A Sweet Girl Graduate | Page 3

you. And
perhaps there'll be stories and larks in it. Now you really must go to
sleep, for I have to get up so early in the morning. Katie, darling, I'll
make a corner for you in my bed to-night. Won't that be a treat?"
"Oh, yes, Prissie."
Katie's pale face was lit up by a radiant smile; Hattie and Rose lay

down side by side and closed their eyes. In a few moments they were
sound asleep.
As they lay in the sound, happy sleep of healthy childhood Priscilla
bent over them and kissed them. Then before she lay down herself she
knelt by the window, looked up at the clear, dark sky in which the
moon sailed in majesty, bent her head, murmured a few words of
prayer, then crept into bed by her little sister's side.
Prissie felt full of courage and good resolves. She was going out into
the world to-morrow, and she was quite determined that the world
should not conquer her, although she knew that she was a very poor
maiden with a specially heavy load of care on her young shoulders.
CHAPTER II
THE DELIGHTS OF BEING A FRESHER
THE college was quite shut away in its own grounds, and only from the
upper windows did the girls get a peep of the old university town of
Kingsdene. From these, however, particularly in the winter, they could
see the gabled colleges, the chapels with their rich glory of architecture
and the smooth lawns of the college gardens as they sloped gently
down to the river.
St. Benet's, the college for women, was approached by a private road,
and high entrance gates obstructed the gaze of the curious. Inside there
were cheerful halls and pleasant gardens and gay, fresh, unrestrained
life. But the passer-by got no peep of these things unless the high gates
happened to be open.
This was the first evening of term, and most of the girls were back.
There was nothing very particular going on, and they were walking
about the gardens, and greeting old friends, and telling each other their
experiences, and more or less picking up the threads which had been
broken or loosened in the long vacation.
The evenings were drawing in, but the pleasant twilight which was

soon to be rendered brilliant by the full moon seemed to the girls even
nicer than broad daylight to linger about in. They did not want to go
into the houses; they flitted about in groups here and there, chatting and
laughing merrily.
St. Benet's had three halls, each with its own vice-principal, and a
certain number of resident students. Each hall stood in its own grounds
and was more or less a complete home in itself. There were resident
lecturers and demonstrators for the whole college and one lady
principal, who took the lead and was virtually head of the college.
Miss Vincent was the name of the present principal. She was an old
lady and had a vice-principal under her at Vincent Hall, the largest and
newest of these spacious homes, where young women received the
advantages of university instruction to prepare them for the battle of
life.
Priscilla was to live at Heath Hall-- a slightly smaller house, which
stood at a little distance away-- its grounds being divided from the
grounds of Vincent Hall by means of a rustic paling. Miss Heath was
the very popular vice-principal of this hall, and Prissie was considered
a fortunate girl to obtain a home in her house. She sat now a forlorn and
rather scared young person, huddled up in one corner of the fly which
turned in at the wide gates, and finally deposited her and her luggage at
the back entrance of Heath Hall.
Priscilla looked out in the darkness of the autumn night with frightened
eyes. She hated herself for feeling nervous. She had told Aunt Raby
that, of course, she would have no silly tremors, yet here she was
trembling and scarcely able to pay the cabman his fare.
She heard a girl's laugh in the distance, and it caused her to start so
violently that she dropped one of her few treasured sixpences, which
went rolling about aimlessly almost under the horse's hoofs.
"Stop a minute, I'll find it for you," said a voice. A tall girl with big,
brown eyes suddenly darted into view, picked up the sixpence as if by
magic, popped it into Priscilla's hand and then vanished. Priscilla knew

that this was the girl who had laughed; she heard her laughing again as
she turned to join some one who was standing beside a laurel hedge.
The two linked their arms together and walked off in the darkness.
"Such a frightened poor fresher!" said the girl who had picked up the
sixpence