six and a half. Who's to be the half girl?"

"Oh! They'll make it seven on one afternoon and six the next, I
expect."

"That's not fair! It's throwing too much work on those six and not
enough on the seven. It's opposed to all the instincts of co-operation
and justice which Gibbie has laboured so hard to instil into me."

"Don't see how the Bumble can manage otherwise, unless she chops a
girl in half. No, I predict you'll be chosen among a select six, and
have to pour out tea and hand cakes with one-sixth extra power laid
on, and your conversation carefully modulated to your hearers."

"Oh, Jemima!"

"Please to remember that this is a finishing school!" mocked Ardiune.
"Don't on any account shock the neighbourhood by an unseemly
exhibition of vulgar slang!"

"It'll slip out, I know, when I'm not thinking," groaned Raymonde.

On the first afternoon of the geological course, an audience of about
twenty visitors augmented the usual gathering in the lecture hall.
They were accommodated with the best seats, and the school occupied
the third and fourth rows. Directly in front of Raymonde sat an
elderly lady in a large black hat trimmed with cherries, which bobbed
temptingly over the brim. She appeared to take an interest in her
surroundings, glanced about the room, and turned a reproving eye on
Raymonde, who ventured to whisper to Aveline. With Miss Gibbs hovering
in the background with a now-mind-you-keep-up-the-credit-of-the-school
expression, the girls hardly dared even to blink, but Aveline managed
to write: "What a Tartar in front!" on a slip of paper, and hand it to
her chum.

The Professor, bland as ever, was coming into the room and hanging a
geological map over the blackboard. He smiled broadly, showing his
large white teeth to the uttermost, and, after a few preliminary
remarks of welcome to the visitors, plunged into a description of the
earth's crust.

All went well for a while; then an untoward incident happened. The
lady with the cherries in her hat, who had possibly taken cold, or was
affected by the pollen in the flowers upon the table, sneezed
violently, not only once, but twice, and even a third time.

"Three's for a wedding! Is it Gibbie?" whispered Raymonde the
incorrigible.

Aveline's mental equilibrium was always easily upset. The idea of Miss
Gibbs in connection with matrimony was too much for her, and she
exploded into a series of painfully suppressed giggles. The more she
tried to stop