wanted to be alone for a time to think over
the occurrences of the day. "To commune with one's own heart and to be
still." How good it is to do that sometimes. For a few moments my
thoughts lingered lovingly in the little cottage at Putney. Aunt Agatha
and Uncle Keith would be talking of me, I knew that. I could almost hear
the pitying tones of Aunt Agatha's voice, "Poor child! How lonely she
will feel without us to-night!" Did I feel lonely? I hardly think so; on
the contrary, I had the warm, satisfied conviction at my heart that I
was in my right place, the place for which I was most fitted. How
tenderly would I watch over these helpless little creatures committed to
my care! how sacred would be my charge! What a privilege to be allowed
to love them, to be able to win their affection in return!

I had such a craving in my heart to be loved, and hitherto I had had no
one but Aunt Agatha. It seemed to me, somehow, as though I must cry
aloud to my human brothers and sisters to let me love them and take
interest in their lives; to suffer me to glean beside them, like loving
Ruth in those Eastern harvest fields, following the reapers lest haply a
handful might fall to my share, for who would wish to go home at
eventide empty handed as well as weary?

(_To be continued._)

GIRLS' FRIENDSHIPS

By the Author of "Flowering Thorns."

CHAPTER II.

HOW THEY ARE MADE.

Perhaps the first, easiest, and on the whole, least durable of girls'
friendships is formed at school. Not such a school as we go to at
twelve, where we have class competitions, good-conduct marks, and fines
for talking, but such a school as we go to at sixteen, to "finish," when
individual emancipated life is so near that we begin to realise it, and
dimly feel that the friends we now make may form part of it.

Everything looks rather _couleur de rose_; one year, or at the very most
two, and we shall be free and at home, where the nicest girl we ever met
must come to visit us; then we shall return the visit, and together we
shall live in reality those charming times we romance over in low tones
after the lights are put out.

Very little will patch up a so-called friendship at school; a room mate,
especially if you have only one, who is not utterly uncongenial, is
almost sure to become a great friend--the girl who is equal with you in
your favourite lesson, the girl who comes from your county or town, or
whose "people" know your "people." Every sch