One little party, however, escaped his notice, and that of everybody else. Little Betsy had taken her cue from what the captain had said the night before about her spoon-brushes and her basket. She could teach her little companions to make spoon-brushes, while she fancied that, with help from her brothers, she could make what was wanted much more, a strong substantial basket. There was a difficulty about carrying away the earth from the trench; and it occurred to her that, in the absence of barrows and all means of making them, it would be a good thing to have baskets which would take it all away in time, though it would certainly be slow work. Her brothers and she collected twigs in the wood, and she went for rushes to the water-side, and then they sat down to their work. Having found, the day before, that she had no means of fastening the bottom in firm, she did not attempt to make a basket that would stand. She bent the twigs into the same shape she had been accustomed to make, only on a much larger scale, so that the basket, when finished, would look very like a sieve. She was particularly careful to fasten the ends of the twigs firmly to the stronger ones that made the rim, and to twist in the handles so that they would not easily give way. She tied the twigs wherever they crossed with bands of rushes, and then wove in the whole as closely as possible. This was not done in an hour’s time. She and her companions made many attempts before they could get the twigs into any shape at all, and their fingers were scarcely strong enough to twist the rim firmly. Once, just when she thought she should succeed, the little boys left hold, saying they were tired and hungry. She was very near crying; but she thought the wiser way would be to let them rest, and find them something to eat, when they would, perhaps, help her again; for she little expected that any better assistance would come. She desired one of the boys to watch her basket lest the monkeys, which abounded in the wood, should destroy it; while, with the other brother, she looked about for wild strawberries and chesnuts. There were a few strawberries still left, and a great many chesnuts lying in the grass, and more to be had by throwing stones at the monkeys in the trees, which provoked the animals to pelt them with chesnuts in return. After a hearty laugh at these mimics, Betsy returned with her treasure of fruit; but the young gentleman who, the day before, was mourning for gravy, could not, hungry as he was, eat his chesnuts unless they were roasted. Betsy cared much less about eating than about her basket; but she was a good-natured little girl, and ready to remember that her brother was younger than herself. So she advised him to run home and roast his chesnuts at the oven-fire; and told him not to come back again unless he liked. She sent a message to her mother to say that she was quite safe, and would be back before dark; but she charged Ned not to tell any body