and I didn't care in the least who it was.
In much the same mood that Don Quixote selected the Dulcinea del Toboso
for his lady-love, I singled out one of Miss Dorothy's incomparable
young ladies for mine.

I debated a long while whether I should not select two, but at last
settled down on one--a pale little girl with blue eyes, named Alice. I
shall not make a long story of this, for Alice made short work of
me. She was secretly in love with Pepper Whitcomb. This occasioned a
temporary coolness between Pepper and myself.

Not disheartened, however, I placed Laura Rice--I believe it was Laura
Rice--in the vacant niche. The new idol was more cruel than the old.
The former frankly sent me to the right about, but the latter was a
deceitful lot. She wore my nosegay in her dress at the evening service
(the Primroses were marched to church three times every Sunday), she
penned me the daintiest of notes, she sent me the glossiest of ringlets
(cut, as I afterwards found out, from the stupid head of Miss Gibbs's
chamber-maid), and at the same time was holding me and my pony up to
ridicule in a series of letters written to Jack Harris. It was Harris
himself who kindly opened my eyes.

"I tell you what, Bailey," said that young gentleman, "Laura is an old
veteran, and carries too many guns for a youngster. She can't resist a
flirtation; I believe she'd flirt with an infant in arms. There's hardly
a fellow in the school that hasn't worn her colors and some of her hair.
She doesn't give out any more of her own hair now. It's been pretty well
used up. The demand was greater than the supply, you see. It's all very
well to correspond with Laura, but as to looking for anything serious
from her, the knowing ones don't. Hope I haven't hurt your feelings,
old boy," (that was a soothing stroke of flattery to call me "old boy,")
"but it was my duty as a friend and a Centipede to let you know who you
were dealing with."

Such was the advice given me by that time-stricken, careworn, and
embittered man of the world, who was sixteen years old if he was a day.

I dropped Laura. In the course of the next twelve months I had perhaps
three or four similar experiences, and the conclusion was forced upon
me that I was not a boy likely to distinguish myself in this branch of
business.

I fought shy of Primrose Hall from that moment. Smiles were smiled over
the boxwood hedge, and little hands were occasionally kissed to me;
but I only winked my ey