she was twelve she pricked her finger in sewing and made a blood-stain on the little white mull apron that she was making.  The stuff was so delicate that she did not dare to attempt any cleansing process, and she was in a great hurry too, so she embroidered a green four leaf clover over the bloodstain, and all the family exclaimed, “How like Nancy!”) Grammar teased Nancy, algebra and geometry routed her, horse, foot, and dragoons.  No room for embroidery there!  Languages delighted her, map-drawing bored her, and composition intoxicated her, although she was better at improvising than at the real task of setting down her thoughts in black and white.  The class chronicles and prophecies and songs and poems would flow to her inevitably, but Kathleen would be the one who would give new grace and charm to them if she were to read them to an audience.

How Beulah Academy beamed, and applauded, and wagged its head in pride on a certain day before Thanksgiving, when there were exercises in the assembly room.  Olive had drawn The Landing of the Pilgrims on the largest of the blackboards, and Nancy had written a merry little story that caused great laughter and applause in the youthful audience.  Gilbert had taken part in a debate and covered himself with glory, and Kathleen closed the impromptu programme by reciting Tennyson’s—­

  O young Mariner,
  You from the haven
  Under the sea-cliff,
  You that are watching
  The gray Magician
  With eyes of wonder,...
    follow the Gleam.

  Great the Master,
  And sweet the Magic,
  When over the valley,
  In early summers,
  Over the mountain,
  On human faces,
  And all around me,
  Moving to melody
  Floated the Gleam.

  O young Mariner,
  Down to the haven,
  Call your companion,
  Launch your vessel
  And crowd your canvas,
  And, ere it vanishes
  Over the margin,
  After it, follow it,
  Follow the Gleam.

Kathleen’s last year’s brown velveteen disclosed bronze slippers and stockings,—­a novelty in Beulah,—­her hair fell in such curls as Beulah had rarely beheld, and her voice was as sweet as a thrush’s note; so perhaps it is not strange that the poem set a kind of fashion at the academy, and “following the gleam” became a sort of text by which to study and grow and live.

Thanksgiving Day approached, and everybody was praying for a flurry of snow, just enough to give a zest to turkey and cranberry sauce.  On the twentieth it suddenly occurred to Mother Carey that this typical New England feast day would be just the proper time for the housewarming, so the Lord children, the Pophams, and the Harmons were all bidden to come at seven o’clock in the evening.  Great preparations ensued.  Rows of Jack o’ Lanterns decorated the piazza, and the Careys had fewer pumpkin pies in November than their neighbors, in consequence of their extravagant inroads upon the golden treasures of the aft garden.  Inside were a few late asters and branches of evergreen, and the illumination suggested that somebody had been lending additional lamps and candles for the occasion.  The original equipment of clothes possessed by the Careys on their arrival in Beulah still held good, and looked well by lamplight, so that the toilettes were fully worthy of so important a function.