ne in order to pique the proud, spoilt young courtier
to resent the laughter, and, in homely parlance, to give Her Majesty
more to laugh at. The phrase "_and the Queen laughed_," had been
emphatically repeated again and again in Lord Essex's hearing, with much
malicious meaning and effect.

That mocking quotation was resounding in Rose's ears with a
characteristic variation. It was no longer "_and the Queen laughed_," it
was "and Miss Rose Millar laughed," then alas! alas! as a fit pendant,
"and Miss Rose Millar cried."

What a big baby she had shown herself, without the decent reticence of a
gentlewoman's good breeding, or the proper pride of a girl who
respected herself. How these school-girls must despise her! What was she
to do? Wait for the girls to whisper and chatter as all girls will,
however trained? Or go at once to the Miss Stone with whom she had most
to do, tell her the solecism of which she, Rose, had been guilty in the
best behaved of schools, and abide by Miss Stone's decision, though it
should be that she and her sisters would in future dispense with the
services of Miss Rose Millar as assistant drawing-mistress.

Rose had the courage and honesty to adopt the latter course, and she
tried to think that the fresh affront it brought her, was part of the
penalty which she was bound to pay for her disgraceful childishness.

Miss Lucilla Stone listened with a little personal discomfiture, for she
was, like Mrs. Jennings, so thoroughly mistress of herself and the
situation, that any _gaucherie_ or boisterous indiscretion was positive
pain to her. Besides, the bad example to the girls for whom Miss Lucilla
and her sisters were responsible, made a matter which people who did not
understand might wrongly consider a trifle, really a serious affair. "No
doubt," acquiesced Miss Lucilla, "something had put you out, as you tell
me," in low-voiced rebuke, which yet sunk Rose in the dust, deeper than
she had been, when she was making her impulsive confession. "You were
tired with your walk, of course, but, my dear Miss Rose Millar, it is
necessary to learn to practise self-control, especially in the presence
of young people. They are so quick to notice and to encroach on their
elders and those placed in authority over them, when the necessary
distance of perfect self-control on the one side--if possible on both
sides--is not preserved between them. Perhaps," added Miss Lucilla
meditatively, and beginning to brighten