THE STANDARD AT WELLESLEY.

THE eyes of any one who wanders by the banks of Lake Waban cannot fail to be attracted by the towers of Wellesley College. Mine were, when, after a rather unsuccessful afternoon's sport in the pretty pond, - whose waters were stocked with black bass at about the same time that its shores were stocked with pretty girls - I walked along its wooded banks.

I was thinking partly of my ill-luck with the bass, - a fish which is, as every sportsman knows, as "uncertain, coy, and hard to please" as woman is, or is said to be, - and partly of the college whose towers rose above the trees before me. I was casting a pretty mystery about its sweet girl graduates, and wondering whether their ways of life and methods of thought were like ours, and whether - still more important - they were good-looking or not.

I had often seen them at a distance, but it had never been my good fortune to know one personally. As I walked along absorbed in speculations upon the probable characteristics of these maiden collegians, I was startled by a slight cough, and upon looking up I found myself in the immediate presence of a very young and pretty girl, who was sitting reading, or pretending to read, at the foot of a large maple-tree whose branches overhung the water. Being a Boston man, my first impulse was to beg pardon for my unintentional intrusion, and beat a hasty retreat; but, upon perceiving my intention, the maiden, somewhat to my surprise, remarked, with more amiability than grammatical accuracy, "Wal, you ain't a-going, are you? Do I look dangerous?" Here was a nice opening for a pretty speech; but as I did not think it quite good taste to make a pretty speech upon such short acquaintance, I merely remarked, "No, you don't "(for she certainly did not), and, throwing down my rod and basket, seated myself on the grass at her feet. After a rather painful silence of a few moments, during which she scanned my face with a somewhat naive curiosity, I rushed into the breach in the conversation with, "Are you at Wellesley College?" "Yes, I am," said she. "Guess you're a Harvard boy." I confessed to this accusation; but as I never carry an obtrusive crimson handkerchief, and do not dislocate my elbows in walking, I don't see how she knew. "Been a-fishin'?" was her next remark. I said I had, and, to make conversation, produced my bass. She examined them critically, and announced that though "mighty mean little ones, they were reel bass, - acanthopterygious fish, of the genus perca, so called from their dark color."

When I recovered from my astonishment at her display of ichthyological knowledge, I asked to see her book, at the same time remarking, "This is just the time and spot that one would choose to read a good novel. Are you fond of novels? But I suppose they are forbidden in the college." " Nothin's forbidden, 'cept young men," replied she; "and I don't take much stock in novels, anyhow. There ain't enough meat to 'em, - lot of girls and men that don't know anything, nor can't talk about anything 'cept each other and love; oh! awful stuff!"

I looked at the book she had given me, to change the conversation. Ye nymphs! It was "Plutarch's Lives" in the original Greek! She saw my astonishment, and said triumphantly, "Guess you must 'a' thought girls could n't read Greek. Oh, you college boys is awful silly! Why, I like that ever so much better than novels; but I don't believe you could read it a bit."

I knew I could n't, so I replied nothing, and she went on. "S'pose you can read French, or think you can. I like that too. Got a French book here that's jest lovely." "Let me see it," said I, hopefully. It was the "Confessions of Jean Jacques Rousseau"! I had had enough; I said I had an engagement to dinner, and left, while she called after me, "Come round again some afternoon, - I'm' most always here fine days, - and we might have a row on the lake." I accepted the invitation" with pleasure," and departed from Wellesley next day in a hurry.