o sleep. But the desire for the work did not fade with
the daylight. Flossy had even been tempted to say a humble little word
to Marion, but had been deterred by the sound of that sneer of which I
told you; and Ruth, lying on her bed, had revolved the subject and sent
up many an earnest prayer, and went out to afternoon service resolved
upon keeping her eyes very wide open.

The special attraction for the afternoon was a conference of primary
class teachers. They were out in full force, and were ready for any
questions that might fill the hearts and the mouths of eager learners.
Our girls had each their special favorites among these leaders. Ruth
found herself attracted and deeply interested in every word that Mrs.
Clark uttered. Marion was making a study of both Mrs. Knox and Miss
Morris, and found it difficult to tell which attracted her most. Even
Eurie was ready for this meeting. She had never been able to shake off
the thought of Miss Rider, and her eager enthusiasm in this work, while
Flossy had been fascinated and carried away captive by the magnetic
voice and manner of Mrs. Partridge.

"She makes me glow," Flossy said, in trying to explain the feeling to
the calmer Ruth. "Her life seems to quiver all through me, and make me
long to reach after it; to have the same power which she has over the
hearts of wild uncared-for children."

And Ruth looked down on the exquisite bit of flesh and blood beside her,
and thought of her elegant home and her elegant mother, and of all the
softening and enervating influences of her city life, and laughed. How
little had she in common with such a work as that to which Mrs.
Partridge had given her soul!

Keeping her eyes open, as she had planned to do, this same Flossy saw as
she was passing down the aisle the hungry face of one of her boys, as
she had mentally called the Arabs with whom her life had brushed on the
Sunday morning The word just described it still, a hungry face like one
hanging wistfully around the outskirts of a feast in which he had no
share. Flossy let go her hold of Ruth's arm and darted toward him.

"How do you do?" she said, in winning voice, before he had even seen
her. "I am real glad to see you again. If you will come with me I will
get a seat for you. A lady is going to speak this afternoon who has five
hundred boys in her class in Sunday-school."

Now the Flossy of two weeks ago, if she could have imagined herself in
any such business, would have be