y,
then; for here we all work with a good will." "He does not burn with
the true fire," thought the good Star; and she wrapped herself about
with a soft cloud, and said no more.

"Oh that I could be set on fire like the Comet!" thought the cold
North Star. "I would gladly burn to death if I could astonish the
world with my blaze!"

"Let us die!" said the Seven Sisters; "let us die together; we have
ceased to be noticed."

"Ah, hum!" growled the Great Bear; "so many years as I have kept watch
in this sky; and now to be set one side by this upstart of a
foreigner! I've a great mind to go to sleep and never wake up!"

"Hush!" whispered the Vesper Star gently; "do your duty, and trust God
for the rest."

And lo! that very night there was an end of the Comet's splendor.

"Adieu, my dull friends," said he; "I am tired of a quiet life: a
little more, and I should fade out entirely!"

Then, with a blaze and a whiz, and a dizzy wheel, he flashed out of
the sky; and no one knew whither he went, or whence he came, any more
than the path of the quick lightning.

The stars were ashamed of their envy, and went to their old work with
a stronger will and a steadier purpose: but to the Vesper Star was
given a brighter and sweeter light than to any other, because she had
done her work without envy and without repining.

THE WATER-KELPIE.

Once there lived under the earth a race of fairies called gnomes. They
were strange little beings, with dull eyes and harsh voices; but they
did no harm, and lived in peace.

They never saw the sun; but they had lamps much brighter than our
gaslight, which burned night and day, year after year.

They had music; but it was the tinkling of silver bells and golden
harps,--not half so sweet as the singing of birds and the babbling of
brooks.

Flowers they had none, but plenty of gems,--"the stars of earth."
There were green trees in the kingdom: but the leaves were hard
emeralds; and the fruit, apples of gold or cherries of ruby; and these
precious gems the gnomes ground to powder, and swallowed with much
satisfaction.

They heaped up piles of gold and diamonds as high as your head; and
never was there a gnome so poor as to build a house of any thing a
whit coarser than jasper or onyx. You would have believed yourself
dreaming, if you could have walked through the streets of their
cities. They were paved with rosy almandine and snowy alabaster; and
the palaces glittered in the ga