My new home is in a building on Union Square. And I like it--the place,
the people, the glimpse of the wintry Square, the roaring city life under
my window. I'm sure I don't want a quiet room. It's such fun, just like
playing house, to be by ourselves and independent of all the world. I
think it's an intoxicating thing, just at first, for a girl to be really
independent. Boys think nothing of it; it's what they've been brought up
to expect.

Well, I tore myself away from the dear place to get at my work. I really
mean to work hard and justify Father's sacrifices. I tried to take singing
lessons, because John is so fond of music, but there I made a dismal
failure; I had, three months ago, neither ear nor voice. The day before
the fall semester opened, I climbed the long hill to Barnard College, fell
in love with its gleaming white and gold, so different from the State
University, and arranged for a course in biology. Then I began physical
culture in a gymnasium.

I couldn't have made a queerer or a better combination. For it was in the
Barnard laboratory that I met Prof. Darmstetter; and it was my bearing, my
unending practice of the West Point setting-up drill, my Delsarte, my
"harmonic poise" and evident health that drew his attention to me.

How well I remember the day I made his acquaintance! I had entered the
laboratory without knowing what manner of man he was, for all my
arrangements about my course had been made with clerks. So it was with
genuine surprise that I turned from an inspection of the apparatus to
answer when a squeaking voice at my elbow suddenly saluted me:--

"Mees Veenship, not so?"