"Goodness!" laughed Ruth, suddenly, "we'll be almost 'grown women' ourselves before we get through college."
"Oh, don't!" exclaimed Helen. "I don't want to think of that."
What was ahead of the chums did trouble them. Their future school life was a mystery. There was no prophet to tell them of the exciting and really wonderful things that were to happen to them at Briarwood during the coming term.
CHAPTER VII
"SWEETBRIARS ALL"
"Oh, dear me!" complained Nettie Parsons, "I never can do it."
"'In the bright Lexicon of Youth, there is no such word as "fail,"'" quoted Mercy Curtis, grandiloquently.
"That must be a pretty poor reference book to have in one's library, then," said Helen, making fun of the old saying which the lame girl had repeated. "How do we know—perhaps there are other important words left out—A bas le Lexicon of Youth!"
"Perseverence is the winning game, Nettie," Ruth said to the Southern girl, cheerfully. "Stick to it."