unmindful of old Silas Pratt, who was solemnly
reading the moral piece, the paper held close to his eyes, were
doubling up in convulsions of silent laughter; while from underneath
them came ominous squeaks and rumbles and a pair of wicked eyes gleamed
from the dusky shadow of the seat. Elizabeth's heart stood still.
Those dreadful boys were teasing Trip, and he would burst forth soon
into loud barking, and what would become of the culprit who had brought
him into the church?

The moral piece was drawing to a close; old Wully Johnstone had
finished his, and a hush had fallen over the school. Noah Clegg had
left his class, and gone squeak, squeak on tiptoe to the platform, and
was coming squeak, squeak back again with the collection box. The
little girls had begun to untie their cents from the corners of their
handkerchiefs.

Now, the window just above Elizabeth's head was open, and a little
sparrow, emboldened by the quiet, hopped upon the sill, and fell to
pecking at some crumbs left there from the last tea-meeting. He even
ventured to the edge of the sill and with his knowing little head on
one side contemplated, with one bright eye, the cherries on Martha
Ellen's hat, as though he longed to get a peck at them.

But just across the church the wicked pair of gleaming eyes were
watching the little sparrow from the dark corner. From beneath them
subterranean grumblings and mutterings warned Charles Stuart that Trip
was growing dangerously excited. John Gordon indicated the cause, by a
nod at the sparrow, and the two boys ducked their heads in an agony of
mirth. This was too much for Charles Stuart. Not stopping to consider
the consequences, he leaned down and whispered, "Crows, Trip, crows!"
and clutched the little dog tighter between his legs. Now Trip had
been trained all spring to chase the crows from the corn, and this was
his signal to charge. Not all the boys in Forest Glen Sunday school
could have held him at that moment. The word "crows" changed him into
a raging, squirming, yelping, snarling, exploding little
powder-magazine. With a yell of wrath he burst free and leaped upon
the opposite seat, knocking the moral piece from Silas Pratt's hand and
the spectacles from his nose. With one explosive yelp he hurtled
across the aisles, landed upon Martha Ellen Robertson's seat, slid half
its slippery length, righted himself, and standing upon his hind legs,
with his front paws upon the back of the seat,