g
to make room in the earth for a new plant, she saw growing there a
little green sprig, which was not a weed. She listened a moment, and
heard the child's voice outside.

"Polly, my dear, are you sure you scattered all the seeds of your
pretty apple the day you were so provoked at their not having begun to
grow for you?"

The child reddened a little, and turned away.

"I don't know, grandmother. I think so; I wished to then."

How delighted she was when the old lady showed her the treasure, and
how carefully it was watched and tended! For one little seed had been
buried deeper than the rest, and now in the sunshine of grandmother's
wide window it had come up. Every pleasant day it was placed somewhere
in the sun, and at night it was always carried to Polly's own room.
Her dolls and other old play-house friends, formerly much honored, and
of great consequence, were quite neglected for "the apple tree," as
she always called the tiny thing with its few bits of leaves.

And now we must leave the Brentons' old stone house and the garden.
All this happened in the days of King Charles I., when there was a
great war, and the country in a highly discordant state. Polly's
father was on the king's side, and one day he did something which was
considered particularly unpardonable by his enemies, and at night he
came riding from Oxford in the greatest hurry he had ever been in; and
riding after him were some of Cromwell's men. It was bright moonlight,
and as he rode in the paved yard the great dogs in their kennels began
to bark, and that waked Polly's mother, in a terrible fright at
hearing her husband's voice, and sure something undesirable had
happened.

Squire Brenton hurried in to tell her, in as few words as possible,
what he had done, and that he was followed, and had just time to say
good by, and take another horse, and rush on to the sea, where he
hoped to find a fishing-boat, by means of which he could escape.

"And you," said he, "had better take Polly and one of the men, and
ride to your cousin Matthew's; for in their rage at my escape, they
may mean to burn my house. I little thought a month ago,--when he
offered you 'a safe home,' and I laughed in his face, and said, 'Give
your good wife the same message; for she may not find your house so
safe as mine by and by,'--that you would need to accept so soon."

"But I cannot go there now," said Mistress Brenton; "for cousin
Matthew is away with the Roundhead army,