as I wanted,
and I should like to have sister to be silly with. I like to be silly
sometimes, and sister does, too. It is a long time, Ada, since we saw
them all, the boys, and the kittens, and Snowflake, and all the rest.
I am afraid it is going to be a long time more, for mamma wrote that
it would have to be quite warm weather before they could come back."

To be sure Ellen had a lap ready whenever there was time for her to
sit down, but she was kept very busy, the one servant in a large
house, and even on the days when the wash-woman came she worked just
as hard. Then Aunt Elizabeth did not approve of much time spent in the
kitchen by her niece, and so, with Louis grumpy, Ellen busy, Uncle
Justus reading, and Aunt Elizabeth absorbed in her many interests,
there were days which seemed very long to the little girl, and once or
twice she went to her room at night so homesick that she threw
herself, crying, on the bed, with her doll hugged up to her, and fell
fast asleep without undressing, to awaken in the middle of the night
chilly and uncomfortable, finding herself on the outside of the
covers. She would then shiver out of her clothes and creep into bed,
after groping around to get Ada and place her safely under the
bedclothes. But this was only sometimes; generally speaking, the days
were not unhappy ones, for lessons and practicing, so many squares of
patchwork, so many pages of reading filled up the hours, and the
playtime was not so long as to become tiresome.

Once a week there was a visit to Maggie, who was always overjoyed to
see her little friend.

"I don't know what I shall do when you go home," Maggie said, sadly,
one day. "And when you take Moggins so far off, I'll never hear of
him."

Edna was thoughtful. "What becomes of little girls who live here till
they grow up?" she asked.

"Some of 'em don't stay that long, they get 'dopted," replied Maggie,
"an' some of 'em get places." And Edna bore this information in mind.

"What do you have to do to get 'dopted?" she asked her aunt.

"You don't do anything but try to behave yourself," replied she. "What
are you thinking about, Edna? Surely you do not need to have anyone to
adopt you?"

"No," was the reply, "I was thinking of Maggie."

"Well, if some lonely, childless person were to come along and take a
fancy to Maggie, she might be adopted, but usually the younger
children are preferred; little girls of her age are not often chosen."

Edna was dis