you hear me say thus?" she
inquired. When I nodded, she gazed at me sadly. "People who belong to the
highest class never gesticulate; they use spoken language exclusively.
Furthermore, as to the thus. I wondered if an up-springing sense of
courtesy persuaded you to refrain from hooting at such elegant verbiage.
That would be a sign of benefit already derived from the classes. By the
way, it was Mary Winchester who inspired the idea."

"Oh, but she has no manners at all!" I exclaimed before I thought.

"That is precisely the point. I met her flying along like a wild creature
on her bicycle, eyes staring, hair streaming in the wind. At least, some
locks were streaming. She gave the impression of a being utterly lawless.
Then I thought----See here, Miss Leigh, are you interested in my
thoughts?"

"Yes'm," I answered meekly.

"Then drop that pen and pay attention. Even the girls who are to belong
to the second class in manners know how to do that. Well, I thought that
she hardly ever accepts an invitation, and she looks as she didn't expect
anybody to like her, and she minds her own business and does exactly as
she pleases generally. My next important thought was that sometimes she
cuts me in the hall, and sometimes she doesn't, just as she happens to
feel. That led to the philosophic reflection that politeness is a
question of law."

"Ah, pardon me, Miss Abbott, but I remember from a story which was read
by my teacher about forty years ago when I was in the fourth reader that

"'Politeness is to do or say
The kindest thing in the kindest way.'"

"That's what I meant. The law of kindness--that's what politeness is.
Listen to the logic. Mary Winchester is lawless, hence she breaks the law
of kindness, hence she has no manners, hence it will be fun to divide
everybody here into various classes according to their manners."

So that is the way our classes began.

It was awfully, awfully interesting. Robbie Belle said she didn't want
to; but Berta and Lila and I talked and talked and talked. We sat in the
windows and talked instead of dancing between dinner and chapel. We
talked after chapel, and on our way to classes or to meals. And of course
we talked while we were skating or walking or doing anything similar that
did not demand intellectual application. Lila even talked about the
classes in her sleep. We discussed everybody who happened to attract our
attention.

Finally we had sif