ets, while from behind this magic
screen--hiding one could not guess what wonders--shone all the lanterns
owned by the population of Forest Glen, and across its glowing surface
flitted gigantic shadows.

Martha Ellen Robertson, in a brilliant pink satin waist, and all her
jewelry; and Miss Hillary in a new white dress, were already hurrying
up and down the aisle marshaling their forces. As the artists appeared
they arranged them on the row of improvised benches at the front,
charging them to sit there quietly until their turn came for stepping
behind the magic curtain.

Elizabeth and Rosie found each other immediately, and sat close
together on the very front row. Rosie was a perfect vision in a white
dress, with a string of beads around her neck and her curls tied up by
a broad pink ribbon. Elizabeth, in her Sunday pinafore, starched a
little stiffer than usual, gazed at her in boundless admiration. She
had supposed, before leaving home, that Mary would be the most
beautiful creature present; but Mary's pale flaxen curls and colorless
pinafore were lost in the gorgeous display on all sides. Katie and
Lottie Price were the grandest. They fairly bristled with ribbons and
lace; but indeed all the girls were so gayly dressed that the Gordons
looked like little gray sparrows in a flock of birds of Paradise. Mary
sighed and looked around miserably at the gay throng; but little did
Elizabeth care. She sat on the front bench, with Rosie on one side and
Eppie on the other, and rapturously swung her feet and laughed and
talked, all oblivious of her dun-colored clothes. It was quite
impossible not to be wildly happy at such a grand festive gathering.
The schoolroom seemed some wonderful place she had never seen before.
The middle section of the sheets was drawn back, displaying the
platform with the teacher's desk and the blackboard, all fairly
smothered in cedar and balsam boughs and tissue-paper roses, and
smelling as sweet as the swamp behind the school. It was such a bower
of beauty that Elizabeth could scarcely believe she had stood there
only yesterday, striving desperately to make a complex fraction turn
simple.

The crowd was steadily gathering, and the noise steadily increasing.
Right at the back a group of boys were bunched together, laughing,
talking, and whistling. Elizabeth was ashamed to see that John and
Charles Stuart were amongst those whom Miss Hillary was vainly striving
to bring up to the perfor