d,
And bounded up the mountain-side
As fast as they could bound,
And came again to the meadow
With pails heaped high with snow,
And so, through half the night, the moon
Beheld them come and go.

But when with the daybreak roses
The silver walls shone red,
The three little foolish maidens
Were lying cold and dead.
The needles of the frost had sewed
Into shrouds their woollen coats,
And with cheeks as white as the ice they lay
Among their mountain goats.

ALICE CARY.

[Illustration: GRACIE AND HER FATHER.]

MY STORY.

Many years ago, when the sky was as clear, the flowers as fragrant,
and the birds as musical as now, I stood by a little mahogany table,
with pencil and paper in hand, vainly trying to add a short column of
figures. My small tin box, with the word _Bank_ in large letters upon
it, had just been opened, and the carefully hoarded treasure of six
months was spread out before me. Scrip had not come into use then; and
there were one tiny gold piece, two silver dollars, and many quarters,
dimes, half-dimes, and pennies. For a full half hour I had been
counting my fingers and trying to reckon up how much it all amounted
to; but the problem was too hard for me. At last I took pencil and
paper, and sought to work it out by figures.

"What are you doing, Gracie?" pleasantly inquired my father, entering
the room with an open letter in his hand.

"O, papa! is that you?" I cried, eagerly turning towards him. "Just
look--see how much money I've got! John has just opened my bank. It is
six months to-day since I began to save, and I've more than I
expected."

"Yes, you are quite rich."

"So much that I can't even count it. I've done harder sums in addition
at school; but somehow, now, every time I add, I get a different
answer. I can't make it come out twice alike."

"Where did you get that gold piece?"

"Why, don't you know? _You_ gave it to me for letting Dr. Strong pull
out my big back tooth."

Father laughed.

"Did I?" said he; "I had forgotten it. But where did you get those two
silver dollars?" he inquired.

"O, grandmother gave me this one. It's _chicken_ money. She gave it to
me for feeding the chickens every morning all the while I staid there;
and the other is _hat_ money. Aunt Ellen told me if I'd wear my hat
always when I went out in the sun, and so keep from getting
sun-burned, t