ved
kittens would fail as a balm for griefs like this, and Jo wrathfully
proposed that Mr. Davis be arrested without delay; while Hannah shook
her fist at the "villain," and pounded potatoes for dinner as if she had
him under her pestle.

No notice was taken of Amy's flight, except by her mates; but the
sharp-eyed demoiselles discovered that Mr. Davis was quite benignant in
the afternoon, and also unusually nervous. Just before school closed Jo
appeared, wearing a grim expression as she stalked up to the desk and
delivered a letter from her mother; then collected Amy's property and
departed, carefully scraping the mud from her boots on the door-mat, as
if she shook the dust of the place off her feet.

"Yes, you can have a vacation from school, but I want you to study a
little every day with Beth," said Mrs. March that evening. "I don't
approve of corporal punishment, especially for girls. I dislike Mr.
Davis's manner of teaching, and don't think the girls you associate with
are doing you any good, so I shall ask your father's advice before I
send you anywhere else."

"That's good! I wish all the girls would leave, and spoil his old
school. It's perfectly maddening to think of those lovely limes," sighed
Amy with the air of a martyr.

"I am not sorry you lost them, for you broke the rules, and deserved
some punishment for disobedience," was the severe reply, which rather
disappointed the young lady, who expected nothing but sympathy.

"Do you mean you are glad I was disgraced before the whole school?"
cried Amy.

"I should not have chosen that way of mending a fault," replied her
mother; "but I'm not sure that it won't do you more good than a milder
method. You are getting to be altogether too conceited and important, my
dear, and it is about time you set about correcting it. You have a good
many little gifts and virtues, but there is no need of parading them,
for conceit spoils the finest genius. There is not much danger that real
talent or goodness will be overlooked long; even if it is, the
consciousness of possessing and using it well should satisfy one, and
the great charm of all power is modesty."

"So it is," cried Laurie, who was playing chess in a corner with Jo. "I
knew a girl once who had a really remarkable talent for music, and she
didn't know it; never guessed what sweet little things she composed when
she was alone, and wouldn't have believed it if any one had told her."

"I wish I'd known that n