BY WAY OF CORRECTION.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XXVI, Issue 7246, 29 August 1902, Page 4

BY WAY OF CORRECTION.

"Georgina!" called Miss Bin-well in cr attenuated fulsrllo. "Georgina!" No reply.

Miss Harwell walked round the vernidnh to the buck of the house und a 'civ yards down the path. "Gcorginii!" she called again. Still no answer.

Miss Harwell was much annoyed. As she stood on the path, undecided what to do next, she looked not unlike v ruffled canary with her faded, light hair, und small, sharp feulureH.

"It is really most provoking!" she exclaimed. "Tina is the third time Mr Wedgewood lum culled, and cuch time Georgina is nowhere to be found. It puts me in such n ridiculous position after asking him to conic for Ihe specilic purpose of trying to bring her to a more serious friiinc of mind, and, if possible, to some sense of the responsibility of life. I feel cerlaiii she was in the hall when the hell went! It was a bud day for mo when poor Samuel left a hi-ndslrong, wilful girl lo me to bring up. A thankless task it is, indeed, a thankless tusk!" and her head shook in ;<" agitated manner. Then she turned to a demure-looking maid standing near.

"Susan," she said, in a voice in which asperity scented lo have reached its highest and final expression, "Have you seen Miss Georgina?"

"She was in the 'all a few minutes ;igo, ma'am," answered Susan sympa-

thetically. "Traps she's gone up to lier room."

And she run upstairs, turned roitir cm the landing, and ran down again lo announce that "Miss Goorgie wusn'

here, anyhow.'

"Well, I suppose I must apologise for her again," said Miss Harwell, and she turned into the house, comforting herself with the thought that at any rate she had a good excuse for a long discussion with her patient visitor on sermon. In the days of her youth Miss Harwell hud been told by a designing

friend that she possessed considerable power of argument, and she had never forgotten tho only compliment she had ever received. It spoke much for the llov John Wedgowood's interest ill her nieees's moral welfare that after having been completely worn out- by his pro-

tracted endeavours to come to a satisfactory conclusion regarding the locality of the ten. tribes and the authorship of Shakespeare respectively on the two former occasions when lie had failed to see Georgina, he yet culled again.

"I call it a shame the way she goe on at poor Miss Goorgie," said Susai indignantly, us she went into the kit

ebon. "It's like, well, to my mind its like trying to niter the shape o

a sunbeam!"

Susan's simile, escaping in an vi premeditated way, astonished her fe! low servant as well as herself.

"Why, you're getting - quite v poo I do declare!" exclaimed the fat ol cook, looking up from her puslry.

'(Jo on!" replied Susan nnd giggle

consciously

"Hut I'm sorry for Miss Georgie," sho continued. "A nicer, kinder young lady never lived, and how she keeps so bright with that old tubby always scratching at her is more than I can understand."

Meanwhile the cause of Miss Bar well's annoyance and poor Samuel's mi welcome legacy was curled up in a bi*. willow at the bottom of the old gulden, completely hidden by the lent'; boughs. She was breathless and hut less, but triumphant.

"Catch me going into lie lectured by the reverend John!" she punted, relapsing iuto the language of school days. "I'd liko to see myself!"

Then she crawled carefully along one of tlio branches stretching over the fence which formed the boundary of Miss Harwell's domain.

"I wonder if Peggy's anywhere about," thought Goorgie, glancing into her neighbour's garden. "Ah, yes, here she conies, Tennyson in her hand and Browning under her arm. Embarras dcs richesses, but a compliment to

neither, I take it. Peggy !" she culled in a hoarse whisper, as her friend came within earshot.

But the virtuous Peggy was deep in King Arthur's farewell to his erring queen, every now and then reading a few Hues aloud for the pleasure of

listening to the music of the words

"Yet think not that I come to urge thy crimes, I did not come to curse thee, Guinevere," she read, and then broke off with a startled "What on

earth is that?" as a large apple fell heavily right in the middle of her sailor hat.

"I'll troublo yon for my apple, if you please," came apparently from Hie skies, and then Georgian's laughing, lovely face peeped forth once more through the lcnfy screen.

"Oh, Goorgie, you villain!" crid Peggy, and proceeded forthwith I

scramble ovor the fence and up t willow, where tho two girls llien ma themselves coiiifortiiblc, Browning in Tennyson reposing peacefully and n

parently unconcernedly in the long grass !-en--ath them.

"What's the meaning of this?" asked Peggy, who scented mischief in the air. "What are you up to now?"

"Hush !" said Goorgie. "We're playing nt Bonnie Prince Charlie biding from the Roundheads in the oak tree. I'm the prince and Aunt Lilian is old Noll."

"But this isn't an oak," objected Peg gy, the practical, "and it wasn't "

"Oh, never mind," interrupted Goorgie impatiently. "It's all the same. All I know is that I heard Mr Wedgcwood's voice in the hall, and I pelted down here as hard as I could, leaving Susan to cover my retreat. Susan is invaluable. She is the sole redeeming feature in a life otherwise completely marred by Aunt Lilian."

"But why do you want lo 'im aw from Mr Wedgcwood?" M-keJ Peggy. Georgie's face (lushed with anger.

"Aunt Lilian forgets that I am grown up now," she said with dignity. "I was twenty last birthday, and because my ways and ideas are not the same as hers, she must needs ask this budding clergyman lo reprove me for my levity, forsooth !"

"Oh, Georgie!" said Peggy reproachfully; "I don't think you need cull Mr Wcdgewood names! You used to like him."

"So I should now," replied her friend, whose mouth began to tremble suspiciously, "if only Aunt Lilian would leave mo alone. Oh, Peg, I wish I could go away! I shall never, never be happy here ! Everything I do Aunt Lilian says is wrong. If I tried all day and all.night 1 could never please her, so I have given up trying at all!" And the big grey eyes filled with tears. Peggy squeezed her friend's hand sympathetically. She knew enough of Miss Harwell to feci convinced that in no circumstances could she be other Hum n thorn in the Ilesh to anyone unfortunate enough to be brought into close eonlact with her. But- Georgic was not a person who remained depressed for long. She gave a great gulp, winked steadily once or twice, and was herself once more. "I don't think I should like to marry a clergyman, should you?" asked Peggy presently, apropos apparently of nothing. "Pooh, no!" replied Goorgie, with a contempt almost too marked to be natural. "Think of having to be always on one's best behaviour! Aunt Lilian says Mrs Binnoy is a pattern to all her husband's parishioners. Fancy going through life a pattern! Ugh, it makes me feel quite flat and newspapery to think of it!" Peggy laughed. "I wouldn't mind that so much," sho said. "It's the bazaars and things I should hate. You never go to sec Mrs [ Binney that she isn't inakiug pin

cushions or pen wipers or something Billy." "She seems to spend most of her waking moments trying to disguise the fact that v pin cushion is a pin cushion," said Goorgie. "It must be either a hideous velvet siinilower or v doll in long clothes, or a harp—anything but a plain, sensible cushion. "Poor Mrs Hinney!" said Peggy comliiisoriitiiigly. "Hut perhaps there aro compensations." "I doubt it," said Goorgie eitipliiitieally. Then she added suddenly, "Oh, Peg, I've just- thought of my tea- getting cold in the dining-room ! I just long for il! And a, lovely hot scone, 100. What horrid luck!" "I wish 1 could ask you to conic and have tea with me," replied the other, "but Hob broke tho drawing-room mirror this morning, cracked it right across, and I can fell you there's thunder in the nil - ! Father's wailing for liim to come home from school. I only hope I'm not there when the slurm buhls. Hut I'll go nnd see what I can bring down. here. Even milk and cako would be better than nothing." And .she slid down the tree, responding with a brief "All right" to Georgian's injunction to "hurry up." (To be mndnded in our next).

Miss Oldgirl: I think that- was just lovely to give Susan I!. Anthony a rosi for every year of her age. Mr Sourdrop: Good thing they don' l do that for everybody. Miss Oldgirl: Why, pray? Mr Sourdrop: Somo poor fellow woiih have to buy a greenhouse for you.