hoes.

And then, too, the elder girl had said nothing about another side of
the question, had not touched on the sighs and simpers, the winged
glances, and drooped, provocative lids--all the thousand and one
fooleries, in short, which Laura saw her and others employ. There was a
regular machinery of invitation and encouragement to be set in motion:
for, before it was safe to ignore a wooer and let him dangle, as Maria
advised, you had first to make quite sure he wished to nibble your
bait.--And it was just in this elementary science that Laura broke down.

Looking round her, she saw mainly experts. To take the example nearest
at hand: there was Monsieur Legros, the French master; well, Maria
could twist him round her little finger. She only needed to pout her
thick, red lips, or to give a coquettish twist to her plump figure, or
to ogle him with her fine, bold, blue eyes, and the difficult questions
in the lesson were sure to pass her by.--Once she had even got ten
extra marks added to an examination paper, in this easy fashion.
Whereas, did she, Laura, try to imitate Maria, venture to pout or to
smirk, it was ten to one she would be rebuked for impertinence. No, she
got on best with the women-teachers, to whom red lips and a full bust
meant nothing; while the most elderly masters could not be relied on to
be wholly impartial, where a pair of magnificent eyes was concerned.
Even Mr. Strachey, the unapproachable, had been known, on running full
tilt into a pretty girl's arms in an unlit passage, to be laughingly
confused.

Laura was not, of course, the sole outsider in these things; sprinkled
through the College were various others, older, too, than she, who by
reason of demureness of temperament, or immersion in their work, stood
aloof. But they were lost in the majority, and, as it chanced, none of
them belonged to Laura's circle. Except Chinky--and Chinky did not
count. So, half-fascinated, half-repelled, Laura set to studying her
friends with renewed zeal. She could not help admiring their
proficiency in the art of pleasing, even though she felt a little
abashed by the open pride they took in their growing charms. There was
Bertha, for instance, Bertha who had one of the nicest minds of them
all; and yet how frankly gratified she was, by the visible rounding of
her arms and the curving of her bust. She spoke of it to Laura with a
kind of awe; and her voice seemed to give hints of a coming mystery.
Tilly, on the ot