"Never mind," she would say, "here is an idea--or at least half an idea.
This little bit of composition is original, and not, at best, a poor
imitation of Sir. Walter Scott or Lord Macaulay."

Thus the girls found a strong stimulus to be their real selves in these
little essays, and the best of them chose their subject and let it
ferment in their brains without the aid of books, except for the more
technical parts.

More than one girl in the school was surprised at Dora Russell exerting
herself to try for the prize essay. She was just about to close her
school career, and they could not make out why she roused herself to work
for the most difficult prize, for which she would have to compete with
any girl in the school who chose to make a similar attempt.

Dora, however, had her own, not very high motive for making the attempt.
She was a thoroughly accomplished girl, graceful in her appearance and
manner; in short, just the sort of girl who would be supposed to do
credit to a school. She played with finish, and even delicacy of touch.
There was certainly no soul in her music, but neither were there any
wrong notes. Her drawings were equally correct, her perspective good, her
trees were real trees, and the coloring of her water-color sketches was
pure. She spoke French extremely well, and with a correct accent, and her
German also was above the average. Nevertheless, Dora was commonplace,
and those girls who knew her best spoke sarcastically, and smiled at one
another when she alluded to her prize essay, and seemed confident of
being the successful competitor.

"You won't like to be beaten, Dora, say, by Annie Forest," they would
laughingly remark; whereupon Dora's calm face, would slightly flush and
her lips would assume a very proud curve. If there was one thing she
could not bear it was to be beaten.

"Why do you try for it, Dora?" her class-fellows would ask; but here Dora
made no reply: she kept her reason to herself.

The fact was, Dora, who must be a copyist to the end of the chapter, and
who could never to her latest day do anything original, had determined to
try for the composition prize because she happened accidentally to hear a
conversation between Mrs. Willis and Miss Danesbury, in which something
was said about a gold locket with Mrs. Willis' portrait inside.

Dora instantly jumped at the conclusion that this was to be the great
prize bestowed upon the successful essayist. Delightful idea; how well