Marion looked after the plain woman thoughtfully, then looked down at the tiny pin she wore. “I am not sure but she is. Anyhow, I was bound to endeavor to please her. I’m an Endeavorer, you know.” She gave the pin a significant touch as she spoke. It was very small—almost too small to attract attention—but the letters “C. E.” were, after all, quite distinct. “O, bother!” said her neighbor, speaking contemptuously, “so am I; at least so far as wearing the pin is concerned. I wear it because it is pretty, and I have so few ornaments that I have to make the most of them; but as for putting sentiment into spools of cotton and balls of tape, I can’t do it; the things don’t match.” “They ought to,” Marion said gravely. “If you and I don’t put our pledges into spools of cotton and balls of tape of what use are they? Because we spend our days in just such work.” “I know it,” with a discontented yawn; “I’m sick and tired of it. It is a slave life; I’d get out of it if I could. If there was any chance of getting promoted it would be a little different. Belle Mason has been transferred to the ribbon counter, and she gets more wages and sees other sorts of people, and has lots of fun; she hasn’t been in the house as long as I have, either; it is just because she was put at a counter where she had a chance of pleasing people, and here we have just to poke over tape and cotton and pins, and such stuff. I think it’s mean!” PANSY. [Illustration: SAYING HER EVENING PRAYER.] HELEN’S “APRIL FOOL.” “MAMMA, is an April fool different from any other kind of a fool?” cried Helen Palmer, rushing into the sitting-room on arriving home from school. “Oh! good-evening, Mrs. Glenn,” she added, as she noticed a lady who sat sewing with her mother. “What does the child mean?” exclaimed Mrs. Glenn, returning Helen’s nod, then looking her astonishment at Mrs. Palmer, who said: “What do you mean, Helen?” “Why, the girls are all talking to-day about to-morrow being ‘April Fool Day,’ and they said a lot of things I don’t understand, about calling people ‘April fool.’ They all agreed to see who could make the most fools and tell about it Monday. They said I must too, and I didn’t want to tell them I did not know how to do it, or what it means.” “You don’t mean to tell me, Helen Palmer, that you don’t know anything about April fool?” cried Mrs. Glenn, in surprise. “No,” said Mrs. Palmer; “she doesn’t. This is her first year at school, you know; I have taught her at home, and in our country home she heard very little but what we told her. I never saw any sense or fun in the custom of fooling on the first day of April, and did not instruct her in it when I taught her of Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year, St. Valentine’s Day, Washington’s Birthday, Decoration Day and Fourth of July.” “But what is it?” insisted Helen.