrowly watch Miss Clare's face as she scans the contents.

"It is the long-lost letter!" she exclaimed in astonishment. "Where did you find it?"

Both quickly explained, adding, "Do read it, auntie; what does Miss Marjorie say?"

So in a trembling voice Miss Clare read the words penned by a dying hand fifty years before,--

"MY DEAREST ANNA,--I feel that I have but a short time longer to live, and but one thing disturbs my peace. It is the presentiment that sooner or later the thoughtless extravagance of your brother George will bring you all into trouble. It is little I can do to avert this calamity, but years of economy have enabled me to save 280l. (which is concealed beneath the floor in my room, under the third plank from the south window, about ten inches from the wall). I wish you, niece Anna, to hold this money in trust, as a profound secret, and to be used only in case of an emergency such as I have hinted. In the event of none such taking place before your sister is of age, you are then to divide the money, equally between yourself, George and Lucy, to use as you each may please. Hoping that I have made my purpose clear, and that my ever trustworthy Anna will faithfully carry out my wishes, I pray that the blessing of God may rest richly on my nephew and nieces, and bid you, dearest girl, farewell.

"MARJORIE WESTFORD. "January 2nd, 1825."

Miss Clare's eyes were dim when she finished these words, sounding, as they did, like a voice from the grave, while Kate and Aubrey sat in spellbound silence. The boy was the first to speak.

"Do you think it is still there?"

"There is no reason why it should not be," replied Miss Clare; "indeed it seems that this legacy, so strangely hidden for half a century, and as strangely brought to light, is to be the means by which our Father will bring us out of our present difficulties."

"Get a light, Katie, and let's look for the treasure; that will be the best way of making sure that our adventure isn't the result of a mince-pie supper," suggested Aubrey, producing his tool-box.

So they all proceeded to the room, now seldom entered, where Marjorie Westford breathed her last. It was almost empty, and the spot indicated in the letter was soon determined upon. Aubrey knelt down on the floor, and commenced, in a most unsystematic way, his task of raising the board; while Katie, trembling with excitement, dropped grease spots on his head from her tilted candlestick.

Aubrey's small tools were wholly inadequate to their task, and many were the cuts and bruises his inexperienced hands received before he at length succeeded in prising the stubborn plank.

There lay the mahogany box, which, with some trouble, owing to its weight, they succeeded in bringing to the surface. It fastened by a simple catch, and was filled with golden guineas.

When Kate bade Aubrey good-night upon the stairs, he detained her a minute to murmur with a soft light in his dusky eyes,--

"I'm so very, very glad your sacrifice isn't to be made, darling, but the will is just the same as the deed. I shall love you for it as long as you live; and better still," he added, with deepening colour and lowered voice, "God knows, and will love you too."

"THE COLONEL."

BY MARION DICKEN.

Dick was only thirteen years of age, but he was in love, and in love too with Captain Treves's wife, who, in his eyes, was spick-span perfection. In their turn Mrs. Treves's two little boys, aged six and five respectively, were in love with Dick, who appeared to them to be the model of all that a schoolboy ought to be.

It was in church on Easter Sunday that Dick first realised his passion, and then--as he glanced from Mrs. Treves to the captain's stalwart form--the hopelessness of it! He remarked, afterwards, to his brother Ted, a lieutenant in Treves's regiment, that Mrs. Treves looked "ripping" in grey. But Ted was busy with his own thoughts, in which, if the truth be told, the sermon figured as little as in those of his younger brother.

Dick was on very friendly terms with the Treves and was rather surprised to find that the captain and his wife treated him more like a little boy than a "chap of thirteen--in fact, almost fourteen," as he put it to himself. He used to take Jack and Roy out on the river and to the baths, where he taught them both to swim. To use Ted's own expression to a brother-sub, "Dick was making a thorough nursemaid and tutor of himself to those kids of the captain's." He was teaching them certainly, unconsciously, but steadily, a great many things.

Jack no longer cried when he blistered his small paws trying to scull, and when Roy thought of Dick, or the "colonel," as they called him, he left off making grimaces at, and teasing, his baby sister, because Dick had answered carelessly when Jack once offered to fight him, "No thanks, old boy, I only hit a chap my own size." Roy recognised the difference between tormenting a girl and fighting a boy.

About three weeks after Dick went back to school for the summer term, both the little Treves's fell ill, and Jack cried incessantly for "the colonel." Yet when kind old Colonel Duke came to see him one afternoon, and brought him some grapes, the child turned fretfully away and still cried, "'Colonel'; I want the 'colonel'!"

"But, Jack dear, this is the colonel," remonstrated his mother, gently smoothing the crumpled pillow.

But Jack still wailed fretfully, and would not be comforted.

Colonel Duke happened to remark on the incident at mess that evening, and Ted Lloyd knitted his brows, as if trying to solve some mental mystery. The result of his cogitations was an early visit to Mrs. Treves next day.

The children were worse. Roy was, indeed, dangerously ill; and neither his father nor mother could persuade Jack to take his medicine.

"We cannot think whom he means by 'colonel'," added the poor lady despairingly.

"That's just what I've come about, Mrs. Treves; they used to call my young brother that at Easter."

"You are sure, Mr. Lloyd?"

"Quite. I heard them myself more than once. I'll trot round and see the Mater, and we will wire for him if it will do any good."

That afternoon Dick received a telegram which sent him off full speed to his housemaster for the necessary permission to go home.

"Is Mater ill?" he asked breathlessly, as he bundled out of the train on to Ted, who bore the onrush heroically.

"No, she's quite well, only Treves's kids are ill."

"Well?" queried Dick rather indignantly, as he thought of the cricket-match on the morrow, in which he had hoped to take part.

"Well, you see, Dick, they're seriously ill, and they can't make the little 'un take his physic."

"Well, I can't take it for him, can I? queried Dick, as they started home.

"Nobody wants you to, you little duffer. But the kids used to call you 'colonel,' and now he keeps crying for you. Perhaps if you order him to take the physic, he will--that's all."

"Oh!" briefly responded Dick.

He was sorry to hear that his whilom chums, the "captain" and "lieutenant," were ill. But weren't kids always having something or other, and would he always be sent for to dose them? "Rot!"

However, these thoughts abruptly left him, when, directly after tea, he went to the captain's and saw Mrs. Treves' pale and anxious face, and instead, his old allegiance, but deeper and truer, returned.

"Thank you, Dick," she said kindly in reply to his awkward tender of sympathy. And then they went upstairs.

By Jack's bed a glass of medicine was standing. A nurse was turning Roy's pillow, and Captain Treves stood by her, gnawing his long moustache.

Just then Jack's fretful wail sounded through the room for "'Colonel!' Daddy, Jack wants the 'colonel'!"

"I'm here, old man," said Dick, sitting down on the edge of the bed. "Drink this at once," he added, taking up the glass, as he remembered his brother's suggestion.

But Jack had clutched Dick's hand and now lay back sleepily.

Dick felt desperate. He glanced round. Captain and Mrs. Treves and the nurse were gathered round the other little white bed. Was Roy worse? With what he felt to be an unmanly lump in his throat, he leaned over the boy again.

"Jack, I say, Jack" (hurriedly), "if you drink this you shall be a captain."

Jack heard, and when Dick raised him up, he drained the glass.

"But Roy, Dick, he's a captain?"

"Roy shall be promoted too," replied Dick.

And just then the captain left the other bed and came over to Jack. Dick could see Mrs. Treves bending over Roy, and the nurse leaving the room. He looked up and saw that there were actually tears in the captain's eyes. He had never seen a soldier cry before, and guessed what had happened. Roy had indeed been promoted. He would never again "play soldiers" with Jack or Dick.

Jack was now sleeping quietly, and the doctor, who came in an hour later, pronounced him out of danger.

"Goodbye, my boy. We thought you'd like Roy's watch as you were fond of him," said the captain next day; and then Mrs. Treves not only shook hands, but stooped and kissed him.

Dick flushed, muttered some incoherent thanks, and went off to the station.

Dick reached school in time for the cricket-match, after all; but, fond as he was of cricket, he absented himself from the ground that afternoon, and spent the time printing off some photos of "two kids," as a chum rather scornfully remarked.

One of those "kids" is now a lieutenant in the regiment of which Dick is a captain, and, indeed, in a fair way to become a colonel--for the second time in his life.

NETTIE.

BY ALFRED G. SAYERS.

Nettie was a bright, fair girl of fifteen years of age, tall and graceful in movement and form, and resolute in character beyond her years. She was standing on the departure platform of the L. & N. W. Railway at Euston Square, watching the egress of the Manchester express, or rather that part of it which disclosed a head, an arm, and a cap, all moving in frantic and eccentric evolutions.

Tom, her brother, two years her senior, was on his way back to school for his last term, full of vague, if big, ideas of what he was going to be when, school days over, he should "put away childish things." "Most of our fellows," he had said loftily, as he stood beside his sister on the platform a few moments before, "go into the Army or Navy and become admirals or generals or something of that sort." And then he had hinted with less definiteness that his own career would probably combine the advantages of all the professions though he only followed one. But Tom soon dropped from these sublime heights to more mundane considerations, and his last words concerned a new cricket bat which Nettie was to "screw out of the gov'nor" for him, a new pup which she was to bring up by hand under his special directions, and correspondence, which on her part at least, was to be regular, and not too much occupied with details about "the kids."

Nettie sighed as she turned her steps homewards, and her handkerchief was damped by at least one drop of distilled emotion that bedewed the rose upon her cheek. Poor Nettie, she too was conscious of a destiny, and had bewildered thoughts of what she was going to be! She had opened her heart on this subject to her brother Tom during the holidays; but she had not received much encouragement, and at the present moment she was inclined to murmur at the reflection that the world was made for boys, and after all she was only a girl.

"What will you be?" Tom had said in answer to her question during one of their confidential chats. "You? why, you--well, you will stay with the mater, of course."

"Yes; but girls do all sorts of things nowadays, Tom," she had replied. "Some are doctors, some are authors, some are----"

"Blue-stockings," responded the ungallant Tom. "Don't be absurd, Net," he added patronisingly; "you'll stay with the pater and mater, and some day you will marry some fellow, or you can keep house for me, and then, when I am not with my ship or my regiment, of course I shall be with you."

Poor Nettie! She had formed an idea that the possibilities of life ought to include something more heroic for her than keeping house for her brother, and she had determined that she would not sink herself in the hum-drum of uneventful existence without some effort to avoid it; and so it happened that that same evening, after doing her duty by the baby pup and Tom's new cricket bat, she startled her father and mother by the somewhat abrupt and altogether unexpected question,--

"Father, what am I going to be?"

"Be?" repeated her father, drawing her on to his knee, "why, be my good little daughter as you always have been, Nettie. Are you tired of that, dear?"

But no, Nettie was not tired of her father's love, and she had no idea of being less affectionate because she wanted to be more wise and useful, and so she returned her father's caresses with interest, and treated her mother in the same way, so that there might be no jealousy; and then, sitting down in the armchair with the air of one commanding attention, harked back to the all-absorbing topic. "You know, father, there's Minnie Roberts, isn't there?"

"What if there is?" replied her father.

"Well, you know she's going to the University, don't you, dad?"

"No, I didn't."

"Well, she is. Then she'll be a doctor, or professor, or something. That's what I should like to be."

Mr. Anderson looked from his wife to his daughter with somewhat of surprise on his face. He was a just man; and he and his wife had but recently discussed the plans (including personal sacrifices) by which Master Tom's advancement was to be secured. Really, that anything particular needed to be done for Nettie had hardly occurred to him. He had imagined her going on at the High School for another year, say, and then settling down as mother's companion. His desire not to be harsh, coupled with his unreadiness, led Mr. Anderson to temporise. "Well, little girl," he said, "you plod on, and we'll have a talk about it." Nettie was in a triumphant mood. She had expected repulse, to be reminded of the terrible expense Tom was, and was to be, and she felt the battle already won. Doubtless the fact that Nettie was heartened was a great deal toward the success that was unexpectedly to dazzle her. She worked hard at school, and yet so buoyant was her spirit, that she found it easy to neglect none of her customary duties at home. She helped dust the drawing-room, and ran to little Dorothy in her troubles as of yore; and Mrs. Anderson came to remark more and more often to her husband, what a treat it would be when Nettie came home for good. "You can see she has forgotten every word about the idea of a profession," said that lady; "and I'm very glad. She's the light of the house." Forgotten! Oh no! Far from it! as they were soon to realise. The end of the term came--Tom was expected home on the morrow, Saturday. In the afternoon Nettie walked in from school, her face ablaze with excitement. For a moment she could say nothing; so that her mother dropped her work and wondered if Nettie had picked up a thousand-pound note. Then came the announcement--"Mother! I've won a Scholarship!"

"You have?"

"Yes, mother dear, I'm the QUEEN VICTORIA SCHOLAR!" Nettie stood up and bowed.

"And what does that do for you?"

"Why, I can go on studying for my profession for three years, and it won't cost father a penny!"

"What profession, dear?"

"I don't know, mother, what. But I want to be a doctor."

"A what!"

"A doctor, mother. Minnie Roberts is studying for a doctor; and I think it's splendid."

"What! cut people open with a knife!"

"Yes, mother, if it's going to do them good."

"But, my dear----"

However, Nettie knew very little about the medical profession; she only knew that Minnie Roberts went about just in the independent way that a man does, and was studying hard, and seemed very lively and witty. So detailed discussion was postponed to congratulation, inquiry, and surmise. "What will Tom say?" Nettie found herself continually asking herself, and herself quite unable to answer herself. What Tom did actually say we must detail in its proper place, which comes when Mr. Anderson and Nettie go to meet him at the station. They were both rather excited, for Mr. Anderson had, to tell the truth, felt somewhat guilty towards his little daughter over the question of the profession. While he had flattered himself that the idea was a passing fancy, she had cherished his words of encouragement, and had made easier the realisation of her dream by her steady improvement of the opportunity at hand, viz., her school work.

Tom kissed Nettie and shook hands with his father, and then it was that Nettie said,--

"Tom, I've won a Scholarship!"

And then it was, standing beside his luggage, that Tom replied,--

"Sennacherib!"

Though not strictly to the point, no other word or phrase could have shown those who knew Tom how much he was moved. Nettie knew. She was rather sorry Tom had to be told at all, for he had been quite unsuccessful this term, a good deal to his father's disappointment; and Nettie was sure he must feel the contrast of her own success rather keenly. They talked of other things on the way home, and directly Tom had kissed his mother and Dorothy and Joe, Nettie said, "Now shall we go and get the pup? I can tell you he's a beauty!"

"What a brick you are, Net, to think of it!" said Tom. "Yes; let's go."

These holidays were very delightful to Nettie and Tom; that young man permitted, even encouraged, terms of perfect equality. He forgot to patronise or disparage his sister or her sex. Perhaps his sister's success and his own lack of it had made him feel a bit modest. Nettie had explained her achievement both to herself and others by the fact that she had been so happy. And she was right. Some people talk as though a discipline of pain were necessary for all people in order to develop the best in them. That is not so. There are certain temperaments found in natures naturally fine, to whom a discipline of pleasure is best, especially in youth, and happily God often sends pleasure to these: we mean the pleasure of success; the pleasure of realising cherished plans; the pleasure of health and strength to meet every duty of life cheerfully. And now Nettie began to build castles in the air for Tom. Tom would go to Sandhurst; he would pass well; he would have a commission in a crack regiment. And Tom's repentance of some former disparagement of the sex was shown in such remarks as "that Beauchamp major--you know, the fellow I told you a good deal about."

"Oh yes, a fine fellow!"

"Well, I don't know, Net--I begin to think he's a beastly idiot. That fellow was bragging to me the other day that he bullied his sisters into fagging for him when he was at home. I think that's enough for me." And so holidays again came to an end, to Nettie's secret delight. She hated parting with Tom, but she longed to be back at her work.

Six years passed away and Nettie's career had been one of unbroken success. She had proceeded to Newnham and had come out splendidly in her examinations. Only one thing clouded her sky. Tom had not been successful. In spite of all that coaching could do, he had been plucked at Sandhurst, and the doctor had prohibited further study for the present. Nettie wrote to him constantly, making light of his failure, and assuring him of ultimate success. And now she was to make her start in her chosen profession. Before long she would be able to write herself "Nettie Anderson, M.D." and she was then to go into practice with her elder friend, Minnie Roberts. Little paragraphs had even appeared in some of the papers that "for the first time in the history of medicine in England, two lady graduates in medicine are to practise in partnership." Miss Roberts was already settled in one of the Bloomsbury squares, and had a constantly increasing circle of clients.

One Saturday afternoon in October the inaugural banquet was held. Nettie had a flat of her own in the house, and here the feast was spread. Mr. and Mrs. Anderson, Tom, and the two doctors formed the company. They were all so proud of Nettie that they almost forgot Tom's lack of success. There was what is understood as a high time. Who so gay and bright as Nettie! Who so gentle and courteous as Tom! (I am afraid a discipline of failure is best for some of us!) How the time flew! How soon mother and Nettie had to go to Nettie's room for the mother to don her bonnet and get back home in decent time!

"But you'll be marrying, you know, some day, Nettie."

"Ah! time will show, mother dear," was Nettie's answer; and then she added, "but if I do it will be from choice and not necessity."

THE MAGIC CABINET.

BY ALBERT E. HOOPER.

"A castle built of granite. With towers grim and tall; A castle built of rainbows, With sunbeams over all:-- I pass the one, in ruins, And mount a golden stair,-- For the newest and the truest, And the oldest and the boldest, And the fairest and the rarest, Is my castle in the air."--M.

Spotted a mistake or have an idea?

Fifty-Two Stories For Girls 12Part 1 · The Passing of Nadine

Fifty-Two Stories For Girls 12

Fifty-Two Stories For Girls 13