"OH, MISTRESS MINE, WHERE ART THOU ROAMING ?" "Lavina! Have done!" It was a whispered entreaty.

The victim of the feather of a quill pen tickling her neck dared not raise her voice.

Miss Pinwell, the proprietress of the extremely genteel seminary for young ladies, Queen Square--quite an aristocratic retreat some two hundred years ago--was pacing the school-room.

Her cold, sharp eyes roamed over the shapely heads--black, golden, brown, auburn, flaxen--of some thirty girls--eager to detect any sign of levity and prompt to inflict summary punishment.
"Miss Fenton, why are you not working ?" came the inquiry sharply from Miss Pinwell's thin lips.
Lavinia Fenton withdrew the instrument of torture and Priscilla Coupland's neck was left in peace.

It was done so swiftly that Miss Pinwell's glance, keen as it was, never detected the movement.