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OF course the change in our circumstances soon became known to all our acquaintances in the little place, and it was no small part of our misfortunes to hear the remarks and condolences and the "I told you so's" of the less considerate part of them. I had my share of this part of our troubles at school. There were a few girls who had always accused Jeanne and myself of "feeling above them," as I dare say we did, and from them I had to hear such remarks as "Pride must have a fall," and they "guessed some folks wouldn't hold up their heads quite so high nowadays. " In this last supposition they were mistaken, however, at least so far as I was concerned, for I held my head higher than ever. As for Ruth, her happy disposition never led her to think whether any one was above or below her, which was much the better for her.
But there were only a few who were thus ungenerous. Most of my school-mates pitied me quite as much as was good for me, and applauded to my heart's content my resolution to make the best of matters. Miss Tempy gave me as much of her time as possible, and only two or three girls murmured when she passed over their work or lessons for the sake of mine. I was not wanting on my own part, knowing that this summer's schooling might be the last I should ever have, and I applied myself with all my might to the mysteries of square root and Murray's "Prosody," thinking all the time how I should make the rules and explanations clear if I had to teach them. I really think I learned more in this one summer than I had done in two years before. I finished the famous flounce which, as I said, contained specimens of all the stitches known to Miss Tempy; and what she did not know in that line was not worth considering. I learned to darn linen and muslin so as to make them even better than new, and I copied out in a little blank-book which I made for the purpose all those wonderful recipes for domestic medicine and sick-cookery for which Miss Tempy was famous, and which she had inherited from her grandmother.