until we had won honors."

"I don't care," said Gladys, "I'm going to decorate mine. I
won't be the only plain one. Miss Kent," she called, as their
guardian passed by with an armful of firewood, "I may put these
beads on my ceremonial costume, mayn't I?"

Nyoda dumped her burden on the ground and came over to the girls.
"Of course you may if you want to," she said genially. "It's your
dress. But do you want to? What does the ceremonial dress mean
to you? Is it only a sort of masquerade costume to be decorated
up just anyhow to make it look fantastic, or is it a record of
achievements, written in a language that only Camp Fire Girls
understand? Just think what it means to sit in a circle of girls
and be able to tell by their costumes what kind of things they
have done! We'll pretend that a Guardian from another group has
come to look on at our ceremonial. The first one she happens to
see is myself. She looks at my costume, sees the Guardian's
symbol on the back and the border of small symbols around the
bottom. She counts them; there are seven. She says to herself,
'She is the Guardian and there are seven girls in her group.'
She then sees Migwan's costume with the four Wakan honors for
Written Thought. She knows that Migwan has literary ability and
that her symbol is the Quill Pen, because there is a quill sewn
to the front of her dress and feathers are never used for
decoration except in case of a personal symbol. She knows that
Migwan had to work hard for her Wakan honors because above the
first one there are two Shuta buttons and a Keda, showing that
her first efforts won only third and second class honors, but she
persevered until she reached the first class. She knows Sahwah