Alice B. Emerson

“ This Aunt Emmy seemed to be an empty-headed creature who thought that the most essential thing for a girl in life was to be fancifully dressed, and to attain a position in society.
Aunt Emmy had evidently filled Rebecca's head with such notions. The girl had come to Ardmore with a totally wrong idea of what it meant to be in college.
"Why! some of these girls act as waitresses," said Rebecca. "I couldn't do that even to obtain the education I want so much. Oh! Aunt Emmy would never hear to it."
"It's a perfectly legitimate way of helping earn one's tuition," Ruth said. ”

“ Rebecca never opened her lips about these troubles, despite the fact that she loved Ruth and was much with the girl of the Red Mill. But Ruth was keen-eyed. She knew that Rebecca suffered for articles of clothing. She saw that her raiment was becoming very, very shabby.
The girl in this trouble was foolish, of course. But foolishness is a disease not so easily cured. There was not the slightest chance of giving Rebecca anything that she needed; Ruth knew that quite well. Her finery—and cheap enough it was—the girl would flaunt to the bitter end. ”

“ The wind was so strong that they were only holding their own against it.
"Pull!" shouted the coxswain again.
Ruth bent forward, braced her feet firmly and drove the long oar-blade deep into the jumping little waves. Those waves quickly became larger and "jumpier." A white wreath formed upon their crests. The shell in a very few seconds was in the midst of white water.
Once with Uncle Jabez, and in a heavy punt, the girl of the Red Mill had been caught in the rapids of the Lumano below the mill, and had fought with skill and courage to help save the boat. ”

“ I want to be your friend," Ruth declared boldly. "I want you to have other friends, too. No use flocking by one's self at college. Why, my dear girl! you are missing all that is best in college life."
"I'd like to know what is best in college life!" burst out Rebecca Frayne, sullenly. ”

“ A high shoulder of the hilly island broke the force of the wind.
"Ashore! Put us ashore!" Ruth managed to gasp so that Trix heard her.
"We—we'll wreck the shell!" complained Trix. "It's so shallow."
"We'll not drown in shallow water," ejaculated Ruth, expelling the words between strokes.
The coxswain shot them shoreward. She caught a glimpse of another boat pulled up on the beach—the skiff they had earlier seen rounding the point of the island. ”

“ The slope of College Hill would be just splendiferous for that! Away from the observatory to the lake—and then some!"
"We'll start a skiing club among the freshies," Ruth said, warmly accepting the idea. "Wonder nobody has thought of it before."
"Ardmore hasn't waked up yet to all its possibilities," said Helen, demurely. "But this umpty-umph class of freshmen will show the college a thing or two before we pass from out its scholastic halls."
"Question!" cried Ruth, laughing. Then: "There! you can see that light again."
"Goodness! You're never going over to that island?" cried Helen. ”

“ She was very glad to have been the means of finding Rebecca such a nice little fortune as this that came to her for the old periodicals. With what the girl's brother could send her, Rebecca would be pretty sure of sufficient money to carry her through her freshman year and pay for her second year's tuition at Ardmore.
"Something may be found then for Rebecca to do," thought Ruth, "that will not so greatly shock her notions of gentility. Dear me! she's as nice a girl as ever lived; but she is a problem." ”

“ Ruth knew better than to offer to pay for the new tam-o'-shanter the freshman could not afford to buy. To make such an offer would immediately close the door of the strange girl's friendship to Ruth. So she did not hint at such a thing. She talked on, beginning to laugh and joke with Rebecca, and finally brought her out of her tears.
"Cheer up," Ruth said. "You are making the worst possible use of your time here—keeping to yourself and being so afraid of making friends. We're not all rich girls, I assure you. And the girls on this corridor are particularly nice." ”

“ Listen to the troubles of a poor mathematics instructor."
"Yes, Miss Cullam," said Ruth, demurely.
"You see, my dear," said Miss Cullam, who had a whimsical way about her that Ruth had begun to delight in, "after all, we college instructors are all necessarily of the race of watch dogs."
"Oh, Miss Cullam!"
"Our girls are put upon their honor and are in the main worthy of our confidence. But we have experiences that show us how frail human virtue is.
"For instance, there are examinations. A most trying necessity are examinations. ”

“ Because of their characters and their class standing, several of the instructors besides Miss Cullam, the mathematics teacher, were the friends of the Briarwoods. Miss Cullam had shown a warm appreciation of Ruth Fielding's character all through the year. Not that Ruth was a prize pupil in Miss Cullam's study, for she was not. Mathematics was the one study it was hard for Ruth to interest herself in. But when the girl of the Red Mill had a hard thing to do, she always put her whole mind to it; and, therefore, she made a good mark in mathematics in spite of her distaste for the study. ”

“ There were in Dare Hall alone as many pupils as had attended Briarwood altogether. This was, indeed, a much larger school life on which they were entering.
So many of the girls they saw were older than themselves—and the trio of girls had been among the oldest girls at Briarwood during their last semester.
"Why, we're only kids," sighed Helen. "There's a girl on this corridor—at the other end, thank goodness!—who looks old enough to be a teacher."
"Miss Comstock," said Heavy. "I know. She's a senior. There are no teachers rooming at Dare. Only the housekeeper downstairs. ”

“ There were two large auto-stages in waiting, and Ruth and Helen followed the crowd of girls briskly getting aboard the buses. As they saw other girls do, the two chums from Cheslow gave their trunk checks to a man on the platform, but they clung to their hand-baggage.
"Such a nice looking lot of girls," murmured Helen in Ruth's ear. "It's fine! I'm sure we shall have a delightful time at college, Ruthie." ”

“ Where are you staying?"
"I have been working in Greenburg all winter. We're poor girls and have no parents. Margy is with me now," said the girl. "And I want that vase. I want it for Margy. She will never be satisfied until she can give it back to the dean of the college herself and explain how she came to hide it, and then forgot where she hid the vase."
"Tell me where to find you in Greenburg," said Ruth, hastily. "No! I'll not let you have the vase now. I will not show it to anybody else, however, and we'll come over to town this evening and bring it with us, and talk with Maggie." ”

“ The crowd along shore cheered the younger girls vociferously, and although they did not quite "bump" the juniors before crossing the mile line——
"We came so near it there was no fun in it!" declared Jennie Stone, delightedly. "Oh, girls! some of us are going to be great rowists after a few more years at Ardmore."
"Dear me," panted Helen, making the last pun of the term. "It should be called Hard-more. I never worked so hard in my life as I have this first year at college."
"But it will never hurt us," laughed Ruth, later. "We have got on famously." ”

“ Here was the case of a student who, Ruth believed, was much misunderstood.
She could not imagine a girl deliberately making trouble for herself. Rebecca Frayne by the expenditure of a couple of dollars in the purchase of a new tam-o'-shanter might have easily overcome this dislike that had been bred not alone in the minds of the girls of the two upper classes, but among the sophomores and her own classmates as well. The sophomores thought her ridiculous; the freshmen themselves felt that she was bringing upon the whole class unmerited criticism. ”

“ Ruth, what an e-nor-mous place this is! I feel just as small as—as a little mouse in an elephant's stall."
Ruth laughed, but before she could reply they rounded the corner of the building nearest to the campus and saw the group of girls upon its broad porch, the stranger at the foot of the steps, and the heap of baggage piled where the chauffeur had left it.
"Hello!" May MacGreggor said, aloud, "here are a couple more kittens. Look at the pretty girl with the brown eyes and hair. And the smart-looking, black-eyed one. Now! here are freshies after my own heart." ”

“ They towed the boat back to the mill landing. Tom and Ben carried the strange girl, still unconscious into the Red Mill farmhouse, and bustling little Aunt Alvirah had her put at once to bed.
"Shall I hustle right over to Cheslow for the doctor?" Tom asked.
"Who's goin' to pay him?" growled Uncle Jabez, who heard this.
"Don't let that worry you, Mr. Potter," said the youth, his black eyes flashing. "If I hire a doctor I always pay him."
"It's a good thing to have that repertation," Uncle Jabez said drily. "One should pay the debts he contracts." ”

“ The eight oarswomen picked the light shell up, shoulder high, and marched down the platform to the float. Taking their cue from the tam-o'-shanters the seniors had made them wear early in their college experience, the freshmen eight wore light blue bandannas wound around their heads, with the corners sticking up like rabbit-ears, blue blouses, short skirts over bloomers, and blue stockings with white shoes. Their appearance was exceedingly natty.
"If we don't win in the races, we'll be worth looking at," Helen once said pridefully. ”

“ Ruth gave the matter of Maggie's photograph very little thought. Not at that time, at least. She merely handed the print over to Miss Cullam and forgot all about it.
These were busy days, both in the classroom and out of it. The warmth of late spring was in the air; every girl who felt at all the blood coursing in her veins, tried to be out of doors.
The whole college was eager regarding the coming boat races. Ardmore was to try out her first eight-oared crew with three of several colleges, and two of the trials would be held upon Lake Remona. ”