t his way,
and they were detained. Lights were gleaming from all the windows, and
as they neared the broad steps a delightful strain of music welcomed
their approach. Servants were waiting to greet them, and Laura was quite
overwhelmed with all their kind attentions. She could not but remember
how coldly and indifferently she had been in the habit of receiving
kindness before she left home; for, child that she was, she had learned
to think and reflect. Thrown upon her own efforts to make herself
comfortable and happy, and even to sustain her own life, she had grown
out of the listless, dissatisfied, unhappy child into a rational and
useful being, grateful and disposed to make others happy.

"Oh, Miss Laura, what a tall, lovely girl you are!" exclaimed Nannette,
looking at her affectionately and turning her around. "Who dresses
you, dear? and who brushes your beautiful hair? I have been lost without
you."

"I am my own maid, Nannette, and you will have to wait upon mamma in
future, or knit stockings for all the poor people. Do I not look well
dressed? Ah! here is my dear Fido. What a great big creature he has
become! And, oh! my dear Nannette, how are all the birds? and where is
Polly?

"Welcome! welcome!" screamed Polly, in reply.

Laura took Kathie about from room to room till the child was almost
bewildered; but so modest and refined was she by nature, that the
grandeur did not dazzle her. She was just the same simple, quiet child
of the woods, with a heart-sick and homesick longing to return to her
own poor home; and it was not many days before Laura and Lady Idleways
saw that the little wood-violet was drooping.

Kathie had been allowed a room next to Laura's, and each day Lady
Idleways gave them lessons together. They walked, they rode, they
gathered flowers. Kathie was teaching Laura to knit, and Laura was
teaching Kathie many little nice ways about herself; and Laura was all
brightness and energy--a veritable sunbeam, as all in the castle said;
but Kathie grew quieter and sadder, and one day Laura found her unable
to rise from her bed. In alarm she went to her mother.

"Mamma, Kathie is ill; her head is hot, and she says strange things to
me, and she moans as if in pain."

Lady Idleways found the child truly ill, and she had to forbid Laura's
even seeing her, for she knew not but that her fever might prove to be
contagious.

Nannette shook her head wisely, and took her place at the bedside, as if
now s