The Corner House Girls at School

that almost always smiled. She did not possess a single beautiful feature; yet that smile of hers-friendly,

l-almost at once; and the boldest and most unruly boy dropp

r teachers' deportment books-somehow managed to reach the door of Miss Georgiana's room without being dismissed fro

t he could spend a year with Miss Georgiana Shipman, in nine cases out of ten these hard-to-man

form and cried: "Se sesame! change!" the young pirates often came through Miss Georgiana'

about it? Oh! they would merely hang their heads, and scrape a foot back

ging you on. And if you did not work, Miss Georgiana felt aggrieved, and that made any nice girl feel dreadfully mean! Besides, you took u

than half of her girls would be sure to hang around the school ent

ks of the Parade soon after school closed for the day, or chattering along Whipple Street on which Miss Georgian

ge back from the street-line. There were three big oaks in the front yard, and no grass

dd afternoon indeed that did not find a number of girls here. To be invited to stay to te

She had their confidence and some of them came to her with troub

as noticeable that girls who had no mothers at all, found in the little, plump, rather dowdy "old maid sch

d her influence was-to use a trite description-like a stone flung into a still pool of wat

ew her for just the "stormy petrel" that she was. Agnes gravitated to scrapes as naturally as

did at the nearest desk. The custom was, in verbal recitation, for the pupil to rise in her (or his) seat and recite.

es herself) did not hear it. But it got on Agnes' nerves and one afternoon, before the first week of school

pering that way, Trix S

d Miss Shipman. "W

d Agnes, stormily. "

sproving her own statement in that particu

!" insis

sternly enough, for the whole room was d

ipman," declared Trix,

You need not recite, and I will see both of you aft

the jealous girl added: "You Corner House girls think you are going to run thin

iss Georgiana made her investigation of the i

er accusation that Trix's whispering

Trix, tossing her head. "I'm not s

" said Miss Georgiana, smiling, "too, too fond to hur

it all on,"

t to fly into a passion and be unladylike. Beatrice, you must not whisper and annoy your neighb

ack was turned, Trix screwed her face into a horrid mask and ra

o she missed the first part of an incident of some moment.

Corner House, soon after the Kenway girls came to live there. Petal was Ruth's particular pet-or, had been, when she was a kitten. Agnes' choice was the black

et of mature age and now and then the girls were fairly convulsed wit

cked them into a box in a corner of the kitchen, so that the down would not be scatte

s chasing a stray feather about the floor and in diving behind the big range for it, she kn

as three ordinary tails and fur standing erect upon her b

on the floor, supposedly out of the way. Mrs. MacCall was measuring molasses

o many of you cats erbout disher house, an' dat's a fa

eral. "Aren't there as many as five mice left? You know you said yo

n to purty few numbers," agreed Unc

had left the table for a momen

, and darted for the p

r back, spit angrily, and then dove from the table. In her flight she overturned the china cu

!" Mrs. MacC

ged Ruth, trying

ere covered. Wherever she stepped she left an imprint. And when the excited Ruth grabbed for

"stuck-up" now, Popocatep

ind her. She made a single lap around the kitchen trying for an ou

r!" shri

chen!" wailed

ders!" gasped Uncle Rufus. "She don

t, in chorus, and clinging tog

t appeared to be an animated feather-boa dashing abou

' sake is the matt

h she had been shot out of a gun, leaving a trail of feathers i