e your heart beat to think of going to him in his study,
and having a private talk?"

"Dear me!" said Flossy, "I never shall think of such a thing. I couldn't
do it any more than I could fly."

"There are harder things than that to do, I suspect; and it will come to
a visit to his study if we are to unite with the church; don't you know
that is what he always asks of those?"

And then these girls looked absolutely blank, for to two of them the
thought of that duty had never occurred before; they did not understand
it well enough to know that it was a privilege.

"Well," said Eurie, rallying first, of course, "are we to stand here
gazing around us all day, because nobody knows enough to invite us to go
up-stairs? It is clear that we are not to be invited. They are all
come--all the Sabbath-school people; and, hark! why, they are singing."

"Dear me!" said Flossy; "then it is commenced; I hate to go in when it
is commenced. How very unfortunate this is!"

"Serves us right," said Marion. "We ought to be in a condition to invite
others, instead of waiting here to be invited. I'll tell you what,
girls, if we ever get to feel that we _do_ belong, let's constitute
ourselves a committee to see after timid strangers, like ourselves, and
give them a _chance in_, at least."

"Well," said Ruth, speaking for the first time, "shall we go home and
wait till next Sunday, and take a fair start, as Flossy says, it isn't
pleasant to go in after the exercises have fairly opened?" As she said
this, for the first time in her life Miss Ruth Erskine began to have a
dim idea that possibly she might be a coward; this certainly sounded a
little like it.

Each waited to get a bit of advice from the other. Both Marion and
Eurie, it must be confessed, bold spirits that they were, so dreaded
this ordeal, that each hoped the other would advise retreat as the
wisest thing to be done next. It was Flossy who spoke:

"I am going up now; it won't be any easier next Sunday, and I want to
begin."

"There!" said Eurie, "that is just what I needed to shame me into common
sense. What a company of idiots we are! Marion, what would you think of
a day-scholar who would stand shivering outside your doors for this
length of time? Now come on, all of you;" and she led the way up-stairs.

How very awkward it was! It was during the opening prayer that they
arrived, and they had to stand by the door and be peeped at by
irreverent children; then they had to