erly, yea pleasurably, a move involving money, at a time
when money was more than usually scarce. His assent was even of such a
nature as to deceive both himself and the child into thinking that it was
being done for her benefit!

The young girl received a new impetus toward improvement. The family began
to regard her as a member set apart, as one from whom special things were
to be expected. From being just comfortably at the head of her classes,
she became more ambitious, reached over into new territory, and induced
the teacher to create new classes for her benefit. The subjects required
for the examination of teachers were added to those usually carried. There
was a real purpose in her efforts now, and the smoky kerosene lamp burned
stubbornly till late hours.

The new teacher not only listened to recitations but appealed to the
artistic in the newly developing woman. She rolled her hair from neck to
brow in a "French twist" and set on the top of it an "Alsatian bow," which
stood like gigantic butterfly wings across her proud head. The long basque
of her school dress was made after the newest pattern and had smoke-pearl
buttons, in overlapping groups of three, set on each side of its vest
front. The skirt of this wonderful dress was "shirred" and hung in
graceful festoons between the rows of gatherings, and was of an entirely
new style. Last, but not least, the teacher's feet were shod in "side
laces," the first pair of a new kind of shoes, destined to become popular,
which laced on the inside of the ankle instead of on the top as we have
them now. Of all her stylish attractions this was the most absorbing.
"Fool shoes," Sadie Crane called them, and her little black eyes twinkled
with a consuming spite when she mentioned them, but the ambitious Farnshaw
child, reaching out for improvement and change, coveted them, and preened
her own feathers, and mimicked, and dreamed. She accepted the shoes just
as she accepted the teacher's other attributes: they were better than her
own.

To be better than her own--that was the measure of Lizzie Farnshaw's
demand. If the shoes, the clothing, the manners, the ideas, were better
than her own they were worthy of honest consideration. The teacher's
tongue was sharp and her criticisms ruthless, but they had elements of
truth in them, and even when they were directed against the child herself
they were a splendid spur. The young girl copied her manners, her gait,
and her vocabulary.