characteristics. But Louise was not handsome, she
insisted upon disliking every character of household work, and her
position at school was not always above the average. In certain
classes she did excel. Louise herself was the last person who could
have explained why there were days when she was so absorbed that she
seemed more than ordinarily dull even in the subjects that sometimes
interested her.

She was never a favorite with her teachers or with strangers. But for
one thing Louise was always grateful. Her own troop of Girl Scouts
sincerely liked her, for her own sake as well as Dorothy's. Only
Dorothy she believed really understood and cared for her deeply in
spite of her faults and idiosyncrasies.

With Dorothy alone she felt able to say and behave exactly as she
desired. She could drop into one of her moods of self-absorption, or
speak as if she were thinking aloud. Not always were her ideas clear
even to herself until she had slowly evolved them.

Now these days in the woods Louise felt freer, less awkward and
self-conscious. Mysteriously, unexpectedly, she was finding herself.

With the other girls nature study was a pastime, or merely a necessity
of their outdoor Scout training. With Louise it was becoming a
passionate delight.

The note of the first bird singing deep among the beechwoods found her
awake and guessing the name before slipping noiselessly outdoors to
see if the warbler could be discovered.

The other girls were amused by the fact that Louise wandered about all
day carrying a nature book in her hand. She studied the trees and
flowers, even the stones, silent most of the time while her companions
chattered. If one of them asked a question concerning the outdoors
that she could answer, she would become eloquent enough. But to
Dorothy McClain alone she confided her deeper spiritual and mental
reactions.

"It is as if I had been asleep all my life before, Dorothy, dear, and
was only beginning to wake up. Somehow I cannot explain it, even to
myself, I feel so convinced that this summer in the woods will have a
tremendous influence on my future life. I am going to find something
in these woods that I have been looking for in a stupid fashion since
I was a little girl."

"We are what the winds and sun and waters made us," Dorothy quoted,
glad to recall at this moment the lines her father so often repeated.

Louise shook her head.

"No, I mean something different. We all are what you have j