Chapter XV - Page 2

it Violet Vale. Diana says she never saw the
beat of me for hitting on fancy names for places. It's nice to
be clever at something, isn't it? But Diana named the Birch
Path. She wanted to, so I let her; but I'm sure I could have
found something more poetical than plain Birch Path. Anybody can
think of a name like that. But the Birch Path is one of the
prettiest places in the world, Marilla."

It was. Other people besides Anne thought so when they stumbled
on it. It was a little narrow, twisting path, winding down over
a long hill straight through Mr. Bell's woods, where the light
came down sifted through so many emerald screens that it was as
flawless as the heart of a diamond. It was fringed in all its
length with slim young birches, white stemmed and lissom boughed;
ferns and starflowers and wild lilies-of-the-valley and scarlet
tufts of pigeonberries grew thickly along it; and always there
was a delightful spiciness in the air and music of bird calls and
the murmur and laugh of wood winds in the trees overhead. Now
and then you might see a rabbit skipping across the road if you
were quiet--which, with Anne and Diana, happened about once in a
blue moon. Down in the valley the path came out to the main road
and then it was just up the spruce hill to the school.

The Avonlea school was a whitewashed building, low in the eaves
and wide in the windows, furnished inside with comfortable
substantial old-fashioned desks that opened and shut, and were
carved all over their lids with the initials and hieroglyphics of
three generations of school children. The schoolhouse was set
back from the road and behind it was a dusky fir wood and a brook
where all the children put their bottles of milk in the morning
to keep cool and sweet until dinner hour.

Marilla had seen Anne start off to school on the first day of
September with many secret misgivings. Anne was such an odd girl.
How would she get on with the other children? And how on earth
would she ever manage to hold her tongue during school hours?

Things went better than Marilla feared, however. Anne came home
that evening in high spirits.

"I think I'm going to like school here," she announced. "I don't
think much of the master, through. He's all the time curling his
mustache and making eyes at Prissy Andrews. Prissy is grown up,
you know. She's sixteen and she's studying for the entrance
examination into Queen's Academy at Charlottetown next year.
Tillie Boulter says the master is DEAD GONE on her. She's got a
beautiful complexion and curly brown hair and she does it up so
elegantly. She sits in the long seat at the back and he sits
there, too, most of the time--to explain her lessons, he says.
But Ruby Gillis says she