kept
their exquisite shapes of star and wheel and triangle. Cousin Wealthy
would be pleased with this! Hildegarde felt the same pleasant assurance
of success. "There ought to be a bit of pearl-coloured satin ribbon
somewhere! Oh, here it is! A bit of ribbon gives a finish that nothing
else can. There! now that is ready, and that makes two. Now, Benny, my
blessed lamb, where are you?"

She drew out a truly splendid scrap-book, bound in heavy cardboard, and
marked "Benny's Book," with many flourishes and curlicues. Within were
pictures of every imaginable kind, the coloured ones on white, the black
and white on scarlet cardboard. Under every picture was a legend in
Hildegarde's hand, in prose or verse. For example, under a fine portrait
of an imposing black cat was written:

"Is this Benny's pillow-cat?
No! it is not half so fat!
No! it is not half so fair,
So it mews in sad despair,
Feeling that it has not any
Chance for to belong to Benny."

Hildegarde had spent many loving hours over this book; her verses were
not remarkable, but Benny would like them none the less for that, she
thought, and she laid the book back with a contented mind. Then there
was a noble apron for Martha, with more pockets than any one else in the
world could use; and a pincushion for Mrs. Brett, and a carved
tobacco-stopper for Jeremiah. Beside the tobacco-stopper lay a pipe,
also carved neatly, and Hildegarde took this up with a sigh. "I don't
like to part with it!" she said. "Papa brought it from Berne, all those
years ago, and I am so used to it; but after all, I am _not_ likely to
smoke a pipe, even if I have succumbed to the bicycle, and I do want to
send some little thing to dear Mr. Hartley. Dear old soul! how I should
like to see him and Marm Lucy! We really must make a pilgrimage to
Hartley's Glen next summer, if it is a possible thing. Marm Lucy will
like this little blue jug, I know. We have the same taste in blue jugs,
and she will not care a bit about its only costing fifteen cents. Ah! if
everything one wanted to buy cost fifteen cents, one would not be so
distracted; but I _do_ want to get 'Robin Hood' for Hugh, and where am I
to get the three dollars, I ask you?"

She addressed William the Silent; the hero drew her attention, in his
quiet way, to his own sober dress and simple ruff, and seemed to think
that Hugh would be just as well off without the record of a