“Well!” uttered Jasper, gazing after her a moment with an air of profound admiration, and then looking down at himself in equally deep disgust. “If we haven’t been most beautifully and artistically circumvented _this_ time, I should like to know the reason why! I feel as cheap as an eighty-cent dollar.” “We certainly have had a good fright!” declared Kitty. “It seems to me,” observed Ethel seriously, “that this ought to be a lesson to us not to turn everything and everybody to ridicule quite so freely in the future.” “Yes,” cried Freddy. “And how about all that money you three will have to pay for talking all this while, instead of singing?” “Sure enough!” said Kitty. “I’ll tell you what we’ll do,” suggested Ethel. “We will let ourselves off, once for all, for seven dollars; and we’ll make up that sum and send it to Mrs. Malviny to complete the twenty-seven dollars she owes her sewing-machine man.” “Done!” shouted Jasper with enthusiasm. And done it was, that very night. THE WEASEL AND THE ADDER. [Illustration] Of all the sharp-toothed and vindictive little animals that prey upon their comrades and sometimes do service for man, none is sharper or more vindictive than the weasel—a bright-eyed little beast, with a coat of golden-brown fur and a clean white shirt-front. It somewhat resembles the rat, and also the squirrel; but it is, really, the deadly enemy of both. And of all the hateful reptiles that crawl and coil and sting, there are few more venomous and hateful than is the little olive-brown snake known as the adder—a rattlesnake without rattles, and the untiring foe to mice and birds and moles, thus also occasionally proving of service to man. Both the weasel, which belongs to the family known as the _mustelidæ_, or mouse-eaters, and the adder, which belongs to the _viperidæ_, or viper family, are, as you see, agreed upon one thing—a liking for mice for dinner. And they are just as heartily united upon another subject—their hatred of each other. So when, as in the above picture, weasel and adder meet in the way, there is certain to be a duel to the death. The weasel is a spry and fiery-tempered little animal; the adder is treacherous and equally hot-headed. And although, as the rule, the weasel is worsted in such encounters, sometimes the coils of the adder squirm and droop and stiffen as, with one quick snap, the sharp teeth of the weasel seize and break the mottled neck of the snake. GEORGE WASHINGTON. [_An Historical Biography._] BY HORACE E. SCUDDER. CHAPTER XXIV. PRESIDENT WASHINGTON.