known to me and you, Help me then to bring it true". The girls watched rather half-heartedly. They were growing a little tired of the performance. They fully expected the ninth stick to drift the same way as its predecessors, but to everybody's astonishment it made one rapid circle of the basin, and bobbed successfully through the gap. "It's gone! it's gone!" cried Betty Scott in wild excitement. "St. Perran's working after all. Oh, why didn't he do it for me?" [39] "How funny it should be the only one!" said Elyned Hughes. [39] "I believe the water's running faster than it did before," commented Romola Harvey. "Has the old saint turned on the tap?" "Shall I get my wish?" said Gerda, who stood by with shining eyes. "Of course you'll get it—certain sure. And jolly fortunate you are too. You've won the luck of the whole Form. Don't I wish I were you, just!" "You're evidently St. Perran's favourite!" laughed Annie Pridwell. "Come along, it's nearly time for call-over. We'll be late if we don't sprint," said Barbara Marshall, consulting her watch, and starting at a run on the path that led back to the Dower House. "It was a funny thing that our sticks should all 'stick', and Gerda's just sail off as easily as you like," said Deirdre that evening, as, with Dulcie, she gave an account of the occurrence to Phyllis Rowland, a member of the Sixth. As one of the elect of the school, Phyllis would not have condescended to consult the famous oracle, but she nevertheless took a sneaking interest in the annual ceremony, and was anxious to know how St. Perran's votaries had fared. "Did you do it really properly?" she enquired. "An old woman at Perranwrack once told me it wasn't any use at all if you forgot the least thing." "Why, we hung up our garlands and then wished, and said the rhyme, and threw in our sticks." "Oh, that isn't half enough. Where were you looking[40] when you wished? Facing the sea? Your stick should be chosen from the third twig on the third branch, and it ought to be turned round three
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