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ock overhanging the lake, was made short work of, for tonight was to be held the first Council Fire. "What's going to happen?" asked Gladys of Nyoda, watching the girls scrambling out of their bloomers and middies and into brown khaki dresses trimmed with leather fringe. "Ceremonial Meeting," answered Nyoda, slipping on a pair of beaded moccasins. "What's that?" asked Gladys. "You'll see," said Nyoda. "Follow the girls when I call them." Nyoda slipped out of her tent and disappeared into the woods. In a few minutes a clear call rang out through the stillness: "Wohelo, Wohelo, come ye all Wohelo." The girls stepped forward in a single file, their arms folded in front of them, singing as they went, "Wohelo, Wohelo, come we all Wohelo." Gladys followed at the tail of the procession. Nyoda stood in the center of a circular space about twenty feet across among the trees, completely surrounded by high pines. In the middle the fire was laid. The girls took their places in the circle, and Gladys, now arrayed in bloomers and middy, with her hair down in two braids and a leather band around her forehead, sat under a tree and looked on. Not being a Camp Fire Girl she could not sit in the Council Circle. Nyoda made fire with the bow and drill, and when the leaping flames lit up the circle of faces the girls sprang to their feet and sang, "Burn, fire, burn," and then, "Mystic Fire," with its dramatic gestures. Gladys, sitting in the shadows, looked on curiously at the fantastically clad figures passing back and forth around the fire singing, "Ghost-dance round the mystic ring, Faces in the starlight glow, Maids of Wohelo. Praises to Wokanda sing, While the music soft and low Rubbing sticks grind slow. Dusky forest now darker grown, Broods in silence o'er its own, Till the wee spark to a flame has blown, And living fire leaps up to greet The song of Wohelo." As they chanted the words the girls acted out with gestures the dancing ghosts, the brooding forest, the rubbing sticks and the leaping fire. So they proceeded through the strange measures, ending up in a close circle around the fire, all making the hand sign of fire together. Gladys began to be stirred with a desire to sit in the circle. When the girls were again seated in their original places and the roll called, Nyoda rose and read the rules of camp. No one was to leave the camp without telli
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