ngs on them, whoever they are.
Nothing ever could have fitted in more splendidly than they did just
there and then. And the singing rested and helped them all.

Now a sensation came in the shape of a poem that had been written for
the occasion, and was to be learned to sing in greeting to the
president. How they rang those jubilant words through those old trees!
Tender, touching words, with the Chautauqua key-note quivering all
through them.

"Greet him! Let the air around him
Benedictions bear;
Let the hearts of all the people
Circle him with prayer.'

"I wonder if he realizes what a blessed thing it is to be circled with
prayer?" said she of the Teacher's Bible, turning a thoughtful face upon
the four girls who had attracted her attention.

"I wonder who Mary A. Lathbury is?" said Eurie, reading from the poem.
"She is a poet, whoever she is. There isn't a line in this that is
simply _rhyme_. I doubt if the president ever had such a rhythmical
tribute as that."

"She is the lady with blue eyes and curls who designs the pictures in
that charming child's paper which flutters around here. I have forgotten
the name of it, but the pictures are little poems themselves."

This was Flossy's bit of information.

"Which designs them, the blue eyes or the curls?" Marion asked, gravely.
And then these four simpletons burst into a merry laugh.

Still the president did not appear. The audience had exhausted their
resources and their good humor. Ominous grumblings and cross faces began
to predominate. Some darkly hinted that he was not coming at all, and
that this was a design to draw the immense crowd together. Nobody
believed it, but many were in a mood to pretend that they did.

"I never believed in this thing," said a tall, dark-faced,
solemn-featured man, speaking in a voice loud enough to interest the
crowd in front "This sensation business I don't believe in. What do we
want of the president here! Who cares to see him? I don't like it; I
believe it is all wrong, turning a religious meeting upside down for a
sensation, and I told them so."

Our friend Marion, you will remember, was gifted with a clear voice and
a saucy tongue.

"If he doesn't like it," she said, quickly, "and doesn't want to see the
president, why do you suppose he has kept one of the best chairs for
four mortal hours? Don't you think that is selfish?"

Which sentence caused ripples of laughter all about them, and quenched
t