There are all kinds of first things one can look back upon; I mean by that the first things of all. There is the little toddling journey across the floor, with father's arms stretched out to help one, and mother's smile to greet one when the adventurous journey is over. And there are other baby things, of course. Then there come the big things which one can never forget. My big thing arrived when I was eight years old. I came home with father from India. Father's name was Major Grayson, and I was called Heather. I was petted a great deal on board ship, and made a fuss about, and, in...

"Nora, Nora Where are you?" called a clear, girlish voice, and Cara Burt dashed headlong into a pretty bedroom all draped in white, where a tall girl was standing by an open window. "Nora " she cried, "what are you doing up in your room at this hour, when we are all busy in the garden preparing our tableaux? Mrs Hazlitt says that she herself will recite 'A Dream of Fair Women, ' and by unanimous consent you are to be Helen of Troy. Did any one ever suit the part so well? 'Divinely tall, and most divinely fair.' Why, what is the matter, Honora? Why have you that frown between your pretty...

It was on a summer's evening early in the month of August that the little Mummy was once again seen on the platform at Dawlish. She looked now very much like she did when we saw her of yore-slightly broadened, it is true, by the added years, but she still wore somewhat rusty widow's black, and her face still had that half-anxious, half-comical expression, which made people turn to look at her with something between a smile and a sigh. She was commonplace and plain, and yet in one sense she was neither commonplace nor plain. She had a character, and that character had developed during the last...

Priscilla Weir, Mabel Lushington, and Annie Brooke were all seated huddled up close together on the same low window-sill. The day was a glorious one in the beginning of July. The window behind the girls was open, and the softest of summer breezes came in and touched their young heads, playing with the tumbled locks of hair of different shades, varying from copper-colour to dark, and then to brightest gold. Priscilla was the owner of the dark hair; Mabel possessed the copper-colour, Annie Brooke the gold. All three girls looked much about the same age, which might have been anything from...

The Squire's little daughter rode her pony down the avenue. She stopped for a moment at the gate, and the children at the other side could get a good view of her. There were four children, and they pressed together and nudged each other, and took in the small erect figure, and her sturdy pony, with open eyes and lips slightly apart. The Squire's daughter was a fresh arrival at Harringay. Her existence had always been known, the children of the village and the children of the Rectory had talked of her, but she had never come to live amongst them until now, for her mother had died at her birth,...

The three girls were called after flowers. This is how it came about: When Primrose opened her eyes on the world she brought back a little bit of spring to her mother's heart. Mrs. Mainwaring had gone through a terrible trouble-a trouble so dark and mysterious, so impossible to feel reconciled to, that her health had been almost shattered, and she had almost said good-bye to hope. The baby came in the spring-time, and the soft, velvety touch of the little face, and the sight of the round baby limbs, had made Mrs. Mainwaring smile: had caused her to pluck up heart, and to determine resolutely...

The school was situated in the suburbs of the popular town of Merrifield, and was known as the Great Shirley School. It had been endowed some hundred years ago by a rich and eccentric individual who bore the name of Charles Shirley, but was now managed by a Board of Governors. By the express order of the founder, the governors were women; and very admirably did they fulfil their trust. There was no recent improvement in education, no better methods, no sanitary requirements which were not introduced into the Great Shirley School. The number of pupils was limited to four hundred, one hundred...

"Robina Starling will arrive at the school this evening," said Mrs Burton. "She is twelve years old, and has never been at school before. I want you girls of the third form to take her under your charge. Frederica and Patience Chetwold, do you hear? Harriet Lane and Jane Bush, I expect great tact and consideration; don't forget. And as to you, dear Rose, and you. Cecil and Vivian Amberley, I know beforehand that you are always sweet and considerate to those a little younger and a little more ignorant than yourselves. Robina has been sent from home because of her mother's illness. She is quite...

All the other children who knew her thought Maggie a wonderfully fortunate little girl. She was sometimes spoken about as the "Little Princess of Tower Hill," for Tower Hill was the name of her father's place, and Maggie was his only child. The children in the village close by spoke of her with great respect, and looked at her with a good deal of longing and also no slight degree of envy, for while they had to run about in darned and shabby frocks, Maggie could wear the gayest and daintiest little dresses, and while they had to trudge sometimes even on little bare feet, Maggie could sit by...

"And then," said Rachel, throwing up her hands and raising her eyebrows-"and then, when they got into the heart of the forest itself, just where the shade was greenest and the trees thickest, they saw the lady coming to meet them. She, too, was all in green, and she came on and on, and--" "Hush, Rachel " exclaimed Kitty; "here comes Aunt Grizel." The girls, aged respectively twelve and nine, were seated, one on a rustic stile, the other on the grass at her feet; a background of splendid forest trees threw their slight and childish figures into strong relief. Rachel's hat was tossed on the...