o see what is permitted to your English
_Mees_."

"I'm glad we are English," whispered Aldred to Mabel. "French girls must
have a stupid time, if they're never allowed to toboggan, or to go in
the snow. If I were sent to a French school I'd run away, and come back
to Birkwood!"

"There's no place like the Grange," agreed Mabel, brushing the snow
vigorously from her dress. "If there's any jolly thing that it's
possible to do Miss Drummond thinks of it."

Miss Drummond certainly justified the character that Mabel gave her, for
when the girls, very warm and rosy after their exertions, returned to
the school at four o'clock, they found a surprise waiting for them.
Brown, the gardener, with the aid of two or three labourers who had been
called in to help him, had shovelled away the whole of the snow on the
asphalt tennis court, and piled it as a wall all round. He had then
brought the hose, and was now busy flooding the court to a depth of
three or four inches.

"It ought to freeze hard to-night," said Miss Drummond, "and by
to-morrow morning there should be a splendid surface. Those girls who
have brought skates to school will be in luck, and I shall be able to
arrange for those who have not. I have written to Wilson's, the
ironmonger at Chetbourne, to send us out a parcel of several dozen to
choose from."

The prospect of a skating rink in the garden was hailed with joy, and
the anxiety of the school was great lest the frost should give way, and
frustrate their very delightful plans. The amusements of the cold spell
so outweighed the discomforts that nobody (except poor Mademoiselle)
grumbled at nipped fingers or chilly toes. Even Agnes Maxwell, who was a
martyr to chilblains, suffered heroically, and did not wish for a thaw.

"It's quite the most severe winter I can remember," said Mabel, breaking
the ice in her bedroom jug next morning. "I believe even my bottle of
hair wash is frozen, and the glycerine cream is perfectly stiff; I shall
have to melt it on the radiator before I can put any on my hands. Look
at the window! It's covered with beautiful frost patterns."

"All the better for skating," said Aldred, who was trying to thaw her
toothbrush. "I'm glad there has been no more snow to spoil our ice. I
wish Miss Drummond would let us go out at once, after breakfast, instead
of doing lessons."

Miss Drummond's good nature, however, did not extend to such a pitch of
leniency as that, and the morning classes went