I

Round the Camp-fire

It was the first Saturday of the term. So far the girls had been kept
busily occupied settling down to work in their fresh forms, and trying
to grow accustomed to Miss Teddington's new time-tables. Now, however,
they were free to relax and enjoy themselves in any way they chose. Some
were playing tennis, some had gone for a walk with Miss Moseley, a few
were squatting frog-like on boulders in the midst of the stream, and
others strolled under the trees in the grove.

"Thank goodness the weather's behaving itself!" said Mary Acton, who,
with a few other members of the Lower Fifth, was sitting on the trunk of
a fallen oak. "Do you remember last council? It simply poured. The
thing's no fun if one can't have a real fire."

"It'll burn first-rate to-night," returned Lizzie Lonsdale. "There's a
little wind, and the wood'll be dry."

"That reminds me I haven't found my faggot yet," said Beth Broadway
easily.

"Girl alive! Then you'd better go and look for one, or you'll be all in
a scramble at the last!"

"Bother! I'm too comfy to move."

"Nice Wood-gatherer you'll look if you come empty-handed!"

"I'd appropriate half your lot first, Lizzikins!"

"Would you, indeed? I'd denounce you, and you'd lose your rank and be
degraded to a candidate again."

"Oh, you mean, stingy miser!"

"Not at all. It's the wise and foolish virgins over again. I shan't have
enough for myself and you. I've a lovely little stack--just enough for
one--reposing--no, I'd better not tell you where. Don't look so hopeful.
You're not to be trusted."

"What are you talking about?" asked Rona Mitchell, who had wandered up
to the group. "Why are some of you picking up sticks? I saw a girl over
there with quite a bundle just now. You might tell me."

So far Rona had not been well received in her own form, IV B. She was
older than her class-mates, and they, instead of attempting to initiate
her into the ways of the Woodlands girls on this holiday afternoon, had
scuttled off and left her to fend for herself. She looked such an odd,
wistful, lonely figure that Lizzie Lonsdale's kind heart smote her. She
pushed the other girls farther along the tree-trunk till they made a
grudging space for the new-comer.

"I'm a good hand at camp-fires, if you want any help," continued Rona,
seating herself with alacrity. "I've made 'em by the dozen at home, and
cooked by them too. Just let me know where you want it, and I'll set to
wo