and to be a sort of
mother to Miss Grantley, without wanting any wages, and only just her
board and lodging, beside which she could afford to pay for a good many
things towards the housekeeping.

She used to teach the juniors, and taught them well too, though some of
them were occasionally spoiled; and as it was very often somebody's
birthday, seed-cake and gingerbread and lemon toffee were more common
than they are in most schools. Even the senior girls came in for some of
the goodies, and used to say that, as they lived in a world where
somebody was born every minute, it would be hard if they couldn't keep a
birthday once a week.

But this saying reminds me that we might go on gossiping about our
governess for the hour together, and yet not get to the stories that she
used to tell us. It was one of her delightful plans to devote an
afternoon in each week to fancy needlework; and we used to take our work
with us on that day, and instead of going home to dinner we had luncheon
and stayed as her guests to tea, with cake or home-made bread and
butter, jam, or in summer, ripe plums and apples from the garden, or
plates of strawberries and cream from Ivory Farm.

It was then that we read in turns from some of the best books of
fiction; for Miss Grantley said, "Girls are sure to read novels, and the
imagination needs to be cultivated as well as the intellect and the
memory." So we read stories, and sometimes poems by Tennyson and
Browning and other modern writers, as well as Shakspeare, Dante,
Schiller, and Goethe. Our governess would explain the passages to us,
and we used to talk about them afterwards; but very often the
conversation took a good deal more time than the reading, for it was
then we found out that Miss Grantley had travelled in Germany, France,
and Italy, and that she had been a student not only of subjects that she
might have to teach, but of people and their ways.

We found out too that she could tell stories of her own; and now and
then we used to persuade her to "spin a yarn," as Bella Dornton, whose
father had been a naval officer, used to say.

One summer there were to be great doings at Barton-on-the-Lees. A grand
fancy fair was to be held in the town-hall for the benefit of the
infirmary, and we had all promised to work for it; so that nobody was
offended when Miss Grantley made known that she intended to give a
half-holiday every day for a week, that we seniors might be her guests
from two o'c