bubbling stream,
taking good heed of the stones at the bottom. She got across safely, and
began to climb the steep, narrow path leading to the cottage. On either
side the grass was long, sometimes almost meeting across the path. All
in a moment her foot caught in some hidden trap, and down she fell! Alas
for the poor little milkmaid! Her pail was upset, and the milk--the
precious milk--ran hither and thither amongst the primroses and daisies,
and finally trickled down into the brook.

"This comes of sending babies a-milking," said Grandmother, who had seen
the disaster from the cottage door. "Come in," she added crossly, as the
distressed little maid came slowly up the path. "Thou'rt a bad, careless
lass, and shall have no breakfast. Catch me sending thee a-milking
again."

"Wait a bit, Grandmother," said the old man, in his feeble, quavering
voice. "Did not I hear Tom say that he'd teach the little one to meddle
with his job? You must go down the path and see for yourself if it is
not one of his tricks. Something must have tripped the child up."

Grandmother could not refuse to go down the path, but she went
unwillingly. Tom was her favorite, and she did not wish to find him out
in the wrong. But when she came to the milk-dyed spot, and found the
long grass tied together across the path, she could no longer deny that
the child in fault was not little Susie. As she slowly wended her way
back to the cottage, she felt not only angry with naughty, idle Tom, but
grieved at her own lack of justice to the willing little milkmaid.

Tom's unkind and revengeful conduct did not this time go unpunished; but
his grandmother's over-indulgence had sadly spoilt his character, and
although she strove hard to remedy the evil, it is doubtful if he will
ever learn to be as obedient and unselfish as his good little sister
Susie.

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MR. BOBOLINK.

"I wish I could catch a bobolink," said Samuel.

"Let us try to-morrow and see if we cannot catch one in a box trap,"
said his brother Robert.

"That will be real fun," said little Maggie. And so the three children
talked the matter over, and made plans for the morrow.

"You must help me in the morning," said their father. "Samuel must drop
the corn in the hills for the hired man to cover, Robert will drop the
beans, and Maggie must put in the pumpkin-seed. We shall have it all
done by ten o'clock, and then you c