ty.
"You needn't rush to any extreme of killing yourself over your books.
There is no hurry. You won't be ready to try the Entrance for a year and
a half yet. But it's well to begin in time and be thoroughly grounded,
Miss Stacy says."
"I shall take more interest than ever in my studies now," said Anne
blissfully, "because I have a purpose in life. Mr. Allan says everybody
should have a purpose in life and pursue it faithfully. Only he says
we must first make sure that it is a worthy purpose. I would call it a
worthy purpose to want to be a teacher like Miss Stacy, wouldn't you,
Marilla? I think it's a very noble profession."
The Queen's class was organized in due time. Gilbert Blythe, Anne
Shirley, Ruby Gillis, Jane Andrews, Josie Pye, Charlie Sloane, and Moody
Spurgeon MacPherson joined it. Diana Barry did not, as her parents
did not intend to send her to Queen's. This seemed nothing short of a
calamity to Anne. Never, since the night on which Minnie May had had the
croup, had she and Diana been separated in anything. On the evening when
the Queen's class first remained in school for the extra lessons and
Anne saw Diana go slowly out with the others, to walk home alone through
the Birch Path and Violet Vale, it was all the former could do to keep
her seat and refrain from rushing impulsively after her chum. A lump
came into her throat, and she hastily retired behind the pages of her
uplifted Latin grammar to hide the tears in her eyes. Not for worlds
would Anne have had Gilbert Blythe or Josie Pye see those tears.
"But, oh, Marilla, I really felt that I had tasted the bitterness of
death, as Mr. Allan said in his sermon last Sunday, when I saw Diana go
out alone," she said mournfully that night. "I thought how splendid it
would have been if Diana had only been going to study for the Entrance,
too. But we can't have things perfect in this imperfect world, as Mrs.
Lynde says. Mrs. Lynde isn't exactly a comforting person sometimes, but
there's no doubt she says a great many very true things. And I think the
Queen's class is going to be extremely interesting. Jane and Ruby
are just going to study to be teachers. That is the height of their
ambition. Ruby says she will only teach for two years after she gets
through, and then she intends to be married. Jane says she will devote
her whole life to teaching, and never, never marry, because you are paid
a salary for teaching, but a husband won't pay you anything, and grow
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