Free Daddy-Long-Legs and Dear Enemy by Jean Webster Page A

twenty feet in the air and bit the dust.” That is the subject of the frontispiece. Aren’t Judy and Jervie having fun?
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    September 15th.
    Dear Daddy,
    I was weighed yesterday on the flour scales in the general store at the Corners. I’ve gained nine pounds! Let me recommend Lock Willow as a health resort.
    Yours ever,
JUDY.

    September 25th.
    Dear Daddy-Long-Legs,
    Behold me—a Sophomore! I came up last Friday, sorry to leave Lock Willow, but glad to see the campus again. It is a pleasant sensation to come back to something familiar. I am beginning to feel at home in college, and in command of the situation; I am beginning, in fact, to feel at home in the world—as though I really belonged in it and had not just crept in on sufferance.
    I don’t suppose you understand in the least what I am trying to say. A person important enough to be a Trustee can’t appreciate the feelings of a person unimportant enough to be a foundling.
    And now, Daddy, listen to this. Whom do you think I am rooming with? Sallie McBride and Julia Rutledge Pendleton. It’s the truth. We have a study and three little bedrooms— voila!

    Sallie and I decided last spring that we should like to room together, and Julia made up her mind to stay with Sallie—why, I can’t imagine, for they are not a bit alike; but the Pendletons are naturally conservative and inimical (fine word!) to change. Anyway, here we are. Think of Jerusha Abbott, late of the John Grier Home for Orphans, rooming with a Pendleton. This is a democratic country.
    Sallie is running for class president, and unless all signs fails, she is going to be elected. Such an atmosphere of intrigue—you should see what politicians we are! Oh, I tell you, Daddy, when we women get our rights, you men will have to look alive in order to keep yours. Election comes next Saturday, and we’re going to have a torchlight procession in the evening, no matter who wins.
    I am beginning chemistry, a most unusual study. I’ve never seen anything like it before. Molecules and Atoms are the material employed, but I’ll be in a position to discuss them more definitely next month.
    I am also taking argumentation and logic.
    Also history of the whole world.
    Also plays of William Shakespeare. 36
    Also French.
    If this keeps up many years longer, I shall become quite intelligent.
    I should rather have elected economics than French, but I didn’t dare, because I was afraid that unless I reëlected French, the Professor would not let me pass—as it was, I just managed to squeeze through the June examination. But I will say that my high-school preparation was not very adequate.
    There’s one girl in the class who chatters away in French as fast as she does in English. She went abroad with her parents when she was a child, and spent three years in a convent school. You can imagine how bright she is compared with the rest of us—irregular verbs are mere playthings. I wish my parents had chucked me into a French convent when I was little instead of a foundling asylum. Oh, no, I don’t either! Because then maybe I should never have known you. I’d rather know you than French.
    Good-by, Daddy. I must call on Harriet Martin now, and, having discussed the chemical situation, casually drop a few thoughts on the subject of our next president.
    Yours in politics,
J. ABBOTT.
    October 17th.
    Dear Daddy-Long-Legs,
    Supposing the swimming tank in the gymnasium were filled full of lemon jelly, could a person trying to swim manage to keep on top or would he sink?
    We were having lemon jelly for dessert when the question came up. We discussed it heatedly for half an hour and it’s still unsettled. Sallie thinks that she could swim in it, but I am perfectly sure that the best swimmer in the world would sink. Wouldn’t it be funny to be drowned in lemon jelly?
    Two other problems are engaging the attention of our table. IST. What shape are