t."

"Help yourself, Mr. Teacher," said the girl, looking up without
hesitation. The teacher took one, blushing.

"Eat some yourself," said her grandmother.

"No, thank you: just help yourselves: I hope they'll do you good."

"Where did you pick them?" asked her grandmother.

"In the gully by the side of our field: you know where the bush is:"
said the girl, and went into the house.

The bush which had formed the subject of the teacher's first sketch was
the same from which Hedwig now brought him the ripened fruit.

Hedwig soon returned, still followed by the white hen.

"Where are you going so fast, Miss Hedwig?" asked the teacher: "won't
you stop and talk with us a little?"

"No, thank you: I'll go and see the old teacher a little before
supper."

"If you have no objection, I'll go with you," said our friend, and did
so without waiting for an answer.

"Do you see the old teacher often?"

"Oh, yes: he's a cousin of mine: his wife was my grandmother's sister."

"Was she? Why, I'm delighted to hear it."

"Why? Did you know my grandaunt?"

"No, I was only thinking----"

On entering the old teacher's garden, Hedwig closed the gate hastily
behind her: the white hen, thus excluded, posted herself before it like
a sentinel.

"What makes that hen run after you so?" asked the teacher. "That's
something extraordinary."

Hedwig pulled at her apron in great embarrassment.

"Are you not permitted to tell me?" persisted the teacher.

"Oh, yes, I can, but---- You mustn't laugh at me, and must promise not
to tell anybody: they would tease me about it if it was to become
known."

He seized her hand and said, quickly, "I promise you most solemnly." It
seemed a pity to let the hand go at once, and he retained it, while she
went on, looking down,--

"I--I--I hatched the egg in my bosom. The cluck was scared away and
left all the eggs; and I held this one egg against the sun, and saw
there was a little head in it, and so I took it. You mustn't laugh at
me, but when the little chick came out I was so glad I didn't know what
to do. I made it a bed of feathers, and chewed bread and fed it; and
the very next day it ran about the table. Nobody knows a word of it
except my grandmother. The hen is so fond of me now that when I go into
the field I must lock it up to keep it from running after me. You won't
laugh at me, will you?"

[Illustration: "Sha'n't I have a shake of the hand for good-night?"]

"Certainly not,"