d!"

Then she stopped, looked earnestly in Miss Ashton's face, and
asked,--

"Do you believe me, Miss Ashton?"

Now, Miss Ashton knew Kate to be a very impulsive girl, doing many
foolish, and often wrong things, only sometimes sorry for them, so she
did not receive her excited apologies with the consideration which
they really deserved.

She said, perhaps a little coldly,--

"I am glad you have come to see the matter both more kindly and
reasonably, Kate. Yes! I do believe you: I do not doubt you feel all
you say; but, Kate, you are so easily tempted by what seems to you
fun. I can't make you see, fun that becomes personal in a way to
injure the feelings of any one ceases to be fun, becomes cruelty.
There is a great deal of that in this school this term. Hardly a day
passes but some of the girls come to me crying because their feelings
have been wounded, and I am truly grieved to say, you are oftener the
cause of it than any other girl. To be both witty and wise is a great
gift; to be witty without being wise is a great misfortune; sometimes
I think it has been your misfortune. You are not a cruel girl. You are
at bottom a kind girl; yet see how you wound! You didn't _mean_ to
hurt Marion Parke; you like her, yet you did: you made fun of an old
country cousin, whose visit must have been a trial to her. You are two
Kates, one thinks only of the fun and the _eclat_ of a witty tableau;
the other would have done and said the kindest and the prettiest
things to make Marion Parke happy. Which of these Kates do you like
best?" Miss Ashton now laid her hand lovingly over the hands of the
excited girl, who answered her with her eyes swimming in tears, "Your
kind, Miss Ashton." Then she put up her lips for the never-failing
kiss, and went quietly away, but not to her own room.

There was something truly noble in the girl, after all. She went to
Marion's door and, knocking gently, asked if Marion would walk with
her to the grove.

Much surprised, but pleased, Marion readily consented, and the two
went out in the early darkness of an October night alone, the girls
whom they met in the corridors staring at them as they passed.

[Illustration: Marion turned, threw both arms around Kate's neck,
kissing her over and over again.--Page 89.]

"Marion!" said Kate, "I ask your pardon a thousand, million times! I
never, _never_ meant to hurt your feelings! I forgot everything but
the fun I saw in the old farm-scenes, and the new