drawings was brought down to be left on the centre table.

"The plants are not doing as well this summer as usual,” said her mother, looking at the dried and spindling things in the corner. "I am sure I can't conceive what is the trouble with them."

"Perhaps they need more light and air," suggested Maggie. “You know that plants must have a plenty of both."

Ah! wily Maggie! to manage in this way. “You are right. I believe I will have them taken out to the stoop at once. Possibly they may revive a little out there."

Mrs. Westmore was as good as her word, and so another eye-sore was disposed of.

Helen watched these innovations in a cold, sneering way that was terribly exasperating. To think of a younger sister stepping ahead of her in this way! This was what vexed her most of all.

"Really, Maggie, you can't make a city palace of this old house, with all your trouble," she said.

"I don't expect to," was the bright reply. "But I should be glad to make everything look pleasanter and more cheerful. What will you wager that Harry don't say to-night that I have made an improvement ?"

Helen glanced in her face a little nervously. Why should she wish to do anything to please Harry?

Sure enough, when young Henderson came home from his office at night, he noticed the change at once, and to judge from the expression of his face he found it a very agreeable one.

cried, pulling away from him, and hurrying from the room. She dared not allow him to go on.

Somehow the room looked colder and drearier to him when she was gone. Her cheerful presence seemed to put everything else into an agreeable glow. He wondered what he should do without her, when she had gone back to the city again.

"I wish Helen was more like her," he said, settling down to the evening paper with a sigh.

And so 'Maggie worked on patiently, day after day, and not without her reward. Now and then she was strengthened by some faint sympathy in her efforts. Under her management, the household was better regulated, and Mrs. Westmore, consequently, less flurried and anxious, and her husband better natured. Harry became more polite and careful in his general manner; Helen was a trifle less prim and unbending; and the boys, with whom Maggie had become quite a favorite, always treated her like some little queen. Neddie would have taken up the gauntlet in her favor against any one.

As the weeks slipped by, Harry Henderson watched her proceedings with a great degree of interest. He realized the good that she was doing in that household, and secretly blessed her for it. His sympathies were entirely with her, though he ventured to say but little, lest he should arouse Helen's jealousy.

But he could not perceive this young, tender girl working so untiringly, and against such difficulties, without fully appreciating her worth and unselfishness. He felt that her

"How do you like it, Harry ?" she asked. "Humph! Well enough. It is a change, and you know that is always welcome. But I don't believe in frittering too much time over such matters."

He spoke rather bruskly, but there was a light in his eyes that belied his words, and so the young girl understood it.

"Time is not frittered away when we are laboring for those we love," she said.

He looked keenly in her face.

"Your whole life seems hinged on that one sentence, Maggie," he said, with a quiver in his voice. "You used to be just so when a child, before you ever went away from here to live. Don't you ever think of that old time now. Maggie ?"

"Let me go! Mother is calling me!" she

household, and so longed, somehow, to get her away from there, and claim her all to himself.

She was watering the plants in the stoop one morning (she had taken all the care of them since their removal), when he went to her, resolved to tell her what was passing in his mind.

"You are a real wonder, Maggie," he said, earnestly. "You bless everything that you touch. Just look at these plants, now-green and thrifty. They were more like dried herbs, in the parlor, yonder."

She laughed pleasantly.

"That is only the effect of plenty of sunshine and water," she returned. "No other magic has been employed. You might have done the same thing, had you set yourself about it."

He looked as if he doubted it. He moved nearer to her, and got hold of her hand.

66

Maggie," he said, "I want you to help me make something good and great of life. I shall never be good for anything without you. When we were children together, you used to promise to marry me! Why will you not promise once more-promise now ?" She turned very pale, and tried to get away from him, when she saw how much in earnest he had become.

"Don't, Harry! You forget yourself!" she exclaimed. "What will Helen think? You are to marry her, you know."

"Never!" he cried, excitedly. "She does not love me-she never did. Besides, I never asked her to become my wife." "But she has expected that you would, though."

"Pshaw, Maggie, it's only my money that she is after. If she should give me up of her own free will, would you marry me then ?”

"Don't ask me," she said, breaking loose, her face burning with blushes. "Remember, that time has not come yet, and until it does you must not ask me such questions."

She ran into the house after saying those last words. Perhaps she ought not to have given the young man so much encouragement, but she thought, with Harry, that Helen was more captivated by the money than anything else.

In less than a week, Harry came home one night, trying to look very grave and melancholy. While at tea, he let out his trouble.

"The Grafton bank has failed," he said, shortly.

There was a universal exclamation.

"What a calamity!" cried Mr. Westmore. "They held the bulk of your property! You must be a ruined man!"

For some moments all was excitement. Helen went into hysterics, and refused to be comforted. Maggie was the calmest of them all. She had seen a roguish twinkle in Harry's eyes that made her rather suspicious of him.

The next day's papers told the whole story. It was a hopeless failure, and Harry's affairs seemed in a worse condition than ever. During the day, he came home, and asked to see Helen alone.

"You know of my altered circumstances," he said, the moment she entered the parlor, where he was awaiting her. "However, I hope it will not delay my marriage. When will you be ready to become my wife ?"

"What do you mean, Harry Henderson ?” she asked, with well-assumed indignation. "I have never promised to marry you at all that I know of. You'd better take Maggie. I know that you love her much better than you ever did me. She would take to cottage life better than I would."

And Helen sailed from the room with this parting shot. She seemed determined to have no nonsense about the matter, at least. Shortly afterwards, when Harry met her walking out with the new doctor-who was reputed to be a man of means-he understood better how she could be so easily reconciled.

He waited several days after this, before he again broached the subject to Maggie. Then he addressed her very much after this fashion:

"My dear, how will you like having the doctor for a brother-in-law, instead of me ?" "Very well, I am sure," she answered, with a blush.

66

"Why?" eyeing her curiously.

"I should think you might guess the reason, Harry," she returned, dropping her burning face upon his shoulder. By-and-by she raised it to ask, roguishly:

"What of your money in the Grafton bank?"

"I had drawn it out several days before the failure," was the composed reply. "We are going to the city to live, and you shall have some of it to buy a brown stone front with, if you choose."

And thinking over all her "experience," she did choose!

"HALLOO! here's fun, boys! Here's a new scholar!" shouted the tallest boy of the group in the yard.

It was just as I expected. I knew I had got to be the target for all their jeers, and sport, and insulting glances, when I took my satchel and started for school.

If I could only have taken a good whipping that morning, instead of being obliged to march down the street, through that large play-yard, and under the portico of Dr. Polisher's great building, how happy I should have been! But there was no escape for me, and I knew it, and I knew besides that there ought not to be any escape. But, O dear! that didn't help my heart's fluttering in that queer, faintish fashion. that takes all the life out of a fellow. I felt, for all the world, as if I was marching straight up to the biggest kind of a dentist's chair, where a great ogre was standing with a terrible pair of those terribly glittering instruments. There was a great lump in my throat, and my knees were knocking together, and my lips trembling like a sick monkey's, and all because I had got to face the music there at the famous school of the widely-known and greatly respected Dr. Polisher.

I was ashamed enough of myself; but that didn't help me to behave any better. I took the longest way around by the post-office,

PRIDE.

and then cut through the fields, tucking my book-satchel under my jacket; for I really thought every soul I met, from poor, wizenedlooking Widow Martin to the pompous and dignified squire, who was lounging with his cigar at the great, stone gateway, knew that I was on my way, a new scholar for Dr. Polisher.

Not that it was Dr. Polisher himself who could frighten me. He was a portly, handsome man, and whenever I had seen him in the streets or at church, had always worn such a benignant, comfortable look, that I rather mistrusted he would wink at a good many tricks on the part of his boys, before he would spoil the good look of his face by an ugly frown. Nor, indeed, was it any one especially of the pupils who gave me such a horror of the experiment I was about to make, although I had a nervous remembrance of Reginald Motley's sneering red lips; but I think it was most of all my own consciousness that I was putting myself in a false position.

Dr. Polisher's school was an aristocratic institution. There was not a single poor boy in it; but every one was either the heir of a rich man, or the relation of an influential one; and here was I, the only child of a poor widow, going among them. I somehow seemed to feel as if I deserved all the con

tempt and abuse they might put upon me. I felt the hot blood seething into my theeks at the very thought. O, if I could only have kept on at the public school! But my mother said that I must have instruction in higher branches than were taught there, and she told me that though Dr. Polisher's tuition fees were high, she could better afford to pay them, than to send me away where my board would also be required. In this decision Mr. Starkweather also concurred. Mr. Stark weather was her chief adviser, and assisted and advised in her business matters. He came out from the city, at long intervals, to see us; but I don't think he was any relation. I often wondered why he seemed so interested in us; but I never liked to ask mother about him, because she was always so much graver and sadder after his visits, that I would not prolong the impression.

I meekly suggested that I did not see why I need to go to school any more at all, since I could read, and spell, and write, and dispose of all problems in arithmetic, that I should ever be likely to need. Why couldn't I go to work and earn something for myself? There was Jake Scranton would be glad to take me for one of the hands on his fishing-smack. I knew how to steer, and haul on the ropes, and make sail, and in a little while I should be an able seaman; and then maybe I'd soon get along, and own a fishing-boat of my own, and could take care of her, instead of spending the hard earnings of her needle.

When I said this, growing bolder as I proceeded, mother sighed and kissed me, and I was quite sure it was a tear slipped down her cheek, and splashed upon my hand; but she said, firmly, that I must go to the school. Come what would, I must have a good education. And that was how I came to be walking on my way to the dreaded school, all of a shake and tremble. I tried to whistle, but the tone I got up was as sickly as the notes of a cornstalk fiddle. Then I kept saying over to myself:

"What a smart fellow you are! Who are you afraid of? Aren't you as good as any of 'em? I guess I'd be a little more of a man. I'd show 'em I wasn't afraid of any of 'em. I'd have a little more respect for myself."

But it wasn't any good. I've noticed that when you get weak-kneed in that fashion, there's only one way to do; just to let your trepidation run with you as far as it will, and then suddenly you bring up with a sharp turn, pick yourself up, and turn about man

fashion. So I went creeping along, until I found myself under the arched gateway whose gilt letters announced:

"DR. POLISHER'S ACADEMY FOR BOYS.” And there was the lion I dreaded waiting for me. A group of young fellows, Reginald Motley at their head, were practising archery. I was in hopes they would be so busy as to overlook ine, but their leader's eyes were too sharp for that.

"Halloo!" he shouted; "who's all this ?"

And down went all the bows, and the whole group gathered around me. I had a desperate desire to turn about and cut for home at about the rate a comet streaks along, but I pushed on toward the academy door.

"Halloo, I say!" shouted Reginald Motley. "Stop where you are, you fellow, until I've found out about you."

It was queer, but the very thing which had scared me so to think about, took away all my alarm. The arrogant insolence of his tone just cooled off my embarrassment. I faced around, looked at him defiantly, and answered:'

"I don't know what that has to do with you. I don't suppose you are Dr. Polisher, are you?"

'Yes, I kicked your dog, and I'll do it again, if you set him on again to scare poor little Susy Lee, as you did that day," answered I, indignantly; and took another step toward the academy door.

"What a distinguished philanthropist !” sneered the persecutor, stepping in front of me and stopping my advance. "But what, I say, are you doing here? If you have fish to sell, don't you know enough to go around to the kitchen door?"

66

"O Reg, you're too bad!" said a pitying voice. "You know very well the poor fellow has come to the school."

I looked around me, and met the kindly glance of a pair of gentle, blue eyes, beaming from a very delicate face, which no one who saw could help liking, it was so full of innocence and good-will.

"Thank you," said I, looking at him over Reg Motley's shoulder. "You are right; I have come to the school because my mother

sent me. I wish to goodness I could have helped it."

"I guess you will wish so in earnest before you get through here," ejaculated Reg, laughing triumphantly. "You come to our school! That's a queer piece of business. What right have you to come here among gentlemen's sons ?"

"If you are a gentleman's son, you do not behave like one," retorted I; whereupon a few boys in the silent but eagerly attentive group laughed a little, which seemed to anger the fellow extremely.

He flung them one or two angry glances. "Humph! I guess I know who wont go with me on the next cruise of the Nautilus,"

He came round like a tiger, and sprang at me, his eyes gleaming with rage, his cheeks purple.

I stood back a little, and I wont say that my heart didn't beat like a trip-hammer, but I kept myself calm on the outside. I hadn't been through the rough and tumble of the common school, without knowing that a boy who lost his self-command lost the battle always, or, at least, the one who kept cool gained the respect of the lookers-on. Besides, I had measured him that day on the beach, and guessed, although he was taller than I, that his aristocratic and dainty rearing had weakened his muscles, and that in a close scramble my tough, work-strengthened arms had, by far, the best advantage.

muttered he. And the boys who had laughed looked suddenly blank.

Then he turned to me and shook his fist. "Now look here, you chap, you may as well back out in the commencement. I tell you we are all gentlemen's sons, and we wont have any charity fellows among us. I know you, for I took pains to hunt you up, and you live in that mean little cottage on the cliff, beyond Fisherman's Lodge. And I say you have no right to come amongst us, and I wont have it."

"And I say that I am going to the academy door, and you may just stand out of my way," answered I. giving him a sudden shove, which sent him whirling out of my path.

"I am no fighter," said I; "but I can look out for number one, and defend myself against insult. Now I wish to go to the schoolhouse."

And with my head pretty straight, I imagine, I walked on. The first I knew there came a tremendous blow in my back, which nearly drove the breath away from me. I turned around just in time to ward off a second, and seeing there was no use in dodging the matter, I threw down my satchel and began to practise some scientific evolutions, which Jim Sands the pugilist had taught my friend, Joe Stephens the big fisherman, who, in turn, had imparted the valuable informa tion to me. The result was, that Master