"Just about right, dear child," answered the gentleman. "Human nature is pretty much made up of such things."
"But then Jesus will help us with it, if we go to to Him," said the child softly to herself, thinking of the battle she had fought with her own sinful nature, and the victory she had won through the aid of the Captain she had chosen.
The good news about her composition did much toward helping on Gracie's recovery; and before Maggie and Bessie went away, she was quite herself once more, and talking cheerily to them about to-morrow's expected events.
Mrs. Ashton's schoolrooms were a pretty sight the next morning, for scarcely a girl in either class but had brought some flowers as a gift to her teacher, and they were all set forth to deck the rooms. The girls were all in white, the elder ones with pink ribbons, the little children with blue to mark their classes; though there was not much need of this, for the difference in size would have done that readily enough. But it was a fancy of some of the girls, and as it put them all in a sort of uniform, and made the rooms look gay, it was just as well. But the bright young faces, full of pleasure and good-humour, were the greatest attraction there, and so thought Miss Ashton as one after another appeared.
The girls all came about two o'clock, though their friends were not expected till half an hour later.
"Did you ever see a lovelier day?" said Kate Maynard, coming in with her hands full of lilies of the valley, the sight of which called forth many an admiring "oh!" and "ah!" from the rest.
"Lovely!" said Julia Grafton; "it is a real genuine poet May-day. No make-believe spring about this."
"Oh," said Kate, "we ought to have chosen a May Queen, and crowned her. Why did we not think of it before? Well, it is not too late now: let us do it, and I will make a crown of these lilies."
The proposal met with general approval.
"Whom shall we choose?" said Fanny Leroy.