of Irish linen paper will do _without_ any monogram.

I.

_To Mrs. William Murray_

BALAK, _January 31_.

MY DEAR MAMMA,--Certainly I got your last letter. I have not
forgotten you at all, and the draft came all right. Bella Seymour
exaggerates so. Herr Klug kisses all his pupils in the class, but just
as Grandpa Murray would. He's old enough to be our grandfather; besides,
as Mrs. Ransom says, it is not for our beauty, but when we play well,
that he rewards us. I'm sure I don't like it, and if Mrs. Klug, or his
six or seven cousins who live with him, caught him they would make a
lively time. I never saw such a jealous set of relatives in my life. How
am I improving? Oh, splendid; just splendid. I do wish you wouldn't coax
and worm out of Bella Seymour all I write. You know girls exaggerate so.
Good-by, darling mamma. Give my love to pa and Harry. I'll write soon.
Yes, I need one new morning frock. I owe for one at a store here where
the Ransoms go. Lizzie Ransom is the nicest, but I play better than she
does.

Your affectionate daughter,
IRENE.

_To Miss Bella Seymour_

BALAK, _March 2_.

YOU MEAN OLD THING,--I got your letter, Bella, but I don't
understand yet how you came to tell mamma the nonsense I wrote. Such a
lot of things have happened since I wrote last fall. I haven't improved
a bit. I have no talent, old man Kluggy says--he's such a soft old
fool. He can't play a bit, but he's always talking about his method,
his virtuosity, his wonderful memory and his marvellous touch. He must
have played well when he was painted with Beethoven in the same picture.
Yes, he knew Beethoven. He's as old as old what's-his-name who ate grass
and died of a colic, in the Bible. Golly, wouldn't I like to get out of
this hole, but I promised pa I'd stick it out until spring. I play
nothing but Klug compositions, his valses, mazurkas--mind _his_ nerve,
he says he gave Chopin points on mazurkas; and Bella, Bella, what do you
think, I've found out all about his cousins! I wrote ma that all the old
hens in his house were his cousins, and I spoke of his wife. Bella, _he
has no wife_, he has _no cousins_. What do you think? I'll tell you how
I found it out. The Ransom girls know, but they don't let on to their
mother. The first lesson I took, Klug--I hate that man--motioned me to
wait until the other girls had gone. He pretended to fool and fuss over
some autographs of Bach and a lot of other old idiots--I ha