ring woods
(not, however, through the fire-escape), and Peggy and the Owls had
returned each with a wheelbarrow-load of boughs and ground pine and all
manner of pleasant woodland things. The leaves had turned, and were
glowing with scarlet and gold and russet. These were put in water, lest
they should begin to curl and wither before night; while the evergreens
were heaped in a corner and left to their fate. Now it was afternoon,
and the girls, released from their tasks, had flown to the scene of
action. Already the gymnasium began to assume a festive appearance.
Several garlands were in place, and on the floor sat six or eight
juniors, busily weaving more. Ladders stood here and there. At the top
of one stood the Snowy Owl, arranging a "trophy," as she called it, of
brilliant leaves, on another, Peggy was valiantly hammering, as she
arranged in festoons the long folds of green and white bunting that the
Fluffy handed up to her. The Fluffy was a curious sight, being swathed
in bunting from head to foot. When Peggy demanded "more slack," she
simply turned around a few times and unrolled herself, thus presenting
the appearance of an animated spool.

"It's effective," said Gertrude, surveying her from her perch, "but I
can't say that it looks comfortable. How ever did you get yourself into
such a snarl, Fluff?"

"Why, I was measuring it, don't you know?" said Bertha, "and it got all
into a heap on the floor, and there was so much of it I didn't know what
to do. So I began to roll it round and round myself, and the first thing
I knew I was the cocoon-thing you see before you. I feel as if I ought
to come out a butterfly, somehow."

"They are lovely colours!" said Peggy. "There's nothing so pretty as
green and white. How do you choose your colours? We haven't chosen ours
yet, but I suppose we shall soon."

"The Snowy chose them," said Bertha. "They were Sir Somebody-or-other's
colours at the Siege of Acre. I wanted scarlet, because that was
Launcelot's--"

"Fluffy! it was nothing of the kind!"

"Well, you know what I mean, Snowy; don't make a cannibal meal of me.
Scarlet was Elaine's colour, and Launcelot wore it; that was what I
meant."

"I thought--" said Peggy, timidly, "I thought she was the Lily Maid; I
thought she wore white."

"Did, herself," said the Snowy, with her mouth full of tacks. "But she
gave him a scarlet sleeve embroidered with pearls, and he wore it on his
helmet, and that was what made Guinevere