ars; but Miss Dorothy never
got over his duplicity. She was convinced that the sole aim of mankind
was to win the unguarded affection of maidens, and then march off
treacherously with flying colors to the heartless music of the drum and
fife. To shield the inmates of Primrose Hall from the bitter influences
that had blighted her own early affections was Miss Dorothy's mission in
life.

"No wolves prowling about my lambs, if you please," said

Miss Dorothy. "I will not allow it."

She was as good as her word. I don't think the boy lives who ever set
foot within the limits of Primrose Hall while the seminary was under her
charge. Perhaps if Miss Dorothy had given her young ladies a little more
liberty, they would not have thought it "such fun" to make eyes over the
white lattice fence at the young gentlemen of the Temple Grammar School.
I say perhaps; for it is one thing to manage thirty-five young ladies
and quite another thing to talk about it.

But all Miss Dorothy's vigilance could not prevent the young folks
from meeting in the town now and then, nor could her utmost ingenuity
interrupt postal arrangements. There was no end of notes passing between
the students and the Primroses. Notes tied to the heads of arrows were
shot into dormitory windows; notes were tucked under fences, and hidden
in the trunks of decayed trees. Every thick place in the boxwood hedge
that surrounded the seminary was a possible post-office.

It was a terrible shock to Miss Dorothy the day she unearthed a nest of
letters in one of the huge wooden urns surmounting the gateway that led
to her dovecot. It was a bitter moment to Miss Phoebe and Miss Candace
and Miss Hesba, when they had their locks of hair grimly handed back
to them by Miss Gibbs in the presence of the whole school. Girls whose
locks of hair had run the blockade in safety were particularly severe on
the offenders. But it didn't stop other notes and other tresses, and I
would like to know what can stop them while the earth holds together.

Now when I first came to Rivermouth I looked upon girls as rather tame
company; I hadn't a spark of sentiment concerning them; but seeing my
comrades sending and receiving mysterious epistles, wearing bits of
ribbon in their button-holes and leaving packages of confectionery
(generally lemon-drops) in the hollow trunks of trees--why, I felt that
this was the proper thing to do. I resolved, as a matter of duty, to
fall in love with somebody,