In the height of the cherry season Mrs. Clavering always gave a cherry feast.  It was the event of the entire year, and the girls looked forward to it, making all their arrangements in connection with it, counting the hours until it arrived, and looking upon it as the great feature of their school year.  Everything turned on whether the cherries were good and the weather fine.  There was no greater stimulus to hard work than the merest mention of this golden day, which came as a rule towards the end of June and just before the summer vacation. For Cherry Court School was old-fashioned according to our modern ideas, and one of its old-fashioned plans was to give holidays at the end of June instead of the end of July, so that the girls had the longest, finest days at home, and came back to work at the end of August refreshed and strengthened, and prepared for a good long tug at lessons of all sorts until Christmas.