as I regret it.”

Peggy turned away, a little twinge of disappointment in her heart. She had heard the girls discussing the matinée party for to-day, and she had never dreamed of not going with them. As she left the chapel Miss Carrol, the youngest teacher, timidly approached the principal.

“I am going to chaperone the girls to-day, am I not?” she asked.

“Yes, Miss Carrol.”

“I thought I’d venture to suggest that Peggy Parsons be forgiven this once—I don’t think she did anything so very terrible—and that she be allowed to come with us to the first party. Don’t you remember when you were away at school—how heartbreaking it was if you were shut out of anything, and how easily a fit of homesickness came on to blot out all the sunlight of the world? Don’t you remember—Mrs. Forest?”

Mrs. Forest didn’t remember at all. It wasn’t just because all such experiences for her had been very long ago—many women remember all the more tenderly as they grow older,—but she had set out to be a good disciplinarian, and the girls she graduated from her school must be as nearly alike as possible, she wanted them all run in the same mold of training. But Miss Carrol’s pleading voice and her eager eyes did what Mrs. Forest’s own reminiscences could not do for her—they softened her attitude toward Peggy and finally she gave her consent for Peggy to go.

Peggy, flying back to her room, her heart full of disappointment, unaware of the change in her immediate fortunes brought about by Miss Carrol, heard her name mentioned by a group at the foot of the big staircase.

“This is really a very clever paper little Miss Parsons has written for my English class,” one teacher was saying, tapping the folded sheet Peggy had labored over as the first of her work for Andrews.

“Yes?” politely inquired another. “That’s rather unusual for Andrews. We have so many beautiful girls, but so few brilliant ones. Peggy Parsons may be popular—and she may develop into a genius, but she’ll never be a belle, will she? Not like some of our girls.”

Peggy’s feet grew heavy on the stairs. She went miserably on to her room and there carefully locked the door, and went and stood before the mirror. She had never been conscious of just how she did look before. She had never thought of being beautiful, but much less had she thought of being NOT beautiful. That was too tragic. She saw a little sober face, with clear brown eyes, and goldy 

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