shop had been
boiled down into that one glass. The second tumbler was, if possible,
even worse than the first; but this time I noticed a white froth on the
top, such as I had never seen upon any tea before. A frightful suspicion
suddenly occurred to me. I emptied out my camp-kettle, and
discovered--with what emotion I need not say--that the supposed
chocolate was nothing less than a piece of brown _soap_!

Just at that eventful moment in came my Tartar. One glance at the soap,
my distorted visage, and the froth in the glass, told him the whole
story; and the effect was magical. To throw himself on the floor, to
kick up his heels in a kind of convulsive ecstasy, to burst into a
succession of shrill, crowing screams, like a pleased baby, was the work
of a moment; and he kept on kicking and crowing, till, provoked as I
was, I could not help laughing along with him. Then he suddenly sprang
up and stood before me with his usual solemn face, as if it were
somebody else who had been doing all this, and _he_ were utterly shocked
at him. But he never afterward alluded to the occurrence, nor did I ever
again see him laugh, or even smile.

FOOTNOTES:

1 The Russians drink tea in tumblers, with lemon-juice instead of milk.

[Begun in No. 17 of HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE, February 24.]

BIDDY O'DOLAN.

BY MRS. ZADEL B. GUSTAFSON.

CHAPTER IV.

Little Katy Kegan had the blackest hair and eyes you ever saw, and she
was very pretty, with color like the cream and red of the lady-apples
packed in tempting pyramids in the fruit stalls. She was the kind of
girl who keeps you always expecting, without your knowing what it is you
expect. Katy was very bright, quick as a dart in her motions, but as
rough and sharp as a prickly-brier if things didn't go to suit her. She
had all the bad habits which friendless little children learn from
living on the streets, with no one to care what they do or how they
feel. She was saucy and bold, and used very bad words, and thought it
smart to steal fruit and pea-nuts when she could; and she would tell a
lie about her thefts, or indeed about anything else, as glibly as a toad
swallows a fly. If you ever saw that done, you know that it is pretty
swiftly done; and just as a toad, when it has swallowed a fly, looks as
if it had never so much as heard of such an insect, so Katy, when she
told a lie, would look straight at you, and smile with an air of such
innocence that you would find it hard to n