The Madcap of the School Part 27

"And to our women too, I hope," said Miss Beasley, who, unnoticed by Veronica, had joined the group. "It would be a poor thing for the country if only the men came purified out of this time of trouble. 'A nation rises no higher than its women!' And now is Woman's great opportunity. I think she is taking it. She is showing by her work in hospitals, in canteens, on the land, in offices, or in public service, how she can put her shoulder to the wheel and help in her country's hour of need. I believe this war will have broken down many foolish old traditions and customs, and that people will be ready afterwards to live more simple, natural lives than they did before. The school-girls of to-day are the women of to-morrow, and it is on you that the nation will rely in years to come. Don't ever forget that!

Try to prove it practically!"

Miss Beasley seldom "preached" to the girls, but when she spoke, her few quiet words generally had their effect. Hermie and Linda in especial turned them over in their minds. As the result of their mistress's last remark, they made a suggestion to their fellow-monitresses.

"Some of us are leaving this term, and at any rate in a few years we shall all have left, and be scattered about in various places.

Wouldn't it be nice to make a kind of League, and undertake that every girl who has belonged to this school will do her very best to help the world? It should be a 'Marlowe Grange' pledge, and we'd bind ourselves to keep it. If a whole school makes up its mind to a thing, it ought to have some effect, and it would be splendid to feel that our school had been an inspiration, and helped to build up a new and better nation after the war. There are only twenty-six of us here at present, but suppose when we leave we each influence ten people, that makes two hundred and sixty, and if they each influence ten people more, it makes two thousand six hundred, so the thing grows like circles in a pond. I don't mean that we're to be a set of prigs, and go about criticizing everybody and telling them they are slackers--that's not the right way at all; but if we stick up constantly for all that we know is best, people will probably begin to sympathize, and want to do the same."

Hermie's and Linda's idea appealed to the Sixth. They inst.i.tuted the League at once, and persuaded the entire school to join. They put their heads together, and drew up a short code which they considered should explain the att.i.tude of their society. It ran as follows:--

MARLOWE GRANGE LEAGUE

AFTER-THE-WAR RULES

1. To do some definite, sensible work, and not to spend all my time in golf, dances, and other amus.e.m.e.nts.

2. To read wholesome books, study Nature, and be content with simple pleasures.

3. Not to judge my friends by the standards of clothes and money, but by their real worth.

4. To strive to be broad-minded, and to look at things from other people's points of view as well as my own.

5. To do all I can to help others.

6. To understand that character is the most useful possession I can have, to speak the truth, be charitable to my neighbours' faults, and avoid gossip.

7. To cultivate and cherish the faculty of appreciating all the beautiful in life, and to enjoy innocent pleasures.

8. To realize that as a soldier is one of an army, so I am a unit of a great nation, and must play my part bravely and n.o.bly for the sake of my country.

9. To remember that I can do good and useful work in my own home as well as out in the world.

10. To keep my heart open, and take life cheerfully, kindly, and smilingly, trying to make my own little circle better and happier, and to forget myself in pleasing others.

11. Not to moan and groan over what is inevitable, but to make the best of things as they are.

12. To be faithful to my friends, loyal to my King and my Country, and true to G.o.d.

G.o.d Save the King!

In order to make the League a binding and lasting affair, the monitresses decided to give each member a copy of the code, and ask her to sign her name to it. For this purpose they made twenty-six dainty little books of exercise paper, with covers of cardboard (begged from the drawing cupboard) decorated with j.a.panese stencils of iris, chrysanthemums, birds and reeds, or other artistic designs, the backs being tied with bows of baby ribbon. After the list of rules, were appended a few suitable quotations, and blank pages were left, so that each individual could fill them up with extracts that she liked, either cut out of magazines or written in her own hand. Most of the girls admired Robert Louis Stevenson, so the selections began with his wise and tender epitome of life:--

"To be honest, to be kind, to earn a little and to spend a little less, to make upon the whole a family happier for his presence, to renounce when that shall be necessary and not be embittered, to keep a few friends, but these without capitulation. Above all, on the same grim condition, to keep friends with himself. Here is a task for all that a man has of fort.i.tude and delicacy."

As Linda and Hermie could not agree whether this ideal of life or the one by William Henry Channing was the more beautifully expressed, it was agreed to put the latter's as well:--

"To live content with small means; to seek elegance rather than luxury, and refinement rather than fas.h.i.+on; to be worthy, not respectable, and wealthy, not rich, to study hard, think quietly, talk gently, act frankly; to listen to stars and birds, to babes and sages with open heart; to bear all cheerfully, do all bravely, await occasions, hurry never; in a word, to let the spiritual, unbidden and unconscious, grow up through the common--this is to be my symphony."

As the League was to be nothing if not practical, everyone felt that the best way of upholding its principles at the present moment was to raise a good collection for the fund for the blinded soldiers. The Sixth determined to give a theatrical performance, the juniors a display of gymnastics and dancing, and the Fifth concentrated their minds upon a concert.

"It's not to be just an ordinary concert," said Ardiune, addressing a select committee of management; "it must be something extra special and outside, such as we've never had before in the school, so rub up your ideas, please, and make suggestions. I'm waiting!"

"Rather a big order to get anything entirely new!" grunted Morvyth. "I should say everything on the face of the earth's been tried already!"

"But not here! How you catch me up!"

"There isn't time to get up an operetta, I suppose?" ventured Fauvette.

"Hardly--in three days!"

"A patriotic performance?"

"Had one only last term, so it would come stale."

"Then what can we have?"

"I know!" exclaimed Raymonde, bouncing up from her chair, and taking a seat upon the table instead. "I vote we be c.o.o.ns!"

"What's c.o.o.ns?" asked Katherine ungrammatically.

"Oh, you stupid! You know! You sing plantation songs, and wear a red-and-white costume, and wave tambourines, and that sort of thing."

"Do we black our faces?"

"We can if we like, but it isn't necessary. We're not to be n.i.g.g.e.r minstrels exactly. c.o.o.ns are different. Of course, the songs are all about Sambos and Dinahs, but white people can sing them with quite as great effect. I believe the b.u.mble's got some castanets and things put away that we could borrow."

"So she has! Bags me the cymbals!"

"Pity n.o.body can play the banjo."

"Never mind, we shall do very well with the piano."

The committee having decided that their concert was to be a c.o.o.n performance, the girls set to work accordingly to make preparations.

All the songbooks in the school were ransacked to find plantation melodies, and after much discussion, not to say quarrelling, a programme was at length arranged, sufficiently spicy to entertain the girl portion of the audience, but select enough not to offend the easily shocked susceptibilities of Miss Gibbs, whose ideas of songs suitable for young ladies ran--in direct opposition to most of her theories--on absolutely Early Victorian lines.

"Gibbie's notion of a concert is 'Home, Sweet Home' and 'Cherry Ripe', and perhaps 'Caller Herrin' if you want something lively," pouted Ardiune.

"Yes, and even those have to be edited," agreed Morvyth. "Don't you remember when we were learning 'Cherry Ripe', she insisted on our changing 'Where my Julia's lips do smile' into 'Where the sunbeams sweetly smile?'"

"And she wouldn't let us sing 'The Blue Bells of Scotland', and we knew it was just because it began: 'Oh where, tell me where, is your Highland laddie gone?'"

"Don't you know it's highly improper for a school-girl even to mention a laddie?" murmured Katherine ironically.

"How about the blinded soldiers, then?"

"That's another matter, I suppose."

"Look here--let's take our programme to the b.u.mble, and get her to pa.s.s it beforehand, and then there can be no criticisms afterwards."