The Getting of Wisdom

more and more on those around her; to grasp that th

ed by Mother to wear her dresses an inch below her knees. She became a quick, adaptable pupil, with a parrot-like memory,

with her stories of the great doings that took place at school; and none of her class-mates would ha

h had preceded her. Yet here she now had to hang about, alone, unhappy, the target of all eyes. It might be supposed that Laura would feel some sympathy for her, having so recently undergone the same experience herself. But that was not her way. She rejoiced, in barbarian fashion, th

aura's class, and the tw

she never wore an apron to protect the front of her frock. Naturally, too, she had a bottomless supply of pocket-money: if a subscription were raised, she

to move gracefully among companions none of whom knew what it meant to be really poor. Many trivial mortifications were th

all, trifling, compared with the in

he daughters of an imaginative mother, and, balked in other outlets, this imagination had wreaked itself on their clothing. All her short life long, Laura had suffered under a home-made, picturesque style of dress; and she had resented, with a violence even Mother did not gauge, this use of her young body as a peg on which to hang fantastic garments. After her tenth birthday she was, she thanked goodness, considered too old for the quaint shapes beneath which Pin still groaned; but there remained the matter of colour for Mother to sin against, and in this she seemed to grow more intem

made by the local dressmaker, and consequently had not the home-made cut that Laura abhorred. But the colour! Her heart fell to the pit of her stomach

ur. No matter how sumptuous or how simple the material of which the dress was made, it must be dark, or of a delicate tint. Brilliancy was a sign of vulgarity, and put the wearer outs

she retreated to the bottom of the

d. "Oh, how COULD she buy such a thing? And I

. "It'll look darker, I'm sure, if you've go

ish of you, Pin, perfectly piggish! You

own and I said take that, you would like it better, and she said hold your tongue

for church there was a great mustering of one another, both by girls and teachers. Laura was the only one to descend in the dress she had worn throughout the w

see how her partner took the remark: it was the good-natured Maria Morell, who was resplendent in velvet an

e at a harmless-looking youth, who was doing his best not to blush on passing th

ed its modish cut. Once, no one being present, she even took it out of the wardrobe. But the merciless spring sunshine seemed to

obey. On the fatal morning she dawdled as long as possible over her mending, thus postponing dressing to go out till the others had vacated the bedroom; where, in order not to be forced to see herself, she kept her eyes half shut, and turned the looking-glass hind-before. Although it was a warm day, she hung a cloak over her shoulders. But her arms peeped out of the loose sleeves, and at least a foot of skirt

hump, for the moment when he should raise his eyes and, with a start of attention, become aware of the screaming colour. At Godmother's all the faces disapp

Like a parro

his way! Step up, ladies and gen

seen what they were looking at. After this, she tied the dress up with string and brown paper and hid it in a drawer, under her nightgowns. When she went home at Christmas it went with her, still in the parcel, and then there was a stormy scene. But Laura was stubborn: rather than wear the dress, she would not go back to the Col

sked Lilith Gordon as she and Laura undress

e thought Lilith winked at the third g

Or have you gone in for

amed in

r that was! Fit for an Eas

belonged to a girl I knew who died-and her mother gave i

does your mother let you wear other peo

alness. It was not likely she had been believed, and if she were, well, it made matters worse instead of better: people would conclude that she lived on charity. Always when unexpectedly required to stand on the defensive, she said

one since you left here. I woul

we've got at home. We've had her for yea

ly. "So I should think

ith the fib. For who believed in old nurses nowadays? They were a stock property, borrowed on the spur of the moment from readings in THE FAMILY HERALD, from Tennyson's LADY CLARE. Why on earth had such a far-fetched excuse leapt to her tongue? Why could she not have said Sarah, the servant, the maid-of-all-work? Then Miss Day would have had no chance to sniff, and she, Laura, could have believ