ssamer lace lay upon my breast like a silken mist. I was beautiful
in that gown and I knew it. It was my hour of appreciation of my own
charm.

Later I lifted the dress and saw my plain calfskin shoes. I smiled but
soon grew sober as I thought that the incongruity between gown and shoes
was no greater than that between the gown and the girl--the girl who was
reared to wear plain clothes and be honest and unpretentious. But
honesty--that is the rock to which I cling now. I am going to be honest
with myself and have my share of happiness while I'm young.

I went back again to the fire, still wearing the borrowed gown. Virginia
found me there several hours later. When she came in and saw me, a
gorgeous butterfly, she said, she was very happy. She would have me go
down to her mother and Royal. I shrank from it but she said I might as
well become accustomed to being stared at when I was so dazzling and
beautiful. I went down, feeling almost as much of a culprit as I did the
day Aunt Maria surprised me at playing prima donna and marched me in to
the quilting party.

Mrs. Lee was lovely. She is sure I deserve to be happy in my youth.
Royal went mad. "Ye Gods!" he cried as he ran to me and grasped my
hands. "You take my breath away! You are like this!" He seized his
violin and began to play the Spring Song. The quivering ecstasy of
spring, the mating calls of robins and orioles, the rushing joy of
bursting blossoms, the delicate perfume of violets and trailing arbutus,
the dazzling shafts of sunlight pierced by silver showers of capricious
April--all echoed in the melody of the violin.

"You are like that, that is you!" he said as he laid his instrument
aside. His words were very sweet to me. The future beckons into sunlit
paths of joy.

So I have departed from the teachings of my childhood and turned to the
so-called vanities of the world. I am going to grasp my share of
happiness while I can enjoy them.

When I went up-stairs again to take off the borrowed gown I was already
planning the new clothes I want to buy. I must have a pink crepe
georgette, a pale, pale blue--just as I'm writing this there flashes to
my mind one of those old Memory Gems I learned in school on the hill.

"But pleasures are like poppies spread,--
You seize the flower, its bloom is shed;
Or like the snow fall on the river,
A moment white, then melts forever."

I wonder, is there always a fly in the ointment!