" Yes, it was in her. There, undreamed of by
those who saw her drifting. The drifting girl has within her all the
possibilities. That is the pity of it. As she drifts she may lose oars,
chart and compass and in the stress of the storm that is bound to come
be carried out into the sea of darkness, or be wrecked upon the shoals
or sandbars that line the stream of life.
A wise teacher, awakened parents, a good friend, a live church, a great
book, these have the opportunity of pulling the girl out of the current,
and steadying her until she fastens her life to the Ideal which can hold
her.
I can see now the plain, dreamy face and great black eyes of the girl of
whom parents and relatives said as they looked at her, "What will she
ever amount to?" Their faces betrayed their own conviction that she
would amount to nothing. She tried piano but concluded that the training
necessary to make her a teacher would take too long and took up
stenography. After a few weeks she decided that she was unfitted for the
work and would rather be a nurse. Some weeks were spent at home just
thinking about it, then she began her training. At the end of the period
of probation she left--she knew she could never be a nurse. She spent
the days reading, sewing a little, taking pictures in the woods and
along the shore near her home and tinting them.
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