Flaxie.

"Oh, she's at home, but her sister Hatty goes to school."

"Well, I shan't have to make mittens or anything this time, 'cause
you're at home, Milly. I like to be with my twin cousin in a twin
house," said Flaxie, twisting her neck to look at Mrs. Hunter's
door-stone. It was just like Aunt Charlotte's, only there were
flower-pots on it.

"Guess what I dreamed last night," returned Milly. "I dreamed you were
my sister; and then I woke up and thought how queer it is that God
always sends brothers to this house, and not any sisters."

"Why so he does; for Johnny and Freddy are _both_ boys, and so is Ken,"
said Flaxie, struck with a new idea. "It's real-too-bad!"

"But now you've come, and we'll go to school together, and it's just as
well," said Milly, kissing her pea-green friend in rapture.

"Oh, I didn't say I'd go to school, Milly Allen.--Why, who's that
coming?"

"Hush! that's my teacher and her sister."

"Which is the sister?"

"The big one."

"Well, she's got the dropsies."

"Oh, no, she hasn't; she teaches the singing in our school."

"But she _has_ got the dropsies, Milly Allen, for a fat woman has 'em
where I live, and my papa takes care of her; so don't I know?"

Milly said no more, for _her_ papa was not a doctor; so what right had
she to give an opinion concerning diseases?

The two ladies nodded and smiled in passing. "Oh, how homely!" whispered
Flaxie, in amazement; "I mean the other one, not the sister."

There was no doubt about it. I really suppose Miss Pike was one of the
ugliest women in the whole state. Her eyes were small and half shut;
her mouth was large and half open; her nose was enormous, and turned up
at the end,--and, to crown the whole, it was red!

Milly, who had always known her, did not mind her looks. Indeed, so
little can children judge of the beauty of those they love, that I dare
say she might have thought her dear teacher quite handsome if she had
not heard everybody speak of her as "that homely Miss Pike."

"We don't have such looking folks keep school where I live," said
Flaxie, in scorn.

"I can't help it if you don't," returned Milly, slipping her cousin off
her lap with much indignation. "God made her so, and my mamma says you
mustn't notice how anybody looks when they have a beautiful soul."

"Well, you won't get _me_ to go to school, not if you give me five
million thousand dollars, Milly Allen!" said Flaxie; and their loving
chat on the doorstep