'
nature, and it is of such stuff very often, that great men and heroes
are made."

The children listened very attentively to what their father said, and if
they did not understand it all they gathered enough to make them feel
quite sure that Ambrose had been very brave about the cow. So they
treated him for a little while with a certain respect, and no one said
"Ambrose is afraid." As for Ambrose himself, his spirits rose very
high, and he began to think he never should feel afraid of anything
again, and even to wish for some great occasion to show himself in his
new character of "hero." He walked about in rather a blustering manner
just now, with his straw hat very much on one side, and brandished a
stick the gardener had cut for him in an obtrusively warlike fashion.
As he was a small thin boy, these airs looked all the more ridiculous,
and his sister Nancy was secretly much provoked by them; however, she
said nothing until one evening when Pennie was telling them stories.

The children were alone in the schoolroom, for it was holiday time. It
was just seven o'clock. Soon Nurse would come and carry off Dickie and
David to bed, but at present they were sitting one each side of Pennie
on the broad window-seat, listening to her with open ears and mouths.
Nancy and Ambrose were opposite on the table, with their legs swinging
comfortably backwards and forwards.

All day long it had been raining, and now, although it had ceased, the
shrubs and trees, overladen with moisture, kept up a constant drip,
drip, drip, which was almost as bad. The wind had risen, and went
sighing and moaning round the house, and shook the windows of the room
where the children were sitting. Pennie had just finished a story, and
in the short interval of silence which followed, these plaintive sounds
were heard more plainly than ever.

"Hark," she said, holding up her finger, "how the Goblin Lady is playing
her harp to-night! She has begun early."

"Why does she only play when the wind blows?" asked Ambrose.

"She comes _with_ the wind," answered Pennie, "that is how she travels,
as other people use carriages and trains. The little window in the
garret is blown open, and she floats in and takes one of those big
music-books, and finds out the place, and then sits down to the harp and
plays."

"What tune does she play?" asked David.

"By the margin of fair Zurich's waters," answered Pennie; "sometimes she
sings too, but not often, b