"My students and I have spent our vacation handling cartridges," said Josiah grimly, for he was a tutor at Yale, and had done yeoman service in the defense of New Haven. "'Tis a sorry sight to see our beautiful city now laid waste; but that our faith is strong in the Continental Congress and General Washington, I know not how heart could bear it." "Who speaks of faith?" said Pamela's gentle voice, as she slipped into a chair on Dolly's right. "I think hope is ever a better watchword." "Aye," murmured Huntington, as Dolly summoned courage to cross the room, "it is one I will carry ever with me, Pamela, if _you_ bid me do so." "I did not mean," faltered Pamela, casting down her dove-like eyes, but not so quickly that she did not see the ardent glance of her lover, "I--that is--oh yes, Aunt Euphemia," with sudden change of tone, "it is growing somewhat dark, and we had better leave the moulds to harden. Shall I tell Miss Bidwell that you are ready for supper?" To which Miss Euphemia returned an affirmative, and the whole party trooped back to the dining-room, Pamela leading the way, and Huntington following her with a half-mischievous smile curving his usually grave mouth. CHAPTER III OLIVER'S PRISONER "I don't care anything about it," said Miss Moppet with decision. "It's a nasty, horrid letter, and I've made it over and over, and it will not get one bit plainer. Count one, two, jump one; then two stitches plain; it's no use at all, Miss Bidwell, I cannot make it any better." And with a deep sigh Miss Moppet surveyed her sampler, where she had for six weeks been laboriously trying to inscribe "Faith Wolcott, her sampler, aged nine," with little success and much loss of temper. "W is a hard letter," said Miss Bidwell, laying down one of the perpetual stockings with which she seemed always supplied for mending purposes; "you will have to rip this out again; the first stroke is too near the letter before it;" and she handed the unhappy sampler back to the child. "It's always like that," said Miss Moppet in a tone of exasperation. "I think a sampler is the very _devil_!" "Oh," said Miss Bidwell in a shocked voice, "I shall have to report you as a naughty chit if you use such language." "Well, it just _is_" said Moppet; "that's what the minister said in his sermon Sunday week, and you know, Miss Bidwell, that you admired it extremely, because I heard you tell Pamela so." "Admired the devil?" said Miss Bidwell. "Child, what are you talking about?" "The sermon," said Miss Moppet, breaking her silk for the fourth time; "the minister said the devil went roaring up and down the earth seeking whom he might devour. Wouldn't I like to hear him roar. Do you conceive it is like a bull or a lion's roar?" "The Bible says a lion," said Miss Bidwell, looking all the more severe because she was so amused.