he
victim of her jokes.

A few mornings after Gwen's introduction to the Fifth there was a
class for memory map drawing with the assistant teacher. Each girl was
supposed to come prepared to make a map of India, and to mark in a
large number of places, a fairly difficult task, and one over which
many of them grumbled in unison.

"It's not fair! It takes such heaps of time to go over it at home, one
hasn't a second for anything else!" wailed Minna Jennings.

"I'd a raging headache last night, and my mother said she thought
Rodenhurst was getting too much for me," bleated Millicent Cooper.

"Poor frail flower! You look as if you'd wither at a breath! Better
pack you off to a sanatorium!" laughed Netta.

"And you to a lunatic asylum, you mad thing! Don't you ever get
headaches with all this over-swatting?"

"No, my child, for I know a dodge or two! N. G. is no infant in arms,
I assure you."

"Deign to explain, O commander of the faithful!" begged Annie Edwards.

"Well, as I told you, I'm up to a thing or two, and I flatter myself I
know just exactly how to tackle Grinnie."

"Who's Grinnie?" asked Gwen rather sharply.

The others roared.

"My sweet babe, my dear ex-Junior, let us initiate you into the
shibboleths of the Fifth! Yes, Seniors indulge in their little
nicknames as well as the Lower School, though perhaps we are rather
more cultured in our choice of them. Be it known to you then that our
respected Head, vulgarly called The Bogey by ill-trained Juniors, is
among our elect set yclept Lemonade, partly owing to her habit of
fizzing over, and partly to a certain acid quality in her temper,
otherwise hard to define. Miss Douglas, our honoured Form mistress,
being a canny Scot, goes by the familiar appellation of Thistles,
intended also to subtly convey our appreciation--or shall I say
depreciation?--of her prickly habit."

"And Grinnie?" continued Gwen.

"Your sister, by her perpetual smile, courted the title."

"It's no good exploding, Gwen!" said Annie Edwards. "If you've got a
sister who's a teacher you'll just have to hear her called nicknames.
You don't suppose we're going to shut up on your account?"

"And you needn't go sneaking, either, or it'll be the worse for you,"
added Minna Jennings.

"We'd soon know who'd told tales," snapped Millicent Cooper.

"Peace, turbulent herd!" said Netta, holding up her hand. "Our friend
Gwen, being of a sensible disposition, and a lover, like ourselves, of