I am trying to give the impression that I behaved with at least outward modesty during my schoolgirl triumphs, whereas Lizzie could testify that she knew Mary Antin as a vain boastful, curly-headed little Jew.

For I had a special style of deportment for Lizzie.

If there was any girl in the school besides me who could keep near the top of the class all the year through, and give bright answers when the principal or the school committee popped sudden questions, and write rhymes that almost always rhymed, _I_ was determined that that ambitious person should not soar unduly in her own estimation.

So I took care to show Lizzie all my poetry, and when she showed me hers I did not admire it too warmly.

Lizzie, as I have already said, was in a Sunday-school mood even on week days; her verses all had morals.