flutter about our ruffles and ribbons, and could hardly refrain from
openly prinking. But we applauded very heartily every speaker and
every would-be speaker, understanding that by a consensus of opinion
on the platform we were very fine young ladies, and much was to be
expected of us.

One of the last speakers was introduced as a member of the School
Board. He began like all the rest of them, but he ended differently.
Abandoning generalities, he went on to tell the story of a particular
schoolgirl, a pupil in a Boston school, whose phenomenal career might
serve as an illustration of what the American system of free education
and the European immigrant could make of each other. He had not got
very far when I realized, to my great surprise and no small delight,
that he was telling my story. I saw my friends on the platform beaming
behind the speaker, and I heard my name whispered in the audience. I
had been so much of a celebrity, in a small local way, that
identification of the speaker's heroine was inevitable. My classmates,
of course, guessed the name, and they turned to look at me, and
nudged me, and all but pointed at me; their new muslins rustling and
silk ribbons hissing.

One or two nearest me forgot etiquette so far as to whisper to me.
"Mary Antin," they said, as the speaker sat down, amid a burst of the
most enthusiastic applause,--"Mary Antin, why don't you get up and
thank him?"

I was dazed with all that had happened. Bursting with pride I was, but
I was moved, too, by nobler feelings. I realized, in a vague, far-off
way, what it meant to my father and mother to be sitting there and
seeing me held up as a paragon, my history made the theme of an
eloquent discourse; what it meant to my father to see his ambitious
hopes thus gloriously fulfilled, his judgment of me verified; what it
meant to Frieda to hear me all but named with such honor. With all
these things choking my heart to overflowing, my wits forsook me, if I
had had any at all that day. The audience was stirring and whispering
so that I could hear: "Who is it?" "Is that so?" And again they
prompted me:--

"Mary Antin, get up. Get up and thank him, Mary."

And I rose where I sat, and in a voice that sounded thin as a fly's
after the oratorical bass of the last speaker, I began:--

"I want to thank you--"

That is as far as I got. Mr. Swan, the principal, waved his hand to
silence me; and then, and only then, did I realize the enormity of
wh