MY DEAR GIRLS,--As summaries, your stories could hardly have been better. It is clear that, in organising the Competition, the Editor has been doing real educational work. You are acquiring a selective faculty: you are learning to distinguish between the detail and the design. Practice--this sounds arithmetical--is teaching you proportion. This critical power will stand you in good stead--in life as well as in letters. But on some other points I cannot be quite so congratulatory. There is a good deal of adventurous spelling, and there is much distracted punctuation. Many of the miniatures are nearly large enough for family portraits. And, while the stories are admirable skeletons, they seem--as skeletons are apt to prove in society--a little deficient in ease and grace, jerky and unpersuasive. Some, I am almost afraid, are rather dry, and even a little dull. Girls, don't you think that, in dealing with a tale that was meant as a concession to the holiday spirit--a little interlude between more serious efforts--you might have accepted with less reserve the Editor's invitation to be bright? And I should like to see you aiming at some distinction of style. Some of the stories reminded me of telegrams, some of strings of beads. Still, a good many are crisp and neat, and a few have quite a pretty touch. The winner of the first prize, I must add, came very near to being disqualified on account of her sugared and beguiling words. On full reflection, however, her paper being much the best in point of sprightliness and _verve_, I decided, after making a conscientiously wry face, to absorb the saccharine matter. But, another time, she must not put bouquets on the judge's table. With congratulations to many, and hearty thanks to all, Ever most truly yours, FREDERICK LANGBRIDGE. ⁂ Unfortunately we have no space for printing the first prize essays this month.-- . SPECIAL NOTICE TO OUR READERS. [Illustration: RUTH LAMB.] We earnestly desire all our subscribers to read our new Supplement Story "FRIEND OR SELF" issued simultaneously with this monthly part. As a guarantee of its interest and value it is enough to state that the writer of it is the girls' special favourite--Ruth Lamb, author of "In the Twilight Side by Side." In order that the beautiful story shall be well read and enjoyed, and the high teaching of it have its effect, we offer three prizes of TWO GUINEAS, ONE GUINEA, and HALF-A-GUINEA for the three best papers on it. The essays are to give a brief account of the plot and action of the story in the Competitor's own words; in fact, each paper should be a carefully-constructed _Story in Miniature_, telling the reader in a few bright words what THE GIRL'S OWN STORY SUPPLEMENT for the month is all about.