chool turned out better equipped girls, and none held a higher
standard in college examinations. A Sunny Bank diploma was a sure
passport. When the girls worked they worked hard, and when playtime came
it was enjoyed to the full. Naturally, with so many dispositions
surrounding her, Miss Preston often in secret floundered in a "slough of
despond," for that which could influence one girl for her good might prove
a complete failure when brought to bear upon another. Never was the old
adage, "What is one man's meat is another man's poison," more truly
illustrated.

But Miss Preston had a stanch friend, and trusted Him implicitly. Often,
when perplexed and troubled, a half-hour's quiet talk with Him close shut
behind her own door would give her wisdom and strength for the baffling
question, and when she again appeared among them the girls wondered at her
serene expression and winning smile, for in that half-hour's seclusion she
had managed to remove all trace of the soil from the "slough," and,
refreshed and strengthened by an unfailing help, could resume her
"Pilgrimage."

She often said, in her quaint way: "The hardest work I have to do is to
undo," and that was very true. Many times the home influence was of the
worst possible sort for a young girl, or else there was just none at all.
Such girls were difficult subjects. Many had come from other schools, as
in Toinette's case, where distrust seemed to be the key-note of the
establishment, and then came Miss Preston's severest trials. The
confidence of such girls must be won ere a step could be taken in the
right direction. It was a rare exception when Miss Preston failed to win
it.

"You feel such a nasty little bit of a crawling thing when you've done a
mean thing to Miss Preston," a girl once said. "If she'd only give you a
first-class blowing up--for that's just what you know you deserve all the
time--you could stand it, but she never does. She just puts her arm around
you and looks straight through you with those soft gray eyes of hers, and
never says one word. Then you begin to shrivel up, and you keep right on
shriveling till you feel like Alice in Wonderland. You can't say boo,
because _she_ hasn't, and when she gives you a soft little kiss on your
forehead, and whispers so gently: Don't try to talk about it now, dear;
just go and lock yourself in your room and have a quiet think, and I'm
sure the kink will straighten out. I could lie flat on the floor and let
h