Certainly, Silverside was most excellently situated for the purpose she had in view. The property had been bought some years before the town of Harlingden had expanded, and while land was still cheap. The house stood in its own beautiful grounds, on the top of a hill commanding a fine view over the estuary. It was breezy and healthy, with large lofty rooms, big windows, and ample accommodation in the way of side doors and bathrooms: just sufficiently in the country to allow of walks through fields and woods, yet near enough to the town to permit most girls to return home for their mid-day dinners. As a day school, it was far more conveniently situated than The Hawthorns. Harlingden, formerly a moderate-sized and not particularly important town, had since the outbreak of the war been turned into a great munition centre; the Government, attracted by the advantages of the estuary, had established large permanent works there, together with a shipbuilding industry. In a few short years the population had doubled. Fresh suburbs sprang up like mushrooms. In the Silverside district this was particularly noticeable, for where formerly there had been quite a rural walk between hedges, leading to the town, there now stood rows of neat villas with stuccoed fronts and balconies, and conspicuously new gardens. The boarders at Silverside, who preferred country to town, greatly deplored this suburban growth. They had always begged to take their walks in an opposite direction, and had ignored Harlingden and its industries as persistently as possible. The advent of about fifty day girls into Silverside they regarded as neither more nor less than an alien invasion. They sat together in a tight clump when school opened at nine o'clock on Wednesday morning. Until the new gymnasium could be erected, it was difficult to find a room large enough to accommodate everybody. The old drawing-room had been emptied of furniture and fitted with forms, and here, by sitting very close, the girls managed to cram themselves in for the opening ceremony. Miss Thompson, elated at heart, but more stately and dignified than ever in manner, addressed her pupils in a short speech. "As Silverside is entering on a new chapter of its career," she began, "I should like to put before you all, as briefly as possible, what I consider to be the ideals of the school. Those who have been here some years already know our traditions, but it will do them no harm to hear them again, and those of you who are new will, I hope, understand, and be prepared to accept them with equal readiness.