ould like best to have. Mary 'Liza chose _The School-girl
in France_, and I, _The Scottish Chiefs_. (I have it to this day.) We
finished our excursion by a visit to St. John's Church and
burying-ground. Cousin Molly Belle's grandfather had heard Patrick
Henry's "Liberty or Death" speech, and she made the scene very plain to
us as we strolled along the dim aisles, streaked with flaming bars of
sunset, striking through the western window upon the very spot where the
great orator had stood.

By the time I had finished my supper, and was settled before the fire
with my book, the memories of my jaunt making glad my whole being, I had
clean forgotten party and slight, and did not care a fig--for that one
night--if I _was_ countryfied and had not a party dress to my name. The
real things were mine,--home-loves and the world of books and
imagination,--possessions which the scorning of those who were at ease,
and the contempt of the proud could not molest or take away.

I was reading _The Scottish Chiefs_ for the second time,--out of school,
of course,--and studying with might and main, when something came to
pass that altered the tone of my mates, converted oppressors into
champions, and made a moderate heroine of me.

There were sixteen of us in the senior Geography Class, I being the
youngest. The practice of "turning down" for incorrect answers to
questions was common at that date, even in Young Ladies' Seminaries.
When the class was formed, we were seated according to age, but thanks
to my governesses' drill, I had mounted steadily until I was now but one
from the top--or, as we put it, was "next to head." The topmost place
had been held for over a month by Mary Morgan, a slovenly and indolent
girl of sixteen, who wrote poetry and had a great deal of old blue blood
in her veins, as she was fond of informing all who had the patience to
listen to her. Her recitations in most of her classes were so imperfect
that everybody was surprised at her keeping an honorable place in any
until the whisper went around that she smuggled "help-papers" into the
class with her.

I am told that the use of "ponies," and much less reputable aids to
perfect recitation in school and in college, is not considered
dishonorable among the youth of the present age. Unmannerly and cruel as
the girls in our seminary appeared to me, they had a certain sense of
honor, a respect for truth and fair-dealing that bespoke better things
than their surface-co