hunt. Poor
Blackhawk tried to escape, but Prig caught him, gave one shake, and
the pretty rabbit lay dead.

"O, you wicked dog!" cried Ada, while Willie and Dolly stood quite
overcome by the misfortune.

Prig saw in a moment she had made a mistake, and when Willie rushed at
her with uplifted hammer, hid behind the summer-house. With loud grief
and many tears, the children raised their dead pet, and laid it on a
bench in the out-house. Its blue eyes were half open, its soft
black-and-white fur wet and rumpled, and they cried and blamed Prig as
they tenderly arranged it on the bench. Ada fairly howled, and Bridget
and Mary ran out to see what was the matter.

"Ay," said Bridget, "and it was Dolly herself left the door open,
though I told her to shut it."

"I didn't know Prig was there," sobbed Dolly.

"It's all Prig's fault," said Willie, "and I'll kill her."

"No, no," pleaded Dolly, with whom Prig was an especial favorite.

A consultation was held over the bench, and it was finally decided
that the case should be referred to Mrs. Constant on her return,
though Willie still vowed vengeance. Prig had crept back, and crouched
in the doorway; but when the children saw her, they drove her away,
throwing stones and calling her the worst names they could invent. She
skulked outside very unhappy, until Willie shut her up in the
summer-house, while the children spent the rest of the long afternoon
over their dead rabbit. Dolly tied the Princess Widdlesbee's best blue
sash about his neck, Willie emptied his toolbox to lay him in, and Ada
spread her best doll's bed-quilt over him. Then they sat and cried
together until Dolly started up, and said,--

"There's mother."

The first thing Mrs. Constant heard when she entered the house was the
cry of,--

"Mother, mother!"

Not with the joyous ring it had in the morning, but with an appeal in
it which told her some trouble had come which mother could best heal.
All told the story separately and together, laying Blackhawk on her
knees, and crying on her shoulder.

"And I'm going to hang Prig for a wicked, bad dog," said Willie, to
conclude. "She is a murderer!" and he fiercely wiped his tears.

"My dear little boy, I don't think poor Prig was to blame at all."

"O, mother!" cried a mournful chorus.

"No; Dolly left the door open, you all excited her, and I begin to
think you were having too much of what Willie calls a holiday."

"But it wasn't her holiday, and she's k