Surprise

When they heard the horrible clatter that came from the ground floor, the schoolgirls shivered in their beds. When it continued, like the uproar that might herald the approach of some terrible invasion, they left their beds and crept to the head of the stairs. Below them, they saw a Roman scene. A lady somewhat their senior, in a nightgown, indiscreet and hilarious, bade them come down to a feast which she had made ready.

The lady in the nightgown was Miss Clara B. Spence, the principal of the Spence School, where the frightened girls were boarders. There was a reason for her mad, midnight revelling. She had caught her pupils having surreptitious feasts in their cubicles. She wished to show them that she, their principal, could give much better feasts than they could. Then, Miss Spence was certain, they would break her rules no more. That wise, surprising and effective banquet occurred many years ago, in the winter of 1898.

It was with such sure tactics that Miss Spence made her school the Manhattan model for discipline and scholarship as well as for what was then referred to as gentility. Her gayety, her wisdom, and her lofty character came to be reflected in the school she ran so long. When she died in 1923, Miss Charlotte S. Baker became the principal, aided by two assistants, Miss Helen Clarkson Miller and Miss Grace A. McElroy. Miss Miller made an announcement last week which surprised Spence girls more than any Spence girls have ever been surprised since the night of that banquet, long ago.

The announcement said that Miss Spence's school would cease to be a private enterprise; it would be endowed; four of the trustees would be Spence "old girls"; the new school building (to replace the present one on 55th street which replaced the original one on 48th street) will overlook the garden of Mrs. Andrew Carnegie on 91st street. It will house 300 day pupils and 60 pupils from far away. Classes will continue to be limited to eight members. Each pupil will still study ten or more subjects every year, in the famed Spence tradition of "varied curriculum."