"Don't apologize, child!" interrupted Raymonde. "Nobody in their senses expects you to go. You'd be a huge embarrassment to the rest of us. Blue-eyed darlings, all baby-ribbon and fluffy hair, aren't meant for hard work. Why, you'd pick about six strawberries in an hour, and eat three-quarters of them! Go home and be petted, by all means! We don't want you weeping yourself to sleep at night, it disturbs the dormitory. The country'll survive without your services!" Raymonde's harum-scarum mind was for once really filled with a wish to help. She meant to do her full share of work. Also she was determined to enjoy herself. The prospect of camp-life was alluring. There was a gipsy smack about it that satisfied her unconventional instincts. It seemed almost next door to campaigning. "If I'd only been a boy, I'd have run away to the front long ago!" she announced. "Girls have their own chances in life as well as boys now," said Hermie. "Wait till you've finished with school, then you must try to find your niche in the world. There's plenty of pioneer work for women to do yet. They haven't half exploited the colonies. Once we show we're some good on the land, why shouldn't the Government start us in co-operative farms out in New Zealand or Australia? It ought to be done systematically. Everything's been so haphazard before. Imagine a farm all run by girls educated at our best secondary and public schools! It would be ideal. I'm yearning to try it." Hermie's aspirations towards field labour and a colonial future had been greatly spurred on lately by the advent of some lady labourers on a farm near the Grange. For the last fortnight the milk had been delivered, not by the usual uncouth boy, but by a charming member of the feminine sex, attired in short smock, knickers and gaiters, and a picturesque rush hat. Hermie had entered into conversation with her, and learned that she was a clergyman's daughter, that she milked six cows morning and evening, and went round with the cart delivering the milk, and that she was further concerned with the care of poultry, pigs, and calves. The glamour of her experiences made Hermie wish that the Grange were full of pigs instead of pupils. "I'd rather attend to a dozen nice little black Berkshires than act monitress to those juniors!" she sighed. "There would really be more satisfaction in it. And as for Raymonde Armitage and her set--give me young calves any day!"