Peace was panic stricken. Almost at the last minute Miss Peyton had changed her mind about the poem which she was to speak, and had given her instead of "The Children's Hour" which she had so carefully learned, those other lines called "Children"; and there were only five days in which to learn them. Memorizing poetry, particularly when she could not quite understand its meaning, was not Peace's strong forte, and it was small wonder that she was dismayed at this change of program; but it was useless to protest. When Miss Peyton decided to do a certain thing, "all the king's horses and all the king's men" could not alter her decision. Peace had learned this from bitter experience and many hours in the dark closet behind the teacher's desk. So, inwardly raging, though outwardly calm, she accepted her fate, and marched home to air her outraged sense of justice before the little parsonage family, sure of sympathy and help in that quarter. Nor was she disappointed.

Elizabeth recognized the small maid's failings as a student, and was much provoked at Miss Peyton's want of understanding, but very wisely kept these sentiments to herself, and set about to help Peace in her difficult task. At her suggestion, the young elocutionist waited until the following morning before beginning her study of the new lines, and with the teacher's copied words in her hand, went out to the hammock under the trees to be alone with her work. There she sat swinging violently to and fro, gabbling the stanzas line by line, while she ferociously jerked the short curls on her forehead and frowned so fiercely that Elizabeth, busy with her Saturday baking, could not resist smiling whenever she chanced to pass the door, through which she could see the familiar figure.

Slower and slower the red lips moved, lower and lower the hammock swung, and finally with a gesture of utter despair, Peace cast the paper from her, and dropped her head dejectedly into her hands.

"Poor youngster," murmured the flushed cook from the window where she sat picking over berries. "John, have you a minute to spare? Peace is in trouble—Oh, nothing but that new poem, but I thought perhaps you might invent some easy way for her to memorize it. You were always good at such things, and I can't stop until my cake is out of the oven and the pies are made."

He assented promptly, and strolling out of the door as if for a breath of fresh air, wandered across the grass to the motionless figure in the hammock. "What seems to be the matter, chick?" he inquired cheerfully, rescuing the discarded paper from the dirt and handing it back to its owner.

"Oh, Saint John, this is a perfectly dreadful poem! I don't b'lieve Longfellow ever wrote it, and even if he did, I know I can never learn it. The verses haven't any sense at all. Just listen to this!" She seized the sheet with an angry little flirt, and read to the amazed man:

With difficulty the preacher controlled his desire to shout, and mutely held out his hand for the paper, which he studied long and carefully, for even to his experienced eyes, the hastily scribbled words were hard to decipher. But when he had finished, all he said was, "You have misread the lines, Peace. Wait and I will get you the book from the library. Then you will see your mistake."

Shaking with suppressed mirth he went back to his study, found the volume in question, and returned to the discouraged student with it open in his hands. Half-heartedly Peace reached up for it, but he shook his head, knowing how easy it was for her to misread even printed words and what ludicrous blunders it often led to, and gravely suggested, "Suppose I read it to you first. Then if there is anything you do not understand, perhaps I can explain it so it will be easier to memorize."

"Oh, if you just would!" Peace exclaimed gratefully. "I never could read Miss Peyton's writing, and then she marks me down for her own mistakes."

So in sonorous tones, the preacher read the poet's beautiful tribute to childhood:

"Well," breathed Peace in evident relief, as he lingeringly repeated the last stanza, "that sounds a little more like it. Maybe with that book I can learn her old poem now."

"Those are beautiful verses, Peace," he rebuked her.

"Yes, I 'xpect they are. I haven't got any grudge against the verses, but it takes a beautifully long time for me to learn anything like that, too." She seized the fat volume with both hands, tipped back among the hammock cushions, and with her feet swinging idly back and forth, began an animated study of the right version of the words, while the minister strolled back to the house to enjoy the joke with Elizabeth.

But though Peace studied industriously and faithfully during the remaining days, she could not seem to master the lines in spite of all the minister's coaching, and in spite of Miss Peyton's struggle with her after school each day.

"There is no sense in making such hard work of a simple little poem like that," declared the teacher, closing her lips in a straight line and looking very much exasperated after an hour's battle with the child Tuesday afternoon. "You have just made up your mind that you will learn it, and that is where the whole trouble lies."

"That's where you are mistaken," sobbed Peace forlornly, though her eyes flashed with indignation as she wiped away her tears. "It's you which has got her mind made up, and you and me ain't the same people. I just can't seem to make those words stick, and I might as well give up trying right now."

"You will have that poem perfectly learned tomorrow afternoon, or I shall know the reason why."

"Then I 'xpect you'll have to know the reason why," gulped the unhappy little scholar, who found the hill of knowledge very steep to climb. "You can't make a frog fly if you tried all your life. It takes me a month to learn as big a poem as that, and you never gave it to me until Friday afternoon."

"Nine four-line stanzas!" snapped the weary instructor, privately thinking Peace the greatest, trial she had ever had to endure.

"It might as well be ninety," sighed the child. "If Elizabeth was my teacher, or the Lilac Lady, I could get it in no time, but I never could learn anything for some people. Just the sight of them knocks everything I know clean out of my head."

Longfellow slammed shut with a terrific bang, and Miss Peyton rose from her chair, choking with indignation. "You may go now, Peace Greenfield," she said icily, "but that poem must be perfect by tomorrow afternoon, remember."

So with a heavy heart Peace trudged home and took up her struggle once more in the hammock; but was at last rewarded by being able to say every line perfectly and without much hesitation. Elizabeth and her spouse both heard her repeat it many times that evening and again the next morning, and sent her on her way rejoicing to think the task was conquered.

But when it came to the afternoon's rehearsal, poor Peace could only stare at the ceiling, and open and shut her lips in agony, waiting for the words which would not come, while Miss Peyton impatiently tapped the floor with her slippered toe and frowned angrily at the miserable figure. Finally Peace blurted out, "P'raps if you'd go out of the room, I could say it all right."

"You will say it all right with me in the room!" retorted the woman grimly.

"Then s'posing you look out of the window and quit staring so hard at me. All I can think of is that scowl, and it doesn't help a bit."

The dazed teacher shifted her gaze, and Peace slowly began, "'Come to me, O ye children!'" speaking very distinctly and with more expression than Miss Peyton had thought possible.

"There!" exclaimed the woman, much mollified, when the child had finished. "I knew you could say it if you wanted to. Now try it again."

So with the teacher staring out of the window, and Peace gazing at the ceiling, the poem was recited without a flaw six times in succession, and she was finally excused to put in some more practice at home.

Elizabeth thought the day was won, but poor Peace took little comfort in the knowledge that she had acquitted herself creditably at the last rehearsal. "It would be different if that was tomorrow afternoon," she sighed. "But I just know she'll look at me when I get up to speak, and with her eyes boring holes through me, I'll be sure to forget some part of it. None of my other teachers were like her a bit. Miss Truesdale and Miss Olney and Miss Allen all liked children; but I don't b'lieve Miss Peyton does. There's lots of the scholars that she ain't going to let pass, and the only reason they didn't have better lessons is 'cause she scares it out of 'em. Oh, dear, school is such a funny thing!"

"Would you like to have me come to visit you tomorrow?" suggested Elizabeth, who dreaded the ordeal almost as much as did Peace.

"No, you needn't mind. S'posing I should make a frizzle of everything, you'd feel just terribly, I know, and I should, too. I guess it will be bad enough with all the other mothers there. But I wish there wasn't going to be any exercises. I'm sick of 'em already. And what do you think now! She told us only this afternoon that we must all have an antidote for some of the Presidents to tell tomorrow for General Lesson."

"A what!"

"An antidote. A short story about some of the Presidents of the United States."

"You mean anecdote, child. I didn't suppose you were old enough to be studying history in your room."

"Oh, this ain't hist'ry! We have a calendar each month telling what big men or women were born and why. Then teacher tells us something about their lives. Lots of 'em are very int'resting, but I can't remember which were Presidents and which were only manner-fracturers. That's my trouble."

"Well, it just happens that I can help you out there, my girlie," smiled Elizabeth, smoothing the damp curls back from the flushed cheeks. "John has a book in his library of just such things as that. We'll get it and hunt up some nice, new stories that aren't hoary with age."

The volume was quickly found, and several quaint anecdotes were selected for the next day's program, so if by chance other pupils had come prepared with some of them, there would be still others for Peace to choose from. And when school-time came the next day, she departed almost happily, with the Presidential book tucked under one arm and the well-fingered Longfellow under the other; for she meant to make sure that the words were fresh in her mind before her turn came to recite.

The session began very auspiciously with some happy songs, and Peace's spirits rose. Then came the drawing lesson. Peace was no more of an artist than she was an elocutionist, but she tried hard, and was working away industriously trying to paint the group of grape leaves Miss Peyton had arranged on her desk, when one of the little visitors slipped from his seat in his mother's lap and wandered across the room to his sister's desk, which chanced to be directly in front of Peace; so he could easily see what she was doing. He watched her in silence a moment, and then demanded in a stage whisper, "What you d'awing?"

"Grape leaves," Peace stopped chewing her tongue long enough to answer.

"No, they ain't neither. They's piggies."

The brown head was quickly raised from her task, and the would-be artist studied her work critically. The boy was right. They did look somewhat like a litter of curly-tailed pigs. All they needed were eyes and pointed ears. Mechanically Peace added these little touches, made the snouts a little sharper, drew in two or three legs to make them complete, and sat back in her seat to admire the result of her work.

"Ah," simpered Miss Peyton, who had chanced to look up just that minute, "Peace has finished her sketch. Bring it to the desk, please, so we may all criticize it."

Peace had just dipped her brush into the hollow of her cake of red paint, intending to make the piggies' noses pink, but at this startling command from the teacher, she seemed suddenly turned to an icicle. What could she do? She glanced around her in an agony of despair, saw no loophole of escape, and gathering up the unlucky sketch, she stumbled up the aisle to the desk, still holding her scarlet-tipped paint brush in her hand.

Usually Miss Peyton examined the drawings herself before calling upon the scholars to criticise; but this was the last day of school, and the program was long; so she smiled her prettiest, and said sweetly, "Hold it up for inspection, Peace."

Miserably Peace faced the roomful of scholars and parents, and extended the drawing with a trembling hand. There was an ominous hush, and then the whole audience broke into a yell of laughter. Miss Peyton's face flushed scarlet, and holding out her hand she said sharply, "Give it to me."

Peace wheeled about and dropped the sheet of pigs upon the desk, but at that unfortunate moment, the paint-brush slipped from her grasp and spilled a great, scarlet blot on the teacher's fresh white waist. Dismayed, Peace could only stare at the ruin she had wrought, having forgotten all about her drawing in wondering what punishment would follow this second calamity; and Miss Peyton had to speak twice before she came to her senses enough to know that she was being ordered to her seat.

"Oh," she gasped in mingled surprise and relief, "lemon juice and salt will take that stain out, if it won't fade away with just washing."

Again an audible titter ran around the room, and the teacher, furiously red, repeated for the third time, "Take your seat, Peace Greenfield!"

Much mortified and confused, the child subsided in her place and tried to hide her burning cheeks behind the covers of her volume of anecdotes, but fate seemed against her, for Miss Peyton promptly ordered the paint boxes put away, the desks cleared, and the scholars to be prepared to tell the stories they had found. Now it happened that generous-hearted Peace had lent her book of Presidential reminiscences to several of her less lucky mates that noon, and as she was one of the last to be called upon, she listened with dismay as one after another of the tales she had taken so much pains to learn were repeated by other scholars.

In order that all might hear what was said, each pupil marched to the front of the room, told his little story and returned noiselessly to his seat; so when it came Peace's turn, she stalked bravely up the aisle, faced the throng of scared, perspiring children and beaming mothers, made a profound bow, and said, "George Washington was pock-marked."

She was well on her way to her seat again, when Miss Peyton's crisp tones halted her: "Peace, you surely have something more than that. Have you forgotten?"

"No, ma'am. I lent my stories to the rest of the scholars this noon and they have already spoke all I knew, 'xcept those that are hairy with age. Everyone knows that George Washington was bled to death by over-jealous doctors."

The harder Peace tried to do her best, the more blundering she became; and now, feeling that the visitors were having great fun at her expense, she sank into her seat and buried her face in her arms, swallowing hard to keep back the tears that stung her eyes.

Directly, she heard Patty Fellows reciting, "The Psalm of Life," and Sara Gray answer to her name with, "The Castle-Builder." Next, the children sang another song, and then—horror of horrors!—Miss Peyton called her name. It was too bad! Any other teacher would have excused her, but she knew Miss Peyton never would. So with a final gulp, she struggled to her feet and advanced once more to the platform.

Her heart beat like a trip-hammer, her breath came in gasps, and her mind seemed an utter blank. "'Come to me,'" prompted the teacher, perceiving for the first time the child's panic and distress; but Peace did not understand that this was her cue, and with a despairing glance at the immovable face behind the desk, she cried hastily, "Oh, not this time! I've thunk of it now. Here goes!

Verse after verse she repeated glibly, racing so rapidly that the words fairly tumbled out of her mouth. Suddenly the dreadful thought came to her. She had begun the wrong poem! Her voice faltered; she turned pleading, glassy eyes toward the teacher; and Miss Peyton, misunderstanding the cause of her hesitation, again prompted, "'They climb—'"

Peace was hopelessly lost.

She recited in feverish tones:

Someone tittered; the ripple of mirth broke into a peal of laughter; and with a despairing sob, Peace cried, "Oh, teacher, I've got the stage-strike! I can't say another word!" And out of the room she rushed like a wounded bird.

Usually Elizabeth was her comforter, but this day some blind instinct led her to take refuge in the Enchanted Garden, and she sobbed out her sorrow and humiliation in the skirts of her beloved Lilac Lady.

Peace in tears was a new sight for the invalid, and she was alarmed at the wild tempest of grief. But the small philosopher could not be unhappy long, and after a few moments the tears ceased, the storm was spent, a flushed, swollen face peeped up at the anxious eyes above her, and with a familiar, queer little grimace, she giggled, "I made 'em all laugh, anyway, and they did look awful solemn and funerally lined up there against the wall. But I s'pose teacher won't let me pass now, and I'll have to take this term all over again."

"Tell me about it," said the lame girl gently, stroking the damp curls on the round, brown head in her lap.

So Peace faithfully recounted the day's events to the amusement and indignation of her lone audience; but when she had finished, she sighed dolefully. "The worst of it is, I've got to go back to school tomorrow for my books and dismissal card. Oh, mercy, yes! And Miss Peyton has got my Longfellow. I don't b'lieve I can ever ask her for it, even if it is Saint John's."

"Oh, yes, you can," assured the Lilac Lady. "By the time tomorrow comes, the teacher will have forgotten all about the mistakes of today."

"It's very plain that you don't know Miss Peyton," was the disconcerting reply. "There's nothing she ever forgets. My one comfort is I won't have to go to school to her next year even if she doesn't let me pass now, 'cause by that time the girls will all be well and I can go home again. There's always a grain of comfort in every bit of trouble, grandma says."

"Sca-atter sunshine, all along the wa-ay," sang the lame girl, surprised out of her long silence in her anxiety to cajole her little playmate into her happy self again; but Peace did not even hear the rich sweetness of the voice, so surprised was she to have her motto turned upon her in that manner, and for a few moments she sat so lost in thought that the lame girl feared she had offended her, and was about to beg her forgiveness when the round face lifted itself again, and Peace exclaimed, "That's what I'll do! Tomorrow, when I have to go back for my card, I'll offer to kiss her good-bye, and I'll tell her I'm sorry I've been such a bother to her all these weeks. I never thought about it before, but I s'pose she's just been in ag-o-ny over having me upset all her plans like I've managed to do, though I never meant to. The worse I try to follow what she tells us to do, the bigger chase I lead her. My, what a time she must have had! Do you think she she'd like to hear I'm sorry?"

"What a darling you are!" thought the lame girl. "I don't wonder everyone loves you so much." But aloud she merely answered heartily, "I think it is a beautiful plan, dear. When she understands that you have tried your best to please her, I am sure she will be kind to my little curly-head."

So it happened that when Peace received her dismissal card from Miss Peyton the next morning, she lifted her rosy mouth for a kiss, and murmured contritely, "I'm very sorry you have caused me so much bother since I came here to school, but next term I won't be here, for which you bet I'm thankful." She had rehearsed that little speech over and over on her way to school; but, as usual, when she came to say it to this argus-eyed teacher, she juggled her pronouns so thoroughly that no one could have been sure just what she did mean.

However, Miss Peyton had done some hard thinking since the previous afternoon, and a little glimmer of understanding was beginning to penetrate her methodical, order-loving soul, so she stooped and kissed the forgiving lips raised to hers, as she said heartily, "That is all right, my child. I wish I could erase all the troubles that have marred these days for you. I am sorry I did not know as much three months ago as I do now."

"I am, too, but folks are never too old to learn, grandpa says," Peace answered happily, and departed with beaming countenance, for Miss Peyton had "passed her" after all.