The evening Argus. [volume] (Rock Island, Ill.) 1861-1871, 1866-03-07
The School Girl.

80 you THINK TINS letter WIZ 90
Certainly"
''Now isn't 1t silly Z"
mo, not at all.
Most certainly. Now give me the letter.
there, sealed with the white wax and with
the satin paper, it looks quite aristocratio.-
| will put a stamp on 1t, and then put IL my
self in the post-ofhce."
50 spoke Adele Jones, a day scholar in the
great grand French school OF Nine. Nor
VILE, addressing herself to Mary Somers.
boarder in the same establishment Adele
and Mary were intimate trisnds-such friends
as school girls are at the giddy age when
they DO not even know the meaning OF the
word, and think 1t means pleasant indulg
ence for each others faults aud caprices.
Adele was this very day giving her friend
Mary Somers what she called proof Of
friendship: she was conveying letter to u
young aud favorite singer, whom the girls
hai both heard at recent concert, and with
whom Mary had fallen what she called des-
perately in love.
Be it known to all who have daughters at
these grand boarding schools, that the day
scholars are always medium of oommuni-
cation with the outward world, whether for
unwholesome sweatmeats or dangerous
sweethearts. Mary Somers had no secrets
| from Adele. At the concert they had eat
| side by side, and together had discussed the
| lovely eyes, and. sweet moustache. and the
melting voice of the young tenor, who used to
| homage from girls as foolish as themselves.
| scarcely vouchsafed to cast glance on them;
but of course these girls, utterly ignorant OF
the world, judged this man by themselves,
| and imagined he would be delighted to know
| that the lovely, young, and romantic Mary
| Somers, was in love with him.
! Putting their two wild heads together next
| day during the time of the recess, the girls
had come TO the decision the only way was tC
write love letter, which, accordingly, had
been concocted, written, signed and sealed
Of course, being the time of tue recess, wher
no lessons are going on, 1T was nobody's bus
mess to see what the girls we're about.
Now Adele Jones was a girl OF peculiar
cunning and of much worldly wisdom. HeI
father was only book keeper in the large
wholesale dry goods store OF the rich Mr.
| Soners, Mary's father; and her mother wal
a poor, vain, sickly creature, whose beauty
and iaunty manners had, in an evil hour
when he was twenty, and she sixteen, temp
ted honest, Woodworking John Jones t.
make her his wife.
Her beauty had long since gone. hel
health, too, and with both of these the temper
1 that makes amends for youth, health and
beauty.
She seemed to have but two objects in lif,
one was that of complaining constantly to
John of his want of means to indulge hel
taste in fnery and luxury, the other was Il
try by every means in her power to rival il
dress and appearance the rich Mrs. Somert
and her daughter.
OF course this was impossible, and o.
course it led to all sorts of meanness, and al
sorts of deceit, and all sorts of annoyanoe'
to John but the worst of all was that 1t lee
} TO making Adele her mothers CON
fdante of little receptions she practiced OF
him to obtain few dollars; it led 10 bel
daughters plotting and banning with her
and inventing schemes of her own. The
carelessness and neglect of the teachers a
: school. completed this education of evil. Il
was Adele who had planned her going to tn.
same school as Mary Somers it was Adel,
who had planned the friendship which united
the two girls apparently, but which, ON on,
side was but calculation and deceit.