cal.

"They never caught him in one," said Neale, with brutal frankness.
"There's a whole lot of folks honest like _that_."

"Goodness, Neale!" cried Ruth, waking up again at _that_ heresy. "How
pessimistic you are."

"Was--was George Washington one of those things?" queried Tess, liking
the sound of the long word.

"What things?" asked Ruth.

"Pes-sa-pessamisty?"

"Pessimistic? No, dear," laughed Ruth. "He was an optimist--or he never
would have espoused the American cause."

"He was first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his
coun-try-men," sing-songed Dot.

"Oh, yes! I can put that in," agreed Tess, abandoning both the hard
words Ruth had used, and getting back to safe details. "And he married a
lady named Mary, didn't he?"

"No; Martha," said Agnes.

"Well, I knew it was one or the other, for we studied about Mary and
Martha in our Sunday school lesson last Sunday," Tess said, placidly.
"Martha was troubled about many things."

"I should think she would have been," remarked Dot, reflectively, "for
George Washington had to fight Indians, and Britishers, and Hessians
(who wore blue coats and big hats) and cabals----"

"Hold on!" shouted Neale. "What under the sun is a 'cabal'? A beast, or
a bug?"

"Why, my teacher told us about George Washington," cried Dot, with
importance, "only a little while ago. And she said they raised a cabal
against him----"

"That means a conspiracy," put in Ruth, quietly. "How can you folks
study when you all talk so much?"

"Well, Martha," began Tess, when Ruth interposed:

"Don't get your Marthas mixed, dear."

"That's right, Tess," said Agnes. "George Washington's wife was not the
sister of Lazarus--that's sure!"

"Oh, Aggie! how slangy you are!" cried Ruth.

Neale had slipped out after last speaking. He came in all of a bustle,
stamping the snow from his feet on the hall rug.

"It's begun, girls!" he cried.

"Ye-es," admitted Tess, gravely. "I know it's begun; but I don't see how
I am _ever_ going to finish it."

"Oh, dear me, Tess! Let that old composition go for to-night," begged
Agnes. "Do you mean it has begun to snow, Neale?"

"Like a regular old blizzard," declared Neale.

"Is it snowing as hard as it did the night we came from Carrie Poole's
party?" asked Ruth, interested.

"Just come out on the porch and see," advised the boy, and they all
trooped out after him--even Tess putting down her pencil and following
at the rear of the