any teachers, pray?'

Mrs Macintyre was never known to be angry, but she felt almost inclined
to be so now. She mentioned the number of her tutors, her foreign
governesses, and her English teachers--the best-trained teachers from
her own beloved Cheltenham.

'How many servants?' was Mrs Maclure's next query.

'Really, Jane, you are keeping me from my duties; but as you have come
all the way from Edinburgh to question me so closely, I will confess
that I have got ten indoor servants; that, of course, includes the
housekeeper and a trained nurse in case of illness.'

'Dear, dear!' exclaimed Mrs Maclure. 'Prodigious! And then, I
presume, you get special masters and mistresses from Glasgow and
Edinburgh.'

'I certainly do. The school is a first-rate one.'

'My poor Elsie, it won't be first-rate long. You are taking all this
enormous expense and trouble for twenty-three children. How many can
your school hold?'

'My school could hold quite seventy pupils,' said Mrs Macintyre; 'but
you must remember that it was only opened last Tuesday. Really, I
greatly fear that I shall have to leave you, Jane. This is a
half-holiday, and I have a special class to attend to.'

'Let your special class go. Listen to the words of wisdom. The fame
of your school has spread to Edinburgh; it has been talked about; it
has been commented on. It is for that reason, and that reason alone,
that I have come here to-day. Put the boys into an annex, and provide
them with the necessary teachers--men, of course, if possible. Keep
the girls, and I'll engage to get you ten fresh pupils from Edinburgh
early next week, twenty from London--that's thirty--and several more
from Glasgow, also Liverpool, Manchester, and different parts of
England; and when I say I _can_ engage to do this, and fill your school
to the necessary number of seventy, I speak with confidence, _for I
know_. The ladies are dying to send their lassies to you, but the
mixed school prohibits it. I have no wish or desire to stop the
co-education of girls and boys, but to have those of the upper classes
mixing in the same boarding school won't go down in this country, Elsie
Macintyre. No, it won't do. Now, let me think. You speak of five
boys from the neighbourhood--who are their parents?'

'They are the sons of my dear friend Mrs Constable, whose husband,
Major Constable, fell in the late war in South Africa.'

'And the eldest is fifteen?'

Yes.'

'Where does M