spears and masts and stars;
and some all went to money; and one was a queer little bottle and
pills, and one was pencils and artists' tubes, and--really--a little
palette with a hole in it.

[Illustration]

And then came the chestnut-roasting, before the bright red coals. Each
girl put down a pair; and I dare say most of them put down some little
secret, girlish thought with it. The ripest nuts burned steadiest and
surest, of course; but how could we tell these until we tried? Some
little crack, or unseen worm-hole, would keep one still, while its
companion would pop off, away from it; some would take flight
together, and land in like manner, without ever parting company; these
were to go some long way off; some never moved from where they began,
but burned up, stupidly and peaceably, side by side. Some snapped
into the fire. Some went off into corners. Some glowed beautiful, and
some burned black, and some got covered up with ashes.

Barbara's pair were ominously still for a time, when all at once the
larger gave a sort of unwilling lurch, without popping, and rolled off
a little way, right in toward the blaze.

"Gone to a warmer climate," whispered Leslie, like a tease. And then
crack! the warmer climate, or something else, sent him back again,
with a real bound, just as Barbara's gave a gentle little snap, and
they both dropped quietly down against the fender together.

"What made that jump back, I wonder?" said Pen Pennington.

"O, it wasn't more than half cracked when it went away," said Stephen,
looking on.

Who would be bold enough to try the looking-glass? To go out alone
with it into the dark field, walking backward, saying the rhyme to the
stars which if there had been a moon ought by right to have been said
to her:--

"Round and round, O stars so fair!
Ye travel, and search out everywhere.
I pray you, sweet stars, now show to me,
This night, who my future husband shall be!"

Somehow, we put it upon Leslie. She was the oldest; we made that the
reason.

"I wouldn't do it for anything!" said Sarah Hobart. "I heard of a girl
who tried it once, and saw a shroud!"

But Leslie was full of fun that evening, and ready to do anything. She
took the little mirror that Ruth brought her from up stairs, put on a
shawl, and we all went to the front door with her, to see her off.

"Round the piazza, and down the bank," said Barbara, "and backward
all the way."

So Leslie b