r; I don't like this house, 'cause it's got a top to it! Wish I
was somewhere else!"

"Poor child," said Colonel Allen, who was seated on the sofa, looking
out of the bay-window upon the garden; "do you love home better than
this beautiful spot?"

"No," replied the little one, shaking her head. "I don't love my home,
'cause I live there; I don't love nothin'. O, hum, suz!"

Then Dotty wandered into the nursery, and stood all alone, leaning
against the lounge.

"I shouldn't think my mother'd let me be so cross," mused she.

She did not cry, for she had learned very young that crying is of no
use; and it may be, too, that she had only a small fountain of tears
back of her eyes. Prudy, entering the nursery in eager haste, for her
"bean-bags," was touched at sight of her sister's sad face.

"There, now, I'll put back my bean-bags, and try to make her happy,"
said Prudy to herself. "That will be following the Golden Rule; for it's
doing unto Dotty as I want Susy to do unto me, when _I'm_ sick."

She went quietly up to Dotty, who still stood leaning gloomily against
the lounge. The child turned around with a sudden smile. It cheered her
to see Prudy's sweet face, which was always sunny with a halo of happy
thoughts.

"Are you real sick, though, Dotty Dimple?"

"Yes, I are," replied Dotty, well pleased to be asked such a question.
"I got 'most drowned, you know. O, I wish you'd stayed out in the rain
the other day, and got cold; then you'd have been sick, too."

Prudy smiled, for she knew that her little sister really had no such
unkind wish at heart. She was only trying, with her limited stock of
words, to say that she longed to have a little sympathy. It was not
often that Dotty was willing to be pitied.

"See here, Prudy darling, don't you want a piece of my cough-candy? It's
good! You may bite clear down to there, where I've scratched with a
pin."

"No, thank you, dear, I don't care a bit for it."

Dotty's face beamed with joyous dimples. It was so pleasant to be
generous, and at the same time keep the candy! In her short life Dotty
Dimple had not quite learned that "the half is better than the whole."

"Now," said Prudy, after thinking a while, "suppose we play that you're
sick,--as you are, you know,--and I'm the doctor."

Dotty gave a little scream of delight.

"You may see my tongue," said she, running to the looking-glass; "it's
real rusty. Can't you scrape it with a knife, Brady?"

"You must say