NB: All of the excerpts about folk dancing below are © the estate of Elsie J. Oxenham

The Abbey Girls Go Back to School (1922)

This is the book where the English Folk Dance Society makes an appearance for the first time in Elsie J. Oxenham's books. The 'school' referred to in the book title is the Society's summer school in Cheltenham, which is described in loving detail. In addition to this, we see Jen teaching local children and teenagers back home in Yorkshire, having left school herself.

From Chapter 2: The Gift of the Hamlet Club

Jen, sitting chin on hand on her window-seat and gazing out at the falling snow, realised and faced the horrible truth at last; she was not going back to school. This was not holidays. The jolly happy dancing days at Wycombe were over. She was only an honorary member of the Hamlet Club, no longer an active one. All the old friendships were broken; the old interests must be cut right out of her life. And if life were not to be hopelessly dreary and empty, she must find new interests and friendships to take their places.

She had courage and spirit, and a keenly active mind; but her brow puckered gloomily over the problem before her.

'I've got to!' she said, to the snow-sprinkled hills. 'I've simply got to have something to think about, or I shall die, that's all. But what can I do here? School was so thrilling; al-ways something going on! There's nothing here, and nobody at all to chum with. What do people do in villages, anyway?'

Before her window, beyond the big garden, the hill dipped to a narrow valley, where evi-dence of 'works' could just be seen in an occasional crane or bit of scaffolding or light railway, though most was out of sight under the brow of the hill. In one corner Jen could just see the clustered cottages of 'Tin Town,' where the workmen lived in bungalows of corrugated iron, a little colony by themselves, with their own shops, chapel, and school for the children; for the valley was in process of being turned into a reservoir, as so many others in the neighbourhood had been. It was unsightly enough at present, and Jen always walked or cycled in the other direction, where the reservoirs were finished and lay like beautiful lakes in the folds of the hills. But when this one was ready it too would be a long shining strip of water, with a wall and castled water-tower at one end; and 'Tin Town' would pack itself up and remove elsewhere. There were no friends for Jen in 'Tin Town,' though there were plenty of children; and the little old village of cold gray stone, not far from her front gate, could not supply any either. The rector was an old bachelor; the doctor had no family; her only possible friends would have to come from town, an hour's train journey away.

Beyond 'Tin Town' and the valley, the hills rose again, cut up by hedges at first into fields and farms, then bare open brown moor rolling away over the crest. Just now it was beautiful, in a veil of powdery snow, but Jen had known it all her life, had scoured every inch of it with the boys; and she shrugged her shoulders as she gazed out at the emptiness. In summer it was beautiful; even now it had its beauty, and beauty of any kind made an instant appeal to her; but it was familiar, and with her present craving for the excitements of school life, for the full happy days, she found the valley and the hills empty and unsatisfying.

For at school, beyond all the usual bustle of classes and games, of competition and ex-citement, there had been the added interest of the Hamlet Club, with its Saturday ram-bles over the Buckinghamshire hills and woods, its evenings for folk-dancing, its con-stant association of the elder girls who had left with those still in the school. The former Queens and many of the earlier members still came to dance-evenings whenever they could, and attended as a matter of course on ceremonial occasions, when the Queens wore their state 'robes' and their Maids of Honour carried their trains. Jen had been a keen member of the club from her first?? arrival at school; had learned the folk-dances quickly and with great enjoyment, both in their movements and their music; and her cup of joy had been full, when, Queen Joan's maid, Muriel, being chosen as Queen, she had been invited by Joan to fill the vacant place. Her love and admiration for Joan were great; she had accepted joyfully, and had worn Joan's violet colours with much pride.

She was aware of the suggestion whispered among the seniors that she might be the next Queen; and-' I hope I'm not a baby, but-oh, I would have liked it !' she said to her-self, as she sat alone, three days after Christmas. 'I would have tried to be a good one I And Joan would have helped me! If I could have had one more year!'

Christmas had been very quiet. An attack of illness on her father's part had made any house-party impossible, and it had not been thought wise even for Jen to have a visitor on her own account. Her mother had promised that for later on, and Jen had tried to be as cheerful as was expected of her. She saw clearly that even her mother had no idea how much she was missing the old life, and the first resolution she made as she stared out at the snow was a brave one, for her mother's sake.

'I'll never let them know. For they'd be sorry, and that would hurt us all. I've just got to pretend everything's all right; they mustn't guess. Everything is all right, of course; only-well, there used to be so much, and I don't seem able to find it here t I suppose I shall in time.'

'If I were only nearer!' she sighed at last. 'If I were like Cicely and Joan, and could go over to school for dance-evenings and rambles! I could stand it if I had something to look forward to! But there doesn't seem anything here! What do people do in the coun-try? I'd better'-she laughed a little -'teach a Sunday School class, or get up a girls' club, or a creche; couldn't I start something? There doesn't seem to be anything going on. It's the dullest, grayest, coldest village in the world, I do believe it will get on my nerves in time. Couldn't I wake things up a bit? What is it, Alice?' as the maid appeared at the door.

'Post's come in. Miss Jen; and there's a parcel for you.'

'Oh? A late Christmas present?' and Jen sprang up. 'That's something, anyway!' and she ran past Alice and away along the corridor, down the wide shallow staircase, to the round oak table in the middle of the big hall.

A wooden box was awaiting her. She attacked it eagerly, and gave a cry of delight at sight of a letter in Joan's writing lying just under the wrapping paper. She opened it ea-gerly, for a letter from Joan meant more than any present, even one in a big box looking mysterious and exciting.

Joan's letter was short, however.

'DEAR JENNY-WREN,- This is a leaving-present from all of us in the club, but I was asked to see to it and send it off to you. I'm sorry it will be too late for Christmas, but the things didn't come from town till Christmas Eve. I hope they'll arrive safely. They're to remind you of us all, and of the club, and our jolly evenings. I wish there were more; but these are all there are at present. I hope you'll enjoy them; I think they're very good.

'I'll write on my own account in a day or two. This is just to give you best love and all good wishes from the Hamlet Club.

'Yours ever, 'JOAN.'

Puzzled and eager, Jen dived into the straw and shavings that filled the top of the box. 'It's carefully packed! - Records! That's why they asked if we had a gramophone! What a funny present! What are they, I wonder? Oh! Oh, I say! I didn't know you could get them! Oh, how simply gorgeous!'

Record after record, as she lifted them carefully out, bore the name of one of the dances she loved so well. She gave a little gasp of joy as she saw one after another.

'"Peascods"!-how glorious! My dear" Sellenger"! Oh, old "Butterfly"! And "Rufty! I Now father will be able to hear what they're like! "Hudsdon House"; I don't know that. "The Old Mole"-how topping! And I was thinking of getting the music! These will be far better. "Sweet Kate"-I could do hits of that for father. "Newcastle!!" -oh, I am glad! And "Paper," and "Mage"! There's nothing in the world I'd have liked better! I must try them! But there are more yet. Here are some I don't know; but I guess the tunes will be jolly. What's this? Oh, morris! How simply perfect! Couldn't I get some one to do "Rigs" with me? Perhaps I could teach Alice! I wonder if she could jump ! Here's the "Furry Dance" -and, oh! My darling "Jockie"!!! I can dance that alone!'

Wildly excited, she ran to the gramophone to try these new treasures. But to stand still when "Jockie to the Fair" began to come out was impossible. Jen's eyes were shining till they almost seemed filled with tears, so full of associations was the tune for her. She

had danced this on the cloister garth with Joan; she loved it, with its exultant ringing notes, almost more than any of the other jigs. She bore it for a moment, her feet tapping eagerly; then shut off the music, and raced upstairs for dancing-shoes, bells, and hand-kerchiefs.

'I couldn't have stood it another minute!' and she changed her shoes in breathless haste and pulled the bells up below her knees. 'But I could never do "Jockie" in heels!'

Jingling gaily, she sped back to the drawing-room, passing Alice with a laugh at her as-tonished face. 'The carpet will feel funny. But it's better than a polished floor! Now, you priceless thing, play it again for me! Band records! "Jockie" on a band! How gorgeous!'

Wide-eyed and eager, heedless of Alice and Mabel at the door, she stood breathing quickly in excitement through 'Once To Yourself,' handkerchiefs hanging from her hands. Then, with an introductory jump and quick little step, she was into the springing morris movements, her arms swinging straight but easily, her feet light and quick. At the end of the first phrase she stumbled, beginning her side-step and finding it did not fit the music. 'Oh, it's written for two, of course! Then I must take a rest. Now!' and to the amusement of the girls in the doorway she went slanting off across the big room waving her hands in circles round her head. But 'Capers' drew applause from them, and she turned and laughed to see them watching.

'I learned that at school. It is jolly, isn't it? I say, Alice, if you'd get me two little sticks, like hoopsticks, I'd teach you something!'

'Eh, but it's canny, Miss Jen! Would ye do it for cook an' the rest?'

Jen's eyes danced. 'You get them all into the back kitchen one night, and I'll give you a performance,' She promised. 'I must show father and mother first, but you shall see it too, of course. I can't be a whole "side" all by myself, but I can show you a good deal. Perhaps you'd like to learn some country dances? I say, what a perfectly priceless idea!'

With eager happy eyes, she put on one after another of the much-loved dances, and listened with tapping feet and wistful face to 'Newcastle,' 'Sellenger's Round,' and 'Hey, Boys.' Then she raced away upstairs to her father's room, where her mother was sitting, to tell of her new treasures, offering to show as much as she could of the dances.

'Don't you think I could teach somebody?' she pleaded. 'We loved it so at school; I'm sure anybody would enjoy it. Not cook, perhaps; she's rather' -- and she laughed, while her mother smiled, and her father shook his head with twinkling eyes at thought of cook taking to morris dancing. 'But somebody! Country dances are so easy!'

'You'd probably find dozens of children down in 'Tin Town' who would be delighted to learn. They'd have to come up here for lessons, though; I couldn't have you going down there at night,' her mother remarked. 'But you could have the big back kitchen; we shan't be using it this winter.'

'Oh!' Jen gave a little gasp. 'Could I really? Do you really think there's anything in it? I'd simply love it! But could I teach anybody anything? I've never tried!'

'You'll never try younger. I should have a shot at it, if I were you,' her father said encour-agingly. 'I shall come to see how your class is getting on. Will you let me join in?'

'You shall be my partner!' Jen laughed delightedly. 'I do believe I will try! The records just make it possible, of course, for even if I had the music I couldn't play as well as teach.'

'And anyway, there's no piano in the back kitchen!' her mother remarked.

'I'm going to give a performance there one night,' Jen laughed. 'Shall I bring the music up here and do it for father? They all want to see "Jockie." I'll get the gram., and show you!' and she sped away to enlist Alice's help in carrying the gramophone upstairs, while her parents laughed to see her so much excited.

'I'm very glad of it,' her father said warmly. 'The child has been missing her friends, and we can't have them here for her in mid-winter. Any new interest will be good for her. She thinks we don't know, and she's trying to hide it for our sake; but there's no denying it's a lonely house for a bit of a girl, when she's been used to crowds and excitement all the time.'

'I've seen it too,' Mrs Robins said soberly; 'We'll encourage this idea of teaching. It will give her something outside herself to think about, and something in the present. We can't have her living in the past and regretting it. This dancing seems to have meant a great deal to her.'

'I think that was probably partly the close friendship with others who were all of the same mind. We heard enough about it in her letters, didn't we?' the father laughed. 'Now we're to see it for ourselves apparently! It has taken an extraordinary hold on Jen, that's certain!'

"I withdraw !' he cried, laughing and delighted, a few minutes later. 'I said your dancing had an "extraordinary" hold on you, Jen! I take it back; It's not extraordinary at all. I don't wonder you were fascinated by it. Anything jollier or more delightful than that dance I've never seen. What do you call it?'

'A morris jig- "Jockie." I could show you others, but without music, and it isn't the same,' and Jen rested on the end of his bed, her eyes triumphant. 'I knew you'd like it, father!' I've tried to show you before, but the music just makes all the difference, doesn't it? Did you like it, mother?'

'Very much. It's so very free and natural. But I must get used to it. It's so very different from ordinary dancing, you know.'

'Oh yes!' Jen laughed. 'It's folk!'

'Is it that you're going to teach the kiddies?' her father asked. 'I'm afraid the jumping will be rather beyond me-and cook!'

'Oh no!' and she laughed again. 'I'd just give them easy country dances. You don't start with morris jigs, you know!'

'Well, go ahead, and good luck to you! I like it I" her father assured her heartily.

CHAPTER III

THE BLUE-EYED STRANGER

JEN'S demonstration of folk-dancing to the servants in the big back kitchen was over, and amid their delighted applause she was resting and explaining while cook refreshed her with cake and lemonade. Making the most of the occasion- 'You have to, when so little happens!' as she said-she had put on the blue dancing frock, with its full skirt and short loose sleeves, and the white stockings and low black shoes she had worn for dance-evenings at school. She had danced 'Mother Oxford' and 'Jockie' to the music, and 'Princess Royal' without; had shown bits of country dances, the clapping of 'Peascods' and the movements of 'Sweet Kate'; and had even laughingly danced 'The Old Mole' and 'Rufty' without a partner. Now she was sitting on the big table, rather breathless but very happy, telling eagerly of her plans for teaching the village children or the girls from 'Tin Town' in the big unused back kitchen.

'We'd soon be able to show you some dances right through. I say, who's at the door?' and at loud knocking from outside she slid hastily down, lest a seat on the kitchen table should be thought undignified for the daughter of the house.

Alice went to the door and came back giggling. 'It be the guisers, Miss Jen. Shall they come in?'

'Mummers! Oh, rather! It's years since I saw mummers!' Jen cried eagerly. 'Go and tell mother, Mabel! I'm afraid father can't come down. I've been away from home for several Christmases, you know, and for a while they didn't come round much. But I remember seeing them when I was quite a kid. Oh, what sport! It is Christmas, after all!'

At Alice's invitation, a crowd of villagers hustled one another in, and were ushered into the back kitchen, the servants and Jen following and perching themselves on the big dresser to form an audience in the gallery. Mrs Robins preferred to stay upstairs, but sent a gift for the collection and an order that the performers should be entertained with tea and cake. The actual members of the mumming party were few, but they had col-lected a crowd as they came along, and a rabble of girls and boys had followed to see the fun.

With much half-shy laughter, when it came to the moment of performance, and rough jokes in broadest Yorkshire dialect, with chaff and encouragement from the audience, the King and Queen, with blackened faces and patchwork garments, stood forth to play their parts. The clown ran round mocking everybody and wrangling with the King, his 'father'; the Queen, an obvious boy in girl's clothes, quarrelled with one and then the other, and was courted by the King, receiving his advances sometimes bashfully and sometimes with scorn, to the delighted jeers of the onlookers. Several boys armed with wooden swords ran in, interrupting the proceedings, and some rough-and-tumble horseplay followed, bearing only the remotest resemblance to a dance. One of the dancers fell dead in the midst of the swords, and the King and clown accused one an-other, in terrified dismay, of having done the deed; then, each denying it, tried to put the blame on the dancers with the swords. The King called for a doctor, and the Queen, throwing herself on the dead man, wailed in a way that drew enthusiastic applause from the crowd. The doctor appeared, clad in a long coat and very ancient tall hat, and riding on the shoulders of a big boy, who, bending double, represented a horse; with his bottle of magic medicine he tried to bring the man to life again, after a long recitation concern-ing the marvellous cures he could do; the clown finally did the deed by means of myste-rious signs and incantations over the corpse; the dead man sprang up alive and well, and all the party joined in a triumphal joy-dance, at sight of which Jen broke into peals of delighted laughter, for it was the veriest caricature of her beloved ring-dances. Then a blackfaced sweep with a big broom came jigging out to sweep them all away, and the maids went about with refreshments while the hat was passed round. 'They be-ant good guisers!' said cook scornfully, as she dropped in a penny.

'Oh, why not? What was wrong with them? I thought they were simply priceless,' Jen laughed. 'Should be a gra-and sword-dance to finish oop wi' cook insisted. 'Ye'll have seen t' swords, Miss Jen?'

'Sword-dance?' Jen said curiously. 'No, I haven't. What is it like? Among those new re-cords there's one with two sword-dances on it. I wondered what they were.'

'T' men dance it ivvery Christmas in my village. T' guisers be-ant t' real thing wi'oot t' swords.'

'Men! You don't often se men dancing! Are they as funny as these?'

'Be-ant foony at all!' cook said indignantly. 'Friday I be gain' home to see t' dance. Ask t' mistress to let ye coom wi' me, Miss Jen. Ah'll tak' good care o' ye.'

'I shall,' Jen said, with conviction. 'I'd love to see men do a sword-dance.'

'It be champion! Our men be known for t' dance,' Cook said proudly.

While the collection was being taken, Alice came up to Jen, who still sat on the edge of the dresser.

Jen said severely, 'I've put in a shilling, Alice! Isn't that enough?

Of course it was worth pounds just to see that priceless<I>fooling</I> but it's rather soon after Christmas, you know! I've had no time to save up again.'

Alice said eagerly, 'Miss Jen, would ye dance again for them? They'd be that pleased, and they'd tell the kiddies an' make them want to coom.'

Jen laughed at the idea. 'It would be a good advertisement, of course. Do you think they'd really like it? I wouldn't mind a scrap, of course.'

Reassured by an enthusiastic chorus, she slipped on her bells again, while Alice brought the records and cook swept the mummers and their followers back against the walls.

Jen's lips were twitching with amusement as she stood forth to dance; she had never expected an audience of this size! But they were from her own home village, just out-side the gates; they had known her from her babyhood; and it would please them and interest the children in her invitation, when it came. So why not?

As she waited for 'Once To Yourself,' her eyes ranged over the crowd, and she realised that there were strangers present, however. In the interest of watching the mummers she had not noticed the audience particularly, but suddenly she knew that there were at least two faces she did not know. Then the music called her imperatively to jump and start, and she had no time to wonder.

But between the phrases, standing while the partner who was not present should have done her share, for the record was arranged for two, Jen's eyes sought and found the strangers again; first a tall young man, watching her with intense interest; then, at his side, a girl of about sixteen, wearing a close fur hat and a big fur coat. What was it there was in the schoolgirl's eyes? Not the interest her companion showed, that was certain! She was watching 'Jockie' and 'Old Mother Oxford' very closely, but surely there was something strange,something critical, if not scornful, in her eyes? Between the phrases of her jigs, Jen looked again and again at the stranger girl, and if she could have be-lieved her own eyes, she would almost have thought she read amusement in her face. Did the morris appeal to her merely as funny? If so, she was not worth looking twice at; and anyway, she was a stranger whom nobody knew. Probably she and her brother-the relationship was obvious in the black hair and bright blue eyes and the features of both-had been passing through the village, and had followed the mummers to see the fun. It was cheek, of course, to have come unasked into a private house, but no doubt they had thought to be unnoticed in the crowd.

Breathing quickly, Jen faced her delighted audience, and strove to forget those critical blue eyes under the close fur hat. 'There are other dances, but I can't do them for you all alone. If I had a partner, I'd show you "Blue-Eyed Stranger" and "Rigs," but they'd be silly done by one.'

From the crowd stepped the blue-eyed girl. 'I could do those with you. If you really want to give a demonstration, you'd better let me help you.'

She threw off her big coat and cap and looked despairingly at her shoes. 'I'll do my best! It's a good thing I never wear high heels. Give me your handkerchief!' and she turned to her brother. 'Now shall we do "Blue-Eyed"?'

With wide eyes, Jen stared at her. 'Do you know--have you learnt--'

'Oh, I'm a folk-dancer! Have you all the records there? '

Too much amazed to speak, Jen found and placed the new record. 'Why didn't you offer to do the jigs with me?' she demanded, as they waited side by side for 'Once To Your-self.'

The strange girl laughed. 'Because your side-step is so bad. I couldn't have borne it. Oh, yes, it is!' as Jen turned on her in wrathful amazement. 'It's awful! Who on earth taught you?'-and then there was no more time for talk. 'We can do it all but the hey. Cross-over next,' said the strange girl.

In a whirl of surprised indignant thought, Jen realised as she danced that this girl had not spoken without knowledge. Her morris was good; she put a snap and vigour into the dance, which Jen found herself striving to match, and failing.

'How hard you dance!' she panted at the end.

'Have you never seen men dance that?' the girl was hardly out of breath.

'Men? No, do they? I've not seen anybody do it but our girls.'

'Oh!' There was a note in the stranger's voice which seemed to say, 'That explains eve-rything!' She said aloud, 'Would you like me to help you in any more? For I oughtn't to be here.'

'Oh, "Rigs", if you would. I tried to teach one of the maids this afternoon, but she could-n't get her hands and feet right.'

'No, she wouldn't, of course. You'd better do the tapping; it's your show, though mine's sure to be better than yours! Have you sticks? Oh, hoopsticks! Yes, those will do! Turn the record over, then!'

This dance, with its jumping and tapping and quick flashing up and down of the stick, brought a roar of applause. The stranger said grimly, 'Put on any others you want quickly. Oh, I know them all! --all that are on records, anyway. We'll do the Furry Dance round the room, and make stars by ourselves. Would you like me to show you side-step? If you've never seen morris, it's time you did. Better come to Cheltenham next August!'

'Why?' Jen demanded, as they circled the room hand in hand.

'School. You haven't heard? Oh well, never mind! But you know a jolly lot for such a hopeless outsider! I say, what on earth has happened to your sword-dancers? '

'My sword-dancers?' Jen stared at her blankly.

'In that play. Do you mean to say you don't know? There ought to have been a sword-dance instead of all that fooling about. Don't you know anything? And yet you've mum-mers in your own village? I say! People are funny! There's always a sword-dance in the mumming-play; the man has to be killed by the lancers. Something must have hap-pened to yours; those boys just played about with the swords; no movements at all! You ask some of the old people! You'll find there used to be a dance, but the men who knew it are all dead.'

'But how do you know so much about it?' gasped Jen. ' You seem to know everything!'

The girl laughed. 'Oh, that's only the beginning of things! Anybody knows that much; why, it's the Sword-dance Play! It's awful to see it messed up as those boys of yours did; I nearly died with laughing! How do I know? Oh, school! Lectures!'

'I wish you'd tell me a little more!' Jen said, exasperated. 'Where are you staying? Where do you come from? Can't I see you to-morrow? There are heaps of things I want to ask!'

'I'm sure there are!' the blue eyes gleamed. 'But I'm afraid you can't. I don't exist, really. By tomorrow I shall be far away. To-night I'm not really here at all. I'm a changeling, and shall vanish with the dawn. I'm a guiser; a mummer! I shall fall down dead at the end of the dance, like the Haxby Tom, and no doctor or Betty will be able to bring me to life again! Now would you like to show them "Kate"? '

'I wish you'd stay and talk to me!' Jen urged, when the kick and clap and finger-twist of 'Sweet Kate' were over.

'Can't be done,' her mysterious partner was hastily tucking her mane of long black hair inside her big coat and pulling on her cap. 'I've got to go this minute. No, I haven't any name. Call me'-she laughed-' the Blue-Eyed Stranger! Good-night! Better come to school next August!'

From Chapter 5: 'Dancers Old and New'

BREATHLESS, excited, eager-eyed, Jen crouched in a corner of the big barn beside cook among a crowd of villagers, while out in the cleared space eight big burly colliers danced, with tramping feet and flashing steel swords. Never in her life had she dreamed of anything like this dance; the music was only that of a concertina, played by a man standing at the side, yet every nerve in Jen's body responded to the amazing rhythm of the tramping feet .

'In big boots, you know, father!' she told him afterwards. 'And great big heavy men, min-ers all of them, and mostly quite old. Some were gray and some were bald! But -the way they did it! The-the energy and fierceness of it; and the wonderful time of their feet! I tell you, it worked me up to something I'd never felt before. I could have shrieked with ex-citement! And the crowd felt it too, though they see it every Christmas. You could feel the breathlessness--everybody on edge and-and tight with' excitement! At the end they just yelled, and I'm afraid I yelled too! Oh, I am glad to have seen it! I didn't know men's dancing could be like that. They went over the swords, sometimes over one and some-times over two; and under arches of swords; and they did a rolling kind of procession, in twos, over and under one another, rather like the second figure of "Grimstock," or the changes of the Ribbon Dance. And they clashed the swords together; and then they fixed them somehow, all in a second almost, into a kind of star and held them up, all the eight in one man's hand; and they never fell to bits-they were quite firmly fixed! I'd, love to know how they did it !'

'That's the lock,' her father commented. 'I saw it years ago. My grandfather told me there used to be sword-dancing in our village when he was a boy, but, it had died out with the passing of the team, and no younger men had been trained to take their places. I expect a great many.villages would have to say the same.'

'What a pity! But that's what my guiser-girl said, of course-that there must have been a sword-dance, but our men had forgotten it, and now they could only play about with the swords. She said it was really a part of the mumming play; or the play was a part of it! I'm not sure which. I wish I'd told her about these men! If only somebody could see them, somebody who understands, and write the dance down, so that it shouldn't be lost, Daddy! For some of those men won't be able to dance much longer; they looked like grandfathers already! Will the dance have to stop when one of them dies? They say they do it every Christmas.'

'We'll hope they've been wise enough to train younger men to make up the team. Oth-erwise it will be forgotten and will soon die out.'

'It would be an awful pity!' Jen said soberly. 'It's rotten to think of these gorgeous old things being lost! Somebody ought to take on the job of saving them. Is it only in York-shire you see sword-dances, father? Or is it all over England?'

But her father only knew of these dances as done in the villages of his own neighbour-hood. Jen sighed. 'Well, I'm glad we live near one! I shall go to see it every Christmas, and I shall ask cook if they're training other men to have them ready. They were all dressed up, like soldiers, you know, mother! Black velvet coats with heaps of silver braid, and white cotton trousers tied on behind-so funny!, And big black boots, and gai-ters up to their knees, and weird little crimson caps with rosettes at the sides and rib-bons down the back. They looked gorgeous!'

'I wonder the caps kept on,' her mother remarked. 'They didn't, all the time. So they had strings fastened to them, and held the ends in their mouths; yes, they did, really! And there was a clown dressed in white, and he ran round outside the dance and made jokes; and they hung the swords round his neck when they went all joined together in the star. Oh, I wish girls could learn sword-dancing!'

'Jen dear! From your description it sounds most unsuitable!' her mother remonstrated.

'Sword dances are very strictly for men only, I imagine,' her father laughed.

'I don't see why. We dance morris, and that's a man's dance. Of course, girls could never do it as those men did; I know that. But then the men have been doing it for hun-dreds of years; it's been handed down--'

'What, the same men?' her father teased. 'It's about time they did have a rest, in that case! Don't you think they've earned it?'

'I mean their families, their fathers and grandfathers. It's in their blood. I'm not a baby; I could see that! You wouldn't make dancers like, that in a year or two. And they must have practised together for months. And then they were men! Girls could never be the same. But I don't see why they couldn't learn the dance and do it in their own way. I'd simply love to do it!'

'This is what comes of dancing jigs with burglars!' her father said solemnly. 'Now she wants to do sword-dances with men! We shall have to keep an eye on her! Your guiser-girl didn't turn up in the barn, I suppose?'

'No; I wish she had. It was jolly to see dancing in a barn again. We had a topping old barn at Wycombe, you know. I wonder if Cicely's ever seen a sword-dance? The only kind I'd heard of before was the Scotch one, where the swords are on the ground and you dance across them, as in "Bacca-Pipes." I'd never imagined a dance where the swords were in your hands and you were joined together by them!'

'After all, it seems a natural place for the swords to be!' her father laughed.

'I believe even Jack would have liked folk-dancing if she'd been given a sword to dance with!'

'Jack! She was the-er-friend you made when you first went to school, wasn't she?Why haven't we heard much about her lately? ' her father asked.

'She was my husband,' Jen said with dignity, which her laughing eyes belied. 'We were married for quite two years. But her folks took her to live in London with them, and so the marriage had to come to an end. I was awfully fond of Jack! Maybe I'll see her again some day. We had a family, you know; but only for three months. Then it left, and it had been such a bother that we never had another. We decided that adopted children were-n't worth the fag. I'm sure Jacky-boy would have loved to do a sword-dance!'

A few nights later, in the big back kitchen, she gave her first lesson to a dozen small children from the village; and the following night repeated it for a score of youngsters from "Tin Town." 'The two sets would not mix well', she was warned, and there was very little intercourse between the 'Tin Town' people in the valley and the original inhabitants in the gray stone hamlet on the hilltop. Her own observation soon told her that the children were of very different natures, those from 'Tin Town' being more of the city type, children of mechanics and trained workers, in most cases; while the villagers were thorough-going country children, whose parents were farmers or farm-labourers, small shopkeepers, shepherds, and the like. The two sets mutually disliked and were suspicious of one another, the village looking on 'Tin Town' as interlopers, the more travelled inhabitants of the bungalows cordially despising the dwellers among the fields. So Jen wisely taught them on separate nights, and found great differences in their powers of understanding, but no difference at all in their delight in this new interest. The country dances made an instant appeal to both parties, and their enjoyment was obvious-pathetic, indeed, in its revelation of their need of some such outlet. They had felt it instinctively, but without understanding; had known they were dull, without knowing what to ask for; for the city was too far away to allow of fre-quent visits to 'pictures' or theatres on the part of the elder children, and there had been no one to exert himself for the sake of the little ones.

New recruits stopped Jen continually as she cycled through the lanes or along the moorland roads, begging to be allowed to join 'the dancing'; within a week a request came from 'Tin Town' for a class for bigger girls, Jen's present age-limit being twelve. She was very doubtful of this new venture, feeling her want of experience, and would have preferred to make a success of the little ones first; but the girls were so insistent, and so earnest in their promises of good behaviour, and so pathetically eager for 'some-thing new to do,' that with her mother's rather reluctant consent and her father's eager approval she promised to give them a trial.

'It's good for the child,' her father argued. 'She's looking brighter already. She thinks of those classes all day long; I believe she dreams of them all night too. As for the chil-dren, it's invaluable-exactly what they've been needing.'

'Some of those "Tin Town" girls are very rough,' Mrs Robins said doubtfully. 'I wouldn't like Jen to have any difficulty.'

"Let cook sit in the room, if it would ease your mind. I'm going to watch myself, one of these days. The girls are keen, and that will help. Jen has only to threaten that they shan't come again, and they'll do anything she wants. And it's tremendously good for them.'

When her classes were over, Jen would go flying up to her father's room, and dropping on the end of his bed, or at his feet as he sat by the fire, would tell her experiences.

'It's priceless, Daddy! We nearly hurt ourselves with laughing. The girls are the funniest; the kiddies are so serious over it, and work so hard; and really they aren't half bad. They're still at the stage when you run and skip naturally, you see; of course, they've. no idea of rhythm, and just stare when I tell them to keep time to the music; but I think that will come. They aren't stiff, and they aren't afraid to try new things. They took to "Peascods" like ducks to water-though their clapping's still very weird! But it's getting better. But the girls-l They're too gorgeous for words. They're mostly over fourteen, and one or two are older than I am, and it's years since they skipped about, and they can't imagine running and skipping being real dancing steps. They want to do all kinds of fancy movements; I have to be awfully strict! They can't believe how simple it really is; they'd turn it into something weird and difficult and -and fancy, if I'd let them.'

'But you don't let them?' her father laughed. 'Goodness, no! Joan's hair would stand on end, and Cicely would have a fit, if they saw those girls trying to point their toes and hold up their skirts quite short skirts, you know!-as if they were ballet dancers! Oh, I'm fear-fully strict! But I'd no idea our dances were so funny! Does it seem frightfully funny to you to run forward four steps, holding your partner's hand?'

'I've heard funnier jokes,' her father said gravely.

'Those girls giggled no end when I made them try.

As for running back four steps, that was simply too funny for words. They all went at dif-ferent speeds, and banged into one another, and roared with laughing till I nearly fell into the gramophone, and was almost too sore to go on. I don't know when I've laughed so much. They simply can't run in small neat steps; either they fly all over the place or they stand still and giggle. I had no idea running was so difficult; I don't remember find-ing it so hard! I simply took Joan's hand, that first day on the cloister garth, and we ran forward and back, and that was all there was about it. But it's an absolute mystery to these girls! As for skipping-well, the first week I sent them home to practise, and to get the little ones to show them how to do it. This week I made them do "Brighton Camp," and led it myself-without any music, unfortunately. But they could skip by the time they were done with it; they were nearly dead, too, between tiredness and laughing. They won't be able to move for stiffness to-morrow. You see, they work so frightfully hard! -far harder than they need. They skip like horses, pulling their knees right up, for one thing. They don't seem able to do it easily.'

'Did all last week's girls turn up?' her mother asked.

'Rather! They wouldn't miss for anything. And six more came, and they say still more want to. I had eighteen to-night.'

'You mustn't take too many, my dear.'

'Oh, it's easier with a lot! They all laugh at one another! But sometimes I could throw the records at them,' and Jen grew grave. 'A joke's all very well, and apparently country dancing's very funny when you've never done it before. I didn't know it was, but it seems to be! I don't mind them laughing; classes must be jolly! But sometimes they giggle in a silly way that makes me want to shake them all. Why do they do it, mother? We never used to! They can't forget about themselves; they're thinking all the time how funny they must look. They do look funny, but I dare say we did when we began, but we never used to think about it. We just enjoyed it. I remember my first dance-evening,' she said thoughtfully, nursing her knees and gazing into the fire. 'It was in the big hall in Joy's house, during the dip. time, when the whole school went to the Abbey for the summer term-just after Joan had found the abbey treasures, the church plate, and the books and manuscripts, but before we'd discovered the hermit's church, and the well, and the jew-els. We had a practice dance, everybody in gym tunics, no dressing up, and Joan took me all down the line and up again in "The Mary and Dorothy," and I danced "Hey, Boys" and "Rufty" and "Bonnets" and "Galopede" and "We Won't Go Home Till Morning"! I dare say my steps were frightful and I looked awfully funny; but I don't remember ever thinking about it. I enjoyed every minute of it. If I'd been one of these girls I'd have been giggling at myself all the evening. Why are they like that, mother?'

'You were younger, only thirteen. They are in the very self-conscious stage,' her mother suggested. 'They are, of course. It's awful! But none of our girls were like that?'

'Don't you think that may be because they had got out of it before your day, and you un-consciously adopted the attitude of all the rest, and were as natural about it as they were?' her father remarked. 'You had the help of all the others, who had been at it for some time; you copied them, without thinking about it.'

Jen nodded gravely. 'I see. They made the-the proper feeling, of enjoying it and forget-ting oneself; and I just dropped into it. Yes, I think that's right. I wonder if they were gig-gly when they started? That would depend on Cicely, I suppose; she set them all danc-ing, and it would depend whether she was natural about it or not. But she would be, of course; she's never anything else. Seems to me we all owe a jolly lot to her; not only the definite dances, but the-the jolly easy feeling--'

'The natural atmosphere,' her father suggested. 'Yes, she gave us that. Then-then I suppose I' she paused suddenly and flushed. 'I say, it's rather cheek of me, Daddy!'

'You have to play Cicely for these "Tin Town" girls. You have to create their atmosphere. There's no doubt of that, Jen; they'll take their cue from you.'

'It's rather a big thing!' Jen contemplated the fire again. ‘I thought it was just going to be a case of jolly evenings to cheer US all up. But seems to me there's more in it than that. Seems to me it may make them quite different kind of girls. I say, don't you think per-haps it is rather cheek of me?'

'If you don't want to go on with it, the sooner you stop the better,' suggested the practical mother.

Jen's father eyed her gravely. 'Do you want to go on with it, Jen?'

Jen, staring into the fire, was seeing visions. ' Oh, I do!' she cried softly. 'It might help them not to be so silly-to get outside themselves-to think bigger things altogether! Don't you think it might help them, really?'

'Of course I do. There's education in it, in the sense of development, and character; and art. Give them all those, with your music and beautiful movements, and give them a common interest that will hold them together and take them outside their everyday lives; and you won't have done such a little thing, my dear.'

'It rather frightens me, though!' and Jen turned anxious eyes on him. 'I'm only a kid! Perhaps I oughtn't to try. I hadn't thought folk-dancing was such a big thing. If I give it to them wrongly, then I may do harm. Perhaps I'd better -not go on.'

'You're worrying the child, father!' Mrs Robins said indignantly.

'I don't think so. I should forget all about this now, Jen; or nearly forget it. Let it lie at the back of your mind; it will help you to keep on the right lines; but don't let it worry you. You won't give the girls anything wrong; you love it too much-just as, I've no doubt, your Cicely did. You must teach them as she taught you, that's all. But it won't hurt your work for you to have a high ideal of it. Don't feel you're doing a little thing!'

Jen nodded soberly. 'I see what you mean. But I must enjoy it, Daddy, or the girls won't.'

'Of course not. Everything depends on you. They'll copy you without knowing. it. If you're going to teach them to be natural and unselfconscious, you must be absolutely so yourself. If they are to enjoy the music and the dancing, they must see that you enjoy them most of all.'

After a long thoughtful silence, Jen summed up the situation as she saw it. 'Yes! All that about it doing them real good is interesting and rather wonderful, and I'm glad to have thought about it. But it seems to me what I've got to do is just to have as good a time as I can, and make them enjoy the classes; and see if I can make them love it all as I do.'

'Exactly! You won't go wrong along those lines.

And the very first night I think it would be safe I'm coming along to watch.'

'Oh, not yet!' Jen pleaded laughing. 'They'd simply die! At Wycombe we used rather to like having people to watch, because we felt they were enjoying it so. But these girls haven't nearly got to that stage yet! They'd hurt themselves with giggling! But some day, perhaps in the summer, or next winter, when they've learnt to be sensible, I'm going to have an open evening and invite their friends-and you two, of course!-and each class will do two or three dances. It would be good for them; don't you think so?'

'Better have the hall in "Tin Town," and give a real show,' her father laughed.

'We'll see!' Jen's eyes sparkled. 'Perhaps we could have it when Joan comes here in the summer! That would be topping!' and shy forgot possible responsibilities in the glorious prospect.

Her father saw it with relief, for he feared lest he had said too much. 'What dances did you do to-night?' he asked.

'Besides "Brighton Camp"!' and Jen laughed again at the memory of that exciting epi-sode. 'Oh, "Peascods," of course; and they all sat on the floor-they thought even that was rather funny! Everything's funny to them!-and I told them they'd been worshipping the sacred tree on the village green; and their eyes were the size of saucers. Then we did the first figure of "The Black Nag," for practice in slipping step; and the couples all banged into one another, and they simply shrieked with laughing. As for turning single on the spot, that was too funny for words! And I tried "Butterfly" and taught them to swing and change; and if you'd seen the muddles with the arches! They tried to behead one another, and nearly hurt themselves with laughing. And women get into the men's ring in "Peascods," and men get left out, and then try to fight their way in when it's too late. Oh, it's a priceless time! But I do enjoy it. And so do they!'

From Chapter 6: 'Waking up the village'

Jen's face clouded. 'I thought it would be jolly to have boy partners; and it would have been good for the girls too. Teach 'em not to be too silly! But the boys call it "girls' stooff," and won't have anything to do with us. Of course, what they'd love would be to learn a sword-dance. Every single one of them would come for that! But I can't teach them, and I don't know anybody who could. Cook's men live too far away.'

'They wouldn't teach it outside their own village, anyway, I expect,' her father said thoughtfully.

'I wonder about morris?' Jen's eyes brightened. 'Perhaps they'd come for that! I was thinking of trying it with the girls, but if I could get hold of the boys through morris, it would be far better if the girls didn't try it, of course. It was always a man's dance long ago! I believe I'll try-with sticks, you know. That "Blue-Eyed Stranger" girl who came with the mummers said I ought to see men dance morris. I say, Daddy! I'm going to have one more try for the boys! If they like it, they may come into the country dancing with the girls later on.'

'Your girls will want to do morris too,' her father warned her.

'Well, they can't; not at first, anyway. The boys won't believe it's a man's dance if the girls do it too.'

Morris sticks were easily made, and one day Jen's cycle stood at the gate of the boys' school when they all came out at mid-day, while she, with her arms full of sticks, invited any who cared to come up to the house that evening and learn how to use them. The boys had one use, at least, about which they never hesitated, and were all prepared to hit one another over the head, or to use the sticks as swords or clubs. But several had seen the dance between Jen and the guiser-giel, with its hopping step, its tapping, and its swift glancing-up-and-down strokes of the flashing white sticks. Several boys turned up for the first lesson, enjoyed it, and went home to tell their friends and to ransack the shops of all the nearer villages for bells to wear below their knees, in imitation of Jen's. The bells were a great attraction; the girls wore no bells for their dancing! The class doubled in size within a fortnight, and Jen had to refuse to take any more unless they formed a second class and came at a different time. 'Rigs' and 'Bean-Setting' captured them at once, and Jen foresaw that 'Shepherd's Hey' would soon be necessary, in spite of its more difficult track movements. She introduced them to handkerchief dances, and was surprised herself by the vigour they put into 'Blue-Eyed Stranger' and 'Trunkles'. 'Capers' won their hearts, though they found the side-step difficult; Jen, watching their efforts with some misgivings, remembered often her 'guiser's' criticism, and wondered apprehensively if there might have been some foundation for it after all.

Then, one great night, the boys asked if they might stay to watch ,the girls for a time, and were allowed to do so, on promise of very good behaviour. Jen, with deliberate mischief in her eyes, lined the girls up for 'Brighton Camp,' and saw envy and eager-ness dawn in the watching faces as the procession skipped gaily down the room and up again, the top couple swung down the 'aisle,' and all swung round and round in their places.

'That be jolly fine!' she heard one say.

'Soom foon tha-at!' another agreed. 'Joost champion, it be!'

'Would you like to join in?' she asked innocently, and held out her hands to one. 'Come in with me; join on at the end! I'll keep you right!'

The first bold pioneer enjoyed his turn so much that he called to his friends to 'Coom on in, you chaps!' and two by two the boys joined the line, the girls laughing but with no time to make remarks.

Jen took her partner from top to bottom in fine style; this left two boys as leaders, and they 'ramped all over the place' as she said afterwards, but enjoyed themselves hugely, while at sight of them going down the middle together the girls were nearly helpless with laughter.

Presently Jen called a halt. 'I'll give you something new; something nobody knows. But sit down a minute and get your breath. Now the boys must all dance on one side and the girls on the other; it looks awfully silly to see two boys together. Divide yourselves up; take partners, I mean; but don't waste time about it. Just take anybody. We'll do "Galopede"; then you boys can watch while we do some set dances. If you think you'd like to join in any of them, you must come next week and learn the movements in ear-nest:

'Galopede,' with its running lines, won all their hearts, and by the time the boys had watched 'Mage' and 'Peascods' they began to think they would like to come regularly. 'We Won't Go Home Till Morning' and' Pop Goes the Weasel,' taught to the. whole crowd, completed their conquest, and Jen, dismissing them at last, went up, weary but laughing and very happy, to tell her father that the morris had proved a successful bait, and that the boys had voted country dancing 'not half bad, after all.'

'They'll be knitting jumpers next,' her father teased. The problem of music had long since become acute, of course; Jen's ambitions could not long be kept within the bounds of a few gramophone records, many of whose dances would be far beyond the powers of her classes for many a day. She regretfully put 'Newcastle' and 'Parson's Farewell' aside; and there were others she did not know herself. But music for 'Brighton Camp' and 'Galopede' became imperative and she set all her girls and boys to the solv-ing of the problem. Various bashful budding violinists were produced among the 'Tin Town' tribes, and one after another was invited to try what she could do with the music Jen had sent for from town. But they stumbled, and, to Jen's consternation, were so conscientious that if they played a wrong note they went back to correct it, and so ruined their rhythm and drove Jen nearly crazy, while the class hopped about on one foot and waited till the tune would let them go on,' or, worse still and much more frequently, dis-regarded it entirely and went on their way with no reference to the music.

Jen was in despair, when some one reminded her that old Billy Thwaites, the village po-liceman, could play the concertina. Jen promptly interviewed him, mindful of the man who had played for the sword-dancers in cook's village, and found she had stumbled on a treasure. Billy loved 'tunes' and quite understood the need to 'go on, go straight on, whatever happens,' on which Jen insisted so emphatically. She played the tunes she wanted to him once, Billy at first shy in the unusual surroundings of the big drawing room and the grand piano, but soon forgetting everything in his delight in the music; he was one of those self-taught natural musicians who could play anything by ear, and, stamping his foot to catch the time, knew instinctively what Jen meant by rhythm. Thereafter Jen was happy, the girls and boys could have any dance they wanted in the big empty kitchen, and Billy spent more jolly evenings and laughed longer and more heartily than he had done for years, and, moreover, was distinctly useful in controlling the boys when their feelings became too much for them at times. It was not every one, as Jen said, who had a tame policeman to play for her classes! He was never satisfied and never tired, and as he was not dancing himself, he was always urging them on, even during the intervals Jen thought necessary for rest and discussion of jumpers.

Her father slipped in to watch one evening, unnoticed for some time by the boys, who were learning the hand-clapping of the 'Shepherd's Hey' jig with great gusto and much laughter at first. Billy, perched on a wide windowsill, jeered at their efforts at the cross-back-step, but Jen knew the difficulty and was more patient. She stood on a chair en-couraging and explaining-' Across! Never mind the "apart" bit; that will happen of itself. Cross your feet closely, and let them go out again, like scissors. Like this!' and she jumped from her chair to show what she meant.

Her father watched with interest and amusement and some surprise the air of authority with which she controlled the boys, and still more the manner with which she presently greeted and directed the big girls from 'Tin Town,' when they arrived, eager for their turn, inclined to be noisy and giggly still, but all instantly yielding to a word from her. They crowded round her to show the progress in their knitting, while the boys played about with the morris sticks, threatening Billy and sparring with one another. Then Jen, mindful of the audience she had discovered and smiled to, mounted her chair again and called for 'Galopede'. Billy struck up the tune, the boys caught hands and the girls did the same, the long lines ran up to meet, fell back, crossed over, turned their partners, and the top couple swung to the bottom, while all the rest clapped in time to the music.

'That's first rate!' and Mr Robins came out of his corner. 'I congratulate you all! You're doing splendidly. Let me see something else, won't you?'

Jen, with laughing eyes, called for 'Brighton Camp,' but shook her head when he begged her to join in with him. 'You'd have heart failure, Daddy. It's hardly worth it. Now I'm going to teach them something new. "Haste to the Wedding," please, Billy; you know, this one!' and she hummed the first few bars. From her chair she gave swift clear directions; then came down to be 'first man' and show them what she meant. 'Now try that! Don't be silly, Violet. There's nothing to laugh about. Just nod to Jack and turn away quickly; you haven't time for more. Can't you feel the music driving you on? Some of you don't seem to feel the-the push the music gives you; the swing of it. Don't curtsey, Maud; there's far too little time; just nod. Now both hands to the man. and turn gently, running. Lift the girls' hands, as I told you, boys! Don't grab hold of them so roughly. Now try again!'

'You don't wear your gym things for dancing, then?' her father asked, as they went up-stairs when the class was over. 'You did at school, didn't you?'

'Yes, always, for practising. I'd have liked to,' Jen said soberly. 'I love a tunic; it's so comfy. But I thought about it a lot, and decided I'd better not, especially with those big girls. You see, I look about eleven! Nobody would believe I'm over sixteen. Some of them are as old as I am, so I couldn't afford to look an infant. I want to look important, you know! So I decided it was my duty to wear a jumper and a longer skirt.'

'I've no doubt you're right. Here's a letter for you,' and her father paused by the big table in the hall. He took his own letters and went on to describe to his wife the scene in the back kitchen-the dancing laughing boys and girls, the jolly-faced policeman with the ac-cordion on the window-sill, and Jen standing on her chair, in gray skirt and emerald jumper, a long yellow plait hanging over one shoulder, the other flung back, her face watchful as she corrected mistakes, missing nothing, pulled up a rowdy girl, scolded a boy who was always late in his movements, explained points which had been misun-derstood, then sprang down to stand in the midst and show how setting or siding ought to be done, or to explain what somebody was doing wrongly. She made fun of the mis-takes, caricaturing the awkward movements till even the victim had to laugh and all the rest shouted, though many looked self-conscious and guilty and wondered why she had not fallen upon them instead; but she did it so gently and tactfully that nobody's feelings were hurt .

'I wonder they don't mind when you jeer at them!' her father had said to her, during an interval .

'Oh, but I'm careful!' Jen had answered swiftly. 'I know which of them I mustn't laugh at. Most of them don't care a scrap. But there are one or two I wouldn't laugh at for pounds! They'd never come again !'

'I can quite believe it. But how do you know which they are?'

'I don't know how. By looking at them, Daddy. I just know! I'd hate to hurt their feelings, and I know which have feelings and which haven't. I can't tell you how, but I do know.'

Her father was repeating this remark to his wife, with an appreciative chuckle, when Jen came flying into the room, letter in hand, her face radiant. 'Mother! Father! The most topping idea! It's from Cicely! Oh, you must let me go! Just listen!' And sitting together round the fire, they read the President's letter.

CHAPTER VII

A NEW KIND OF SCHOOL

"JENNY-WREN!-The most gorgeous plan for next August! You simply must come. Joan and Joy are going, and I'm just counting the days. And we'd like you to make the fourth.

'I'll tell you all about it. I've found out heaps of things we ought to have known years ago. I made friends with a jolly girl on the boat coming home from Ceylon, and before very long I found out that she was as keen on folk-dancing as if she'd been brought up in the Hamlet Club. We talked a lot about it, and I found that she knew heaps that I didn't; don't tell the Wycombe girls! She knows morris dances that we've never dreamt of; some with great thick sticks two feet long; she showed me the tapping with walking-sticks, and I was simply fascinated. She seemed to know everything, all the dances that we have the music for in our books. I've an awful fear creeping over me that we may be wrong in little points here and there; you can't be sure when you've learnt from a book, you know! And she talked about a wonderful thing called Running Set, that was found in America, but is really Old English; it goes on for hours, figures and figures of it. And she knows sword-dances' - Jen stopped in her reading to look up at her parents with a gasp of excitement- 'wonderful things with long wooden swords, and steel swords, and bend-ing swords she calls "rappers"; all with old village names, after the places they came from.'

'Perhaps she knows ours!' Jen cried excitedly. 'I never dreamt anyone was interested in them! And I'm going to learn them! -if you'll let me go! Oh, Daddy! Mother! I must!'

'There's a society in London,' Cicely's letter went on. 'And they teach the dances all the year round and have parties for their members. Last week I stayed a night in London with my friend, and she took me to a Country Dance Party as a visitor. Fifty or sixty people, Jen, all grown-up, in evening dress, dancing "Haste to the Wedding" and "Old Mole" and "Mage" and "Mary and Dorothy" and "Newcastle," just as we used to .do at school and in the barn, and ending up with a glorious "Sellenger's Round." I felt as if I must be dreaming it; I'd never imagined grown people, London people, cared for our dances like that. Of course, they think they're their dances, and we're just outsiders playing at it!'

I suppose that's so, really. Well, I'm going to be a member and go up to town for parties, and get somebody to put me up for the night, or I'll know the reason why I But best of all, kid, they have schools for folk-dancing in the holidays, and people go from all over the country. We can't go to the Easter one now; they've been all booked up for weeks. But I'm going in August, for all four weeks, and I want you, to come too. It's at Chelten-ham; they say it's relaxing, but very pretty country, and the air's all right up on the hills. My friend can't go; she's getting married in July, unfortunately. I can't think why people do; it interrupts everything so dreadfully! But I'm going, and Joan and Joy, and you! We'll ask to be in classes together, and we'll get rooms and live together, and it will be just exactly like being back at school, except that the classes will all be for dancing. There are lectures, too, all about the history and folk-lore of the dances; I'm afraid I did-n't know there was any! And demonstrations, when the people who teach show you how the dances look when they're done perfectly; there were some people dancing at that party, and-well, it was different from anything we do, that's all! I guess they must have been the teacher-people; I was just hungry to see them do some more. They didn't do any morris, of course; only country dances. And they have folk-singing every morning, and a party once a week, at night; and exams, when you can get certificates for danc-ing. Think of that! I'd rather like to go in for it. Hundreds of people go, mostly teachers or students from college; you must make heaps of friends and meet all kinds of jolly inter-esting people. And we'd learn sword-dances, and the weird running thing. Now you'll come, won't you? Think what topping fun it will be! I don't know how I'm going to exist till August!

From Chapter 9: 'The girls from Switzerland'

'Oh!' said Joan, in a hushed tone, as they jumped off the tram in a crowd of other hat-less girls, many wearing only mackintoshes over their tunics and displaying stockings and knees with an absolute lack of self-consciousness. 'Is this the college? And we're going to dance in it? But what a glorious building! Why do they allow it? It hardly seems right!'

'You needn't talk, my child! What about the

cloister garth? That was a funny place to dance, if you like! '

'I learnt my morris step on the cloister garth; to say nothing of .. Hey, Boys" and .. Rufty Tufty!'" ~en laughed. 'It is tophole, though, isn't it, Joan?'

The great gray college, the reddening creeper and yellow roses, the double rows of wide perpendicular windows, the great doorway, the tower and little turrets, the beautiful chapel at the side, the wide gravel drive up which students, men and girls, were crowd-ing on cycles or on foot, reduced Joan to a state of bewildered rapture. 'Classes in there will feel like dancing in the refectory at home!' she said. 'It's the same style, of course; Tudor. See the wide square windows! I always wanted to dance in the refectory, but never quite dared. Oh, I love this place !' as they looked for the first time round the great hall, with its cleared floor, honour tablets on the walls, canopied head master's seat, and the platform with a big grand piano.

Joan looked about her in an incredulous dream.

She had expected classrooms, not a beautiful hall with open vaulted roof and stained-glass windows.

Cicely pinched her gently. 'Wake up, Abbey-Girl !

You'll be in here every day for a month. We're to learn our sword-dance in this very hall. And there's our room for country dancing-Room C. Come and ask where we leave our coats and change our shoes.'

Joan followed and changed, still in a dazed happy dream. Jen, with sympathetic under-standing which never failed her, whispered, 'I've looked into our room, Joan, and it's just like the refectory! You'll love it. Aren't we lucky? Poor old Jack, and Tazy and Karen, having to go to some old ordinary school in an old ordinary street! We are in luck! Come and see the refectory! Such a lovely roof and windows! '

The big schoolroom was not unlike the great beautiful hall at Grace-Dieu, which Joan had so often described to visitors. The windows were in Perpendicular style; the open roof had great black beams; there was a distinctly ecclesiastical atmosphere, in spite of the floor cleared for dancing, the piano, and the books of country dance music. The stu-dents beginning to assemble, girls in gym dress and men in flannels, looked oddly out of place, and so did the desks piled on the platform and the forms against the walls.

In their interest in their surroundings, the Hamlet friends had forgotten to be conscious of their unusual costume, partly, no doubt, because nobody else seemed aware that it was unusual. The girls standing talking and laughing with the men apparently wore gym tunics all their lives. Cicely's eyes widened at sight of several men, evidently members of the class; she had hardly expected men to go in for country dancing. But it was only after she was in bed that night that she remembered, and laughed in the darkness, how very long Joan's legs had looked, and no doubt her own had been as bad. At the mo-ment the thought never occurred to her; all her attention was for their fellow-students, as she began dimly to realise how very very interesting these next few weeks were going to be, with this unusual sensation of being one of a crowd, and a very big, enthusiastic crowd. What were all these girls? Teachers? Students from colleges? They were all grown-up, in spite of their short skirts; Jen was the only girl in the room whose hair still hung in plaits, and she was realising the fact with a shock. Would it be possible to make friends with some of these girls, and hear what each one did at home?-for Cicely had no doubt they all 'did' things; she could see it in the keen purposeful faces of many. Teach-ers, probably, most of them, she thought, and used to being in positions of authority. How would they like being taught for a change?

'They'll feel it as funny as I'm going to do! I hope our teacher-person is up to her job. It's not like bossing a lot of kids,' she said to herself. 'And men too! I wonder if she's here yet? Any of them might be going to teach, by the look of them. She's got her work cut out for her. I hope she's not soft, with this crowd. There must be nearly thirty of us! Joan, did you ever know such a joke in your life? I wouldn't have missed this for a thou-sand pounds!'

Joan woke from her joyful absorption in these most unexpected surroundings, and laughed. 'It's simply gorgeous! I'm just awfully glad we came. Oh, President, I want to dance! I want to dance the joyfullest thing I know! I think I'll do a morris jig by way of ex-pressing my feelings.'

'Do!' Cicely said encouragingly. 'You'll create "some" sensation! Oh, cheers! Is this our lady boss?'

Some one had come quickly in, and, jumping lightly on a form, surveyed her class. 'Make up sets of eight. I want to see "Newcastle," she said.

'And jolly well do what you're told, all of you!' Cicely murmured, her face alight with amusement and anticipation. 'Good old "Newcastle!" We're all right there, anyway!

CHAPTER X

'SHE-WHO-MUST-BE-OBEYED'

SHE was big and fair and jolly, with a very emphatic air of authority, and eyes which missed nothing. Those were Cicely's first impressions; they did not change, but others were added to them, even before the first hour's class was over. From the first moment she never doubted this 'teacher-person's' power to control her class, however big or grown-up or mixed; from the first dance she marvelled at her gift of seeing every detail and missing nothing.

There was an extremely personal reason for this last, however. As they honoured their partners on the last note, the authority on the form delivered judgement with no uncer-tain voice. 'Yes! Well, that's very bad, you know. You were all wrong over there; and you were all lost too. As for this set her eyes were on Cicely and Joan, who, in spite of their resolve, had danced together when it came to the point, facing Joy and Jen- 'You got your places all right, but you made your lines frightfully badly. You were all wrong in the second figure too; you four, the side couples. Turn your backs on one another and lead to your places, left hands; don't fall back. Go to your positions for the arming; now turn to the person whose hand you're going to take. Never turn your back on her; it's wrong, and very ugly; and anyway, it's frightfully rude. You four in this set were wrong, every-one of you. . Be careful this time. Now ready!'

"She's spotted us, in the first two minutes!' Cicely groaned, amused and dismayed. ;And we are wrong in "Newcastle!" This is awful!'

'But it's a much jollier movement!' Joan argued. 'Oh, it's a great improvement on our scramble round! Why didn't we see it for ourselves? But isn't she" some" boss! I'm going to call her Madam! Wonder if she's any better pleased this time?'

'That's better! Now do the whole dance right through. Be careful of that leading back, you four.'

'Yes, ma'am I' Cicely murmured abjectly, as they caught hands and ran to the centre. 'I feel about ten: she said to Joan, as they armed together. 'Do take care of me in those lines! I shall die if I make a mess of it after being told! I say, she's got one eye on us all the time! I wonder what's wrong with us?'

'Everything, I expect; Joan laughed, as she bobbed her honour and passed on.

'Madam' watched the sets critically. Suddenly she sprang from her form and went flying across the room to a group in one comer. 'You're still all wrong here! This is your place; you should be here'-and she hustled them into their proper positions. 'Now go back to the arming, everybody. And listen to me! Don't talk when I'm teaching you; don't talk!' She sprang up on the nearest chair. 'You're so busy telling one another what's wrong that you won't listen to me. Your first lines are made up and down the room; first man will be at the end of that line, first woman opposite him. Second' man will be, or should be, in the middle of the other line, opposite his own position, second woman at his side. Third man will be at the end--'

'Oh, goodness! Stop her, somebody! I'm getting all tied up !' groaned Cicely, in an amused but agonised whisper. 'I know where everybody ought to be, including myself, but I never heard it all recited at full speed like that before! She's like a gramophone! But isn't she sure of it, and no mistake!'

'When she went for those places like an express train, I wanted to hold my head on,' Joan laughed afterwards. 'It took my breath away; I just whirled round and round. But it was awfully clever!'

'That's better! That was quite good. See if you can do it like that on Monday. Now I want to see "Hey, Boys,"' and Madam returned to her place on the form.

'If she wants to see "Hey, Boys," she will, I'm certain sure of that!' Cicely remarked. 'Be my man in this, Joy? Jen likes to do it with Joan.'

'Well, let's get farther away,' Joy suggested. 'We needn't stand right under her nose. I feel a premonition that there's going to be something awfully frightfully wrong with the way we do it.'

'After being pulled up for "Newcastle," anything may happen,' Cicely observed. 'But I don't believe it's any good running away. She'll just come flying after us, or yell at us across the room.'

'Don't go away, you four,' a voice called them suddenly. 'You've plenty of room. Stay where you are; I want to watch you.'

The eyes of the four met, apprehensive though full of amusement. 'Caught out!' mur-mured Jen.

'Coo! Isn't she a bully!' Joy said indignantly. '"She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed!" Do as you're told, my children! We may as well know the worst,' and Cicely resignedly returned to her place. 'But "Don't talk while I'm teaching you," any of you three! I won't be scolded for behaving like a baby. Besides, it's rude,' and they waited attentively for the music to be-gin.

Joan, her face full of amusement, was watching the 'teacher-person' appreciatively. Something in Madam's' movement and bearing, as she made that flying leap from the form and ran across the room, had reminded her irresistibly of the big gray Persian cat, who lived with the caretaker of the Abbey, and could be met any day wandering among the ruins. Joan had always held that Timmy was the most beautiful things in the way of movement she had ever seen; he could not put himself into an awkward position; every line was perfect, every curve graceful; every movement, whether he walked or jumped or ran or rolled or washed himself or stretched in the sun, was a delight to watch. Sud-denly she found the same quality in Madam, in her perfect poise and balance as she ran or stood or jumped on and off her form; what it must be to see her dance Joan could only imagine, and hoped the chance would be given them some day. Beauty of any kind moved her strongly. At home there had been the beauty of ancient∑ buildings, of won-derful colour. Then had come a new joy in the folk music to which the Hamlet Club had introduced her; but of all the dances should have meant in the way of the beauty of free natural movement she had hardly caught a glimpse till now she began dimly to feel it; her eyes followed Madam, when presently she came down from her perch to demon-strate a movement, with hungry eager delight.

But 'She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed' was as unconscious of being watched as Timmy. She kept one eye on the Hamlet four and one on the rest of the room, with the result that Jen grew nervous and lost her head, and ran round wildly in the last figure after anyone who came near her, and had to be hauled into place by Joan; and the dance ended with the four in a state of collapse, helpless with laughter.

The culprit apologised abjectly to the rest, and Cicely addressed their instructress, who was coming towards them. 'She does know it, really. She only got in a muddle. She's known it for years.'

'I'm awfully sorry,' Jen said humbly again.

'I know. I saw what happened. She knows it all right,' Madam agreed, and unhappy Jen recovered on the spot. 'But you're all wrong, all four of you, you know.'

'What, again?' Cicely groaned.

'Not in "Hey, Boys," surely!' Joy said indignantly. Madam's eyes gleamed. 'Yes, even in "Hey, Boys." I don't know who's been teaching you, but your style's dreadful I I may as well tell you that at once. I've been watching you--'

'Don't we know it !' Cicely' groaned. 'That's why Jen went wrong !'

'What's wrong with us?' Joy demanded incredulously.

'Your" gypsy" is wrong, to begin with. You turned out; this is the movement. Gipsy with me !' she said to Joan, who would far rather have watched her, but obeyed meekly. 'Now do you see? Do that, all four of you. No, no!' and she caught Joy by the shoulders and turned her about. 'That way!'

'Oh ! ' said Cicely. 'Oh, I see I' Her face grew blank. . I say, we have been making fools of ourselves!'

Madam offered no opinion as to that, but, bidding the rest of the class sit down, deliv-ered more swift destructive criticism. 'Then you stood still in the second figure; you must never do that; no one stops running for one moment in this dance. You must fill in the time. Men do it this way; women, balance before you cross. Do you see that?'

Cicely's eyes met hers honestly. 'Your way is far jollier than ours.'

'Your way simply ruins the whole thing,' Madam said ruthlessly. 'In the last figure, you must keep straight arms, and you must have them ready. Now do the whole dance, and remember those points. The rest can join in, if they like, but it wasn't at all bad, except for this set.'

She watched keenly as the four very meekly went through the dance. But though they were extremely obedient and quite obviously trying to satisfy her, there was a twinkle in Cicely's eyes and a suppressed grin in Joy's, while Jen was scarlet with the effort to re-strain her feelings. And Joan saw that Madam was quite aware of their amusement; like Cicely, she had already a high respect for their teacher's power of observation.

When the dance was finished, Madam said approvingly, 'Yes, that was a different thing altogether. I wish you could have seen yourselves the first time. That was quite good. Now have a rest, and then I want "Boatman."'

'We don't know that,' Cicely remarked; and then, with laughing eyes, 'Perhaps you'll be glad to hear it! We may not be so bad in dances we don't know!'

'I shouldn't wonder,' Madam retorted, and turned to a group of girls sitting on the floor. ' Your arms were wrong too; keep them straight. Your siding is very bad; you must be careful; it's this! You ended by turning your back on your partner; you must turn in, like this!'

'She knows what every single person in the room did!' Cicely marvelled, as they dropped on the floor to rest. 'Has she eyes all round her head?'

'I never saw anything like the way runs-except Timmy!' Joan murmured, watching the demonstration of siding with fascinated eyes. 'I could watch her all day!'

'But think of those awful mistakes we've been making!' Jen wailed. 'Don't you feel sick? I do!'

'I say, President I' Joy leaned forward across Jen. 'Did you say you felt ten? I feel two!' I feel like a squashed beetle. I'm utterly crushed.

Every scrap of self-confidence I ever had is oozing out of my plimsolls,' Cicely said mournfully. 'I wish I'd gone to classes years ago! Did I say I meant to take an exam next week? Goodness me, what an ignorant idiot I was! In a year, perhaps I When I get up my courage, I'm going to confess we've been learning from the books.'

'I believe she knows,' Joan laughed, watching Madam as she went round the room, tell-ing each girl and man where she or he had been wrong. 'She knows everything. I think she's wonderful. She never misses a thing!'

'Oh, what a glorious tune!' Jen cried softly, when she heard 'The Boatman' for the first time. ' And what a topping dance!' she added, when they had learned it.

Cicely and Joan were watching Madam, but could not tell from her face whether criti-cism or commendation would be their lot. But presently when she thought another inter-val for rest was necessary, she turned to Cicely, who was approaching her, intent on confession. 'I'd rather have you in dances you haven't done,' she said, with a twinkle in her eyes which kindled an instant response in the President's. 'You're easy to teach; you pay attention, and you don't talk; and you grasp things quickly.' .

'I'm glad there's something can be' said for us,' Cicely said ruefully.

'Oh, there's a good deal! Sometimes you're all quite good. But you've got into dreadfully bad ways, or been very badly taught, and you're all alike. You all have the same faults.'

'Of course. I taught all the rest,' Cicely said gloomily. 'And we've been so pleased with ourselves for years and years.- You can't think what a shock this afternoon has been.'

Madam laughed. 'I'm sorry. I thought you looked a bit--'

'Crushed!' Cicely groaned. 'Flattened out. I wish we'd come years ago.'

'I don't think you looked crushed at all. I was going to say tremendously amused. I thought you must be having the funniest afternoon you'd had for some time, by the way you looked at one another. As for the way you looked at me!' and Madam laughed again.

Cicely laughed too. 'Well, it is funny! We've been dancing for years, and teaching all the rest, and they think we know everything and are just It! And in the first five minutes you pull us up on a dozen points, and in things like "Newcastle" and "Hey, Boys!"'

'Which you think you've known for years. I'm very sorry, but look at the things you've been doing!'

'Oh, every single thing you tell us is an improvement!

But all the same, it's awfully funny. I thought Jen would have hysterics from suppressed giggling when you stood over us and made us do "Hey, Boys" all by ourselves. They'll simply die at home when we tell them. I shall call the girls together and they'll have the time of their lives when they hear how Joan and I were sat on in the first afternoon's class.'

She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed laughed. 'You'll confess, then? '

'Oh, rather! I'll get the club right on all those points before I've been home a fortnight, and I've no doubt there will be a few more points still to come.' Hcr eyes danced.

'I've no doubt there will. Is it a dancing club?' Madam asked with interest. 'And you're the leader? '

'The President. I started them dancing six years ago, and taught them all they know; most of it wrong, apparently! At Wycombe, you know; we dance in a huge old barn on a farm, by lantern-light, with a friend to fiddle for us.'

'But how perfectly gorgeous! ' Madam's appreciation was as frank and eager as a schoolgirl's. 'How often do you meet? Do you have folk-singing too? I wish you'd invite me some evening I I often go to Oxford, and I pass through Wycombe.'

'Would you come?' Cicely's face lit up. 'We'd simply love it! But not till I've had a whack at their style! Just now their dancing's ghastly; I can see that already. It would make you ill. But I'll get them right; it will be some shock to them, though I But first of all, can you get us right? Or are we too hopeless? '

'I wanted to speak to you about that,' Madam said seriously. 'In knowledge of the dances you are quite up to this grade, but in style you are not. I've either got to put you down, or keep on at you till I get you right. I can't possibly pass mistakes such as you are making. You've been learning dances from the books, I suppose? '

'We have,' Cicely assented gloomily. 'But I did do some at school; before I was fifteen, though, and that's some time ago. Oh, please keep on at us as much as ever you like! That's what we've come for. Besides, we enjoy it. I do! It's the funniest thing that has happened to me for years. Pull me up for every old thing you can; I really want to get the dances right, and if we've been messing them up I'm sorry. But I'm afraid we'll be an aw-ful nuisance to you. Do you mind keeping us?'

'Not if you'll remember the things I tell you; don't let me have to tell you over and over again I But you won't; I saw that in those new dances. And don't talk when I'm talking; that really does make we lose my temper!'

'It's the limit,' Cicely agreed. 'Oh, we won't; you can trust us there. The way some of them go on is awful! I do think they might listen.'

'They can't help it. They're teachers,' Madam said philosophically. 'It's in their blood to tell everybody what's wrong and try to put the class right. I'm used to it; but I wish they'd leave it to me I Well, If you'll work hard you may stop; but I shall pull you up all the time, you know.'

'We want you to! Besides, I'll take it out of the club when I get home!'

From Chapter 14: 'Morning in the school'

MRS HUNT'S little maid, Fanny, was washing the hall on Monday morning when Miss Newcastle, in the neatest of blue tunics and black legs, and wearing her silver star on her breast, came downstairs with unconscious dignity. With one astonished gasp Fanny fled to the kitchen, and the Advanced Certificate greeted the others, when they followed her into the breakfast room, with an amused chuckle.

'How many small girls were washing the hall when you came down?'

'Both of them,' Cicely said in surprise. 'Why?'

'Because I gave Fanny such a shock that she went flying to fetch Ethel to see too. I guessed they'd both be there. You should have seen Fanny's face! Her eyes travelled down as far as my knees and then she exploded and just ran to find the other kid. Ethel was out on Saturday, you know; I've no doubt Fanny had been telling her what a comic lot we are! They'll both be hanging about when we go up to fetch our coats. They think we're lunatics.''Glad we're causing the inhabitants some amusement,' Joy said airily.

Cicely and Joan were practising side-step, according to the instructions given them on Saturday night, when She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed entered the classroom. Their eyes fol-lowed her, Joan's in warm appreciation, Cicely's in rapture, for she wore a smooth blue tunic and looked as happy in it as everyone else.

'Coo!' Joy murmured. 'Isn't she a treat? She looked jolly before, but in her gymmy she beats herself into fits!'

'You see so much more of her!' Jen remarked truthfully. 'And when she's as topping as that, the more you see the better ! '

'You see her movement better,' Joan said enjoyably. 'Yes, I feel like a sack of potatoes or a lump of clay beside that!' Cicely groaned.

'Oh, you needn't!-She wants you,' and Joan retreated hurriedly, as Madam came to-wards Cicely, with a peremptory, 'Miss Hobart!'

'She must have seen that side-step! I said she'd got eyes all round her hea~!' and Cicely went to meet her gloomily.

'Look here !' Madam spoke in the offhand almost schoolboy manner characteristic of her, which fitted her short skirt admirably, but contrasted strongly with the inimitable beauty of her every movement. 'I don't want you four to think, because I'm always find-ing fault with you, that you haven't any good points. You've a great many. I don't think I said much about them on Saturday, but they are there. Your balance and movements are good; any one can see you've done a lot of dancing; you're above the average in many ways. In some points your style's surprisingly good, but you've lots of dreadful faults, you know. I want to pet you out of them, and then you'll be quite all right. But you've a lot to build on; your rhythm is always good; you know a great many dances thoroughly, and you're sure of what you do know; you don't make silly mistakes continu-ally, and you do concentrate on your work. I wish I could say the same for more of them! I can see that if I tell you a thing, you'll grasp it and remember it, and that means you'll be easy to teach. And you don't chatter!' and she laughed. 'But, when I've said all that, I must say again, you've got dreadful faults! You're murdering some of the dances. That's all. Now make up sets of six, everybody,' and she sprang on to the form and stood sur-veying them. 'I want to see "Trunkles"'.

'How awfully nice of her!' and Cicely swiftly repeated the gist of Madam's words. 'Fancy taking the trouble to buck us up like that! I say, don't be too awful after that! Do play up and make the best show you can ! '

It was a harassing and disheartening hour for four who had been quite pleased with their morris dancing up till then. Madam watched them closely, and when her eye caught Cicely's she shook her head with a twinkle that seemed to say, 'You're very nearly hopeless. But not quite!' She made no crushing comment, however, but coming down from her form gave a demonstration of the steps and circles which they watched with hungry, wondering eyes.

'Now do it like that!' said she.

'Like that! I never saw anything like that before!' Cicely informed her swiftly, as she passed their set.

She laughed. 'Have you never seen morris? Well, what could you expect?'

'Not morris like yours. Only our own, and apparently we've been playing at it. Yours is quite another thing,' the President said gloomily.

'Yours has got to be quite another thing too,' was the crushing retort, and from her form Madam demanded the dance again.

But this time she gave them a brief nod. 'Practise that at home. Now have you all done Bampton? I want "Bobbing Joe." Remember, when you "show," your movement is this!' and she came to earth to demonstrate again.

'I thought she was going to do it up there, and break her leg!' Joy murmured in relief.

But Joan and Cicely were watching the beautiful waving arm-movement with delighted eyes. 'I never saw anything to beat that! But I could never do it like that in this world!' the President groaned.

Madam heard and laughed. 'Now let me see that. All "show" to your opposites, for prac-tice. B music, please!' and she watched them with keenly amused eyes.

'Oh, I dare say it's awfully funny!' Cicely informed her, as they rested. 'But you forget that I'm stunned with horror at the mess we've been making of things; and Joan's dumb with joy at the way you do them; and Joy and Jen are ready to burst with amusement because I've been teaching the rest all wrong; and how can we concentrate on which foot goes behind and which arm comes in front?'

'Oh, you'll improve in time!' Madam said coolly. 'Now you can be thinking out "Shep-herd's Hey." We'll have some Ilmington for a change.'

'You're trying to muddle us!' Joy said indignantly; they were sitting on the floor in a ring at her feet. 'We do know the hey, though. We did it on Saturday, at midnight, in our--'

'No, I want to see how much you know,' and Madam did not wait to hear whether the last word referred to place or costume. '

With hundreds of other eager laughing girls, they presently crowded into the big hall for the morning session. As they sat in the closely-packed rows, singing folk-songs under the leadership of the Director, each found enjoyment in her own particular way. Joan's eyes roved over the beautiful hall, and she felt again the privilege of meeting in such a place. Jen, sitting on the floor with Jack, Tormy, Tazy and Karen, who had come in late but managed to find her, sang with all her might, while resolving to teach these songs to her children as soon as she reached home; they satisfied her artistic sense, and were exactly what she had been unknowingly craving for. The choice for the day fell on 'As I walked through the Meadows,' 'Admiral Benbow,' 'Banbury,' 'Spanish Ladies,' 'Midsum-mer Fair,' and 'The Crystal Spring,' and each in turn was a delight. Then came chanties - 'Whip Jamboree,' and the high roof rang with the sailors' chorus, 'Oh, Jenny, get your oatcake done!' -and a solo, the very announcement of which was greeted with joyful ap-plause; evidently it was an old favourite. 'Shanadar' was followed by 'Sally Brown,' which was called for from all quarters of the room; everybody joined happily in the cho-rus lines 'I spent my money 'long 0' Sally Brown' -and there was a ripple of laughter at the last verse-' Now we're married and we're living nice and comf'r'able.'

Jack giggled and nudged Jen; but Joy said exuberantly, 'What a topping voice he's got! I wish he'd go on and on!'

'What wonderful accompanying!' Karen said wistfully. 'I could listen for ever! But how weird that last tune was ! '

Cicely's eyes went from the soloist to Madam, sitting on the platform with one knee cocked over the other and singing with as much enjoyment as anybody. There was no mistaking the relationship.

'He's her brother. I wonder if he dances too?' she whispered to Joan, as the Director rose to make some announcements.

Cicely, as she had foreseen, had found her greatest interest in the crowd. While she sang, her eyes had been roving over the thronged benches, as for the first time she saw the whole School together and began to sense its atmosphere, of eagerness and ex-citement, of friendship and good fellowship, of keen artistic joy in beautiful sights and sounds. The majority of the students were girls, though there were many men; the tu-nics were of every colour and variety, from cream shantung silk to the regulation blue of Chelsea and Reading; there was no monotony, such as she had expected. The men wore coloured blazers over their flannels; many of the girls had brilliant jumpers over their tunics and looked more boy-like than ever, with almost no skirt at all showing-especially those who had bobbed their hair, and there were many of them. Keenly inter-ested in everything and everybody, Cicely wondered again how many of these girls were teachers; how many had come because they had found in this folk-art the widen-ing and uplift of which Miss Newcastle had spoken; and if it would be possible to make friends with many outside their own immediate circle. She saw the Advanced Certificate, sitting with several other 'silver-badge' ladies on the edge of the platform, facing the crowd and swinging her legs happily as she sang, but did not know that Miss Newcastle had been watching her intent face with interest.

'But how on earth are they going to dance to us in this packed place?' jerked Joy, as the Director bade them 'Clear away the chairs for the demonstration,' with a gesture, as if he expected the crowded rows of seats to vanish when he raised his hand.

'Gracious !' gasped Jen. 'It's happening!'

It happened, indeed, and in record time. In a perfectly marvellous way, to the novices, the big hall cleared for dancing as if by magic. Madam's brother came to help, and took control of the proceedings with an accustomed air of authority which told of long prac-tice. The chairs vanished to the sides of the room; a solid row of students sat on the floor in front of the first line of seats; those behind stood up against the wall; others scrambled on to desks or window sills or made for the platform; the raised seats at the end of the hall were packed right up to the stained-glass windows. The Director took his place at the piano again; a dark girl sitting by him shouldered a violin; he called the name of a dance, Madam and five other girls in tunics Came out, sticks in hand, to dance 'Shepherd's Hey, Ilmington'; and the morning demonstration began.

Jack sat on the floor, eagerly pointing out her teacher among the demonstrators. 'Isn't she just like a jolly round chirpy little robin? There, the second one! You watch her, Jen! She made us do morris step, all standing in a big ring: then she told us to go forward doing it, and said, "You must travel on it; like this!" -and, coo! She shot forward like a cricket ball! Tophole! She got across the room in three steps! And she's awfully kind; she never laughs at you. She goes round watching your feet, and saying, "It's coming!" -I suppose she means the step! She sees every single person and knows just what they did, just as you say your one does.'

Tazy Kingston and the Torment, with a strong bond between them in their love of cricket and boys, commented admiringly on the perfect figure and erect bearing of a tall fair girl in brown, who was tapping sticks with Madam. 'I guess she's a gym mistress. Doesn't she look it? I shall be like that some day!' Tormy laughed.

Cicely and Joan were very quiet, and Jenny-Wren, glancing up at Joan's face from her seat on the fioor, reached for and clasped her hand, but did not speak. The hall rang with applause as the dance ended; then their 'Madam' Came forward; handkerchiefs in hand, to dance a Bampton jig with her sister-in-law; and Joan glanced at Cicely, whose rigid attention had deepened. Neither of them missed a fraction of the beautiful move-ments; at the end, Cicely relaxed with a sigh. 'And we've had the cheek, the impudence, to think we were doing "Princess Royal" Joan, don't you feel a worm?'

'I'm crushed,' Joan responded limply. 'I'm flattened out. I know just how you feel.'

'Do you? I don't! I'm all turned up inside. I never saw anything like this before. Don't speak to me; and don't let those kids chatter. It's too-too thrilling for words! It's working me up awfully, you know.'

Joan glanced at her tense face. 'I know. We didn't understand.'

'The men are going to dance! Oh, tophole!' Jen chortled joyfully, remembering her 'guiser's' words.

All through the country dances that followed the men's morris, Cicely was unnaturally quiet, watching intently but without a word for anyone. For the men, six very tall hefty fellows, had danced 'Step Back,' and again she had had a revelation of what morris should be. During the wild rush to the quad and the scramble for buns and milk and lemonade, which followed the demonstration, she was still unlike herself, unwilling to speak to anyone save for a few quick deeply-moved words to' Joan. 'The most wonder-ful thing, in its way, I ever saw. I don't know why, but I, wanted ·to cry. I can't talk about it yet. You felt it too, Joan! I'm going to ask her--'

She retreated to a corner with the milk arn, buns Joy had brought her, and kept away from the excited group where Tazy and Tormy, Jack and Joy, were telling Miss NeW-castle what they had thought of the dancing, each one fairly bubbling over with delight and appreciation.

'And we'll have that every morning? And an hour of it on Thursday?' Jack cried eagerly. 'I simply love watching them! Each dance was prettier than the last! "Chelsea Reach" was simply lovely!'

'Did "Greenwood" upset you, Karen? ' Tazy laughed. 'Wasn't it jolly of them to do it on our first day?'

'Oh, I enjoyed it! It was as beautiful as I'd imagined it! But quite different!' Karen laughed. 'I'd been seeing girls in white, and no men; not blue tunics and flannels! But of course I saw our pine woods, and Rennie, and the whole school crowd, as soon as the music started. It was so vivid that I could hardly watch the dance.'

As soon as Madam appeared in the classroom Cicely, who had been waiting for her, went towards, her. 'Why did your dancing make me want to cry?' she demanded.

'Make you what? I'm sure I'm very sorry! I hope it doesn't affect everybody that way!'

'Don't you know what I mean?' Cicely brushed aside her mocking words. 'It was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen. I'd never dreamt of anything like it. I couldn't speak; I haven't really got over it yet. Of course, I felt, in a subconscious kind of way, what idiots we've been making of ourselves. But that was a secondary idea, behind the real one. Why did it work me up like that? Things don't very often. I don't know when I've felt so-so queer!'

Madam laughed at this anti-climax. Then, with a glance at her face, she asked gravely, 'Have you felt like it before, about other things? Music? Or poetry?'

'Not those. I asked myself that. I'm not clever enough. I felt rather as if this were music and poetry come to life; as if I were meeting them really for the first time. But I have felt it,' Cicely said slowly. 'I know it sounds very ridiculous, and you'll laugh at me; but I felt the same thing in Switzerland when I first saw Mont Blanc, suddenly, from the Col de Balme. The sight of it took me by the, throat and nearly choked me. And once when I came on York Minster unexpectedly I nearly cried. Now why? And why should your dancing make me feel the same? '

But Madam did not laugh. She said gravely, 'Don't you know? Then go home and think it out for yourself. But you've said it all already. I'm not sorry; after all; I'm glad. But there aren't many to whom it means as much as that, I think.'

'I've loved it for six years,' Cicely said simply . 'But I never really Saw it till this morning. I hadn't an idea what it could be. That men's dance!'

'Oh, well! "Step Back" is always glorious,- isn't it? '

'I never saw it before. You're used to it. I suppose. I never saw anything like those back steps. But your jig was the best of all. Thank you for that! I'm going to dream of it!'

Madam laughed, and changed the subject with characteristic abruptness; Cicely soon found that she would take no compliment for herself, though she could sympathise with praise of her art. 'We're gossiping! This won't do. Make up sets of eight, and let me see "Newcastle." Be careful of your last figure. Then I want to do "Chelsea Reach.'"

'After doing it for us like that! I suppose you know we feel worms?' Cicely groaned.

'I don't see why--'

'Oh don't you!' the President murmured; as she went to her place in the ring.

From Chapter 15: 'A shock for the President'

Madam's eyes met Cicely's in a questioning challenge at the afternoon class. Cicely said gravely, 'I understand now. I didn't quite get it for myself; I'm not clever enough. But we've got a little walking dictionary living in our house, and she explained to me what I'd been feeling. I won't say it to you, for it would be embarrassing, and you always shy when I try to say nice things. Oh, yes, you do !' as Madam laughed. 'But I feel it all the same and all the time. Thank you for what you showed me this morning!'

'I'm glad you came to the school, since it means so much to you,' Madam said seriously. 'Why on earth didn't you come years ago?'

'Oh, why? I'm asking myself all the time! To think of the years we've missed! We'd never heard of it; that's why!'

'Why won't you wear your gymmies in the afternoon?' Jen ventured to interrupt the 'heart-to-heart' talk.

'Because the Director doesn't wish it,' Madam said solemnly.

'And does he always have to get his own way?' Joan laughed.

'Yes, we heard him this morning,' Joy joined in. 'He said we could go home and change and have our bath! We thought it was topping of him to take such an interest in our baths!'

'But a weird order to do things in!' Cicely added. 'Does he always have his bath last?'

'Cicely calls him The Prophet, because he's gone all over the country finding out these dances and songs, and now he's passing them on to us,' Jen remarked. 'It's exactly what I wanted somebody to do with our sword-dance at home; but I didn't know there was a Prophet! We're awfully much obliged to him, really, you know.'

Madam nodded. Joy said teasingly, 'The President has names for you all. You know the Prophets little secretary-lady? She calls her "the little foot-page," out of that ballad we sang this morning. She looks just like it when she sits at his feet, in her tunic, and flies off if he wants anything, almost before he's asked for it; I mean the little dark one, that's almost related to you, but not quite! We're sure she dances without touching the ground, especially when she's setting! Isn't she light?'

Madam laughed out. 'What a description! It's very clear! There's no doubt whom you mean!'

'Cicely says your brother ought to be called Joshua,' Joy went on. 'Not because he's the least like Joshua! She owns he isn't. But because he's the Prophet's helper and right-hand man, and carries out his orders. The Prophet thinks of things, and Joshua sees they're done.'

Madam laughed. 'I'll tell Joshua I And what is her name for me?'

But Joy quailed under the President's terrible look, and fled. 'I'm sure we ought to start! Aren't we wasting too much time?'

And Madam, thinking the nickname might possibly express some of those compliments, which she had not allowed Cicely to speak, did not press for an answer which might have been embarrassing.

...

no one went riding on Thursday, when the weekly demonstration took place on the cricket-field; not on the precious pitch, of course, but on a smooth green lawn in one corner, with the beautiful college windows and the tower of the gymnasium as back-ground. In brilliant sunshine, which kept cameras snapping on every side, the Staff danced to the students for an hour, and the scene, with the white flannels and coloured rosettes and ribbons of the men, and the brilliant blue dresses of the girls, was one never to be forgotten. Jen and Joy argued warmly as to whether the rich blue looked best on the black-haired 'little foot-page,' their own brown-haired Madam, or her tall fair morris opposite; but agreed at, last that it suited them all equally well. Cicely and Joan, in a happy dream, had thoughts only for the beautiful movements and changing figures of the dances.

Cicely was so utterly overwrought with the excitement of the hour, so strung up and yet worn out, that to go home at once afterwards would have been sensible, but was quite impossible. They crowded on to the first tram that passed the college, and spent a happy evening on the hills, first talking over in detail the dances and dancers they had just been watching, while they had tea in the garden of a little hotel with a wonderful view, then going up on the hills above the Devil's Chimney; and there, under Miss New-castle's directions and to the music of Karen's fiddle, they danced on the turf when they had found a sufficiently level, sufficiently lonely spot.

'You can admire the beautiful style Madam's creating in our country dancing!' Cicely in-formed the Advanced Certificate. 'And you can teach us something new! Then you can dance a jig to us! Do what! Madam calls "Lumps!" "Plum Pudding," you know; such a name to give a jig! This morning she did it just for our class, in our room; a private dem-onstration. It was glorious; I love those Bampton things! I hope she knew how we ap-preciated it!'

'Her brother's jig this afternoon was simply marvellous,' Joan said wistfully. 'It's a won-derful thing to see a man dance like that.'

'Oh well, he's--I' and Miss Newcastle shook her head, as if words could not express it.

‘Joan and I once thought' we could do "Ladies' Pleasure",' Cicely said mournfully. 'We never will again!'

From Chapter 16: 'All about the Pixie'

Cicely and Joan stood in the doorway and looked at Miss Newcastle, who, tired but happy after an hour with Madam in the college gymnasium, had reached home first and was resting by the open dormitory window.

She looked up, expectant of interest, and perhaps amusement. The impressions of these strangers to the school, their comments on things and people, Cicely's devotion to Madam and Joan's delight in her, and Joan's joy in the complete collapse of the Presi-dent at Madam's feet, were causing the Advanced Certificate keen enjoyment. In their appreciation she was renewing her almost forgotten early days; she looked forward with amused anticipation to their comments on every new experience. And she knew very well these were by no means at an end yet. At sight of Cicely's face and Joan's laughing eyes, her face lit up and she laid down the petticoat she was mending. 'Aa put me fut throo 't in "Haste to the Wedding" last night! Cum in an' tell me aall aboot it! Now, Cicely Hobart!' with a sudden lapse from dialect. 'What does that face mean?'

Cicely laughed. She dropped her shoes in a corner, and threw herself on her bed, and lay gazing at Miss Newcastle with dancing 'eyes. 'Guess!' she said.

'You've got somebody you like better than your Madam?'

'No! There's only one of her, and I missed her "something fearful." I'll never like anybody as well, in that particular way. She was the first, and I've given her something nobody else can have, for I haven't got it to give now. But I've discovered there are other peo-ple; you were right-as usual! And I can like them, after all, though in quite a different way.'

'You're getting on,' Miss Newcastle commented. 'I've something to say on that point of liking your first teacher; but it will keep. Tell me about this afternoon. Are you glad you went?'

'Glad! Newcastle, we've got the most priceless little thing to teach us!'

'Oh?' Miss Newcastle's lips twitched. '"Thing" isn't very polite, is it? '

'Well, she is! She's a gem. I love every inch of her, and we're going to have a gor-geously funny week, whether we learn much or not.' '

'Oh, I think you'll learn a little! Tell me what she's like!'

'It isn't saying much to say you love every inch of her, if you mean only the inches you can see,' Joan laughed, taking the pins out of her hair and shaking it loose. 'There isn't very much of her, is there? But I've an idea there's a lot more than you can see.'

'Newcastle, she's so high!' the President measured two feet from the floor.

'Cicely!'

'Well, she's tiny, but very very neat; I'm dying to see her in a tunic! She's a lovely dancer, too. Fair hair-glasses-bright quick blue eyes-every bit as bossy as Madam, though she's such a dot; but in quite a different way. I could have died; at the contrast, you know. I simply didn't dare to look at Jen; I knew she'd explode. And Joan was on the grin half the time. The rest of the time she was too busy.'

'I was only doing what I was told,' Joan observed, shrouded in her bronze-red mane.

'You were. But you seemed to enjoy doing it. She was told off to look after a man; such a nice young man!' Cicely teased. 'Our Tiny Teacher had a man in tow, Newcastle; well, she had several, and she was looking after them like a mother. She turned one of them over to Joan, and told her to "look after Captain Raymond for me, will you?" as he isn't really up to our grade, and she was afraid he'd get lost. So as Joy's off to Tintern, we took him into our set and were good to him.'

'Have you guessed who she is, Newcastle?' Joan cut short the story ruthlessly.

'Yes; and I just want to cry, because you've got her and I haven't!' Miss Newcastle spoke with concentrated energy, jabbing her work viciously with her needle. 'I'm green, yellow, blue, and dandy-gray russet with envy, so there!'

'Oh!. But you've got Madam!'

'Yes, but the Pixie was my first teacher, and I ll-u-u-uve her!'

'The Pixie!' Cicely sat up. 'How perfect! That is her name, of course! I said on the way home she was a changeling, not a real person! The Pixie! Thanks!'

The Advanced Certificate laughed. No one was ever called by her proper name in the big dormitory. 'Tell me all about it!' she said.

Cicely clasped her knees and launched forth into her story. 'We took the tram to the dear old coll., and then, feeling very sad and lonely, and very sorry for ourselves, turned our backs on it and went off to Naunton Park. We found the school all right; in fact, there was a crowd round the gates. The man hadn't brought the keys, and we had to wait there for twenty minutes in blazing sun, to the delight of the neighbourhood. There were stacks of small children looking at us as if we were wild animals let loose. We asked if there were any others for Room I, and which door we should go to, and presently met several of our crowd from last week. Then this pretty little Pixie came bustling up; she'd got on the prettiest little silk tunic-jumper, in lovely colours--'

'Makes 'em all herself!' Miss Newcastle nodded. 'I know!'

'And she may be over four feet, but when she's talking to men who are quite six feet tall she looks just a dot, and they have to bend double to get down to her. She came run-ning round, saying, "Which are my little lot? Who else is here? Oh, here's Keenie"-- that's our little boy from the sword class!- "Quite a family party! Isn't that nice!" And they were all buzzing round her; I think she'd just arrived to-day. She got sorted out at last; only about sixteen of us; it's a little room; and bunched us all together by one gate. I felt rather like a stray lamb that had been rounded up by the sheep-dog! Then she called our names, and told us straight she wouldn't remember us all, so she should just call us "you," and we were to remind her who we were. Then she went through the list of dances, and asked what we'd been doing, and who our last teacher had been, making comments all the time. "Oh, she thinks she knows that, does she?" when we mentioned some dance; Madam, you know! I thought Jen would have hysterics, for Madam does like to give you the impression she knows everything whether she really does or not! "No, we won't do that; I don't know it !No, I always muddle "Greenwood"! "Chelsea Reach" -- yes, I'm very good at that! "Mr Isaac's Maggot" -you've not done that? Oh,- that's far too good to miss! Keenie, do you remember "Mr Isaac" in Cologne?" -and "Keenie" grinned and said she did. I don't know why in Cologne, though.'

Miss Newcastle's eyes snapped. 'I'll tell you presently. Go on!'

'Well, she said it was a pity to waste time, so she lined -us up, in sixes, out in the road, and put us through" Upon a Summer's Day," to the delight of all the small children, and the still greater delight of the other classes. We had no music, but we went through it like lambs, and she ran round and kept everybody straight, and kept one eye on the big men, and their eyes followed her-well; you should have seen! Then she turned Captain Raymond over to Joan, and she told him what to do, and which hand to give, and which way to turn, and was awfully kind to him, and he was frightfully shy and hardly said a word. Perhaps he'll thaw in a day or two, when he finds Joan's quite harmless! We got inside at last, and got to work in earnest; but never will I forget the "Summer's Day" out in the street, and the Pixie running round us like a sheep-dog!'

'And you found her a change from Madam?' Miss Newcastle laughed.

'I could have sat down and laughed till I was sore. I love Madam, and I don't mind what she says to me or how she says it. But sometimes she really was fierce, and I could un-derstand people being scared of her. Some of them are! I'll demonstrate the difference for you!' and the President sprang on to a chair. This is Madam, at the end of a dance, when she's really worked up! "I won't have it! You dreadful people! Not one of you ever listens to a word I say! I don't know how people can be so stupid! You haven't danced for me once yet all this week! Go right back to the beginning and do the whole dance over again; and do think what you're doing! You simply don't use your brains at all! You have the most complicated sort of minds! If there is a difficult or awkward way to do a thing, You invariably choose it-'. Now try to show me a dance for once!" Isn't just like her, Joan?'

Joan, sitting on her bed, laughed. 'It's exaggerated, but it's the correct style! I don't think we got it all at once, like that, but I recognise every bit of it.'

'Of course you do. I longed to say something soothing now and then. Now, Newcastle, this is the Pixie at the end of a very bad performance of "Chelsea Reach". We knew it was bad! She stands on a chair, too, of course--'

'I've seen her sit on the piano,' Miss Newcastle observed, 'and entertain the Director and a crowd of men as if she were on a throne. Well? How did she turn you down?'

'She didn't. We'd been very bad and all she did was to be encouraging and kind of coax-ing. "Yes! Well, that wasn't very beautiful, was it? We haven't quite got the feeling of the rhythm yet. Suppose we have it once again, for luck?" For luck! I didn't dare to look at Jen or Joan. Madam would have been tearing her hair; you know how bad rhythm touches her up! For luck! We did everything once more "for luck." And she calls the neu-trals in a longways set the "dud couple." You should have seen Joan's face when she was' told she and her captain were the dud couple! And she tries to make you learn through the music; tells you to listen to the tune, and then makes patterns with her hands and says, "Follow the curve of the music! Don't you hear it? Got it?" She always ends up with "Got it?'"

'I liked the idea of the "curve of the music,'" Joan remarked. 'It was a change after Madam's" pattern on the floor."

'I always see the patterns of the figures. Now, Newcastle, tell us some more about her! Even in one hour I wanted to take her up and hug her. I could do it easily.'

'You didn't want to hug Madam?' Miss Newcastle asked grimly.

'She keeps you in your place. It's an absolutely different feeling. When we did" Glory of the West" this morning, and she stood on the platform and told us to finish by "running up and bowing to me!" it seemed quite the proper thing to do. I agreed with one of the men-her man, you know - the rest laughed. 'He went down on one knee and put his hand on his heart in a beautiful stagey manner and I wanted to clap. She does know how to pretend she's a princess when she cares to put it on! But I just wanted to pick this Pixie up in my arms and hug her. Somehow I felt she was very extra special from the first minute. Tell me something to justify that feeling, if you can!'

'She's great!' Miss Newcastle said solemnly. 'Don't I know it? But you're quick to see and feel people, President. You must be very sensitive to people's personalities.'

'I'm always interested in people. Perhaps one learns to appreciate them more. You mean that this Pixie is really an interesting person, and that I felt it by instinct? You see how I sit at your feet, for guidance and advice, and come to you for the solution of all my problems!' and Cicely dropped on the floor at Miss Newcastle's feet, below the open window.

Miss Newcastle sat gazing out at the great swaying sunlit trees which shut off the town with a green curtain. ' You respond to people very quickly. You're certainly right this time! Do you know that your Pixie was in France and Germany for three years, during the war and after the armistice; that's what the reference to Cologne meant. Several of our lot were there, and she was the boss. She went out,' the Advanced Certificate said slowly, 'when most people said it was no use and thought it a crazy idea, to capture the men in the Rest Camps and Convalescent Depots for folk-dancing. They had nothing to do, and used to get fed up. She took some morris sticks and a bundle of rappers; and she did the trick. You haven't heard about it?'

'Dancing? The soldiers? That little thing? ' Cicely cried incredulously, and Joan, amazed and interested, came to sit above her on her bed, gazing eagerly at Miss Newcastle.

'Yes. "The Butterfly," and "Galopede," and "We Won't Go Home Till Morning," and "Newcastle"; the men loved them all. And she had longswords too, and taught them "Flamborough" and "Kirkby," and even a little morris---"Rigs," you know. She was never long in one place, and the camps were always changing, the men being sent up the line and so on; so she couldn't often do steady work with any one set. H must have been awfully worrying and disappointing. Just now and then she was able to work up a few till they were good enough to give a show, and then she'd find some girls for partners-W.A.A.C.'s and Y.W. girls, and so on-and she'd sit up all night making demonstration frocks for them, and they'd have a hall or a Y.M. hut and give a show. And then crowds more would come and beg for classes. She had girls out from home to help her, and they had classes going all over the country behind the lines. She organise the whole thing, and raced about in motor-cars, or "lorry-hopped," as she says, when she couldn't get a car or train, or went in the water-cart or anything that was going; and interviewed people, and kept an eye on all the classes and started new ones-my goodness! The brain for organising she's got! Time after time her plans were upset, by the men being moved, and so on; but she never gave in. A month of it would have killed me; but she did it for years without a rest, and turned up smiling at the end. She must have been a joy to thousands-literally thousand-of men, in that awful time. She came in contact with so many, and you can tell, even now, how they worshipped her. You spoke about how well she got on with the men, at your class. Think what she must have been out there, running round all those camps, scattering that Cheery friendly-well, I call it "folk" atmos-phere, that she has so strongly! Friends with everybody; won't turn anybody down. You'll find she invariably sees the nicest side of people and shuts her eyes to the rest. Those men in France simply loved her; she brought the atmosphere of home and Eng-land to the Aussies who didn't know a soul in this country, when she talked to hundreds of them about English villages and Maypoles, and then taught them "The Butterfly" out on the turf of the cliffs by moonlight. That's only one story. I could go on for hours. I once read something she wrote about it, you see. She tackled the raw, rather wild boys who were sent out to Cologne after the armistice, boys who hardly knew enough to salute to the National Anthem, and gave them country dances to keep them happy in their off-times. Stop me, somebody! I could go on all night about that Pixie in France!'

'We want you to!' Cicely cried. 'You shall; after we're all in bed! You know we never go to sleep till one o'clock on Sunday mornings! To-night, instead of toe-dancing, you shall tell us stories of her and the men!'

'She says,' Miss Newcastle bubbled with laughter, 'she loves men and understands them and can do anything with them; but thank heaven she hasn't got to marry any of them! Yes, she said it! I once discussed marriage with her, and she agreed, rather doubtfully, that it was the most complete life for a woman. "Yes. Yes, I suppose it is. But thank heaven it hasn't happened to me!" If people go and get married, she says "Bless them!" but she's quite clear how she feels about it for herself!'

'She's awfully tactful,' Joan laughed. 'A frightful thing happened this afternoon! We were attempting "Hunsdon House," and you, know the Director's feeling for" Hunsdon House!" We were not doing it well; and suddenly he walked in! We nearly died with horror at the thought of him watching us. But she knew! She told him we were just beginning it, and then she said it would be such a treat to us if he would just play it for us! The pianist jumped up, only too delighted, I'm sure, after what he said. about Hunsdon House" in his lecture on accompanying the other day; and he sat down and played it perfectly! But the point was that he'd got his back to us! We could have hugged her! Then he went off, quite happy, and we felt we'd escaped, so we were quite happy; and of course she was! She fairly radiates happiness!'

Miss Newcastle laughed. 'The Prophet likes the Pixie! They're pals! And those men who knew her in France will never forget her; she still hears from some of them, I be-lieve. A General was once so much impressed with "Kirkby" that he asked if she couldn’t teach it to him; and she said '-and Miss Newcastle's laughter bubbled up again- '"Of course she could! But he'd have to find find five other Generals to learn it with him!" I say it was very cheeky; she thinks it was so tactful!'

'To think of her being willing to teach us! Sixteen of us, in a poky little schoolroom!' Ci-cely exclaimed. 'After doing all that big work with all those crowds of men, and Gener-als, and things! I say, we are in luck again!'

'You are lucky to know her so well, Newcastle,' Joan remarked.

'She was my first teacher. She gave me folk-dancing, and gave it to me in a way I'll never forget, a way that made all the difference. I've a theory,' Miss Newcastle said slowly, 'that you never quite lose your feeling for the person who taught you first; that is, if you really have found something big, something real and live; if it's a real live art to you. It's like the opening of a door, and nobody can ever quite take the place of the one who opened the door for you. The Pixie did it for me, and I'll be grateful all my life; and for the way she did it. For there are ways and ways; some people wouldn't have moved me a scrap.'

'Madam was the one for me,' Cicely observed. 'So don't I'm an idiot any more. You're the same yourself about the Pixie. That's what I meant when I said no one could ever take Madam's place, and I'd given her something no one else could have. She showed me the beauty of our dancing, and though I may like all the rest of the Staff, and though I love your Pixie already, after one hour of her, nothing can undo that! Madam's got the pull over 'em all.'

'I never said you were an idiot, nor thought it. I understood; I'd been there myself! But I would have done, if you'd been silly enough not to go this afternoon. I heard a whisper this morning that my Pixie was coming, and some one said she was going to teach at Naunton Park. I hoped you'd have the luck to fall into her hands. If you'd refused to go, I think I'd have dragged you there! '

'Oh, my aunt! Just think what we'd have missed if we'd refused to go!' Cicely said fer-vently. 'I tell you, she's simply priceless!'

Miss Newcastle was in a story-telling mood that night, as often happened. While they all lay listening and laughing, she sat up in bed and by the light of one candle retailed gos-sip and stories from other years and other schools.

'Have you heard about the little girl who was found in tears at the end of "Haste to the Wedding?" It's one of the Pixies stories. When the music stopped, this kid was found to be weeping. The teacher asked what was up, and she sobbed that she "hadn't had a chance to go down the aisle. Extremely appropriate, wasn't it?'

'The Pixie made that up. She's quite capable of if, I'm sure,' Cicely remarked.

'She is; but she didn't.' It really happened. Then there was the man who'd had one les-son in morris, and when he turned up the next time, said he wasn't going on with it, as he " couldn't stand the semaphore business." You'll appreciate that, Jacky-boy!' as Jack, who was still in trouble with her arm and leg movements, began to giggle. 'He'd been in the Army, of course; but it just expresses it, doesn't it? Then there was the man-this one comes from your Madam, I believe! She was teaching soldiers in France, too; oh yes, she was there as well! There was one chap she thought might be troublesome, a great big fellow, and- sulky and dour; she'd fixed on him as the likeliest to be difficult, but he was all right through the class. At the end, he stepped out and evidently wanted to say something. She thought it was coming now, but didn't let on she was worried; just asked him what he wanted. They'd been doing country dances, you know. And he said sol-emnly, "Miss! In the next Christmas pantomime I'm going to be the fairy!" She says she collapsed, and everybody collapsed, and he was never any trouble at all. I believe the Pixie had the same remark made to her; she took a class out in the woods, in Germany; taught the men "Shepherd's Hey, Ilmington' all among the trees. And they said they'd feel more like fairies than ever.'

'Good hefty fairies!' Jen murmured. 'Go on, Newcastle! Don't stop, there's a darling!'

'Oh, well, I've heard of a teacher at a school who told his class to "Go round the lower end of the top couple." Goodness only knows what he was getting at; but the story is that the class obeyed him joyfully-on its hands and knees. Wish I'd been there to see! They say he also told them to "Change right shoulders with their partners"-which is hardly the usual way of putting it. Oh, there are heaps and heaps of stories!'

'But tell us all about the Pixie in France! You promised to!' Cicely urged.

And Miss Newcastle clasped her hands round her knees and plunged into a story that took more than one evening to tell.

CHAPTER XVII

A PIXIE IN A GYM SUIT

THE Pixie was a law unto herself to a very considerable extent, even as to what and where she would teach. By Monday afternoon she had bidden her men haul the piano to the doorway, and was conducting her class out in the playground, to their great delight, as the classroom had been small and 'squares for eight' had had to be done in relays. She conducted proceedings perched on a low wall only a few inches wide, and kept her pupils on tenterhooks lest in her excitement she should slip off and break her neck.

They were all waiting for her on Monday morning when she came bustling in, caught up a morris stick whose purpose soon became apparent, and planted a hair in the middle of the room. From this vantage point she took command and set them all to work.

'Get in sets of six," will you? Then I can see just how many you are. Now we're going to do Ilmington. You've been doing a lot of Bampton, haven't you? Yes, well, we'll have some Ilmington for a change; it will be good for you. I'm very good at lImington, and I love it. See? Now Bampton I muddle, so we'll leave that. Just walk your track move-ments, and we'll see. if you know them. You're an right, Captain Raymond? Is Miss Shirley looking after you nicely? Gracious! Are there two of you?' at sight of Joy, grin-ning behind Joan's back. 'Gracious! This is awful! Which is the one I gave you to, Cap-tain Raymond? Do you know them apart? It's too bad! It oughtn't to be allowed! Oh, you're the one we had before, are you? And you're going to take care of him for me?' as Joan, as red in the face with suppressed amusement as Joy and Cicely, put up her hand. 'That's right! 'That's' nice, isn't it? You two be middle couple! It's a very easy posi-tion. You watch her!' to the shy fair boy, who had made up his mind on Saturday that Joan was well worth watching, apart from her usefulness as guide in these unknown dances, but found her even prettier this morning in her tunic. 'She'll tell you what to do. You like looking after him, don't you? Yes, of course you do.! That's nice! Now listen to me, all of you!' and she hammered with her stick on the chair.

'Oh, stop her, somebody!' Cicely groaned. 'Joan will die in another minute! And that poor boy!'

'You all know your hey, don't you? We'll walk it once for luck. I'll come into your set,' to Joy, who was without an opposite. 'But you oughtn't to be so like your sister, you know. Gracious! It's, awful ! Couldn't you wear a green tunic, or something? Now first couples face down. You pass right, pass left, and bulge to the right at the end. Got it, every-body? Middles face up; pass right, bulge left; pass right; just like the merrythought of a chicken, isn't it?' and the bright eyes twinkled with amusement 'as Cicely collapsed at this description. 'Well,' isn't it?'

'Of course it is! But it's brilliant! I'd never thought of it. You could never forget after that Cicely gasped.

End couples face down; bulge to your right, then pass left and right. You do know it don't you? Then let's walk that. I'll be Number Six; oh, here's another man! Good!' and she sprang on to her chair again. 'You go in there, with the other Miss Shirley. Is he a friend of yours?' as Captain Raymond greeted the newcomer with a laugh and a nod. 'Well, isn't that nice I Quite a family party! Now let's walk our hey! Ready!'

They had all been eyeing her joyfully, from the moment she came running across the room; she was so utterly neat and dainty in a little, black tight tunic and cream blouse, but tinier and slighter than ever. Quick and neat in every movement, too, she hopped on and off her chair like a long-legged robin; but when she spoke her voice rang out in sur-prising volume for so tiny body.

'You mustn't mind me yelling at you as if I were drill sergeant,' she told them during the morning. 'I'm used to men and they think more of you if you shout at them. If you speak to them nicely they take no notice; but they sit up if you shout.'

'But as they walked the tricky hey, Joan and Joy had forgotten to take care of the 'oppo-sites' thus thrust upon them, and all the six in that particular side' had forgotten the Pixie, fascinating as she was.

Captain Raymond was watching Joan, as directed; and he was wondering how their lit-tle teacher could possibly consider these two girls so much alike. They were obviously twins; and they had the same colouring, the same big brown ,eyes and glorious bronze hair; but in expression there was no comparing them; not for one instant had he mis-taken Joy for Joan.

The new man, his friend, was thinking many thoughts and congratulating himself on the good fortune which in the first moment had given him his heart's desire more fully than he could have dared to hope.

Joan, instead of 'looking after Captain Raymond', and Joy, instead of helping the stranger to keep his hey parallel with hers, were watching their first couple with surprise and dismay, eager only for a chance to question them. For it was an understood thing that none of them had any secrets from the rest; but both Cicely and Jen had started-jumped, in fact- when Captain Raymond's friend came in and took his place by Joy; and both were going through the hey with an indescribable look on their faces. Jen's eyes were wide and startled, and she stared at the stranger, forgot to 'bulge' at the end of the line, gave the wrong shoulder, and looked so utterly bewildered that Cicely, waking up suddenly, called her sharply to order. 'Do think what you're doing, Jen! She'll think you don't know it, What's the matter with you, child?'

She sounded, and looked, irritable, and that was not usual with the President at present. She had her fiery times and fits of temper, but she had been so completely happy in the school that she had been unusually placid and easy-going for the last fortnight. The rest looked at her in surprise; her lips were tight and her eyes stormy, and she would not look at any of them. It was only for a moment; then, realising their startled eyes on her, she relaxed suddenly, laughed and became more herself. But her eyes held a secret, whose explanation was obvious to her friends. She knew this man who had been thrust into their set, and she was not pleased to see him. Whether she would deign to explain, they could not tell; if she would not, they would certainly have to remain unsatisfied. All that was plain enough. But what was the matter with Jenny-Wren? What part could she have in the matter? Cicely's past, with her many trips to Ceylon with her father, her holi-days on the continent, and the hosts of friends she must have made in hotels and and on board ship, held possibilities, of course; but where did Jen come in? She had left school to go and bury herself in the wilds of Yorkshire; but she too knew the mysterious sixth man of their 'side'; that was evident. Well, they could make Jenny-Wren explain, anyway!

But while they puzzled and questioned, and Cicely frowned and Jen looked bewildered, they were forgetting the Pixie, and no one was allowed to do that for long. She bade them dance their hey to the music, and watched with a dissatisfied air as they obeyed. At the end she exploded, with a force equal to Madam's, though in a style all her own.

'Well, but you might be a set of little chickens dancing, you know. Yes, you might!' as several laughed. 'You take absolutely no notice of one another. Can't you dance with your opposites? Look at them! Look hard at them! Now keep your heys parallel, all of you! Do it again!' -they soon grew used to, her emphatic little 'Do it again!'.

Captain Raymond looked appreciatively at his 'opposite.' Joan's lips twitched; she knew very well what hers looked like, but she knew too that she had not been troubling to dance with him. How could she, when her first movement was to pass right shoulders with Cicely, and the President's face was full of secrets?

Joy looked curiously at her 'opposite' whose sudden appearance had thrown them all into this state of ferment. He was a tall broad fellow in flannels, and striking-looking, with black hair and keen blue eyes, which dwelt so continually on Cicely, leading the other hey that the wobbly nature of his own was fully accounted for.

'Now do it again, and for goodness sake think what you're doing!' their mentor com-manded.

Presently she instructed them in the stick-tapping, which was new to several, and the class fell to practising in couples.

'Jenny-Wren, you look weird! What's the matter with you?' Cicely demanded, as she tapped and presented her stick to Jen.

'You look cross,' Jen retorted. 'What's up, President?'

'Look how beautifully Joan's teaching her captain!' Cicely teased, pausing to rest, for the movement was unfamiliar to them. 'She's being awfully gentle and patient with him! He'll get it in a moment; he's, improving. If only he wouldn't look at Joan, he'd get on better still!'

Joy was teaching the stranger, and keeping him so busy and demanding such close at-tention to sticks, that, he could no longer look at anybody but her. So Jen and Cicely, each with her own thoughts, stood and gazed at him; then Jen turned and looked curi-ously at Cicely, who, in spite of herself, was breaking into a laugh at his failure to get the right and left, back and forward stroke.

The clatter of the sticks filled the schoolroom. The Pixie, after instructing some novices, tried to make herself heard but failed completely. Even when she hammered on the floor no one took any notice. With determination in her eye, she strode to a bookcase and thumped on it fiercely till the President feared she would be sued for damage to Council property, and everybody looked up in alarm to see what was happening. Jumping on a small table, she yelled 'SILENCE!' in a voice which any sergeant might have envied. Then as they stared at her, in astonishment that one so tiny could produce such a mighty roar, the fierceness died out of her face and a twinkle lit her eyes, and they knew themselves forgiven.

'I have to break it to you,' she said impressively, 'that there are foot movements with that tapping,' and those who knew the dance began to laugh. 'You do this!' and to their dis-may she began to demonstrate the step up on the table.

'She'll break her neck!' murmured the black-haired stranger.

'But it's lovely to see her do it up there!' Joy responded. 'Isn't she simply priceless?'

'She's a joy for ever,' Joan exclaimed, while Cicely made a note of this for Miss Newcas-tle at night; the sight of the neat little figure in the smooth black tunic doing a beautiful morris step up on the table was one not to be forgotten.

'Now try that!' the Pixie 'commanded, and came to earth and went round criticising the feet. 'Oh, you're all right!' to the four Hamlets. 'You know it. You can teach those two men for me,' and she passed to others less experienced.

The black-haired blue-eyed stranger man went straight to Cicely. 'Won't you give me a lesson, Miss Hobart?'

'Oh, Joy's quite able to teach you,' Cicely retorted, a teasing laugh in her eyes. Then she said ceremoniously, 'Miss Shirley-Miss Joy Shirley-Mr Everett. We met on the way home from Ceylon last April.'

Joan bowed politely. Joy 'honoured her opposite', with a country dance bob. Jen thrust her elbow into the President's back, as a protest at being forgotten, and Cicely added hastily, 'And Miss Robins! Sorry, Jenny-Wren!'

Miss Robins's eyes met Mr Everett's in a direct challenge. 'I think I've met your sister!' said she.

His face showed sudden recognition. 'Why, it's the little girl that danced at Christmas! Of course! Avvice told you to come here, didn't she?'

'Yes, but I want to know'-began Jen argumentatively.

But the Pixie's voice cut short her words and Cicely's surprised question, as from her perch on the table again she bade them show her the step. Raymond and Everett, who had not attempted it, and the girls who should have been teaching them, looked at each other guiltily and fell hastily into their places. And somehow Jen found herself no longer Number Tw and Cicely's 'opposite' but Number Six, while the newest comer faced the President and held up his stick for her to tap.

Jen's eyes met Joy's. 'Isn't this awful?' she whispered, as they jumped and swung their sticks. 'Are Joan and Cicely going to think about those men all the time? Look at the way he bagged my place, so that he could dance with her!'

'Knows what he wants and means to get it, anyway!' Joy responded. 'When did you meet him, Jenny-Wren? '

'Tell you later. I can't just yet.'

There were no pauses for rest and conversation under the Pixie's rule. This was the first class of the day and the only one for morris, and she would not waste a moment. She kept them hard at 'Shepherd's Hey' for some time; then changed to 'The Old Woman Tossed Up," bidding them, 'Get your wavies!'

'Wavies!' giggled Jen, as she ran for her handkerchiefs. 'What a gorgeous thing to can them! She's just tophole!'

'She's got the quaintest expressions,' Joan was saying to Captain Raymond, who had produced two big green handkerchiefs. 'I think she's priceless!'

'She's just herself, and there's only one of her,' he said quietly. 'She taught my uncle's men in France, and he's told me what they thought of her!'

'Oh' Joan turned to him quickly. 'I'd like to hear about it!'

'I'd like to tell you-when we get a chance!' and he laughed, as a stentorian voice from the little table called them to their places.

'Mustn't keep the Pixie waiting!' Cicely informed her new 'opposite,' who wanted to talk. 'I want to know what you're doing here, but I simply daren't listen just now. Not that I'm afraid of her; I love her. But I'm afraid she may damage herself if she has to shout at us often like that.'

Captain Raymond heard and turned to her with a laugh. 'She won't. My uncle says she's terrific with the men!' , I'd give a thousand pounds to have heard that! Cicely responded fervently. 'Lucky beggar, your uncle!'

And then, in their anxiety to satisfy 'the priceless Pixie,' as they all came to, call her, and in the girls' amusement at the men's; struggles with side-step, and the men's grim de-termination to learn it, they forgot everything else for the time.

'We'll have to, hurry to get back to the college for singing,' Joan said, as the Pixie dis-missed them at last, and they made a rush for the various dressing rooms.

Raymond paused. 'Everett and I have our bikes and side-cars. If any of you would care to use them, we'd be glad to take you along.'

'He's getting on,' Joy said approvingly, 'He's actually spoken twice without being asked a direct question.'

'On Saturday I thought every word had to be dragged out of him separately,' Jen laughed. 'Belinda won't have such a crowd to take home!'

'No, I guess Belinda will be a lot too slow for Joan and the President now! You'll rattle about in her; she's used to two or three. Perhaps the Pixie would like a ride.'

'Oh, ask her! Do ask her! There's heaps of room!'

'What's that? A ride?' and the little one whirled round on them joyfully. 'Rather! What have you got? I'll ride in anything that will save my legs.'

'Oh, you won't have to lorry-hop!' Jen laughed. 'Joy has quite a good old side-car, and she doesn't often break down!'

Cicely, changing her shoes hurriedly and slipping on her coat, said grimly, 'It's all very well to keep men in their proper places. It may not be wise to encourage them! But if anybody offered me a lift in anything through all those back streets I'd take it!'

'Why did you look so mad when you saw him first, President?' Joan demanded in an undertone.

'Did I? I was awfully surprised.'

'You looked wild. What's wrong with him? He seems quite nice.'

'Tell you later-perhaps. You can go in his car, if you like, and look after the shy boy for you.'

'I don't think that would be very polite,' Joan said primly. 'I hardly think it's what he meant.' Her eyes danced with mischief. 'I say! Joy and Jen have forsaken us and eloped with the Pixie!'

'They've kidnapped her. She's evidently going to patronise Belinda. So we shall have to go with the men' Cicely said resignedly. 'I won't walk if I can jolly well help it !'

'You know you meant to go with them all the time!' Joan retorted.

'0h, well, they may as well be useful, you know!' The Pixie pushed her way through the crowd, with Joy and Jen in tow, eager to be introduced to Belinda. She paused in the playground to address a friend from another classroom, however, asking how her class had been behaving.

'They've been rather naughty!' was the response. 'Oh, I've got mine thoroughly cowed! You should hear me curse them!' cooed the Pixie happily, and passed on chuckling, while Jen collapsed in helpless giggling.

'Isn't this nice?' There was blissful satisfaction in the Pixie's voice, as Joy tucked her and Jen into the car, with approving comments on the small amount of space she re-quired.

'Isn't this a bit of luck? I say! Will you bring me back again after buns and milk?'

'Joy promised laughingly. 'I'll take you both ways every morning,' and the Pixie sighed in happy content.

From Chapter 18: 'Almost a burglar'

When they entered the college, the Pixie discarded her hat and coat and ran about in her little black tunic, speaking to everybody. Seeing her in the midst of a crowd of men, looking tinier than ever but talking volubly and earnestly, Joy and Jen retreated to 'pri-vate boxes' on the sloping lids of the desks, where they looked over the heads of the students on the forms, and Cicely and Joan and the two men joined them there.

'It's very unfortunate that a morris side always has to be six!' Joy whispered. 'Most in-considerate of them! For as there are four of us, those two men, will stick to us for the whole week. I see that plainly!'

Still, it's rather jolly to have our side made up ! Oh here she comes!' as the Pixie hustled her way through rough the crowd, followed by several men, and found seat in the sec-ond row.

'She won't see anything there,' and Joy bent and poke down the Pixie's neck. 'Wouldn't you like to come up into the gallery?'

The tiny one turned joyfully, and allowed herself in be hauled up on to the desks. 'That's what comes of being a little teacher!' she chuckled.

'No, it's what comes of being a nice little teacher! 'Joy informed her gravely.

The Pixie's eyes were following the Director as he made his way to the piano. 'Don't you love to watch him at these schools? He looks so happy! As if he were enjoying himself as much as anybody. And I love the way he goes round the rooms, just to see that we're all happy too!'

'You're fairly happy yourself,' Joy laughed.

'Oh, I'm enjoying myself! It's such a change to be in the middle of things again, after all that queer time abroad. But I do think he goes about looking like a happy uncle or grandfather.'

'Coo! Four hundred grandchildren!' Joy laughed.

As Madam came out to lead the women's morris side in 'Laudnum Bunches' Cicely's eyes fixed on her and never left her till the dance was over. Then she relaxed with a sigh, and looked down at the Pixie, whose quick eyes had not missed a movement. A glance passed between them; but Madam came forward to dance 'Old Molly Oxford,' and the President straightway forgot the Pixie and all the rest of the world.

'I think that's wonderful!' she whispered at the end.

The Pixie looked up at her in eager response. 'Isn't it beautiful? You feel it too? '

'Oh, I love it-and her! She was the first to make me understand.'

'She's an artist all through,' the Pixie said quietly; and Cicely loved her more than ever.

That morning was Cicely's first experience of the 'Adderbury dances, for the men danced 'Lads a Bunchun', and the tapping with the long willow wands overhead roused Joy and Jen to wild excitement, and Joan and Cicely to the highest pitch of delight, though in their case ,that meant that they were very quiet. In the quad, afterwards, over their buns and milk, which they had graciously allowed Raymond and Everett to forage for and bring to them, they told the Pixie something of their feeling for the dancing and the revelation it had been to them, and she listened in sympathetic interest and found them kindred spirits. 'I remember when I began. I'd never been so happy in my life. I think I'd never enjoyed myself before! Now I try to pass on something of what I feel to other people.'

From Chapter 19: 'Miss Newcastle saves the situation'

'My uncle's regiment were in a lonely camp behind the line,' Raymond was saying, as he sat with Joan on the high teacher's desk swinging his long legs, while Joan perched sideways. 'It was after the armistice, and the rest had all gone forward to the Rhine. They felt as if they'd been forgotten by the rest of the world; something went wrong for a time, and they got no letters and no news, and the boys got utterly fed up. So did the officers, and they didn't know what to do for the men. Suddenly this Pixie, as you call her-I like the name I-appeared in a car from a town some miles away, where the Y.M. had a hut. Some one had told her about them, and she had a few days free and came to see if the men would like classes. Uncle John said he doubted if they'd take to country dancing, as everybody else did, but she was keen to try, and the C.O. didn't mind. So she went out, speaking to every man she met, inviting them to come round in the eve-ning; they'd found a small hall with a piano. A good bunch of them turned up, and uncle went to see the fun. He said it was great! It was tophole to see her tackle them; but it was much more than fun; everyone felt they were watching something quite out of the ordinary.'

Joan nodded. 'How did she do it?'

'She'd got rappers, and she let the boys handle them, and talked about them, and they were interested.'

'Rappers! Those are the funny thin swords that bend, with two handles, aren't they? We haven't tried them yet. But when we rave about " Kirkby" or " Flamborough," a friend in our house, who comes from Newcastle, says, "Eh, but you should see the r-r-rappers!" I can't do it!' and Joan tried to imitate the North-country accent. 'She puts a whole queue of r's at the beginning. Did the men like them? '

"Rather! She soon got five to stand up and learn a few movements, while the rest laughed and ragged them, but wanted to have a turn too. And before they had realised it, they were in two lines and doing " Butterfly," and hugely pleased with it and them-selves. She ran round and kept them straight, till it seemed certain she'd get trodden on; Tommy's boots are fairly hefty! But she escaped somehow, and she made herself heard above the boots and the piano. Next night there were dozens more of the boys; and when she went down the street she might have been the Queen! Every man of them knew her. She settled down with them for ten days; they'd have liked it to have been ten months! And the boys just fought for the chance of fetching her rations and carrying her water and cleaning her shoes and doing any mortal thing they could think of for her. And she darned their socks and put on their buttons when she wasn't taking classes. She tackled the officers' mess, too, and in half a day she'd made over the whole place. They'd got past caring what it was like, and the place was going to pieces. The men kept it clean enough, of course, but they hadn't an idea beyond that, and it was an abso-lute barn. They were fed up with its bareness and all that, but they didn't know what to do either. As a matter of fact, they didn't know what was wrong with it, just that they were sick of the whole place. She saw it, didn't say anything; but while they were taking parade she shut herself in and just did miracles. She switched the whole place round, to begin with, so that it all looked different; got down the old bits of pictures that had been up for months and nobody wanted to see again, and nailed up new fresh ones- I don't know how she reached up to them, but she did!'

'That little thing?' Joan cried incredulously, as Cicely had once done. 'Oh, but they shouldn't have let her! How could they?'

'They hadn't a notion what she was up to, till they came back and found the whole place like new. She'd put up curtains at the windows-curtains! She'd found some stuff and run 'em up the night before. And a new cloth on the table; and a rug she'd scrounged somewhere. She's got a way of getting things out of people, you know; I guess she'd talked her landlady round. There were flowers on the table, and yellow paper shades on the lamps! The old man nearly cried with joy when he saw those lampshades, and begged her to make a pink one for his den! Said the place made him think of Home and Mother! She was tired, but proud and happy, and awfully bucked that they were so pleased. Pleased! They could have worshipped her. They never let the old barn get into that dismal state again; they'd been pulled up, and they never forgot it. And you bet they never forgot the Pixie either! Couldn't think what she'd done to the place at first, for it was clean enough, of course; but just all wrong. But she'd turned everything round, and made it cosy and homelike; they thought of her for months! Here she comes! ' and he stood up. 'She was called away in a hurry after ten days, and the boys could have wept; I know they swore. My uncle says he did! But they didn't forget their classes, and later they were moved to the Rhine and found other girls teaching there, and they were able to go ahead. When I heard about it all, I decided if ever I got a chance I'd have a try at it myself. But I was keen to get into one of her classes, of course, so I wrote to her and she worked it for me. And Everett said he'd come too. His folks are all in this dancing business, but he'd never had a chance to try it. So he said he'd come along; he seemed keen to do a little; said he'd heard so much about it for years that he thought it was time he found out what it really was.'

They went to take their places for 'Shepherd's Holiday', called into line by the Pixie, and Joan wondered, as she waited for the music to begin, if she could not not account for Dick Everett's sudden interest in folk-dancing more fully than his friend seemed able to do. For his sister must have told him Cicely was to be at the school.

From Chapter 21: 'The Guiser girl explains'

To her joy, she was dancing with the Pixie, and they had gone all down the line and up again before the music stopped. The country dance class had discovered that their little teacher had no objection to dancing with students, so there had been a rush for her, and she had promised to 'reserve herself for this class!' Jen had proudly claimed her for 'Jamaica'; Joy had 'bagged her for "Newcastle,''' and Jen begged the Advanced Certifi-cate to come and be the eighth, since Joan and Cicely were provided with partners.

'Quite a family party! Isn't that nice?' said the Pixie happily, and enjoyed the 'family set' as much as anybody.

That was half-way through the evening, however, when the novelty was beginning to wear off. At first, only the fact that they could do 'Mary and Dorothy' and 'Hey, Boys' by instinct- 'Standing on their heads backwards,' as Joy said-kept Joan and Cicely from getting utterly lost in their delight in this new experience. For the grass was dry, the night was warm and still, and the party was held out on the lawn in the corner by the big tree. The girls felt dimly that it was going to be 'extra special,' as they looked round at the laughing, talking throng; then the music started, and all the brightly-coloured figures began to interweave in regular rhythm; and the President literally stood still in her place to gaze, forgetting everything.

'Joy gave her an indignant poke. 'Going to cry?' she mocked. 'You needn't spoil the dance for the rest us, anyway! If you want to dream, get out of the way, President! If you want to dance-hands-four, quickly!'

Cecily woke with a start, and laughed, and caught her hand. 'I never saw anything like it !' she said, and felt it again and again, as after each interval the whole moving crowd suddenly resolved itself into rings or squares or lines of rhythmic movement. 'You can see it here! We were so squashed together inside! '

There was plenty of room for everybody, and even with hundreds of dancers no one was cramped, a great relief after the 'crush' of the week before. For 'Peascods,' the big rings seemed to reach as far as one could see in the gathering dusk, and the effect, when all the circles began to swing at the same moment, was 'wonderfully beautiful. For the closing dance, which of course was 'Sellenger's Round,' the whole party, of several hundred, were massed in great rings, one inside the other, all revolving in alternate di-rections, the loved Prophet in the centre, smiling even more happily than usual. Cicely could not resist the temptation to dance it with Dick Everett, nor Joan with Raymond, but they were inclined to agree with the Pixie, as, original always, she retreated to a chair to watch, murmuring, 'I never can dance this! It's too beautiful!'

'Wait till all the arms go up in the second figure! It's like a wave,' said Madam's brother, as he skilfully and tactfully arranged the rings, bidding them go alternately 'clock' and 'counterclock.'

'I know. It's too beautiful,' she said again, and stood enthralled as the coloured crowd below her broke into movement.

'I'll never forget that!' and Cicely broke away with Everett after the first time. 'They'll do it again, you know! Let's look on!' and they joined the Pixie.

'It's a wonderful sight,' he agreed, as all' the arms swung up to the centre.

'It's worth coming for-just that t I'm glad to have seen it out of doors, even once.'

From Chapter 22: 'Take your partner home'

'Oh, you can't do Running Set at top speed and keep quite sober!' Madam laughed.

'How do you like it?' she asked on Monday morning.

She was lying stretched on the lids of the desks in her tunic, her head on her arm, look-ing so like a lazy sprawling cat in the unconscious beauty of her attitude that Joan, look-ing down at her, had hard work again not to stroke her and say 'Pretty pussy!' 'I am get-ting tired!' Madam added. 'I'm ready for a holiday. I shall bathe and lie out on the sand-hills for a month. Well? '

'Running Set's just "It!"' Cicley said warmly. 'If you're going to do that every day, I won't miss a minute for any money!'

'Or any man?' Madam teased, sitting up suddenly. 'I've got to take strong measures, since you've learnt how to be slack! Running Set is the strongest I know. Get in your sets, and we'll do a new figure. You remember "Shoot the Owl?" If you do it well, you shall have "Chase the Squirrel."'

'We want that Wild Goose thing, where you go hunting the men,' Joy begged. 'I'm Jen's man; I want to chase those two!' nodding at Raymond and Everett.

'I want the one where you wind up into a ball, and then you shout "Swing!" and it all flies apart!' Jen pleaded.

Madam laughed. 'We'll see how you get on with your" Do-si-do " 'and Promenades first.'

She sat on the wide window sill, her hands clasped round her knees, and called for si-lence. 'I'm going to be the Caller to-day! Somebody else can do it to-morrow, if they like; but to-day I'm going to count for you all, so you must listen I' and they laughed, recog-nising a familiar note.

Above the music Madam's voice rang out- 'Grand Promenade! Swing your partner! Swing your contrary! One, two, three, four, five, six-turn! One, two, three, four, five, six! Swing your partner! Swing your contrary! Take your partner home!' - it was almost a chant.

But that was only after much practice. At first she came flying across the room to one set after another, as the 'Do-si-do' got wilder and wilder, and more and more out of posi-tion; or buried her face in the skirt of her tunic and groaned, at sight of the hopeless muddle they made of the Grand Promenade. Those who knew her laughed; those who did not, looked alarmed, dreading the storm about to break on them, or wondering if she had collapsed in tears.

She looked up when she had recovered. 'I never saw such hopeless people in all my life. Go back to the beginning, and listen to my counting ! You must turn on six, or you'll never get there. And don't stay too long with your contraries. Do the Grand Prom. again, and be ready for that turn ... Yes. Now go back to the beginning and do the Introduction right through. Be careful with your "Do-si-do." Men, I want to see you avoiding one an-other more. Arch your backs as you pass. It's this!' and she descended from the window sill and bade Raymond stand aside. 'Do the "Do-si" with me!' to Cicely, Joan, and Everett.

That morning had held a new joy and a great treat for them, for instead of 'the chanty-man's' solos during the morning session, Madam had stood beside the Director and sung several of the songs he had found in the Kentucky mountains and brought back to their native land. Her voice was, according to the President, 'exactly what it ought to be for folk-songs and baby nursery rhymes,' every note true, every word clear, and so natu-ral and simple that even the occasional use of a quaint old expression was easy to fol-low. She had sung' Aunt Nancy' and the curious Appalachian version of 'Cocky Robin,' and then the Bird Song, and 'Soldier, soldier, won't you marry me?' and the President had told her exuberantly afterwards,--

'I love you when you're dancing, but I'm not sure that I don't love you more still when you're singing! '

'I say! You're easily satisfied!' Madam mocked her teasingly.

'You know, I think you're a downright sport!' Cicely said to her at the end of the class one morning. 'In the fourth week of a school like this, when you must be getting nervy and tired, you might very well take only easy work. Instead of that you go and tackle a ghastly thing like Running Set; ghastly to teach, I mean. It's ripping to do, and we're en-joying it awfully. But it must be the limit to teach; I think you're just sporting! And with people like us!'

'Oh, you're not as bad as some! I want to dance too,' Madam assured her. 'I'd like to join in. But I can't till you know it-not to enjoy it! I've got to keep an eye on everybody. But I love Running Set.'

'Oh, it's glorious to do I Perhaps we'll be good enough by the end of the week. I wonder-I'm planning an awfully jolly evening in our barn at home, somewhere about Christmas!' Cicely said eagerly. 'If we fixed a day that would suit you, would you come? And would you, would you dance Running Set with us? I'd like the girls to see it. I'm not going to teach it to them yet; I'm going to get them right in the ordinary dances first, and give them some swords.' Madam nodded. 'But if you'd come in and make up a set, we could let them see what it's like, and they could try it later on. We shan't forget it, and our fid-dler can play anything. I'll get the music. But would you dance with us?'

'I'd love it, of course. But that wouldn't make eight? There are only four of you '-Madam paused suddenly.

'Oh, I'm going to ask the Pixie! I think she'll come; she said she would. And Jen's com-ing from Yorkshire, to stay with Joan and Joy at the Hall. I'd love to put you up!'

‘But that only makes six! ' Madam eyed her severely. 'What about your fourth couple?'

'Seems to me it makes eight!' said Cicely placidly. 'Are you hinting that those two men will be there? ' Madam demanded, with sudden understanding.

'No, I'm assuming it! We'll have to get it over sooner or later!'

'Oh! You're going to introduce them to your club? Of course I'll come I I say, congratula-tions!' Madam's eyes snapped.

'Well, you know I always do every mortal thing you tell me to, and you're telling me all the time to "Take my partner home!'" Cicely retorted. 'Don't, give us away to the infants just yet, though! I say! I've a pressing engagement with" Haxby" in the gym! See you this afternoon I Thanks awfully for that Running Set!' and she fled.

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