riginal poem."

"What for?" demanded Elsie, beginning to look rather blank. "I don't
see what poems have to do with a sewing club."

"Oh, we all have to be initiated," said Lulu, "the way college boys are,
you know, and the way we are going to initiate is to make everybody
write a poem. It needn't be more than eight lines, and it doesn't matter
what it's about, so long as it's poetry. It will be such fun reading the
poems and deciding which is the best. The one who writes the best poem
is to be president of the club. It will be decided by vote."

"I think the club sounds very interesting," said Elsie, with a little
air of condescension, "but if I were you I would give up the initiation;
it's so silly."

"Oh, the initiation is half the fun!" cried Lulu and Bessie both
together, and Lulu, who was not very fond of Elsie, added with decision:

"Any one who isn't willing to take the trouble to write a poem can't
join the club."

"I am sure I have no objection to writing a poem," said Elsie, shrugging
her shoulders. "It's perfectly simple; I could write one every week if I
chose, but it's so foolish."

Bessie and Gertie looked at each other, and Gertie formed the word
"brag" with her lips, but did not say it aloud. Marjorie saw the look
that passed between the two girls, and her cheeks grew suddenly hot.

Elsie was certainly very clever, but she could not help feeling that it
would be better taste on her cousin's part not to talk about it.

"I wish I found it easy to write a poem," said Winifred, mournfully. "I
never made a rhyme in my life, but Lulu says I've got to try. She made
me write a story once when we were little girls, and it was the most
awful nonsense you ever heard. Have you ever written a poem, Marjorie?"

"Only a few silly doggerels. One of my aunt's favorite games is capping
verses, and we used sometimes to play it on winter evenings."

Just then more girls arrived, and in a few moments Miss Lothrop rang her
bell, and school began.

"Well, Marjorie, what do you think of the idea of the club?" Elsie
inquired of her cousin, as the two were walking home from school
together that day.

"I think it will be splendid," declared Marjorie, heartily. "Lulu must
be a clever girl to have thought of such a plan, especially of the
initiation. I am sure the poems will be great fun."

"They won't amount to anything," said Elsie, with her superior smile.
"Nobody will write a decent poem, and I do hate poetry th