Kitty's Christmas tree
Date: 2025-11-11T00:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Christian life -- Juvenile fiction; Conduct of life -- Juvenile fiction; Teenage girls -- Juvenile fiction; Mothers and daughters -- Juvenile fiction; Sunday school teachers -- Juvenile fiction

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Title: Kitty's Christmas tree
or, the net of the flatterer

Author: Lucy Ellen Guernsey

Release date: November 11, 2025 [eBook #77219]

Language: English

Original publication: Philadelphia: American Sunday-School Union, 1869

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77219

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK KITTY'S CHRISTMAS TREE ***

Transcriber's notes: Unusual and inconsistent spelling is as printed.

New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the public domain.

Kitty's Christmas Tree.—Frontispiece.
This time she saw her coming slowly.

[Prequel to "The Heiress of McGregor"]

Kitty's Christmas Tree;

OR,

The Net of the Flatterer.

——————————————

"Surely in vain the net is spread in the sight of any bird!"

——————————————

BY THE AUTHOR OF "IRISH AMY," "NELLY, OR THE BEST INHERITANCE,"
"OPPOSITE NEIGHBOURS," ETC.

[LUCY ELLEN GUERNSEY.]

PHILADELPHIA:

AMERICAN SUNDAY-SCHOOL UNION,

NO. 1122 CHESTNUT STREET.
——————————————
NEW YORK: Nos. 7 & 8 BIBLE HOUSE.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1869, by the

AMERICAN SUNDAY-SCHOOL UNION,

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for
the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

CONTENTS.
—————

CHAPTER I.

CHAPTER II.

CHAPTER III.

CHAPTER IV.

CHAPTER V.

CHAPTER VI.

KITTY'S CHRISTMAS TREE;

OR,

THE NET OF THE FLATTERER.

——————————

CHAPTER I.

"I WONDER what keeps Kitty!" said Mrs. Tremain.

It was growing late of an October afternoon, and it was indeed quite time for Kitty to be at home from school. Mrs. Tremain had been twice to the door to look for her daughter, and still no Kitty was to be seen.

"I suspect some of the school-girls have coaxed her away!" answered Cousin Tilly. "That's the worst of Kitty. She can be coaxed into doing any thing. She is just her father over again, in that as well as in her looks!"

"I am sure I hope not!" said Mrs. Tremain, with an anxious expression. "I had hoped Kitty was gaining more firmness!"

And again she went to the door to look for Kitty. This time she saw her coming slowly with her hat pulled far down over her face, and her movements expressing any thing but high spirits. Mrs. Tremain went down to the gate to meet her daughter.

"Why, Kitty, how late you are!" said she. "Do you know it is after five o'clock, and almost dark?" Then, catching a glimpse of Kitty's swollen and tearstained face, she exclaimed, "But, my dear child, what is the matter? What has happened?"

"Miss Oliver kept me after school!" replied Kitty, bursting into tears, and sobbing as if her heart would break. "She has given me three bad marks, and all these sums to do besides. And it was not my fault, either, and I think she is too bad?"

"Hush, hush, my dear! Don't say any thing about it just now, but go up-stairs, wash your face and make yourself neat for tea; after that I will hear the whole story. Come, now, don't cry any more, but do as I bid you, and come down as soon as you can. Cousin Tilly has been getting something very nice for your supper!"

Mrs. Tremain spoke very decidedly, though kindly and soothingly, and Kitty knew she must obey. She went up to her own pretty, nicely-furnished little room, and, putting away her cloak and hat, she drenched her face and head with cool water till the traces of her tears were removed and her short black hair curled up as tight as that of her aunt Baldwin's French poodle. She had hardly succeeded in reducing it to some sort of order when Cousin Tilly called to her from the foot of the stairs—

"Come, Kitty! Tea is ready and the waffles baked brown as a berry, just as you like 'em!"

"Cousin Tilly is real good, and so is mother!" was Kitty's reflection as she came down-stairs. "If it was some people, they would begin scolding me at once. I wonder if it was my fault, after all!"

All through tea-time Mrs. Tremain made no allusion to Kitty's school troubles, but chatted pleasantly about other things—about who had called, about Mrs. Benson's new twin babies, and Aunt Baldwin's letter—sometimes addressing her remarks to Kitty and sometimes to Cousin Tilly, who answered in dry, concise sentences, after her usual manner.

"Now, Kitty!" said Mrs. Tremain, when tea was over. "You and I will wash up the dishes and let Cousin Tilly go over to Mrs. Benson's and help to get her settled for the night. Olly Anne Phillips is going to sit up with her, but she cannot come before nine o'clock."

"Why does not Mrs. Benson have a regular nurse, mother, as Aunt Baldwin did when Georgy was born?" asked Kitty.

"For two reasons, my dear. In the first place, she cannot afford it. And in the second place, no such person is to be had. Mrs. Smith is nursing poor Mrs. Burchard over at the Corners, and Olly Anne Phillips cannot leave home in the day-time. So the neighbours must join together and take care of her as well as they are able. 'Bear ye one another's burdens,' you know, daughter."

"I am sure it is no great burden to wash up the tea-things," said Kitty. "I should like to do it very often, only Cousin Tilly will not let me for fear I should not turn all the cup handles the same way, I believe," added Kitty, laughing.

Her mother laughed too.

"Cousin Tilly has her little ways, but we should hardly know how to live without her," said she. "We must mind what we are about, or else she will scold us when she comes home."

While Mrs. Tremain and her daughter are gathering up and washing the cups and saucers, we will learn a little about who they were. Mrs. Tremain was a widow, with one little girl. She had had other children, but had lost them. Her husband had inherited a large property from his father, but he, too, was gone, and most of his property with him—all indeed, but the share which old Mr. Tremain's kindness or prudence had settled upon his daughter-in-law. Part of this property consisted in a comfortable, old-fashioned brick-house with a good garden and some pasturelands situated in the little village of Holford. Here Mrs. Tremain had come to live after the loss of her husband. And here she still lived, economically indeed, but in great comfort, and even elegance. The neighbours considered her rich, because she "lived on the interest of her money," and did not work for a living.

A good deal of Mrs. Tremain's comfort was owing to Cousin Tilly, as Mrs. Tremain and Kitty called her—Miss Crocker, as the minister and the neighbours said. Nobody knew exactly how Cousin Tilly was related to Mrs. Tremain. She did her work and received wages like any other servant, but she was treated with the greatest respect by both mother and daughter, sitting with them at the table and in church, and introduced to visitors as "my cousin, Miss Crocker." She never went visiting, nor wrote any letters, nor seemed to have any friends outside of Holford. People could not understand it at all, and yet it was no great mystery.

Miss Crocker was an orphan, with a little—a very little—property of her own, not enough to support her. She was not accomplished, nor highly educated in any way, and it did not suit her health to sit and sew. So, like a wise woman, she determined to do for a living what she could do best, namely, housework, which she understood to perfection. She had lived with her cousin, Mrs. Tremain, for many years, and found herself very happy. She earned enough to clothe herself comfortably in the plain way which she preferred; and her little property meantime was accumulating and making a comfortable fund against a time of helplessness and old age, in spite of the liberal way in which she gave to all good objects.

Mrs. Tremain had a sister-in-law—Kitty's Aunt Baldwin—who was very rich, and lived in a fine house in a fashionable street in New York. According to the ordinary belief in such matters, this lady might be represented as very proud, frivolous and hard-hearted, looking down upon her poorer sister-in-law, and treating her with great contempt. Such, however, was not the case. Mrs. Baldwin was a good woman in every sense of the word—humble, charitable, and godly. She was very fond of Mrs. Tremain, and maintained such a close correspondence with her that the gossips at Holford post-office wondered what she could possibly find to say in all the letters she sent. She had visited Mrs. Tremain several times, and on these occasions she seemed to fall at once into the ways of the family. She went to the village store on errands, called at the butcher's, and clearly understood the difference between round and porterhouse steak. And if she dressed rather expensively, the expense was not of a kind to be appreciated by most of the ladies of Holford.

"She thinks any thing is good enough for Holford," said Mrs. Daskin to Miss Parkins, whom she met at the Wednesday evening lecture. "Just look at that bonnet! Not a mite of a flower on it, and just that strip of black lace over the crown!"

"And just look at her shawl!" returned Miss Parkins to Mrs. Daskin. "It must be as old as the hills! I wonder how much it cost when it was new."

"About a thousand dollars, I should say," said Mrs. Brown, the lawyer's wife, who knew a little more about shawls than Miss Parkins, and who could not resist the temptation of giving a snub to the gossiping little milliner.

"Laws me! You don't mean to say that is a real India shawl!" exclaimed Miss Parkins in a tone of awe. "Well, to be sure, there is a kind of look about it. I might have known she wouldn't wear any thing cheap."

"There you are mistaken, Miss Parkins," returned Mrs. Brown. "That very dress she has on cost only thirty cents a yard. I happen to know because I asked her the price, meaning to send for one like it."

Mrs. Tremain's daughter was very fond of Aunt Baldwin. Kitty was a bright, lively girl of thirteen or thereabout, but usually passed for younger than she really was, being small, round, and rosy, with short black hair which would not do any thing but curl up into little crisp rings. Kitty was "her father over again," said Cousin Tilly. She was, on the whole, a good girl—amiable, truthful, fond of her books, and with a hearty desire at the bottom of her little heart to serve and please her heavenly Father. Yet, with all these good qualities, Kitty was often in trouble, and gave her mother a great deal of anxiety.

"Now, Kitty," said her mother, when every thing was washed and put away, and she was ready to sit down with her work—"now, Kitty, tell me all about it. Why did Miss Oliver keep you after school?"

"Because I had not done any of my sums, mamma, and I 'could' not do them, either, because I had no slate-pencil."

"But how was that, Kitty? It was only last Wednesday that I gave you two long slate-pencils, and a lead-pencil besides! What has become of them all?"

"Well, mamma, I left one slate-pencil at home, because I don't always remember to bring it with me, and I broke the other in two, and—and—I lent one piece to Fanny Daskin, and one piece to Lizzy Gates, and they did not give them back to me!"

"I thought Miss Oliver had made a strict rule against lending and borrowing in school. I am sure she told me so, and I thought it an excellent measure on her part. Does she not enforce it?"

"Yes, mamma: that was how I got my bad marks. I told her I had lent my pencils, and she said that was no excuse at all. She marked Fanny and Lizzie too, and now they are angry at me, and say it was all my fault."

"I dare say!" replied Mrs. Tremain. "That is usually the way people are served by those who make tools of them. You know the rule. Why did you not obey it?"

"But, mamma, they asked me!"

"What of that? You owed obedience to Miss Oliver, and not to Lizzy and Fanny. I must say I think Miss Oliver was right. But, Kitty, you say you left one of your pencils at home. What has become of the nice wooden-cased slate-pencil with the extra points which Aunt Baldwin sent you? I told you to keep that to use at home!"

Kitty began to twist her apron strings and to look very much confused, while her cheeks grew as scarlet as her stockings. Mrs. Tremain guessed the truth at once.

"Kitty! You have not given 'that' away surely! After all I said to you! Oh, Kitty, Kitty!"

"Well, mamma, I did not mean to, but Fanny Daskin saw it, and she begged for it so. She would not give me any peace! Indeed, mamma, I am sorry you feel so bad about it. I hated to part with it, too, but I did not think you would care so much, and Fanny kept begging—"

"It is not the value of the slate-pencil I care for Kitty—though in giving away Aunt Baldwin's presents you have been unkind to her and disobedient to me—it is this new evidence that you do not in the least get the better of your greatest fault—a fault which was the ruin of your poor father, and is likely to be the ruin of yourself!"

"The ruin! Oh, mamma!"

"Yes, my poor child. I must say it. You do not at all appreciate the greatness of this fault, Kitty, nor the consequences to which it is sure to lead." Mrs. Tremain paused in her work and walked to the window, while Kitty sat still, covered with confusion at her mother's unusual severity.

"You are not at all aware of the seriousness of this fault, Kitty," repeated Mrs. Tremain, returning to her seat: "in fact I am not sure that you consider it a fault at all. I am rather disposed to think, on the contrary, that you pride yourself upon your generous open-hearted disposition, which makes you (as you imagine) unable to say 'no' to any body."

Kitty hung her head. Her mother had, as usual, read her thoughts exactly.

"But, mamma, don't you think it is a good thing to be generous?" she asked.

"It is a far better thing to be just, Kitty. And it is far better to be really generous than merely to wish to be thought so. Do you think it was generosity which made you lend your pencils, this morning?"

Kitty did not reply, but in her heart she did think so.

"Whom do you love best—Fanny Daskin or Miss Oliver?" asked Mrs. Tremain.

"Oh, mamma! Miss Oliver, of course."

"And whose respect and regard would you rather possess—your teacher's or Fanny's?"

"My teacher's, mamma."

"I don't think so, Kitty!"

Kitty looked surprised.

"You say you love Miss Oliver better than Fanny, yet, to oblige Fanny, you treated her with disrespect and unkindness."

"It was not so much to oblige Fanny as to get rid of her," said Kitty, candidly. "She does tease so; she will not let me alone till I give her what she wants."

"Then it was not generosity, after all, but mere selfish desire of ease," said Mrs. Tremain. "Do you know the reason why Fanny teases you so?"

"No, mamma, unless it is because she knows that I always give up to her. She never goes to Rosa Burns, or any of the other girls, as she does to me. She says they are so stingy and I am so good-natured."

"Yes, that is what she says to your face. Behind your back she says—

"'Kitty is so soft, she can be coaxed into any thing!'

"I know she does, because I heard her myself."

"The mean thing!" exclaimed Kitty, flushing with anger and shame.

"She has been brought up in that way, which is some excuse for her," said Mrs. Tremain. "Her mother and father have always preferred sponging on other people to working honestly for a living. Mr. Daskin preyed on your father as long as he lived, and he owes us at this minute more than a thousand dollars, not one cent of which will he ever pay. It was in that way your father lost his property. I do not like to blame him in your hearing, but it is right that you should know his faults, in order to avoid them. A year after we were married, your father had eighty thousand dollars of his own, free from all incumbrance. Before he died, he had lost every cent of it, and died in debt!"

"How, mamma?"

"Because, my dear, he never could say 'no.' If a man came and asked him to lend him a hundred or even a thousand dollars, though the security might be ever so bad, or altogether wanting, he could not bear to refuse. If he were asked to become an endorser for an acquaintance, he would not say no, though he knew his family might suffer in consequence. In this way his entire property was frittered away, and but for the sum your grandfather settled upon myself, we should have been left destitute."

"The same disposition showed itself in other ways. Your father never would deny one of his children any thing it cried for, no matter how improper or hurtful it might be. Your brother Oswald's death was occasioned by his father giving him a large, hard apple to eat, just as he was recovering from a fever. I had gone to lie down, and the nurse went out of the room in order to prepare the child's broth. When she came back, Oswald was just finishing the apple. In fifteen minutes he went into a fit, and soon afterwards died."

Mrs. Tremain was silent for a few minutes: Kitty was crying heartily. "But that was not the worst!" resumed Mrs. Tremain. "Your father was not naturally fond of dissipation. I think, for a long time after he was married, he would have preferred a quiet evening at home to any other kind of amusement. But his easy disposition and his wealth made him a mark to those whose business it was to lie in wait for souls and to catch men. They flattered him, called him a generous, open-hearted fellow, and so forth. He could not make up his mind to refuse when asked to drink a glass, to share a bottle of champagne, to take a hand at cards, or to play a game at billiards! What was the end? He died a ruined, disgraced man, from the effects of drink and other vices. The only comfort I have is in the thought that he died penitent.

"It has cost me not a little to repeat this sad story to you, Kitty! I never meant you should know it, but the incident of to-day, taken in connection with so many others which have happened lately, has convinced me of the necessity of giving you a solemn warning. You are, as Cousin Tilly often says, 'your father over again.' You have inherited all his good qualities, and with them that fatal disposition and that tendency to be governed by any one who will take the pains to coax and flatter you, which were his ruin: and I tremble for you!"

"Indeed, mamma, I really will try to do better in future," said Kitty. "I know I do sometimes let the girls lead me into scrapes. I do so hate to disoblige anybody!"

"That is a selfish feeling, Kitty, and nothing else. You are led to do wrong just to spare yourself the pain of resistance, and every instance of such weakness leads the way to another. It is only a little while since you got into sad disgrace by writing Lizzy Gates' composition for her. You know it was wrong—that you were, in effect, not only telling a lie yourself, but helping Lizzy to tell one. You were disobeying your mother and your teacher, and displeasing your heavenly Father. You knew all this, yet you deliberately acted against your own conscience because you could not bear to say no to a girl whom you do not respect, and who does not care for you. I dare say Lizzy did not ask Rose Brown to write her composition!"

"No, mamma, she never thought of it. Rose is ready to help the other girls too, but she never will break a rule for anybody, and when once she sets her foot down, you might as well attempt to move the school-house. All the girls know that well enough."

"Well, if you had decidedly refused to write Lizzy's composition for her, she would have known better than to ask you to do so again."

"I did say I would not at first," said Kitty, "but—"

"Well, but what?"

"She teased me so, and said she should think me as mean and stingy as Rose Brown!"

"And what harm would that have done you? Or, which is the worst—to be mean or merely to be thought so, and that, too, by some one whose opinion is not worth anything?

"I shall say no more at present, Kitty," continued Mrs. Tremain. "I do not know that all I have said will do any good. I am not at all hopeful—not so much so as I ought to be, perhaps. My experience has not tended to make me so. I can only pray for you! Now get your slate and do your sums, as Miss Oliver told you!"

"Won't you help me, mamma?" asked Kitty. "Oh, do, please! Miss Oliver said I must not come to school till I had them all finished and written out, and if I do not go to-morrow, I shall not have a chance for the prize!"

"I cannot help it, Kitty! I am very sorry for you, but I cannot help you. I have done so too often already. From henceforth I shall leave you to bear the consequences of your folly, till you learn to have a little firmness and decision of character."

Kitty wept afresh, but she presently reflected that crying would do her no good.

So she wiped her eyes and set about her lessons. With all her diligence, however, she could not finish them that night. It was not till the next afternoon that she was able to present herself at school, and thus all chance of obtaining the prize was lost to her.

CHAPTER II.

FOR a good while after the incident Kitty did better. The sad story of her father's life and death had not been told to her in vain. She began for the first time to see her fault "as a fault," not as a mere amiable weakness at worst, but as a sin to be repented of and guarded against. The girls wondered what had come over her.

There was not a very high tone of morals existing in the school at Holford. The customs of schools often become a matter of tradition, and are handed down from one generation of children to another. It had always been the fashion in Holford to cheat at lessons. The clever girls did the sums, and wrote or helped to write the compositions of the stupid ones, with the understanding that they were to be paid in some way for their services. They "told" in class, read their lessons from slips of paper concealed in their hands, and shirked in every possible way. All this was easy enough under the rule of old Miss Parsons, who never thought of any thing but to earn her small salary in the easiest manner, and to slip through the school duties without making herself or her pupils uncomfortable.

But matters were much changed under the rule of Miss Oliver. Her eyes and ears were ever on the watch. No book could be held half open, no paper concealed in the hand, no exercise copied, without her at once detecting the fraud and exposing it in such a way as to make the offender feel like creeping into a very small hole indeed. At first she had tried to work upon the girls' sense of honour, but she soon found that, in all save a few instances, there was no honour to depend upon. The sense of right and wrong had to be created, in the first place. This was no easy matter, but by degrees some improvement began to show itself. A few girls—Rose Brown, Emma and Julia Parmelee, the minister's daughters, and the three Sibley sisters, with their cousin, Miss Coates, from the Corners—sided at once with the teacher, and gave her efficient assistance.

Kitty Tremain might have been expected to be one of this party. She had been carefully and religiously brought up; she was a good scholar and a lady-like girl. But then came the test! Kitty knew what was right, but she could be coaxed into doing almost any thing. She was so clever and good-natured, as Fanny Daskin and her party said to her face—so "soft," as they said behind her back. Kitty's conscience and taste were with Miss Oliver and her friends, but her real influence was thrown on the other side.

The Daskin family were distantly related to Mrs. Tremain. They were fond of boasting of their relationship to her and to Mrs. Baldwin, though the latter existed only in their own fertile imaginations. Mrs. Tremain, for her part, though she did not positively break with them, saw as little of them as possible. And as for Mrs. Baldwin, she ignored them entirely, and met Mrs. Daskin's first public attempt at cozening in a manner which prevented its ever being repeated.

Mr. Daskin thought himself very superior to the generality of mankind, principally on the ground that he found himself able to impose upon their credulity. He had a good trade, but he worked at it only by fits and starts, when he could no longer exist by borrowing money. Mrs. Daskin was a gossiping, extravagant, malicious slattern. One of the boys had gone to sea in a coasting-vessel when he was twelve years old, and by dint of keeping entirely clear of his own family, had turned out very well. Another was weak and always sickly—made so by his mother's neglect in scarlet fever. The younger ones were just what might be expected of such a father and mother. Fanny, however, was different; she was "a smart one," her father said—a girl who was "sure to fall on her feet, and not be imposed upon!" She had all her father's skill in getting and more than his skill in keeping. She was a handsome girl, with blue eyes and fair hair, and had a great trick of blushing when any one looked at her. If any thing were to be objected to her manners, it was that they were rather too sweet. Fanny flattered and coaxed right and left, and gained her point by sweetness as her friend and ally Lizzie Gates did by bullying.

Shortly after Mrs. Tremain's removal to Holford, the Daskins followed her, hoping, probably, to prey upon her as they had done on her husband. Mrs. Tremain at once and decidedly refused to lend them money, as Cousin Tilly did to lend them just a bowlful of coffee, or a cupful of molasses, or a few pounds of flour. Mrs. Tremain did not consider the Daskins objects of charity. She knew that Mr. Daskin was perfectly able to support his family if he chose to work, and she saw no reason why she should be burdened with them. So she set her foot down once and for all; and they soon left off troubling her.

With Kitty the case was different. With the younger children she had no temptation to associate. But Fanny was so kind in her manners, and seemed so fond of her, that Kitty could not believe it was all a sham. Fanny borrowed her pencil and paper, and never returned them; borrowed her books, and that was the last of them; her pocket-money, and Kitty never saw a penny of it again. Fanny led her into scrapes against her judgment and conscience, laughed at her religious feelings, made use of her without scruple, and then left her to bear the blame. Kitty knew that Fanny was selfish, false, and mercenary—she could not help it—yet she continued to be governed by her because it was hard to say "no!"

What Fanny did by coaxing and flattery, Lizzy Gates did by an opposite course. "I am sure you will do so and so, Kitty—you are always so generous and kind-hearted!" was Fanny's plea. "If you don't do so and so, I shall think you are the meanest girl that ever lived," was Lizzy's argument: and both were equally successful. Fanny and Lizzy had very early formed an offensive and defensive alliance against Miss Oliver. They thwarted her plans for the improvement of the school, teased and annoyed her in all sorts of little mean ways, and kept alive a party against her; and they compelled Kitty to join this party and help along their plans, though Kitty both loved and respected her teacher. The mischief had indeed gone much farther than Kitty's mother was aware of; and Miss Oliver was seriously thinking of advising Mrs. Tremain to take Kitty out of school.

For some days, however, Kitty did better. Fanny and Lizzy had been very angry at her for betraying them, as they said, and thus getting them a double task and a severe public reproof. This was fortunate for Kitty. Instead of being greatly distressed at their coldness, and coaxing them round again, as they expected, Kitty kept out of their way, worked hard at her lessons, and walked to and from school with Miss Oliver or Rosa Brown.

"Never mind! She will come round again!" said Fanny. "I know how to manage her." But the days went on, and Kitty did not come round. She returned Fanny's greeting, indeed, but she did no more, and when Lizzy said something about a haughty, stuck-up puss, Kitty only smiled.

This went on for nearly two weeks, and Kitty began to feel herself quite safe, and to rejoice in her easy victory. This was not a good sign. Rejoicing in a victory is all very well, but it is a good thing to be sure, in the first place, that we have gained it. It was very easy for Kitty to resist temptation as long as the temptation kept at a distance, but it remained to be seen what she would do when she came to close quarters with her enemy once more. In fact Kitty was not acting in the proper spirit. She felt ashamed, and was angry that her mother should think her such a fool, and that the girls should call her "soft," at the same time that they made their own account of her weakness. Her "pride" was wounded! She was ashamed, but not humbled, and she set to work in her own strength to resist temptation.

Kitty had just finished reading "Christmas Greens," which she had taken from the Sunday-school library for the third or fourth time. She had a great fondness for reading over books which she liked, and could repeat her favourite stories almost by heart. She had curled herself up in the window sash to take advantage of the last lingering daylight while her mother was knitting by the fire. Kitty sat silent, looking at the clouds, which were beautiful in the curious afterglow of an autumnal sunset.

"Mamma!" said she, suddenly. "I have got an idea in my head!"

"Have you?" said her mother, smiling. "How do you suppose it could get there?"

"Out of the book I have been reading, I suppose!" said Kitty, laughing in her turn: and then, leaving the window seat, she came and sat down on the hearth-rug at her mother's feet.

"But now listen, mamma dear!" said she. "Because I want to know what you think. Why cannot I make a nice little Christmas tree for my Sunday-school children? I don't mean any thing very expensive, of course, but just to have them here, and give them some coffee and cakes (all French children like coffee you know, mamma), and some little presents!"

"What sort of presents?"

"Oh, little dolls and books, perhaps—although they cannot read English, so the books must be picture-books—little china mugs and figures, and such like!"

"Now 'I' think—" said Cousin Tilly, "that something useful would be more to the purpose. They are all as poor as crows, you know!"

"That is the very reason why I would give them playthings, Cousin Tilly!" replied Kitty: "Because they never have any. They do pretty well for clothes, and you know the society will give them what is really necessary, but nobody gives poor children playthings; and yet I suppose they like them quite as much as other children do!"

"There is something in that notion, I confess!" said Cousin Tilly. "But I never should have thought of it!"

"But, Kitty, who would furnish the necessary funds?" asked her mother. "Christmas parties cost money, you know. Have you thought about that?"

"Yes, mamma, I thought you would perhaps give us the coffee and cakes, and I would do the rest. I shall have some money by that time."

"Haven't you any now, Kitty?"

"No, mamma, only eighteen cents. But there will be my three dollars on the first of December, and you need not pay me any money till then. Five weeks will be fifty cents. Three dollars will buy all I want, and more too, I should think."

"You seem to have considered the matter very carefully, Kitty!"

"I was calculating, mamma, that I would spend twenty-five cents apiece upon the children. Ten quarters of a dollar are two dollars and a half, which leaves something for extra candy and lights, and so forth."

"Well, Kitty, I will take the matter into consideration. But I tell you at once you must not expect any thing great in the matter of refreshments. You know that painting the house and new-covering the roof has used up a great deal of money, and we shall have to be very careful not to run behindhand. However, I suppose I could give them a good-sized cake apiece, and Cousin Tilly can make you some of her nice biscuits. Will that do?"

"Oh yes mamma—nicely!"

"But remember you must not so much as ask me for any funds besides your regular pocket-money."

"I won't, mamma. Then may I consider it settled?"

"You may, unless something unforeseen happens," replied Mrs. Tremain, smiling. "But, Kitty, don't say any thing about it beforehand."

"Oh no, of course not! That would spoil it all. Thank you very much, dear mamma!"

It remains to be explained how Kitty Tremain, a little girl thirteen years old, came to have a Sunday-school class. It arose principally from the fact that Kitty could speak French very fluently and prettily—an accomplishment which she had gained by living in Paris from the time she was two years old till she was eight. In fact she had learned French before she knew any English to speak of, and her mother had taken care that she should not forget what she had learned. Mrs. Tremain's friends in Paris often sent her new books and papers; and Kitty read aloud to her mother in French every day, besides talking over what she read in the same language.

There were then in Holford several families of French Canadians, some of whom could not speak English, and when the women were prevailed upon to let their children come to Sunday-school, there arose a great difficulty about teachers. Besides Mrs. Tremain and her daughter, no one in Holford could speak French with any degree of fluency except Miss Oliver, and her time on Sunday was fully occupied with her large Bible-class, made up of girls from the factory at the Corners. Mrs. Tremain took charge of the elder children, but what was to become of the little ones? In this strait Miss Oliver proposed that the "infants" should be turned over to Kitty.

"Kitty is very good with little ones. I have often watched her in school and in the play-ground. She can have assistance when she needs it, and I dare say she will do very well."

The experiment was tried, and it succeeded. Kitty had very pleasant manners—a great advantage in the management of children. She also possessed sufficient authority, and took great pains; and Mr. Burgess considered the class as well managed as any in the school. Kitty was devoted to her charge, and it was pretty to see how the little things clustered about her when school was out, or when she went to visit them, all anxious for the honour of holding her hand, and all chattering together in their Canadian French like a flock of blackbirds.

"How glad I am that I have broken off with Fanny Daskin!" thought Kitty, as she went to school next morning. "She would be sure to find out all about it, but I am determined she shall not make a fool of me again!"

Kitty was sitting in the school-room at recess, putting to rights the crochet-work of one of the little girls who had got into difficulty with the hood she was making. She was always ready to help the younger girls with their work, and they were very fond of her. She had pulled out quite a piece, and was working it up again, when Fanny Daskin came and sat down beside her. Kitty coloured, but neither of them said a word for a minute.

"So, Kitty, you never mean to speak to me again," said Fanny, presently, in a low voice. "Well, I don't know as I blame you: I like to see people show firmness and decision, even when it goes against myself!"

It was something new for Kitty to be complimented for firmness and decision, and she could not help feeling a little glow of gratified vanity, but she answered, coolly enough—

"As to that, Fanny, you know you began it."

"I know I did," said Fanny. "I was vexed, and I showed it. That is my way. What I feel comes right out; and the more I love any one, the more vexed I am when they treat me ill. You never saw me refuse to speak to Rosa Brown or Julia Parmelee!"

"You don't have much to do with them anyhow," returned Kitty.

"Of course I don't. I don't care for them in the first place, and I know they feel above me. As for Rosa Brown, she feels above everybody, even Miss Oliver; and Julia Parmelee won't have any thing to do with me, because my father never goes to church. I think he is wrong myself, but it is not my fault."

"No, of course not!" replied Kitty, not knowing exactly what to say.

"As to that affair the other day, I was quite as much to blame as you," continued Fanny. "I ought not to have asked you to break a rule, and I won't do it again. Is that all you have against me?"

"I have not said that I had any thing against you."

"Now, Kitty, do follow your natural disposition, and be frank and open," said Fanny. "It isn't one bit like you to be so close and reserved: and I know that some one has been putting you up to it. Who has been telling you things about me?"

"Nobody has been telling me any thing about you," returned Kitty. "I can see enough for myself. You and Lizzy get me into all sorts of scrapes, and coax away all my things. You just make a fool of me; and I tell you plainly, Fanny, I won't stand it. I don't want to quarrel with you, but I won't be governed by you any more."

"Oh, well, if that is the way you feel!—But I am sure governing was the last thing I ever thought of. I supposed you were the one who governed me. I am sure you are the only girl who ever had any influence over me, or did me any good. I know very well I am a wicked girl: I don't want to deny it. But if all the good girls are to turn their backs on me, and never have any thing more to do with me, I don't see how I am ever to be any better. As for Rosa and Julia, I don't care for their professions of religion, because they won't act up to them. But you are different. I think you are a real Christian, and so is your mother. I will say that for her, though I know she does not like me, or want you to associate with me!"

"Because she says you flatter me so, and make a fool of me!" said Kitty, her indignation again rising, as she thought of what her mother had told her. "You call me clever and generous to my face, and behind my back you laugh at me and call me 'soft!'"

"I never did such a thing in this world. Your mother is much mistaken if she thinks so. But I know very well that is not the reason she does not like me. She thinks I shall tell you some things which she does not want you to know. She need not be afraid! I shall not tell you, even though I may think myself you ought to be told. But that is neither here nor there. I am not going to coax you now, Kitty, whatever I have done before. I know very well that it is of no use. You have made up your mind, and that is all about it. I might as well try to coax the North Rock to come down on the Church green. But I think it is rather hard on me to lose the only religious friend I have in the world, and just as I need her the most—just as I was beginning to think of such things and to wish to be a better girl."

"Surely the net is spread in vain in the sight of any bird!" One might think so. But the net was spread openly, and the silly little bird soon walked straight into it. Nobody had ever complimented Kitty on her firmness before. Nobody had ever told her she influenced them. She went home considerably uplifted in her own mind, and wondering very much what Fanny could possibly know which her mother did not wish her to learn.

In a week's time Kitty was just as much "under Fanny's thumb" as she had ever been. True, Fanny, warned by what had happened, was careful not to draw Kitty into any flagrant violation of the school rules, and took some pains to behave better herself. She even brought her Sunday-school lesson to Kitty (the Daskin children attended Sunday-school occasionally), and listened with the greatest deference and attention to Kitty's explanations.

"Humph!" said Cousin Tilly, when she heard it. "I hope it may last, that's all!"

"I think you are very uncharitable, Cousin Tilly!" said Kitty, with a lofty and serene air. "You have such a prejudice against the Daskins, you can see no good in any of them. I don't think poor Fanny ought to suffer for her father's faults!"

"And pray how do you know that I am prejudiced against the Daskins, Miss Kitty? I have known them ever since you were born, and long before! How do you know that my opinion is not founded upon knowledge, and not upon prejudice?"

Kitty had nothing to say in reply but that she supposed Fanny might have some good about her, and as long as she could do her any good, she might as well try!

"Try as much as you please, only be careful that she does not do you harm," said Cousin Tilly.

And there the matter ended.

CHAPTER III.

"HERE are the letters, mamma," said Kitty, who had run down to the Post-office before breakfast, and now came in with glowing cheeks and full hands. "See what a quantity! Three French and two English letters, and two others, besides all the papers. Will you please see if my three dollars has come, mamma?"

"Yes, there it is," said Mrs. Tremain, handing Kitty the bright new note; "and here is the money I owe you—sixty cents. I may as well give it to you now that I have the exact change. Take care you do not lose it!"

"You had better put it away in your desk till you want to use it," said Cousin Tilly, as Kitty took out her purse. "If you carry it in your pocket, it will be gone before you know it."

"That is always the way," thought Kitty, as she put her purse in her pocket. "They think I am an out-and-out fool. I do wonder what it is they are hiding from me that the Daskins know. I mean to make Fanny tell me to-day."

"No, I am not going to tell you either," said Fanny. "You don't tell me your secrets, and I don't see why I should tell you mine. I know that you are getting up something for Christmas, and you will not tell me any thing about it."

"How do you know?" asked Kitty.

"I heard you and Miss Oliver talking about it one day when I was in the dressing-room. Of course you can do as you please about telling me. But what I say is that you can't expect me to tell you my secrets while you keep yours to yourself."

"It is no great secret," said Kitty.

"Great or small doesn't matter. If it is such a small affair, I don't see any use in being so very private about it."

My reader can very easily guess how the matter ended. Kitty was drawn on to tell the whole story of her proposed Christmas entertainment.

"I am sure you are very good to go to so much trouble for those little French young ones," said Fanny. "I can't help being jealous sometimes when I see you so engaged about them. But how much money are you going to spend on your Christmas tree?"

"Three dollars and sixty cents."

"Is that all your mother gives you of your property?" asked Fanny, in a tone of great surprise. "Only three dollars at a time!"

"That is all there is," replied Kitty. "It is only a hundred dollars, you know, and that at six per cent is—"

"I was not thinking of that paltry hundred dollars Mrs. Leffington gave you," interrupted Fanny. "I was thinking of your own property—the two hundred thousand dollars your grandfather left you, and which you are to have when you are eighteen. Did nobody ever tell you about that?"

"Nonsense!"

"No nonsense at all. My father knows all about it." And here Fanny went into many particulars, some of which she had heard from her father, while others were made up on the spur of the moment. "You see it was two hundred thousand dollars at first, but it must be a great deal more by this time, if the interest has been added every year. You must have as much as twenty thousand a year of your own, besides your mother's property. That is the reason I was surprised that Mrs. Tremain gave you so little to spend on your Christmas tree. Three dollars does not seem to be much beside twenty thousand: does it?"

It certainly did not. Kitty's three dollars, which had looked so large in the morning, now seemed very contemptible indeed.

"If your mother would give you thirty, or even twenty, dollars, you might give each of them a handsome present," continued Fanny, "but I don't see very well what you can buy for twenty-five cents. I should be afraid they would only laugh at you."

"I don't see why mother never told me any thing about it," said Kitty, in a very discontented tone. "And what is the use of our living so economically when we are so rich? We might just as well as not live in New York, and have a handsome house and horses and carriages, as Aunt Baldwin does."

"I suppose your mother means to teach you to be very economical," said Fanny, "though I must say I don't think she need be so very close. But then, you see, the money is not hers, but yours. However, I don't want to set you against your mother. Father says it was her closeness and extra economy that drove your father to do what he did, but then he does not like your mother, and he was very fond of your father—so he naturally takes sides with his friend. But I do wish Mrs. Tremain would give you a little more money to spend on this affair. I am really afraid you will make yourself ridiculous, and be laughed at."

Now, being made to appear ridiculous was the thing which Kitty dreaded above all others. She took out her purse and looked at her money.

"It does seem a little bit to be sure, but mamma said I must not ask her for any more, so I must make it answer as well as I can. Have you learned your Sunday-school lesson, Fanny? Do you want me to help you?"

"No!" replied Fanny, shaking her head. "I cannot go to Sunday-school any more. My bonnet is shabby. I am quite ashamed of it. You think three dollars a little money, Kitty; and so it is to you, who could have thousands to spend if you had your rights. But it would be a good deal to me just now, I can tell you. It makes all the difference between my going to Sunday-school and staying at home!"

"Your bonnet is no more shabby than it was last Sunday, and I thought it looked nicely then, I am sure!"

"Yes, it is because I got caught in the rain going home. It does not look fit to wear: and I am not going to Sunday-school to be despised, I can tell you! Oh, Kitty, if you would only lend me that money, just till next week!"

"But why does not your father buy you a new hat?" asked Kitty.

"Because he does not like to have me go to church and Sunday-school," replied Fanny. "I asked him, and he said if I wanted to try the pious dodge, I must ask you or some of my pious friends to help me, and not come to him. He said now was the time for you to show whether you meant what you said or not. And, Kitty, I do think so too! If you can't lend me three dollars out of all your wealth, to help me to go to Sunday-school, I certainly can't think you are very sincere in wishing me to become a Christian."

"You see, Fanny, I have only this money, little as it is, to make my Christmas tree with!" said Kitty, hesitating, and partly feeling, despite Fanny's earnestness, that she was being imposed upon.

"I don't believe but that your mother will give you more if you ask her in earnest," said Fanny.

"Mamma always does as she says, in the first place," replied Kitty. "I should not like to ask her for more."

"Well, I must say it is very queer in her, that is all. But how strange that you should never know you were such an heiress! I don't believe your uncle Baldwin is nearly so rich."

"Uncle Baldwin is very rich, I know, and so is his brother who lives in Paris. They have such a grand house, Fanny, and such a tall Swiss porter—taller than your father!"

"I dare say 'their' daughter don't wear an old plaid woollen dress to school!" said Fanny, casting a disdainful glance at her frock, which was certainly the worse for wear.

"No, she wears a dark gray frock, and a white apron," said Kitty. "That is the uniform of the school at which she is being educated. School-girls dress very plainly in France!"

"Well, but about this money, Kitty. Don't you mean to lend it to me? I will pay you by the middle of next week; and I tell you plainly that I will never go to church or to Sunday-school again unless you do."

"But why can't you wait till then for your bonnet?" asked Kitty.

"Because I can't, and won't!" returned Fanny, passionately. And then, a little more quietly: "You see, Kitty, I can get money from my father for some things though not for others; and if he knew that I borrowed the money from you, he would give me the means to repay it. I will certainly let you have it the middle of next week. Come, Kitty, don't be stingy for the first time in your life, just as you have found out how rich you are! What is three dollars to thirty thousand?"

"But, Fanny, how do you know that I have so much?"

"Because father told me. He knew all about your father's business! Come, Kitty, I particularly want to go church and Sunday-school next Sunday, because father and mother are going to have company all day: and you don't know how it is at our house at such times. You are the only person in the world I can ask to do me such a favour, but you have always been my friend, and stuck to me in spite of every one."

Who can doubt the result! The money was transferred from Kitty's pocket to Fanny's, as many smaller sums had been before. The rest of the way home—the girls had walked the whole length of the village during their conversation—Fanny amused herself in telling of the beautiful things which she might buy if she only had thirty or forty dollars to spend instead of three, till she succeeded in making Kitty thoroughly discontented, and causing her to wish that she had never done any thing about the matter.

"But don't tell your mother what I have told you!" was Fanny's parting injunction. "And, above all, don't tell her that you lent me the money, at least not till I have paid it back. She would be angry, and very likely speak to my father about it, and then he would never let me pay it at all. Nothing makes him so angry as being dunned, and I am like him in that: I can't bear to be dunned."

"But you will be sure to pay me the first of the week, Fanny," said Kitty. "You know, though it is so little, it is all that I have for my Christmas tree!"

"Of course I shall! Good-night."

It was with a very discontented spirit that Kitty entered the house, and went straight up to her room—the room she had been admiring that very morning. How poor and mean it all looked to her now—not at all fit for the residence of a young lady with twenty thousand dollars a year! And yet it was a very pretty room. The floor was covered with bright India matting, and was further decorated by two soft, large Turkish carpet-rugs, as we should call them. The bedstead was a light iron one, and the spread curtains and table-cover were all of the same pretty pink-and-white chintz. There was a little old-fashioned writing-desk, surmounted by a bookcase well filled with volumes, both French and English. There were prints and pictures on the walls, and on a bracket in the corner stood Kitty's chief treasure, a little gilded French clock, which struck the half hours and the quarters, and played a tune at the hour.

To my mind, however, the chief beauty of the room was the splendid view from the windows. The house stood high, and from the upper room on the south side you could see clear across the valley to the North Rock—an immense boulder which crowned the high hill on the other side. You could trace the course of the clear little river as it wound from side to side of the pleasant and fertile valley, and see every one of the many bridges which covered it.

Aunt Baldwin would gladly have given all the fine furniture in her bed-room and dressing-room in New York to have such a view before her windows. To-day, however, this pleasant prospect had no charms for Kitty's eyes, as she looked at it out of her window.

"How stupid to have nothing to look at but trees, and cows, and rocks!" was her only thought. "If I had my rights, I might be living on Fifth Avenue."

"Kitty, are you here?" said Cousin Tilly, opening the door. "You came in so quietly that I did not hear you. Your mother has gone up to Mrs. Parmelee's to visit some of the ladies and talk about clothing up the poor children. She said you might come too, if you liked. They are going to stay to tea!"

"I don't want to!" answered Kitty pettishly: "I would rather stay at home."

"Well, I am surprised at that!" said Cousin Tilly. "I thought you would like it above all things."

"I want to work on mother's cushion!" returned Kitty, seizing on the first excuse which presented itself. "I hardly ever get a chance, mother is away so seldom."

"There is something in that!" said Cousin Tilly. "Well, I will get you a nice supper, and you can have a good time working.

"I wish Tilly wouldn't be so familiar!" thought Kitty, as she gathered together her worsted and came down-stairs. "After all, she is nothing but a servant! I don't see why she does not keep her place and stay in the kitchen!"

Kitty's pattern was a new and very pretty one, which had been given her by her Aunt Baldwin, with the material for making it. It was an easy one, too, being already traced out on the canvas. But, somehow, every thing went wrong with it this night. At last Kitty threw it down, declaring she would not touch it again.

"What is the matter?" asked Cousin Tilly, in surprise, for such outbreaks were rare with Kitty. "Let me see it?"

"Do let it alone, can't you!" returned Kitty, snappishly. "You will get it all dirty, and then it will be spoiled entirely."

"Well, well!" said Cousin Tilly. "It seems to me somebody has come home in a bad humour."

Kitty, rather ashamed of herself, muttered some sort of apology, and taking up her cushion again, she worked for some time in silence. Then, complaining that it hurt her eyes, she put it away, and, curling herself up in her mother's great chair, she sat for some time looking into the fire.

"Cousin Tilly!" said she, suddenly. "How much property did my grandfather leave?"

"I don't know exactly," said Cousin Tilly, rather absently: "about two or three hundred thousand dollars, I guess."

"Who did he give it to?" asked Kitty.

"Really, Kitty, I don't know much about it. I know he provided well for his children, and left your mother twelve thousand dollars of her own. I have heard say it was an odd sort of will, but I never inquired into particulars. What set you to thinking of your grandfather's will?"

"I was looking at his picture!" said Kitty, blushing a little at the fib. Then, after a short silence, "I wish we were well off."

"Why, I think we 'are' pretty well off, Kitty: don't you?"

"No!" said Kitty, pettishly. "I don't call any one well off who has to save and scrimp as we do. If you had lived with us in Paris, Cousin Tilly, you would not think we were well off now. When papa wanted any thing, he just went and got it: he did not stop to reckon up the cost, as mamma does."

"I dare say not," said Cousin Tilly, drily. "Perhaps if he had counted the cost a little oftener, there would be some to spend in these days."

"I don't believe my papa was the worst man that ever lived," said Kitty.

"Nobody said that he was!" returned Cousin Tilly, and then there was another silence.

"I don't care!" exclaimed Kitty, breaking out again. "I think mother might let me have more money to spend on my Christmas tree. What is three dollars to divide among ten children?"

"I thought you had got it all planned out very nicely!" said Cousin Tilly. "I am sure I was quite surprised at your ingenuity."

"It is just the contriving that I hate," said Kitty. "If I had twenty or thirty dollars to spend there would be some fun in it. I think mother might let me have as much."

"You know what she said about that."

"Of course I do, and I shall not ask her, but I do wish she was not quite so close."

"Your mother is not close," answered Cousin Tilly. "She is the most liberal woman I know, according to her means. You ought to be ashamed to think of such a thing, Kitty."

Kitty made no answer, except to toss her head.

"You felt very rich over your three dollars this morning!" continued Cousin Tilly. "What has come over you? Has Fanny Daskin been talking to you again?"

"Oh, Cousin Tilly! To hear you and mother talk, one would think Fanny Daskin was a witch and I her slave. I have a mind of my own, I am thankful to say!"

"I am glad if you have, but it does not seem to be a mind to be thankful for just at present!" said Cousin Tilly, significantly. "I advise you to change it before your mother comes home."

Kitty tossed up her head again, but said no more till her mother's return.

"Why did not you come down to the parsonage, my dear," asked Mrs. Tremain. "The girls were very much disappointed."

"I don't see why they should be disappointed," said Kitty. "I never said I was coming."

"Well, sorry then," said Mrs. Tremain, smiling. "You are very critical to-night. Why did you not come?"

"I had something I wanted to do at home, mamma," replied Kitty.

"Kitty seems out of sorts," said Cousin Tilly. "I don't believe she feels very well."

"There is nothing the matter with me, except that I am tired," said Kitty. "I should like to go to bed, mother, please."

But Kitty did not go to bed for a long time. She sat by her table looking in the glass, and thinking what she would have and what she would wear if only she had the twenty thousand a year which was her right. Startled at last by her candle burning out, she hastily slipped off her clothes and jumped into bed, never remembering till she had lain down that she had not said her prayers.

"It is not worth while to get up again," thought Kitty. "I cannot see to read my verses, and I can say my prayers just as well where I am." But before ten words were said, Kitty was fast asleep.

CHAPTER IV.

FOR several days Kitty was so absent-minded, and so captious and discontented, that her mother did not know exactly what to make of her. She seemed to have lost all interest in her usual pursuits—her readings, her lessons, and more especially her preparations for Christmas. She found fault with her meals, and was so saucy to Cousin Tilly that her mother seriously reproved her.

"Well, I can't help it!" said Kitty. "Cousin Tilly is so interfering. I don't see why she should always put in her word. She is only a servant, and I think she might keep her place, as Aunt Baldwin's housekeeper does."

"It is a good thing for every one to keep their places—little girls among the rest!" said Mrs. Tremain, much displeased. "Let me hear no such remarks. In the relation between ourselves and Cousin Tilly we are altogether the obliged party. She could get three times the wages I give her as matron in the Water Cure, a post she is perfectly competent to fill, while I could not find any one to fill her place for ten times the money."

Kitty stood too much in awe of her mother to say any more. She was in an unhappy frame of mind. Instead of enjoying what she had, and being thankful for it, she was all the time thinking what luxuries she might have "if she had her rights," till a hard feeling grew up in her heart towards her mother, for keeping, as she really supposed, her property away from her. Her lessons were neglected, and she got into disgrace with Miss Oliver in consequence. And even her Bible lay untouched from day to day, while her prayers were almost entirely omitted. Sunday came, and for the first time since she had taken the class, she had made no preparations to meet her scholars.

"I don't want to go out to-day, mother!" said she, after breakfast. "My head aches, and I have that pain in my shoulder again. I don't feel as if I could possibly sit up through church and Sunday-school."

Kitty had had threatenings of spinal disease, and she knew that any complaint of pain in her shoulders would make her mother uneasy. Contemptible enough she looked in her own eyes as she made this perfectly false excuse, and she almost wished she had said nothing when she saw how anxious her mother looked.

"You must not go, of course!" said Mrs. Tremain. "You had better lie flat down upon the sofa, and rest all the morning. I have not heard you complain of that pain in a good while. Have you hurt yourself in any way?"

"No, mamma, not that I know of, unless it was in stepping off two steps at once, two or three days ago. The pain is not so very bad, but it makes me feel sick."

"Do you want any one to stay at home with you?" asked Mrs. Tremain.

"Oh no, mother! I am not afraid."

"Very well, then; Cousin Tilly and myself will go to church. Try to improve your Sunday my dear! You need not lose it because you do not go to church."

But Kitty did not improve her Sunday. She seemed to have lost all her relish for sacred things, and in fact her conscience was too deeply burdened to allow of her finding any comfort in them. She took a story-book and read for a time, and then, putting away her book, she lay indulging in her favourite dreams of luxury and dress, till she fell asleep over them.

"Your secret has leaked out in some way, Kitty!" said Mrs. Tremain.

Kitty started like a guilty thing. "All the girls are talking about your Christmas tree, and the children have got their expectations raised to such a pitch that I fear they will be disappointed. Whom have you told of your plans besides Miss Oliver?"

"Nobody, mamma!"

"I can hardly think Miss Oliver would mention the matter, when you asked her not to do so," said Mrs. Tremain.

"Are you sure you did not tell any one else, Kitty—not even Fanny Daskin?" asked Cousin Tilly.

"Of course I did not!" replied Kitty, promptly. "What should I tell her for?"

"Well, it is certainly very curious, that is all!"

"I dare say Miss Oliver mentioned it to Mrs. Parmelee, and Emma or Julia overheard her!" said Kitty. "All the girls say that Emma is a real tell-tale. She carries all the news of the school to her mother and Miss Oliver. It is very mean, whoever told!"

"You are quite sure you said nothing about it to Fanny, or in her hearing?" asked her mother. "You might have done so incidentally."

"Indeed I did not, mamma," replied Kitty, positively. "I never said one word. I am sorry it has got out, but there is no use in worrying about it now."

"Very true," said her mother. "I did my best to correct the impression that you intended to give any splendid entertainment."

"It can hardly be any thing very splendid, since I have only three dollars. That is so very little, mamma!"

Mrs. Tremain held up her finger.

"Oh, I am not going to ask for any more!" said Kitty, with rather a poor attempt at a smile. "I know very well there is no use in that, but I do think it is a wretched thing to be poor and economical."

"Kitty has felt very poor for the last three or four days!" remarked Cousin Tilly. "One would think, to hear her talk, that we were just ready to go to the County House."

"Well, I do feel poor, and I can't help it!" said Kitty. "I keep thinking about the time when we lived in Paris. I wish we were there again."

"I cannot agree with you, my child!" said her mother. "The days I spent in Paris were very far from being the happiest of my life."

"When I think of Paris, it seems to me like a paradise," said Kitty.

"You were but a child, and you remember nothing but what is pleasant," replied her mother. "I am glad that is the case, but you must not expect me to feel as you do."

"I wonder if I shall ever go there again!"

"Perhaps you may!" said her mother. "I know that Aunt Natalie would be glad to have us come and spend a year with her, and it is just possible—mind I do not say probable," she added, as Kitty's eyes began to sparkle—"that in the course of a few years we may accept her kind invitation."

Here was new ground for Kitty's castle-building! All the afternoon, while her mother and Cousin Tilly were at church, she lay picturing to herself what she would do when her mother took her to Paris, and introduced her into society—as no doubt she meant to do—as a great heiress. Laces and brocades, pearls, flounces, and flowers, presentations at courts, and embassadors' balls chased each other through her giddy head, till she went to sleep again, and slept till her mother came home.

Mrs. Tremain never went out on Sunday evening, but generally devoted her time to reading and talking with Kitty. Kitty had always enjoyed these occasions, but now she looked forward with dread to being alone with her mother, and wished something would happen to prevent it. Something did happen.

"Here is one of your Sunday-scholars wanting to speak to you," said Cousin Tilly, putting her head into the room. "She is in a great hurry, but I can't understand a word she says, only that somebody is sick."

Mrs. Tremain rose and went out to the kitchen.

"I shall have no time for our own talk this evening, my dear!" said she, returning presently. "Lenore Beaubien is here, and says little Julie has been taken with croup, and they fear she will die. I must go over there directly!"

"Oh, mamma! Poor dear little Jou-jou!" exclaimed Kitty, starting up. "Do let me go with you!"

"No, my love!" said her mother decidedly. "It is a very damp, raw evening, and you know if you should take cold, you might be confined all winter. If you had not been complaining to-day, I should perhaps let you go. But as it is, you must not think of such a thing."

Kitty's reflections when her mother was gone were far from being pleasant. Julie, or Jou-jou, as she was called, was the oldest and the most promising of her pupils. She was very much attached to her young teacher, and took great pains to please her. She had already learned to read well in English, and was able to repeat the whole of the Commandments. Jou-jou was a thoughtful child, and asked many questions, some of which Kitty was puzzled to answer.

"I will find out and tell you next time!" had been Kitty's last words to the child the Sunday before.

But the next time had never come, and might never come again.

She had wilfully absented herself from her post—selfishly neglected her duty, and for what? Merely that she might indulge herself in silly reveries, and hard thoughts of the best friend she had in the world.

Nor was this the worst of it. Kitty had contrived to keep her conscience partly quiet through the week, but it was not to be silenced now. It brought up before her, in all their ugly colours, the disobedience of which she had been guilty, and the lie that she told to conceal that disobedience—the hard, uncharitable thoughts she had indulged of those about her, and especially of her mother. Kitty was astonished, when she came to think of it, to see of how many sins she had been guilty.

Kitty had lately thought herself a true disciple of Christ. Especially since she had taken charge of the Sunday-school class had she paid great attention to her religious duties, reading good books, praying, and studying the Scriptures. Fanny Daskin had often said she was the only girl in the school who acted up to what she professed; and this helped to feed her self-complacency, till she had come to think herself quite a pattern, and to criticise her companions—not a safe state of mind for anybody.

Now, all at once her eyes seemed to be opened, and she caught a glimpse of her real spiritual condition. What had she been about all this week? Where had she suffered herself to be led by the arts of the flatterer? Was this acting up to her Christian profession? Were falsehood, neglect of duty, disobedience to her mother, thoughts filled with the world and the things of the world—were these the marks of a true disciple? Kitty could not think so? She had been too well taught to deceive herself in that way.

Kitty got up and walked about the room in a very unhappy frame of mind. She thought she would pray for forgiveness, but then the reflection came across her that she could not do so without an honest intention to abandon her sins; and she could not at once make up her mind to give up all the day-dreams in which she had lately delighted, and confess to her mother the falsehoods of which she had been guilty. She felt that she was not prepared to do this. Must she then incur the added guilt of hypocrisy, or must she give up altogether the thought of being a Christian? There was another trouble upon Kitty's mind.

The more she thought about it, the more vexed she felt that she had been cajoled into lending Fanny the money she had to depend upon for her Christmas tree. She knew very well that she had often lent Fanny small sums of money which Fanny had never paid her. What security had she that she should ever see her three dollars again? And if she did not, what would become of her presents, and what should she say to her mother? These reflections were interrupted by the return of Mrs. Tremain.

"It is all over, my dear!" she said, in answer to Kitty's half-uttered question. "Poor little Jou-jou died about half an hour ago! There was nothing to be done for her. The last words she spoke were something about Mademoiselle Kitty!"

"Oh, mamma! You ought to have let me go and see her!" sobbed Kitty.

"No, my love! It would not have been right to expose your health when you could do no good!"

"Oh, if I had only gone to Sunday-school! If I had only seen her once more!"

"My darling, do not reproach yourself unjustly!" said Mrs. Tremain, tenderly. "You have been very faithful to your class, and it was through no fault of yours that you stayed at home to-day! I do not wonder that you regret it, but you are not in any way to blame."

How these kind words went to Kitty's heart! She knew it "was" all her own fault—that she had stayed at home because she was ashamed to meet her class without preparation, and because she preferred to amuse herself. Her grief became hysterical, and her mother at last put her to bed, gave her some quieting medicine, and sat by her till she fell asleep.

"Was Fanny Daskin at school to-day, mamma?" said she, suddenly, when her mother thought her asleep.

"No, my dear! I heard Miss May inquiring for her. Do you know why she stayed away?"

"No, mamma! She said on Friday that she was going."

"Well, never mind now. Go to sleep."

The next morning Kitty was really too unwell to go to school, and she lay upon the sofa all day, too miserable to read or employ herself in any way. She tried to find some relief in throwing all the blame upon Fanny Daskin, but there was small comfort in that. She had been warned time after time against Fanny's influence and Fanny's flatteries—she knew in her own heart that Fanny had always made a tool and a fool of her. The net had been spread plainly in her sight, she had walked into it like a silly bird, and now she was caught hard and fast enough.

"Kitty," said her mother, the day after little Julie was buried, "do you think you will feel well enough to go down to the city to-morrow?"

"Oh yes, mamma! Why?"

"I shall be obliged to go to see about insurance and other matters, and it will be a good time to buy your Sunday-school presents. I presume you will be able to lay out your money to much greater advantage there then here."

"Yes, mamma!" said Kitty, but with so much hesitation in her voice, that Mrs. Tremain turned to look at her.

"Why, what is, the matter, Kitty? You have not lost your money, have you?"

"Oh no, mamma, it is quite safe—only—"

"Only what?"

"I locked it up in my desk, mamma, and I have mislaid the key."

Kitty had only that morning resolved that she would never tell another lie.

"That is unlucky," said her mother. "What made you lock it up? You do not usually lock your desk, do you?"

"No, mamma, but you know Miss May was talking about burglars the other evening when she was here. So when I went up-stairs I thought I would lock my desk, and I have put away the key so safely that I cannot find it at all."

How glibly these falsehoods ran off the end of Kitty's tongue! Fanny herself could not have invented them faster or told them with less confusion.

"There comes Mrs. Brown," said her mother, glancing out of the window. "You had better go and look for your key, my dear. Try to think where you have put it."

Kitty ran up-stairs, but not to hunt for her key. That was in the lock of her desk, as usual. She turned it, took it out, and threw it over behind her book-shelf. Then hastily putting on her hood and cloak, she went down the back stairs, slipped through the garden gate, and ran through the back street to Mr. Daskin's. She knew that Fanny would just now be coming from school. She was not disappointed. She met Fanny at the gate.

"Why, Kitty, what are you doing out in this rain, and with no rubbers on!" exclaimed Fanny. "You will get your death."

"I don't care if I do!" said Kitty. "Fanny, I want my money."

"Money! What money? What do you mean?" asked Fanny.

Kitty stamped her foot with impatience. "Now, Fanny, don't tire me, for I won't stand it. You know what I mean! I want the three dollars and a half I lent you last Thursday. I am going with mother to T— to-morrow, and I want my money to spend. You said you would pay me the middle of the week."

Kitty's Christmas Tree.
"Father, was not that bill I showed you a counterfeit?"

"Oh that!" said Fanny. "I can't give you the fifty cents now, Kitty: I have not got it; as for the three dollars, the note was good for nothing. I showed it to Mr. May at the store, and he said it was a counterfeit, so I just tore it up and threw it away."

"You did no such thing! I know better. You are telling me a lie, Fanny Daskin!" exclaimed Kitty. "I know that Uncle Baldwin would never send me a bad bill."

"I tell you it was good for nothing; you may ask father. Father, was not that bill I showed you a counterfeit?"

"Of course! Any fool might have seen it!" To do Mr. Daskin justice, he knew nothing about the money that Fanny had borrowed, but thought she referred to a twenty-five cent bill she had got at the store in change. "You must look out sharper, or some of these folks will cheat your eyes out."

"There, didn't I tell you so! I am sorry for you, Kitty, and I don't mean to be vexed with you, whatever you may say. It was very good in you to lend me the money, but you can't expect me to give you back good money for bad. Now, can you?"

"Fanny Daskin!" said Kitty, trembling with excitement. "You are a thief, a cheat, and a liar. I will never speak to you again the longest day I live."

"So you said before," replied Fanny, coolly.

"I mean it this time. I will tell every one how you cheated me."

"No you won't!"

"Why not?"

"Because you can't do it without letting every one know what a fool you have been; and you won't be in a hurry to do that! Good-bye, Kitty. I hope you will have a pleasant Christmas-party. I shan't go to Sunday-school any more just now, but if I ever become converted, I will write and let you know!" Then, with these mocking words, Fanny turned and went into the house, shutting the door after her.

Kitty stood still, as if stunned for a minute. As she turned to go, she ran against Lizzy Gates.

"Why, Kitty, what brings you out in this storm!" exclaimed Lizzy. "I heard you were sick, and I was coming up to see you this afternoon. But how pale you are! Has any thing happened to frighten you?"

Kitty now poured out the story of her wrongs.

"The mean thing!" exclaimed Lizzie. "She spent that very money for a new hat and veil at Miss Perkins's, for I saw her myself. It was a new three dollar bill and a new fifty cent note, was it not?"

"Yes!"

"I saw her pay it to Miss Perkins when I was there picking out my worsteds. Miss Perkins remarked that she did not often see such clean money."

"She says she will pay me the fifty cents some time," said Kitty. "But I want it now. I dare not say any thing about it to mamma, for she has often forbidden me to lend Fanny or any of the girls money."

Lizzy shook her head. "I don't want to be a 'Job's comforter,' as they say, Kitty, but I am afraid you will never see your money again. The Daskins are going away to California day after to-morrow. Mrs. Daskin told mother so this very morning. It is a real shame, and so good as you have been to her! But I won't say any thing about her, for I have been about as bad." She stopped, hesitated, and then broke out again. "It may as well come out, Kitty. I am sorry I have used you so, and led you into so many scrapes. I have been very wicked about that and other things, but I beg your pardon. There!"

"Why, Lizzy! What do you mean?"

"I don't wonder you ask," replied Lizzy, tapping her foot against the ground. "But, Kitty, I mean what I say. I have been very wicked always, but I hope I am different now. I have been thinking about these things a good while, and now I have made up my mind. I am going to try to be a Christian, Kitty, and I hope you will pray for me."

Kitty was too much astonished to answer a word. Lizzy was the very last girl in the school from whom she would have expected to hear such words.

"That was what I was coming to tell you this afternoon," continued Lizzy. "I knew you would be glad to hear it, because you have been 'good' so long. Why, Kitty, what is the matter. You 'are' glad, are you not?"

Kitty was weeping convulsively. "Indeed, indeed I am," she said, as soon as she could speak. "You don't know how glad I am. But oh, Lizzy, don't call me a Christian. I am not! I have been a wicked, wicked girl. I have told lies, and deceived mamma, and myself, and everybody. Oh, what shall I do?"

"I know what I would do if I were you, and what you ought to do," said Lizzy, with decision. "I would go and tell my mother all about it, and tell her you are sorry. You won't have a bit of comfort till you do."

"It is easy to say that," said Kitty.

"It is not easy to do it, I know that I well enough," returned Lizzy. "I know, because I have just done it. I stopped after school and told Miss Oliver all about my cheating in composition and lessons. I knew I shouldn't feel easy till I did. So I told her the whole. I have lost all my credit by it, but I don't care so much for that. You don't know how much better I feel, now it is off my mind. And I 'know,' Kitty—" here Lizzy became very emphatic, as her manner was when she was in earnest—"I 'know,' Kitty, that you will never have one minute's comfort till you tell your mother the whole story."

"I believe you are right," said Kitty, after a minute's pause. "I 'know' you are. I will go home this minute and tell her."

"And, Kitty," said Lizzie, detaining her a moment, "I wouldn't give up every thing because I had done wrong. Remember Peter."

"I know, Lizzy, but that was not like my case."

"Well, anyhow, I wouldn't give up trying. But do go home as fast as you can and change your shoes. I am sure they are wet through."

CHAPTER V.

KITTY did not go in at the back gate this time. She felt that she must have done with concealment in every shape. She walked in at the front door, and, seeing that her mother was not in the parlour, she went straight up-stairs to her own room. Her mother was there, looking at the books in the bookcase.

"Your desk is not locked, Kitty," said Mrs. Tremain. "You turned the key without shutting it close, and the bolt is outside, so you can get your money even if you do not succeed in finding your key."

"The money is not in the desk, mother," said Kitty.

There was something in her voice so strange and unnatural that Mrs. Tremain turned hastily round. Kitty's usually rosy cheeks were as pale as ashes, and her eyes looked large and wild.

"Why, my love, what is the matter? Have you lost your money, or what has happened?"

"No, mamma—yes, mamma, I have lost it, but not in that way. I lent it to Fanny Daskin, and she will not give it back to me. She says it was a bad bill, and she tore it up, but Lizzy Gates says she saw her pay just such a bill to Miss Perkins."

"A likely story, that your uncle would send you a bad bill!" exclaimed Cousin Tilly, who had just come in with some water.

"But, Kitty, how long is it since you told me that the money was safe in your desk?"

"I did tell you so, mamma. Cousin Tilly, please go down-stairs. I want to tell mother something."

"You must change your clothes first of all, Kitty!" said Mrs. Tremain, observing for the first time how wet Kitty was. "I think you had better go to bed. Tilly, will you make a fire?"

As soon as Kitty was safe in bed, her mother sat down by her bedside, saying—"Now, Kitty, tell me the whole story, and let me have nothing but the truth this time, whatever you may have told me before."

Kitty began at the day when she lent Fanny the money, and told her mother, without reservation, all that had occurred, not concealing the fact that she had made an altogether false excuse in order to stay at home on the Sunday that little Julie died.

"Why did you do so?" asked her mother.

"I did not feel as though I could meet my class, mamma! I felt so wicked; and besides—you will think me a fool outright, mamma—I wanted to think about what Fanny had told me—about the fortune grandfather had left me."

"So you have heard that foolish story! There is no truth in it whatever. Your grandfather was very rich, and after having provided amply for each of his children and giving me the sum of money upon which we are now living, he gave the rest of his property to various charitable institutions. And so you have allowed this wicked girl, whom you know to be a liar, to prejudice you against your mother, and make you believe that she was cheating you out of what was justly your due. Oh, Kitty!"

"Yes, mamma, I own it! She did make me think so. She told me a great deal about it, and what fine things I could buy if I only had my rights, as she said. She made me think that three dollars was nothing at all, and then she got it away from me!"

"When was this?" asked Mrs. Tremain.

"Last Wednesday, mamma."

"And how many lies have you told about it since that time?"

"I don't know, mamma: a great many!"

"You told me that you had never said a word to Fanny Daskin about your Christmas tree! Was that true?"

"No, mamma; I told her all about it. She would make me!"

"She would make you!" repeated Mrs. Tremain. "How did she make you?"

"Because I was such a fool, mamma. I don't know any other reason!" said Kitty. "She is going away: that is one comfort!"

"It is no particular comfort to me, Kitty," said Mrs. Tremain, sadly. "The same weakness, the same cowardice, the same love of low, coarse flattery which has made you the prey of one person may just as easily make you the prey of another. Flatterers are never wanting, especially to a girl who is so unfortunate as to get the reputation of being foolish and rich at the same time."

"Then there is no hope for me! Oh, mamma, don't say that!" said Kitty, weeping. "Don't give me up, mamma; please, don't."

"I shall not give you up, my poor child! You will find a faithful friend in your mother as long as she lives. But I may be taken from you any day, and then what is to become of you? Or, what good can I do you if you are ready to believe any one rather than me?"

"Mother, mother, don't! Please, don't!" sobbed Kitty. "Oh, what shall I do?"

"My child, there is one hope for you, only one!" said her mother. "If you can only be brought to see your fault! If you can be brought to see that this weakness of yours is wickedness, then you may be led to go for help to the only one who can help you! But as long as you think it rather creditable to you than otherwise—rather an amiable weakness, at the worst—"

"Indeed, mamma, I don't think so now!" said Kitty. "I see it all. It is just what you say—just vanity and the love of flattery—that made me run after Fanny Daskin. I was a coward, too! I could not bear to have the girls call me stingy or mean! I—" but here Kitty's voice was lost in sobs.

"If you really see this to be true, my daughter, I shall indeed begin to have hopes of you. It is only when people see how much they need help that they really seek it. No man feels his need of a Saviour till he perceives that he is a sinner, and unable to help himself. My child, think of all that your heavenly Father has done for you! Look around you, and see your comfortable home; think of all the blessings you enjoy, both temporal and spiritual! Think of the gift of his dear Son dying for you, and bearing your sins on the cross! And then think of your sins against him. If you do this, with prayer for the help of his Holy Spirit, you cannot help coming to some sense of your condition. I leave you to yourself for a time. By-and-by I will talk with you again."

Left alone, Kitty did think more seriously, more deeply, than she had ever thought before. She saw how she had been deceived in her estimation of herself: how much of her religion had been like that of the Pharisee—done to be seen of men! How pleased she had been when Fanny said that she was the only girl in school who lived up to her profession, though she knew perfectly well that there were half a dozen who were far more consistent than herself. She remembered how much more pains she had taken with her class when Mr. Burgess, the superintendent, or Mr. Parmelee, happened to be near—how anxious she had been to display her fluency in speaking French—how, in talking with Mr. Parmelee, when her mother was not within hearing, she had exaggerated what she had done for the children, and how delighted she had been to hear him say he wished all the teachers were as zealous as Kitty.

The human heart is deceitful above all things! We have the warrants not only of God's word, but of our own experience, for saying so. But there are times when, by his Spirit or by his providence, sometimes by means even of our own falls and sins, God gives us a clear sight of our own corruption and wickedness. Such an insight did Kitty now obtain, and it was not lost upon her. The same infinite mercy and love which showed her her sins showed her also her Saviour, and the experience of that day altered the whole life of Kitty Tremain.

When Mrs. Tremain came up again, she found Kitty sad and humble indeed, but more hopeful. She had no longer any desire to justify herself at the expense of Fanny, or any one else, and she acquiesced, sorrowfully enough, but without remonstrance, in her mother's decision that she must do without pocket-money for the next six months.

"I am very sorry to deprive you of it, Kitty, but I cannot trust you with any more money until I see that you have sufficient firmness to use it properly. For the present you must come to me for every thing you want."

"I suppose I must give up my Christmas tree, mamma?"

"I shall not require you to give up your little party for the children, because it would be a great disappointment to them, and because I have promised you. But you must give up the presents, unless you can contrive to get them in some way out of your own resources."

"Very well, mamma," said Kitty, sadly. "I know it is right that I should be punished. Mamma, do you think I ought to give up my class?"

"No, my dear."

"But when I have been so wicked, mamma." Kitty looked anxiously at her mother.

"My daughter, the fact that you have done wrong is no reason why you should leave off doing right. Peter, you remember, denied his Lord, and that more than once; yet it was to him in particular that the command was given, 'Feed my lambs!' These lambs are committed to your charge by Providence in a special manner, and it is for you to feed them in the best way you can."

"Indeed I will try, then, mamma," said Kitty, with a quivering lip. "I do love them dearly, and I don't want to give them up. Oh, if I had only gone that last Sunday." And Kitty burst into tears, as she thought of little Julie.

"I do not wonder you feel sadly about it, but, Kitty, do not let it end in 'feeling.' Right feelings do us no good unless they lead to right conduct. Remember that if through sloth, or carelessness, or self-indulgence, you omit a duty, you have no reason to think that you will ever have the opportunity to perform it afterwards."

"May I get up to tea, mamma?" asked Kitty.

"I think you had better not, Kitty. You are hoarse, and I fear you have taken a bad cold. Cousin Tilly shall bring up your tea, and I will come and sit with you afterwards, but I think you are better in bed for the present."

The next day and the next Kitty made no objections to staying in bed, but the third day she was able to get up and dress herself, though she was not allowed to leave her room. Mrs. Tremain was obliged to go to T— on business which could no longer be deferred, and as Cousin Tilly was busy down-stairs, Kitty was left alone to occupy herself as she could. With some trouble, she recovered her key from the place where she had thrown it, and opened her desk. The first thing she saw was a piece of paper, on which she had set down the presents she intended to buy. Little Julie's name was first on the list. Kitty's tears fell fast on the leaf.

"Poor Julie! She will not be here to be disappointed, anyhow! Oh, if I could only think of something for them."

Kitty sat for a few minutes in deep thought. Then she unlocked an inner cupboard in the desk where she kept her principal treasures, and drew forth a box. It was a beautiful little box, covered with velvet, lined with white satin, and perfumed with attar of roses. Kitty opened it and took out the contents. There were twelve little French books, elegantly bound, printed in colours, and each having two beautifully-coloured pictures.

"They would be just the thing," said she.

She took them up and examined them one by one. Then she laid them down and took the box in her hand, shutting her eyes as she inhaled the perfume. A whole panorama came before her mind in a moment. The broad Boulevard—the gaily-dressed people walking and sitting about, all so good-natured and polite—the neat white-capped "bonnes," or nurses, running and playing with their nurslings! She seemed again to be holding her papa's hand, as he took her into the beautiful little shop which was like a toy in itself, with its paint and gilding and green velvet. She seemed to see the books and toys lying about, the pleasant, smiling French woman behind the counter, the fat, white cat with his neck and ears adorned with pink ribbons which sat purring and winking in the window. There was a struggle going on in Kitty's mind, as her face plainly showed.

"I do not think papa would care!" said Kitty to herself. "I am sure I never shall forget him even if I had nothing at all to remind me of him. Papa would wish me to do right, I know."

Kitty put the books back into their case, but her mind was made up.

"Mamma!" said she that night before she went to bed. "Would you object to my giving the children those little French picture-books in the box?"

"No, my dear!" said her mother, kissing her, and looking very much pleased. "Not if you can make up your mind to part with them."

"I do hate to part with them, that is the truth, mamma," replied Kitty, candidly. "But I know the children will be so disappointed, now that they have heard of the matter. I feel as if I owed them amends, mamma."

CHAPTER VI.

"HERE is a telegram, mamma!" said Kitty, throwing open the door. "It has just come!"

Mrs. Tremain opened the note. "It is just what I expected!" said she, as the tears filled her eyes. "Your aunt Leffington is dead!"

"Dear old lady!" said Cousin Tilly. "How glad she must have been to go. She has lasted on wonderfully! How old was she?"

"Eighty-eight years old. It is nearly fifty years since she lost her husband and daughter at one blow. She has had a long time to wait."

"Do you think she was glad to die, mamma?" asked Kitty.

"Yes, my dear! I do not believe there has been a day for fifty years that she would not have rejoiced at the summons. Yet she was always cheerful, and constantly busied herself in working for others. She was a good Christian, though she had some oddities, as was expected."

Only a week now intervened before Christmas. It came on Sunday, and the Sunday before, Kitty invited all the children to come to her house on Saturday afternoon. She had quite decided to give away her treasured picture-books, and had written each child's name in the one destined for her.

"I have a letter from Aunt Baldwin, Kitty!" said her mother, as Kitty came in from school the next day. "There is some news in it which concerns you. Listen!"

After giving an account of Mrs. Leffington's last moments, Mrs. Baldwin went on to say—

"The good old lady always said, 'Amabel, I shall not leave my money to you and Catherine. You are well enough off as it is. I shall provide for my old Aggy, and leave the rest to the Old Ladies' Home, but the other things I shall divide between you.' She has kept her word. She has left her jewels and silver to me, her books and furniture to you, and all her clothes and other personal matters to Kitty, making me her executor. I presume you will like to keep the furniture, which is rich and well preserved, though old-fashioned. Please write to me about it directly."

"You will keep it, won't you, mamma?" asked Kitty. "You won't let Aunt Leffington's things be sold?"

"Certainly not, my dear! We have two unfurnished rooms in this big house, you know, which we can now fit up very nicely. But hear the rest of the letter."

"There is one large trunk, the contents of which I hardly know what to do with," Mrs. Baldwin continued. "You remember Aunt Leffington's fancy for buying all sorts of things merely because they were cheap. She always said she should find a use for them, and I presume she has given away hundreds of dollars' worth of children's clothes, toys, &c. But there still remains this large camphor-wood chest, perfectly filled with the most miscellaneous collection of odds and ends I ever saw. After some consideration, I have concluded to send this box to Kitty at once, thinking that she may make use of some of its contents as gifts to her little class. She will therefore receive it, probably, on the same day as this letter. I shall send the other things as soon as possible."

"Oh, mamma!" said Kitty. She could get no farther, but looked at her mother with sparkling and imploring eyes.

"You are thinking you can furnish your Christmas tree out of Aunt Leffington's box," said her mother, smiling.

"May I, mamma?"

"Yes, Kitty, if you find any thing suitable. But, remember, you must not give away a single thing without asking me first."

"I won't indeed, mamma! Oh, mamma, here comes the express-man this very minute. What a great, big box!"

"Isn't it a big one?" said the good-natured express-man, smiling at Kitty's rapture. "I think it is most too big for a little puss like you! Here is the key, I expect, in this little parcel."

A happier girl than Kitty was not to be found in the whole United States that day! What bundles were disclosed when the box was opened! What dolls, and dolls' houses, and furniture, and dishes!—What picture-books, and china-cups, and images, and work-baskets, and scissors, and "odds and ends" enough to stock a small shop Kitty took up one and another, and did not know which to admire most.

"Your only embarrassment will be in choosing among your treasures!" said her mother. "Do not be too extravagant, my dear! It is never a good plan with children!"

"Please pick out the things for me, mamma!" said Kitty. "You will know best, and I will lock up the rest for another time."

Mrs. Tremain selected such articles as she thought suitable, and Kitty spent a pleasant evening in putting the marks upon them.

"You will not need to give away your pretty, little picture-books now," remarked Cousin Tilly, who had taken great interest in Kitty's preparations, and had, indeed, laid in sundry private stores of her own to help them out.

"I think I shall give them, for all that, Cousin Tilly," replied Kitty, gravely. "I feel as though I had promised."

Cousin Tilly looked at Mrs. Tremain, and nodded a grave approval. "I should feel just so if I were you, I know," said she. "By the way, do you know the Daskins are really gone?"

"Gone!" said Mrs. Tremain.

"Gone, bag and baggage, and a good riddance," replied Cousin Tilly. "They say they are going to California, but I think it's doubtful if they get so far. I can't say I care much for any of them except the sick one: I am sorry for him!"

"I think Mr. Daskin was good to that boy," remarked Kitty.

"I believe you are right," said her mother. "His kindness to the boy was one redeeming trait about him."

"Fanny used to say that her father cared more for Fred than all the rest of them," added Kitty. "Poor Fanny! I wonder what she will come to?"

"To no good, I'm afraid," said Cousin Tilly. "A girl with no more principle than that seldom turns out well."

"And yet every one tried to do Fanny good," remarked Kitty, thoughtfully. "Miss Oliver took a great deal of pains with her, and so did Miss May, her Sunday-school teacher. And I am sure nobody could be kinder than Mrs. May was while Fanny lived there. It was not as if nobody had cared for her."

"My dear child, it is by no means so easy to do people good as you might suppose from reading some books and hearing some good people talk," said her mother. "An old author says, very truly, that all the good in the universe will not benefit a man so long as it is outside of him."

"I think Fanny's great defect was that she never cared for anybody but herself," observed Cousin Tilly. "You see how little she thought of Kitty, after all her pretences. She never even came to bid her good-bye."

"Perhaps she was ashamed," said Kitty.

"Probably she was afraid," said her mother. "I could easily have given her a good deal of trouble, as she knew very well. I could have proved by Miss Perkins that she really did spend Kitty's money. But as they were going so soon, I preferred to let matters alone. Kitty's three dollars will be well expended if it teaches her to beware of flatterers."

Kitty's Christmas Tree.
The children were highly delighted with their presents.

Kitty's party was perfectly successful. The children were highly delighted with their presents, and as much pleased with the apple, cocoanut, and molasses candy which Cousin Tilly had secretly prepared as they would have been with the most costly Parisian confections.

Kitty still keeps the class, and takes the greatest pains with them. And as she has lately been more desirous to teach them English than to show off her own French, they have made famous progress.

Lizzy Gates has never receded from her determination to lead a Christian life. She has had to struggle with many temptations, but she is a girl with a great deal of character and courage, and she gains ground every day. As a sample of her improvement, she saw the whole contents of Aunt Leffington's camphor-wood chest displayed without asking Kitty for the least trifle, nor would she accept some bead trimmings which she acknowledged would be just the thing to finish the cushion she was working for Miss Oliver, until Mrs. Tremain herself particularly requested her to do so.

Of Fanny Daskin I have no good to say, and therefore I will say nothing—except that she never appeared in Holford again.

THE END.

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Table of Contents

- Kitty's Christmas Tree;

- CHAPTER I.

- CHAPTER II.

- CHAPTER III.

- CHAPTER IV.

- CHAPTER V.

- CHAPTER VI.

- THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG™ LICENSE