“I am the Spirit of the Woods,” said a gentle voice. No one but the English girl had a voice like that. It did indeed sound like the wind in the pine trees on a spring night. “The Indians ought to love me, for I furnish them with bark for their canoes and wood for their bows and tepee poles. And I sing the little papooses to sleep.”
“Isn’t Cicely sweet?” said Nelly admiringly, and Anne agreed. She began to regret the Columbine costume she had given up, and glanced down at her make-shift rig with some misgiving. “If I had worn the other I should easily be the finest,” she thought. But Nelly Sackett had no such regret. “We will creep up, like the tide, last of all,” she whispered, squeezing Anne’s cold fingers.
Now from opposite directions two figures emerged out of the woods. One was dressed in a simple brown dress, with a white apron, kerchief and cap, and carried a book in her hand, trying to look demure. The other was a pretty Italian peasant, with the brightest colors in her head-dress and embroidered apron. Long scarlet ear-rings—made of partridge berries—dangled on her shoulders. Norma had no difficulty in looking her part.
“Well met!” said the little brown maid gravely. Nancy and Norma were the best actors of the party, and had prepared their speeches beforehand. “Thus you, the newest emigrant, meet the earliest, on Columbia’s ground.” Nancy dropped a curtsey to Norma. “I represent my ancestor Ruth who came over in the Mayflower.”
a fairy creature—a gnome—a gypsy queen
“You are the New England Conscience; but I am the Artistic Temperament,” smiled Norma. “You weren’t very cordial to me at first. But you are improving.”
“Even so, I might teach you something still, of patience and courage and thrift. But I am trying to get rid of my prejudices, anyway. I do most awfully want to get what is best for my Country. I have always tried to do that, have I not, Columbia?”
“Yes; but you are apt to set too much store by book-knowledge; and you’re apt to think that anyone who did not come in the Mayflower like yourself is the ‘scum of the earth!’” retorted Norma.