"This one of mine is possible," asserted Rico. "It makes me think of something that I have really seen, and I know that I have looked at those flowers and the hills. The picture is too real to be a dream only." As they neared the schoolhouse a company of children ran to meet them, and they all entered the schoolroom together. In a few moments the teacher came. He was an old man who had taught in this room many years, and his hair had grown thin and gray as the years passed by. This morning he began the exercises with a number of questions on previous work, following this with the song, "Little Lambs." Rico was looking so attentively at the teacher's fingering of the violin strings that he forgot to sing. The children, being accustomed to depending upon Rico's voice, sang out of tune, and the notes from the violin became more and more uncertain until all was in confusion. The song was abruptly ended by the teacher's throwing the violin on the table in disgust. "What are you trying to sing, you foolish children?" he exclaimed. "If I only knew who gets so out of tune and spoils the whole song!" A lad sitting next to Rico ventured to say, "I know why it went that way; it always does when Rico doesn't sing." "What is that I hear about you, Rico?" began the teacher, sharply. "You are a very obedient little fellow, but inattention is a serious fault, the result of which you have just seen. Let us try again. Now, Rico, see that you sing this time." The children joined heartily, and Rico's voice sustained the song to the end. Then the teacher gave the violin a few final strokes and laid it on the table. "A good instrument that!" he said, and rubbed his hands with evident satisfaction. CHAPTER III THE SCHOOLMASTER'S VIOLIN After school Stineli and Rico found their way out of the mass of children and started for home. "Were you dreaming about your lake when you forgot to sing this morning?" asked Stineli. "No, something quite different," answered Rico. "I was watching the teacher, and I am sure that I can play 'Little Lambs,' if I only had a violin." The wish must have been a heartfelt one with Rico, for he said it with such a deep sigh that Stineli's sympathy was at once aroused and she said: "We will buy one together. I have ever so many pennies that grandmother gave me--I think twelve in all. How many have you?" "Not one," said Rico, sadly. "My father gave me some before he went away, but my aunt took them. She said that I would only squander them anyway. I know we can't get those." "Maybe we have enough without them," said Stineli, consolingly. "Grandmother will give me more soon, and it can't be, Rico, that a violin costs much. You know it is only a piece of old wood with four strings drawn across it. That ought not to cost a great deal. Ask the teacher to-morrow how much one costs, and then we will try to get one."