A Dixie School Girl

rom Four Corners, the road leading to the post of

s to shoot, (straight or otherwise) with Admiral Seldon as head of the discipline department, a position by no means a sinecure since Beverly represented one-half the need of such a department. Until the children were twelve the governess had been all sufficient but at that point Athol rebelled at being "a sissy" and demanded a tutor, Beverly entirely concurring in his views. So a tutor had been installed and had remained until the previous July, when he was called to fill a more lucrative position elsewhere. Thus Woodbine's young shoots were left without a trainer, to the dismay of its older members and distress of its younger ones, for both Beverly and Athol had grown very fond of Norman Lee, who seemed but little older than themselves, though in reality quite ten years their senior. In the schoolroom he had been the staid, dignified instructor but beyond its walls no better chum and comrade could have been f

as not surprising that it seemed to them well-ni

guine of being able to find any one else capable of repeating it and f

ways to different schools became a very definite one indeed. The boy and girl were like a pair of horses which has been driven together fifteen years and suddenly separated. True, the separation was not as yet a fact, but human beings can suffer more in anticipation than the brute creation can in reality. The great question at present was which of many schools to select. Admiral Seldon had written to several for circulars and i

r she could bestride a horse, had welcomed him with delight. Whether the old Admiral had done likewise is open to doubt, but Mrs. Ashby frankly protested. As a girl she had ridden every ridable thing upon the place but it was literally a horse of another color when it came to the point of Beverly doing as she had done. So Apache had been tolerated, not welcomed, by Mrs. Ashby, and having been an eye-witness to some of the little beast's astonishing performances when he first came two years before, she has exacted from Beverly a

set forth upon their two-mile tr

e in his toes this crisp morning, and besides the roads

swered the girl, as she ran down

th the boys, remember," M

s by springing straight up into the air in as good an imitation of a "buck" as any "thoroughly gentled" little broncho could give in the polite society of his aristocratic Vi

nor tormented Beverly for being "no sort of a sport," and "scared to back her painted plug against their thoroughbreds." They were honorable lads and would have felt honor-boun

r, never too elastic, snapped. Her riding crop descended with a thwack, first upon Ro

I'll beat you to Four Cor

al of rage as he shook his bony little head and struck into a gait such as Beverly had never dreamed a horse could strike. It was like a tornado let loose, and, exper

s candy if I do beat t

oments later, the whirlwind arrived and the

ing crop upon the counter. "These boys are trying to make me take two pounds of cinnamon suckers on a bet. Did you e

, I reckon," answered the shop keeper, drawing two or three boxes from his case and placing them upon his counter. From the appearance of the wrappings they belied Huyler's advertis

o put up for one and you for the other. Why just look at me! The mud on me ought to just n

ou started the circus,

rchie Carey, coming over from the letter window where he had gone to ask for the mail and slamming upon the counter beside the bo

settle your hash Bev,

sted Archie. "Then you'd have come along with us as a matter of course

ed up her boxes, nodded to Mr. Telford, and took her mud-spla

ag strapped to his saddle. Then the two boys sprang upon their waiting horses. As they rode in silence Beverly glance

I promised mother

xclaimed the

he repeated wit

and bordering the road echoed to their shouts. Whe

e you going to

have, though goodness knows it's bad enough as it is. I didn't mean to break my promise, but I couldn't let you boys put it all over me like you did and not get back at you. Now

Snowdrift. Flat sticks served as scrapers and bunches of dry grass for cloths. When the animals looked a little less like animated mud pies Beverly turned her attention to her riding skirt. To restore that to its pristine fresh

he began her cleansing processes at the branch, while up in one of the dormer windows of the big house her mother stood smiling to herself. It was one of the rare occasions when she had occa

come confession and repentance and s