Anita's face was a little flushed and she was talking more than usual, though the air of habitual stillness yet clung to her and her hands lay quiet on her lap, half covered by the soft deep ruffles of her blue gown. That she was a student of excellent promise was not known to those about her and Isabel, from long experience, avoided, when within earshot of her, the smallest reference to even the least of her friend's attainments. They did see only a very pretty girl who was talking gayly of all sorts of things in New York with a delight which was charmingly out of place, it seemed to them, among these surroundings; for they could not forget behind the mask of party dress the fact, almost a menacing one to them, of its being a woman's college. As they were New Yorkers by inheritance and much more by education Anita was unconsciously giving them subtle flattery, especially as what she asked about and evidently cared for was not merely the teas and dances uptown but the work and play down among the tall buildings. Isabel sat smiling at Anita's beauty--she gave the word unreservedly that evening--and wondering at her animation among these people who she had feared would bore her friend sadly. An allusion, a name, suggested a plan for the following winter and they turned to Isabel. "You are to be with us then?" "Yes," she answered, "I leave here in a few months." The note of regret was almost evident. "And Miss Fiske?" "Ah! she is fortunate," Isabel answered quickly for her. "She has other things to fill her days. No, I refrain from untimely allusions but we all envy her life next year and the year after--for it is all planned, is it not?" "Yes," Anita replied after a little pause, "I shall only be a few days in New York. I am to be very busy." The flush died off her face and, as she herself was silent, the talk drifted away from her: when Isabel looked at her next she saw again the quiet face as she knew and liked it best with a gravity which well avoided seriousness,--the eyes a little larger and darker than usual under the bright lights. _Ellen Rose Giles, '96._ _A DIPLOMATIC CRUSADE_ Sunday after Mid-Years. A grey biting February afternoon, with a promise of snow in the eager air, was darkening over the deserted campus. The examinations, which had finally dragged their slow length to an end on Friday, seemed to have left a peculiar haze in the mental atmosphere; for throughout the college, whence all who could possibly do so had departed for a brief rest, there was a subdued and slightly melancholy air, as though no one had yet realized that another four months must elapse before the agony of having her knowledge investigated would again rack mind and body.