One day as Helen tripped up and down the velvet sward by her side, admiring the silky white skeins spread multitudinously there, Miss Thusa, gave an oracular nod, and said she believed that was the last watering, that all they needed was one more night's dew, one more morning sun, and then they could be twisted in little hanks ready to be dispatched in various directions. "I am proud of that thread," said Miss Thusa, casting back a lingering look of affection and pride as she closed the gate. "It is the best I ever spun--I don't believe there is a rough place in it from beginning to end. It was the best flax I ever had, in the first place. When I pulled it out and wound it round the distaff, it looked like ravelled silk, it was so smooth and fine. Then there's such a powerful quantity of it. Well, it's my winter's work." Poor Miss Thusa! You had better take one more look on those beautiful, silvery rings--for never more will your eyes be gladdened by their beauty! There is a worm in your gourd, a canker in your flower, a cloud floating darkly over those shining filaments. It is astonishing how wantonly the spirit of mischief sometimes revels in the bosom of childhood! What wild freaks and excursions its superabundant energies indulge in! And when mischief is led on by malice, it can work wonders in the way of destruction. It happened that Mittie had a gathering of her school companions in the latter part of the day on which we have just entered. Helen, tired of their rude sports, walked away to some quiet nook, with the orphan child. Mittie played Queen over the rest, in a truly royal style. At last, weary of singing and jumping the rope, and singing "Merry O'Jenny," they launched into bolder amusements. They ran over the flower-beds, leaping from bed to bed, trampling down many a fair, vernal bud, and then trying their gymnastics by climbing the fences and the low trees. A white railing divided Miss Thusa's bleaching ground, with its winding rill, from the garden, and as they peeped at the white thread shining on the grass, thinking the flaming sword of Miss Thusa's anger guarded that enclosure, Mittie suddenly exclaimed: "Let us jump over and dance among Miss Thusa's thread. It will be better than all the rest." "No, no," cried several, drawing back, "it would be wrong. And I'm afraid of her. I wouldn't make her mad for all the world." "I'll leave the gate open, and she'll think the calves have broken in," cried Mittie, emboldened by the absence of her father, and feeling safety in numbers. "Cowards," repeated she, seeing they still drew back. "Cowards!--just like Helen. I despise to see any one afraid of any thing. I hate old Madam Thusa, and every thing that belongs to her."