younger girls.

"I don't know what she meant," said Sylvia as, with Grace on one side
and Flora on the other, they started toward home.

"She is just hateful," declared Grace. "I wish I had not asked Miss
Rosalie about the forts. But I did want to know. It would be dreadful
not to see them where they have always been."

"Oh, Grace! You didn't think they were going to move the forts to
Washington, did you?" laughed Flora. "I know better than that. Taking
the forts means that the Government of the United States would own them
instead of South Carolina."

Grace laughed good-naturedly. She was always as ready to laugh at her
own mistakes as at those of others; and in the year that Sylvia had
known her she had never seen Grace vexed or angry.

Both Grace and Flora advised Sylvia not to tell her mother of Elinor's
unkindness, or of her taunting words. But it was rather difficult for
Sylvia to keep a secret from her mother.

"You see, it will make your mother sorry, and she will fret about it,"
Flora had said; and at this Sylvia had decided that no matter what
happened at school she would not tell her mother about it. She almost
dreaded seeing Elinor again, and wondered why Elinor's mother had not
wanted Miss Patten to take her as a pupil.

Mr. and Mrs. Fulton were surprised when at supper time Sylvia demanded
to know what a "Yankee" was. She thought her mother looked a little