aused, apparently, by a
pair of light feet, which, with a hop, step and jump, by way of a start,
were now coming in through the leaves and grass with a slow and measured
tread; and so near at hand that he who walked would have been in plain
view just there. At first Sprigg looked too high to see what was to be
seen, but soon lowering his gaze he saw----

But close the book for a minute and guess. Can not? Try it again! Not
yet? No--nor could you, were you to try from New Year's morn to New
Year's eve. Wonderful, as you may think it, Sprigg saw there on the
ground, not a dozen paces from him, his cast-off moccasins, coming
slowly toward him--first the right foot, then the left--without so much
as a pair of knee buckles to show for legs, till they had set their toes
within easy speaking distance, squarely confronting him. The boy stood
stock still, staring before him, with no more power to move from the
spot than the bushes around him. So great was his astonishment, not to
say terror, he felt at the sight of this fantastic apparition.

CHAPTER IX.

Finds the Red Moccasins Whole-souled Friends in Need.

"Are we not beautiful things for the feet, Sprigg? Oh, but we are! You
can't deny it! On with us, then, and away to grandpap's house! Who said
we couldn't take Sprigg to grandpap's house? Who said we couldn't take
Sprigg to young Ben Logan's house? Who said we couldn't take Sprigg to
pretty little Bertha's house? If Will-o'-the-Wisp said so, he lied! He
lied, too, if he said our Sprigg was not a brave boy! He-he-he!"

The boy knew well enough, for he heard it distinctly enough this time,
that the voice did not come from his own heart, nor yet from the
moccasins, but from a point in the air, about as high up from the ground
as his own mouth, as if he who spoke were standing in the moccasins,
face to face with him, though not even so much as a shade of a shadow
could he see.

"An elf! An elf is in the moccasins!" cried the boy, and tearing his
feet from the ground, where he had stood as rooted, fled for his life,
the moccasins following right at his heels and mockingly keeping step
for step with him, till down in a swoon he sank at the foot of an old
oak tree. How long he lay thus he never knew, but when he recovered his
senses, there before him were the red moccasins, side by side, the toe
of the left one turned slightly outward, as if he who stood in them were
taking it quite at his ease. A self-assured air, w