"Adeline excepted, of course," went on Rose, addressing no one in particular. "Why, the French don't know as much as the use of the mistletoe!--and our friends send us here to be trained and educated! No Christmas! no holidays--except a month in autumn, which you are not expected to take! It is a pernicious country; an unnatural state of things; and the British government ought to interfere and forbid the schools to receive English girls."
"But don't the French keep Christmas?" asked a new girl, and a very stupid one, Grace Lucas.
"Bah!" ejaculated Rose. "As if they kept anything except the Jour de l'An!"
"The what?" timidly asked Grace Lucas.
"Qu'elle est bête!" cried Rose in her careless manner.
"Have some consideration, Rose," spoke Adeline in French.
"Why, she has heard it fifty times!" retorted Rose in English.
"Every one is not so apt as you."
"Apt at what?" asked Rose fiercely, a glowing colour rising to her face. Since the episode connected with Mr. Marlborough, Rose's conscience was prone to conjure up hidden sarcasm in every sentence addressed to her.
"I meant at picking up French," laughed Adeline. "What else should I mean?"