e table fell quite to one side, as you see it now,
tumbling down those prodigious books and tin boxes on the floor! I
cannot think how this fine new table could be so easily broken; but
whenever we even look at anything, it seems to break!"

"Yes, Harry! You remind me of Meddlesome Matty in the nursery rhymes,

"Sometimes she'd lift the teapot lid
To peep at what was in it,
Or tilt the kettle, if you did
But turn your back a minute.
In vain you told her not to touch,
Her trick of meddling grew so much."

You have scarcely left my poor table a leg to stand upon! How am I ever
to get it mended?"

"Perhaps the carpenter could do it to-morrow!"

"Or, perhaps uncle David could do it this moment," said Major Graham,
raising the fallen side with a sudden jerk, when Harry and Laura heard a
sound under the table like the locking of a door, after which the whole
affair was rectified.

"Did I ever--!" exclaimed Harry, staring with astonishment, "so we have
suffered all our fright for nothing, and the table was not really
broken! I shall always run to you, uncle David, when we are in a scrape,
for you are sure to get us off."

"Do not reckon too certainly on that, Master Harry; it is easier to get
into one than to get out of it, any day; but I am not so seriously angry
at the sort of scrapes Laura and you get into, because you would not
willingly and deliberately do wrong. If any children commit a mean
action, or get into a passion, or quarrel with each other, or omit
saying their prayers and reading their Bibles, or tell a lie, or take
what does not belong to them, then it might be seen how extremely angry
I could be; but while you continue merely thoughtless and forgetful, I
mean to have patience a little longer before turning into a cross old
uncle with a pair of tawse."

Harry sprung upon uncle David's knee, quite delighted to hear him speak
so very kindly, and Laura was soon installed in her usual place there
also, listening to all that was said, and laughing at his jokes.

"As Mrs. Crabtree says," continued Major Graham, "'we cannot put an old
head on young shoulders;' and it would certainly look very odd if you
could."

So uncle David took out his pencil, and drew a funny picture of a cross
old wrinkled face upon young shoulders, like Laura's, and after they had
all laughed at it together for about five minutes, he sent the children
both to bed, quite merry and cheerful.

A long time elapsed after