en, where she herself slept. It was a little place, bare
enough, but very neat and clean, as all things belonging to Wealthy
were sure to be. Then, she washed Eyebright's face and hands, and
brushed her hair, retying the brown bow, crimping with her fingers the
ruffle round Eyebright's neck, and putting on a fresh white apron to
conceal the ravages of play in the school frock. Eyebright was quite
able to wash her own face, but Wealthy was not willing yet to think
so; she liked to do it herself, and Eyebright cared too little about
the matter, and was too fond of Wealthy beside, to make any
resistance.

When the little girl was quite neat and tidy,--"Go into the
sitting-room," said Wealthy, with a final pat. "Tea will be ready in a
few minutes. Your pa is in a hurry for it."

So Eyebright went slowly through the kitchen, which looked very bright
and attractive with its crackling fire and the sunlight streaming
through its open door, and which smelt delightfully of ham and eggs
and new biscuit,--and down the narrow, dark passage, on one side of
which was the sitting-room, and on the other a parlor, which was
hardly ever used by anybody. Wealthy dusted it now and then, and kept
her cake in a closet which opened out of it, and there were a mahogany
sofa and some chairs in it, upon which nobody ever sat, and some books
which nobody ever read, and a small Franklin stove, with brass knobs
on top, in which a fire was never lighted, and an odor of mice and
varnish, and that was all. The sitting-room on the other side of the
entry was much pleasanter. It was a large, square room, wainscoted
high with green-painted wood, and had a south window and two westerly
ones, so that the sun lay on it all day long. Here and there in the
walls, and upon either side of the chimney-piece, were odd, unexpected
little cupboards, with small green wooden handles in their doors. The
doors fitted so closely that it was hard to tell which was cupboard
and which wall; anybody who did not know the room was always a long
time in finding out just how many cupboards there were. The one on the
left-hand side of the chimney-piece was Eyebright's special cupboard.
It had been called hers ever since she was three years old, and had to
climb on a chair to open the door. There she kept her treasures of all
kinds,--paper dolls and garden seeds, and books, and scraps of silk
for patchwork; and the top shelf of all was a sort of hospital for
broken toys, too far