uite unable to live up to it.
In her excess of zeal she had founded too many societies, and with such
strict and arduous rules that they would have tried the spirit of a
candidate for initiation into some mystic Brotherhood. Urged on by her
enthusiasm, the members had made a desperate first spurt, and then had
slacked lamentably. The records of their brief successes and subsequent
fallings-off were chronicled in certain marbled-cover exercise-books.
Lorraine, fresh from a perusal of these annals, began the meeting with a
drastic suggestion.

"As things stand at present," she said, "the school seems over-weighted
with societies. This is an exact list of them: 'The Research Society',
'The Poker-work Guild', 'The Debating Society', 'The Sketching Club',
'The Stamp Collectors' Union', 'The Post Card Guild', 'The Home Reading
Circle', 'The Jack Tar Club', 'The Entertainments Guild', 'The Musical
Union', 'The Hockey Club', 'The Cricket Club', 'The Tennis Club', 'The
Badminton Club', 'The Basket-ball Club', 'The Natural History League',
'The Elocution Guild', 'The Needlecraft Society', and 'The Home Arts
Guild'."

"Nineteen in all!" commented Patsie, who had been checking off the items
on her fingers.

"Rather stiff for a school of forty girls!" nodded Dorothy sagely.

"There are far too many to keep up properly," urged Lorraine. "Every
hobby we've ever had has been turned into a society. If we'd had no
lessons to do, we could scarcely have managed them all, but when they
must come out of our spare time it gets quite a tax. I think we mustn't
be quite so ambitious this year. Suppose we let some of them drop, and
concentrate on just a few."

"I'm your man!" agreed Patsie. "I always thought such heaps of societies
were a grizzly nuisance. It got the limit when two or three girls
couldn't even compare post cards without being turned into a guild.
Those kids in the Second Form actually had a society for collecting
stumps of lead pencil, and used to steal them shamelessly from any boxes
that were left about in the gym. The 'guild habit' has grown into a
perfect mania with the school."

"Best whittle them down," said Vivien, who had herself suffered at the
hands of the too enthusiastic Lily Anderson.

"Which do you propose to shelve and which to keep?" asked Dorothy.

Lorraine opened the biggest and fattest exercise book.

"This is 'The Gables Guild'," she explained, "a sort of foundation
society that includes all the oth