dren, and the wise members of your board of education that your High School is not situated in Leicester Square. The Place de la Concorde in Paris can only suggest to a sensitive boy or girl the spilt blood of a mighty empire, can only remind us of those horrible pictures Thackeray has painted so vividly in A Tale of Two Cities. No, one would not wish any institution of learning to stand in the presence of the obelisk in the centre of that Place.
So, friends and noble visitor, I offer you your High School and its environment as Maple Valley's most beneficent influence, and I call upon the Principal of that school to rise, so that we may say to her in the words of the great poet:
The best is yet to be.
The applause after this address was prolonged and hearty. There were cheers for Miss Amidon, the elderly Principal of the Maple Valley High School, as she rose from her seat in the centre of the house. The Countess, although almost hysterical, beat her palms together, but Mayme Townsend frowned and remarked. The Judge is trying to get on the school-board, the old fool!
Following Judge Porter's address an intermission was announced and Gareth took advantage of this moment to leave his seat to join Lennie Colman.
Miss Colman, he adjured her, you promised . . .
Gazing at the handsome lad bending over her,
