“Oh, buck up, you sillies!” said Marjorie Kemp, to the tearful plaints of Agatha James and Irene Mills.  “Vaccination doesn’t hurt!  It’s nothing but a scratch.  You might be going to have your arms cut off.  For goodness’ sake show some pluck!  Suppose you were in the trenches?  The Camp will be just topping.  We’ll have the time of our lives!”

“If we don’t break out in spots!” wailed Irene.

“Well, wait till you do before you make a fuss.  You’re far more likely to catch a thing if you’re afraid of it.”

“Oh, I say!” said Winona, suddenly remembering Saturday’s event.  “The match to-morrow will be all off!”

“Hold me up!  So it will!  What a grizzly nuisance!  Oh, the hard luck of it!”

“Well, it can’t be helped!  We must play the Sixth later on.”

“Kirsty’ll be as savage as we are!”

“Poor old Joyce, she’s responsible for a good deal of damage!”

The rest of the day passed in an extraordinary fashion.  V.a. had the whole of the school premises absolutely and entirely to itself.  The Fourth Form room was turned into a temporary surgery, and Dr. Barnes installed himself there with tubes of vaccine and packets of new darning needles.  Each girl in turn went first to Miss Bishop and had her arm thoroughly sterilized with boiled water and boracic lotion, and was then passed on to the medical officer for vaccination.  The scratch with the needle really did not hurt, and the little operations were soon over.  Sixteen maidens walking about waiting for their arms to dry before re-donning their blouses made a rather comical sight.  The giggles that ensued raised the spirits of even Agatha and Irene.

“Glad it was done on our left arms!  I expect we sha’n’t be in much form for cricket after this, unless we play one-handed!” laughed Winona.  “By the by, will there be any field we can practice on out at the camp?”

“I expect so,” returned Miss Huntley.  “You had better make a collection of bats, balls and stumps and a few tennis rackets, and also your school books.  Put them all together, and Miss Bishop will have them sent to us.”

The girls hastened to sort out the necessary impedimenta for cricket and tennis, but arranged piles of books with less enthusiasm, the general opinion being that it was rather stiff to be expected to do work at the Camp.  They were each allowed to take a book from the school library, and Miss Huntley added a pile of foolscap paper, pens and a big bottle of ink, which the girls devoutly hoped might get broken on the way and thus save them the labor of writing exercises.  They had dinner and a four o’clock tea at school, after which meal Miss Bishop, who seemed to have spent most of the day at the telephone, announced that arrangements were now completed, and that they must get ready to start.  Great was the excitement when at five o’clock a motor char-a-banc made its appearance.  The sixteen “contacts” and Miss Huntley took their places, their hand-bags, which had been sent from their respective homes during the course of the day, were stowed away with the rest of their luggage inside a motor ’bus, and the company, feeling much more like a picnic party than possibly infected cases, drove merrily away for their period of quarantine.