Betty Wales Senior | Page 5

waited long enough each girl you had known and liked would
come back in the person of some younger one. But I never really
believed it until to-day." And Betty related the story of her successful
hunt for the freshman who was like herself.
Everybody laughed.
"But then," asserted Babbie loyally, "she's not so nice as you, Betty.
She couldn't be. And I don't believe there are freshmen like all of us."
"Not in this one class," said Rachel. "But it's a nice idea, isn't it? When
our little sisters or our daughters come to Harding they can have friends
just as dear and jolly as the ones we have had."
"And they will be just as likely to be locked out if they linger on their
own or their friends' door-steps after ten," added Madeline pompously,
whereat Eleanor, Katherine, Rachel and the B's rushed for their
respective abiding places, and the Belden House contingent marched
up-stairs singing

"Back to the college again,"
a parody of one of Kipling's "Barrack-Room Ballads" which Madeline
Ayres had written one morning during a philosophy lecture that bored
her, and which the whole college was singing a week later.
CHAPTER II
A SENIOR CLASS-MEETING
It was great fun exercising all the new senior privileges. One of the first
and most exciting was occupying the front seats at morning chapel.
"Although," complained Betty Wales sadly, "you don't get much good
out of that, if your name begins with a W. Of course I am glad there are
so many of 19--, but they do take up a lot of room. Nobody could tell
that Eleanor and I were seniors, unless they knew it beforehand."
"And then they wouldn't believe it about you," retorted Madeline, the
tease.
Madeline, being an A, was one of the favored front row, who were near
enough "to catch Prexy's littlest smiles," as Helen Adams put it, and
who were the observed of all observers as they marched, two and two,
down the middle aisle, just behind the faculty. Madeline, being tall and
graceful and always perfectly self-possessed, looked very impressive,
but little Helen Adams was dreadfully frightened and blushed to the
roots of her smooth brown hair every morning.
"And yet I wouldn't give it up for anything," she confided to Betty. "I
mean--I'll exchange with you any time, but I do just love to sit there,
although I dread walking out so. It's just the same when I am talking to
Miss Raymond or Miss Mills. I wish I weren't such a goose."
"You're a very dear little goose," Betty reassured her, wondering why
in the world the clever Helen Adams was afraid of people, while she,
who was only little Betty Wales, without much brains and with no big
talent, felt perfectly at home with Dr. Hinsdale, Miss Raymond, and

even the great "Prexy" himself.
"I suppose that is my talent," she decided at last,--"not being afraid, and
just plunging right in. Well, I suppose I ought to be glad that I have
anything."
Another senior privilege is the holding of the first class-meeting. Fresh
indeed is the freshman class which neglects this order of precedence,
and in deference to their childish impatience the seniors always hold
their meeting as early in the term as possible. Of course 19--'s came on
a lovely afternoon,--the first after an unusually long and violent
"freshman rain."
"Coming, Madeline?" asked Betty, passing Madeline's single on her
way out.
"Where?" inquired Madeline lazily from the depths of her Morris chair.
"To the class-meeting of course," explained Betty. "Now don't pretend
you've forgotten and made another engagement. I just heard Georgia
Ames telling you that she couldn't go walking because of an
unexpected written lesson."
Madeline wriggled uneasily. "What's the use?" she objected. "It's too
nice a day to waste indoors. There'll be nothing doing for us. We
elected Rachel last year, and none of the rest of the crowd will do for
class officers."
"What an idea!" said Betty loftily. "I'm thinking of nominating Babe for
treasurer. Besides Rachel is going to wear a cap and gown--it's a new
idea that the council thought of, for the senior president to wear
one--and Christy and Alice Waite are going to make speeches about the
candidates. And I think they're going to vote about our ten thousand
dollars."
Madeline rose despondently. "All right then, for this once. By the way,
whom are they going to have for toastmistress at class-supper? They
elect her to-day, don't they?"

"I suppose so. I know the last year's class chose Laurie at their first
meeting. But I haven't heard any one mentioned."
"Then I'm going to nominate Eleanor Watson," declared Madeline.
"She's never had a thing from the class, and she's by far the best
speaker we have except Emily Davis."
"And