DEAR MISS ASHTON,--I have a daughter Marion, now sixteen years old. Developing at this age what we think rather an unusual amount of talent, we are desirous to send her to a good school at the East.
We have been at the West twenty years as Home Missionaries. When I tell you that, I need not add that we have been made very happy by being able to save money enough to give Marion at least a year under your kind care, if you can receive her into your school.
I think I can safely promise you that she will be faithful and industrious; and I earnestly hope that the lovely Christian character she has sustained at home, may deepen and brighten in the new life which will open to her in the East.
May I ask your patience while she is accustoming herself to it; of your kindness I am well assured.
Truly yours, E. G. PARKE.
"The child of a poor, far western missionary, so different from the class of girls that she will be with here," thought Miss Ashton as she slowly folded the letter.
She sat for some time thinking over its contents, then she took her pen, and wrote:--
DEAR MRS. PARKE,--Send your daughter to me. I have great interest in, and sympathy with, all Home Missionary work. I wish I could do something to lighten the expenses she must incur; but this is a chartered institution, and at present all the places to be filled by those who need assistance have been taken. I will, however, bear her in mind; and should she prove a good scholar, exemplary in her behavior, I may be able to render her in the future some acceptable assistance.
Wishing you all success in your trying and arduous life, and the help of the great Helper,
I am, truly yours, C. S. ASHTON.
Miss Ashton did not seal this note; she tossed it upon her desk, meaning to look it over before it was mailed; but she had no time, and, with many misgivings as to what might come of it, she allowed it to go as it was.
Her school had never been fuller than it promised to be on the opening of this new year. Through the summer vacation letters had been coming to her from all parts of the country asking to put girls who had finished graded and high school education under her care. Established for many years, the academy had grown from what, in the religious world, was considered a "missionary training-school," and from which many able and faithful women had gone forth to win laurels in the over-ripe harvest fields, to a school better adapted to the wants of the nineteenth century.
While it held its religious prestige, it also offered unusual advantages to that important and numerous class of girls who, not wishing a college education, were yet desirous to spend the years that should change them from girls into women in preparation for a future great in its aims, and also great in its results.
Miss Ashton, large-hearted and strong-headed, seeing wisely into this future, had succeeded in offering to this class exactly what it had demanded.
Ably seconded by an efficient and generous board of trustees, with ample funds, excellent teachers to assist her, a convenient and handsome building in which to hold the school, she had readily made it a success. There were more applications for admittance than she could find room for; indeed, every available corner of the house had been promised when she received Mrs. Parke's letter.
Sometimes it happened that a scholar for some unforeseen reason failed to appear; that might make an opening for Marion. She wanted this Western girl; the missionary spirit of olden times came back to her with a warmth and freshness it would have cheered the hearts of the long-absent ones in heathen lands to know. The crowd of scholars began to gather. They came from the north and the south, the east and the west, with a remarkable promptness. On the day for the opening of the term every room was full, and many who had delayed applying for places--taking it for granted there was always a vacancy--were sent disappointed away.
There seemed to be positively no spot for Marion; and, in spite of all the cares and perplexities which each day brought her, Miss Ashton could not forget it. It became a positive source of worry to her before she received a letter stating the day on which Marion would arrive.
"That's not a good beginning, to be a week after the opening of the term," she thought. "I hope she will bring a good excuse."
It was a beautiful September twilight when a young girl came timidly into the main entrance of the Young Ladies' Academy at Montrose.
Six days and four nights ago she had left her home in Oregon, delayed by the sickness of one of the companions under whose escort she was to come to Massachusetts.
Before this journey she had never been more than ten miles from home, and it was a wonderful new world into which the cars so quickly brought her.
Mountains, plains, rivers, cities, villages, seemed to fly by her as the train dashed along. She had no time to miss the familiar scenes of her own home.
The flat prairie, over whose long reaches gay flowers blossomed, the little villages dotted here and there, with now and then a small, white steeple pointing heavenward,--her father's church among them, with the neat parsonage, so much of which he had built with his own hand, and the dear ones she had left behind her there.
To-day she had reached her destination, and a smiling girl had met her at the door and ushered her into the lower corridor of the academy.
It was just after tea, an hour given up to social enjoyment, and the corridor was full of young girls, busy and noisy.
The stranger shrank back into the recess of the door; she hoped no one would see her: if she could only escape until the principal came, how glad she should be!
Little groups kept constantly passing her; many from among them turned their heads and looked at her inquiringly; some smiled and bowed, but no one spoke, until a tall girl who had passed and repassed her a number of times left her party and came to her.
"You are our two hundredth!" she said, holding her hand out cordially toward her. "We are glad you have come! Now we are the largest number that have ever been in this school at one time. Shall I take you to Miss Ashton?"
Marion held very tight to the hand that was given her as they passed together down through the lines of scholars toward the principal's room. More smiles and cheery nods met her, and now and then she caught "two hundredth" as she passed.
A knock at a door was immediately answered by a pleasant "Come in."
"Oh, it's you, Dorothy, is it? I'm always glad to see you," said Miss Ashton, rising from the table at which she had been writing.
"I've brought you your new pupil," said Dorothy.
"And I'm very glad to see her. It is Marion Parke, I presume. You have had a long, hard journey, but you look so well I need not ask how you have borne it."
As she was giving Marion this welcome, Miss Ashton, with the quick look by which her long experience had accustomed her to judging something of character, saw in the timid new pupil a very different girl from what in her troubled thoughts of her she had expected her to be.
Two large gray eyes from under long, drooping eyelids met hers with an appealing look; lips trembled sensitively as they tried to answer her, and a delicate color came slowly up over the rounded cheeks.
"I am very sorry to be late," Marion said with a self-possession that belied the timidity her face expressed; "but sickness of my friends with whom I was to come, detained me."
"I had no doubt there was a sufficient reason," Miss Ashton answered kindly. "You are a week behind most of the others, but you can make the time up with diligence. Dorothy, please take Marion to the guest-room for to-night. I will see you later. I am very glad you are here safely. You will have time after tea to write a few lines home. Give my love to your mother, please."
Dorothy led the way to the guest-room. It was a pretty room near Miss Ashton's, kept for the convenience of entertaining guests. Dorothy threw open the window-blinds, and Marion saw before her a New England village.
In the near distance rose hill upon hill, their sides covered with elegant residences, and what she thought were palaces, crowning their tops. The light of this September twilight covered them with a mantle of gold, lit up the broad river that ran at the base of the hills like a translucent band, turned the tall chimneys of factories in the adjacent city, usually so disfiguring, into minarets, blazing with rich Oriental coloring.
"Is it not beautiful?" Dorothy asked, slipping her arm around Marion's waist, and drawing her nearer the window; "we have it always--_always_ to look at, morning, noon, and night, and it is never the same twice. I was born and brought up by the sea, and I've been here three years, yet I love it better and better every day."
