It’s delightful to have ambitions.

Anne is busy preparing for her move to town, including having a fancy evening gown made up in case she’s invited out for a night on the town. But of course going to Queen’s also means saying goodbye to Matthew and Marilla.

“I just couldn’t help thinking of the little girl you used to be, Anne. And I was wishing you could have stayed a little girl, even with all your queer ways. You’ve grown up now and you’re going away; and you look so tall and stylish and so- so – different altogether in that dress – as if you didn’t belong in Avonlea at all – and I just got lonesome thinking it all over.”

[…] “I’m not a bit changed – not really. I’m only just pruned down and branched out. The real me – back here – is just the same. It won’t make a bit of difference where I go or how much I change outwardly; at heart I shall always be your little Anne, who will love you and Matthew and dear Green Gables more and better every day of her life.”

Matthew gets similarly emotional at the prospect of saying farewell, reminiscing on the circumstances that brought Anne to Green Gables.

“She’s been a blessing to us, and there never was a luckier mistake than what Mrs. Spencer made – if it was luck. I don’t believe it was any such thing. It was Providence, because the Almighty saw we needed her, I reckon.”

Anne is taking an accelerated course at Queen’s to become a teacher in only a year, but as a result, she isn’t taking classes with any of her friends – just a rival. But at least she looks forward to continuing her school rivalry with Gilbert, which should serve her well in the new environment.

But after class, she goes to her new residence at a boarding house and proceeds to get homesick.

“I can’t cheer up – I don’t want to cheer up. It’s nicer to be miserable.”

A good cry every now and again is fine, but she finally snaps out of it when Josie Pye comes around to mooch off her snacks. And inform her that Queen’s was awarded a substantial college scholarship, which just so happens to be an English scholarship, Anne’s specialty.

“I’ll win that scholarship if hard work can do it,” she resolved.

Until next time…