E-text prepared by Suzanne Shell, Emmy, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net/c/) Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 20163-h.htm or 20163-h.zip: (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/0/1/6/20163/20163-h/20163-h.htm) or (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/0/1/6/20163/20163-h.zip) THE JOLLIEST SCHOOL OF ALL by ANGELA BRAZIL Author of "The Luckiest Girl in the School," "The Princess of the School," "A Popular School Girl," "Schoolgirl Kitty," "Marjorie's Best Year," etc. A. L. Burt Company Publishers New York Published by arrangement with Frederick A. Stokes Co. Printed in U. S. A. Copyright, 1922, by Frederick A. Stokes Company All Rights Reserved DEDICATED TO THE MANY CHARMING AMERICAN GIRLS WHOM I HAVE MET AND TO THOSE UNKNOWN SCHOOLGIRLS OVER THE ATLANTIC TO WHOM THIS LITTLE BOOK CARRIES MY HEARTIEST GREETINGS [Illustration: "'YOU MEAN THINGS!' RAGED PEACHY" --_Page 124_] CONTENTS chapter page I. Off to Italy 1 II. The Villa Camellia 16 III. Hail, Columbia! 27 IV. A Secret Sorority 41 V. Fairy Godmothers, Limited 52 VI. Among the Olive Groves 66 VII. Lorna's Enemy 81 VIII. At Pompeii 93 IX. Reprisals 113 X. The School Carnival 126 XI. Up Vesuvius 141 XII. Tar and Feathers 156 XIII. Peachy's Pranks 174 XIV. The Villa Bleue 190 XV. Peachy's Birthday 213 XVI. Concerning Juniors 230 XVII. The Anglo-Saxon League 243 XVIII. Greek Temples 257 XIX. In Capri 272 XX. The Cameron Clan 287 XXI. The Blue Grotto 303 THE JOLLIEST SCHOOL OF ALL CHAPTER I Off to Italy In a top-story bedroom in an old-fashioned house in a northern suburb of London, a girl of fourteen was kneeling on the floor, turning out the contents of the bottom cupboards of a big bookcase. Her method of doing so was hardly tidy; she just tossed the miscellaneous assortment of articles down anywhere, till presently she was surrounded by a mixed-up jumble of books, papers, paint-boxes, music, chalks, pencils, foreign stamps, picture post-cards, crests, balls of knitting wool, skeins of embroidery silk, and odds and ends of all kinds. She groaned as the circle grew wider, yet the apparently inexhaustible cupboards were still uncleared.