estion
everything--proof, proof, proof, what will we have to believe left?
How do you know the angel opened the prison door for Peter, except that
Peter said so? How do you know that God talked to Moses, except that
Moses wrote it? That is what I hate!"

The girl knit her brows. Perhaps her thoughts made a longer journey than
the German dreamed of; for, mark you, the old dream little how their
words and lives are texts and studies to the generation that shall
succeed them. Not what we are taught, but what we see, makes us, and the
child gathers the food on which the adult feeds to the end.

When the German looked up next there was a look of supreme satisfaction
in the little mouth and the beautiful eyes.

"What dost see, chicken?" he asked.

The child said nothing, and an agonizing shriek was borne on the
afternoon breeze.

"Oh, God! my God! I am killed!" cried the voice of Bonaparte, as he,
with wide open mouth and shaking flesh, fell into the room, followed by
a half-grown ostrich, who put its head in at the door, opened its beak
at him, and went away.

"Shut the door! shut the door! As you value my life, shut the door!"
cried Bonaparte, sinking into a chair, his face blue and white, with
a greenishness about the mouth. "Ah, my friend," he said tremulously,
"eternity has looked me in the face! My life's thread hung upon a cord!
The valley of the shadow of death!" said Bonaparte, seizing the German's
arm.

"Dear, dear, dear!" said the German, who had closed the lower half of
the door, and stood much concerned beside the stranger, "you have had a
fright. I never knew so young a bird to chase before; but they will take
dislikes to certain people. I sent a boy away once because a bird would
chase him. Ah, dear, dear!"

"When I looked round," said Bonaparte, "the red and yawning cavity was
above me, and the reprehensible paw raised to strike me. My nerves,"
said Bonaparte, suddenly growing faint, "always delicate--highly
strung--are broken--broken! You could not give a little wine, a little
brandy my friend?"

The old German hurried away to the bookshelf, and took from behind
the books a small bottle, half of whose contents he poured into a cup.
Bonaparte drained it eagerly.

"How do you feel now?" asked the German, looking at him with much
sympathy.

"A little, slightly, better."

The German went out to pick up the battered chimneypot which had fallen
before the door.

"I am sorry you got the fright. Th