"  Now  choose  you  East,  now  choose  you  West,
Now  choose  the  one  you  love  the  best  1 "

Tom  Peters,  in  a  velvet  suit  and  consequently  very  miser-
able, refused  to  embrace  Ethel  Hollister ;  while  the  scornful
Julia  lurked  in  a  corner :  nothing  would  induce  her  to  enter
such  a  foolish  game.  I  experienced  a  novel  discomfiture
when  Ralph  kissed  Nancy.  .  .  .  Afterwards  came  the  feast,
from  which  Ham  Durrett,  in  a  pink  paper  cap  with  streamers,
was  at  length  forcibly  removed  by  his  mother.  Thus  early
did  he  betray  his  love  for  the  flesh  pots.  .  ..
It  was  not  until  I  was  sixteen  that  a  player  came  and
touched  the  keys  of  my  soul,  and  it  awoke,  bewildered,  at
these  first  tender  notes.  The  music  quickened,  tripping
in  ecstasy,  to  change  by  subtle  phrases  into  themes  of  ex-
quisite suffering  hitherto  unexperienced.  I  knew  that  I
loved  Nancy.
With  the  advent  of  longer  dresses  that  reached  to  her  shoe
tops  a  change  had  come  over  her.  The  tomboy,  the  willing
camp-follower  who  loved  me  and  was  unashamed,  were
gone  forever,  and  a  mysterious,  transfigured  being,  neither
girl  nor  woman,  had  magically  been  evolved.  Could  it
be  possible  that  she  loved  me  still?  My  complacency  had
vanished;  suddenly  I  had  become  the  aggressor,  if  only  I
had  known  how  to  "aggress";  but  in  her  presence  I  was
seized  by  an  accursed  shyness  that  paralyzed  my  tongue,
and  the  things  I  had  planned  to  say  were  left  unuttered.
It  was  something  —  though  I  did  not  realize  it  —  to  be  able
to  feel  like  that.
