r fingers
upon the counterpane. The roll of the organ sounded through the house,
and the girls' clear voices singing a familiar tune. She listened
unthinkingly, until suddenly one verse struck sharply on her ear, and
startled her into vivid attention:--

"The trivial round, the common task, Will furnish all we ought to ask;
Room to deny ourselves, a road To bring us daily nearer God."

She had heard those words a hundred times before, had repeated them at
her mother's knee, had sung them in church, not once, but many times,
yet it seemed that until that moment no conception of their meaning had
penetrated to her brain. What was it, which was all we ought to ask?
"_Room to deny ourselves_!"--to put ourselves last--to be careless of
our own position? And this path of self-denial was the road that led to
God Himself? Was this what Evie had meant when she spoke of the secret
which each one must find out for herself? Was this the explanation of
the contentment which the Vicar had found in his ill-paying parish?
"_Room to deny oneself_!" Oh, but this had been far, far from her own
ambitions. She had asked for room to distinguish herself, to shine
among her fellows, to be first and foremost, praised and applauded. Her
own advancement had been the one absorbing aim in life, and to gratify
it she had been willing to see others fail, and to congratulate herself
in the face of their distress. Never once in all the miseries of
disappointment which she had undergone had it occurred to her that the
explanation of her difficulties lay in the _motive_ underlying her
efforts--the point of view from which she had started. Other girls had
worked as hard as herself, but with some definite and worthy aim, such
as to help their parents, or to fit themselves for work in life. Rhoda
was honest, even when honesty was to her own hurt, and she acknowledged
it had been far otherwise in her case when she had failed in her
examination, it had not been deficiency in knowledge which she had
deplored, but the certificate, the star to her name, the outward and
visible signs of success. When she realised the hopelessness of seeing
her name on the Record Wall, loss of honour and glory had been her
regret, not sorrow for the thought that she had passed through school
and failed to leave behind a tradition of well-doing whereby future
scholars might be strengthened and encouraged!

Rhoda hid her face in the pillow and lay still, communing