untry should
ever speak anything but English. It would be ever so much more
sensible."

"So it would!" assented Rose. "I say! what a pity we didn't think to
bring something to eat! I'm awfully hungry, walking all this way."

"All this way, Rose!" said Peggy. "Why, how far do you think it is?"

"Oh, four or five miles, I'm sure!"

"Well, it isn't two. Look here, girls, what is the reason none of you
seem to know how to walk?"

"What do you mean? We have walked, haven't we? Here we are."

"Oh, you call this a walk! that's just it, I tell you. You walk a mile,
or two at the very most, and you think you have done something
wonderful; and poor Viola is all tired out, and says she will never come
again. Well, but this isn't what _I_ call walking, you know. Why, I went
with the Owls the other day, and we walked fifteen miles if we did a
step, and it was perfectly glorious. _That's_ what _I_ call walking, and
I do wonder how it is that none of you ever learned. You are all strong
and well, aren't you?"

Yes, they were all strong and well; except Viola, who still declared she
had got her death, and should never recover.

"Well, but what's the use?" asked Rose. "I think this is great fun, to
come to a pretty place like this, and sit and talk and look at the view;
but just to go on walking and stalking along the way you and the Owls
do,--what's the use of it? We are not ostriches, and why should we
pretend we are? Besides, it takes such a lot of time."

"And what would you be doing with your time?" asked Peggy, hotly.
"Reading stories, or just sitting, sitting, and talking, talking. My
goodness gracious _me_! the way some of the girls just sit around all
their spare time, doing nothing, makes me tired. Why, if I hadn't
stalked, as you call it, how would you have come here to-day, and seen
the prettiest place you ever saw since you came here--for it is, and you
can't deny it, girls. I do hate to see people doing nothing. I don't
much care what they do, so long as it is _something_!"

"Peggy, you're getting very ferocious, do you know it?" said Clara Fair.
"And, after all, we did come, and now we are doing just as much as you
are, and why are you shouting at us?"

"I won't shout any more," said Peggy, laughing. "I suppose we all have
our hobbies, haven't we? Walking is one of mine; and you are going to
like it just as much as I do, girls, before we get through the term.
Why, there are about twenty of the loveliest walks