her pace, and
whispering, "you did not tell Miss Bracy she was ill-tempered."

"No--not exactly. How could you tell papa I did?"

"She said so. She was crying, and I asked what was the matter, and she
said my sister Ethel said she was ill-tempered."

"She made a great exaggeration then," said Ethel.

"I am sure she was very cross all day," said Mary.

"Well, that is no business of yours," said Ethel pettishly. "What now?
Mary, don't look out at the street window."

"It is Flora--the Grange carriage," whispered Mary, as the two sisters
made a precipitate retreat into the drawing-room.

Meanwhile, Dr. May had been in the schoolroom. Miss Bracy had ceased her
tears before he came--they had been her retort on Ethel, and she had not
intended the world to know of them. Half disconcerted, half angry, she
heard the doctor approach. She was a gentle, tearful woman, one of
those who are often called meek, under an erroneous idea that meekness
consists in making herself exceedingly miserable under every kind
of grievance; and she now had a sort of melancholy satisfaction in
believing that the young ladies had fabricated an exaggerated complaint
of her temper, and that she was going to become injured innocence. To
think herself accused of a great wrong, excused her from perceiving
herself guilty of a lesser one.

"Miss Bracy," said Dr. May, entering with his frank, sweet look, "I
am concerned that I vexed you by taking the children to walk with me
yesterday. I thought such little brats would be troublesome to any but
their spoiling papa, but they would have been in safer hands with you.
You would not have been as weak as I was, in regard to sugar-plums."
Such amends as these confused Miss Bracy, who found it pleasanter to be
lamentable with Ethel, than to receive a full apology for her imagined
offence from the master of the house. Feeling both small and absurd,
she murmured something of "oh, no," and "being sure," and hoped he
was going, so that she might sit down to pity herself, for those girls
having made her appear so ridiculous.

No such thing! Dr. May put a chair for her, and sat down himself,
saying, with a smile, "You see, you must trust us sometimes, and
overlook it, if we are less considerate than we might be. We have rough,
careless habits with each other, and forget that all are not used to
them."

Miss Bracy exclaimed, "Oh, no, never, they were most kind."

"We wish to be," said Dr. May, "but there are l