By giving a command, by
bestowing a few moments of her conversation, it was within her power to
make some small adoring girl absurdly happy for the rest of the day;
while her displeasure would result in tears, in fawning pleadings for
forgiveness. The homage did not spoil her. Rather it helped to develop
her. She accepted it from the beginning as in the order of things. Power
had been given to her. It was her duty to see to it that she did not use
it capriciously, for her own gratification. No conscientious youthful
queen could have been more careful in the distribution of her
favours--that they should be for the encouragement of the deserving, the
reward of virtue; more sparing of her frowns, reserving them for the
rectification of error.
At Girton it was more by force of will, of brain, that she had to make
her position. There was more competition. Joan welcomed it, as giving
more zest to life. But even there her beauty was by no means a
negligible quantity. Clever, brilliant young women, accustomed to sweep
aside all opposition with a blaze of rhetoric, found themselves to their
irritation sitting in front of her silent, not so much listening to her
as looking at her.
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