not say such dreadful things to me. I am still your
obedient child. Indeed, I am. However stupid I may be, I should never
be able to curse any one who belonged to you, much less pray for the
death of one you love. Surely some one has been telling you lies, and
you are dazed, and you know not what you say--or some evil spirit has
taken possession of YOUR heart. As for me I do not know--no, not so
much as a dew-drop, of the evil thing of which you accuse me."

But the father remembered that she had hidden something away when he
first entered the room, and even this earnest protest did not satisfy
him. He wished to clear up his doubts once for all.

"Then why are you always alone in your room these days? And tell me
what is that that you have hidden in your sleeve--show it to me at
once."

Then the daughter, though shy of confessing how she had cherished her
mother's memory, saw that she must tell her father all in order to
clear herself. So she slipped the mirror out from her long sleeve and
laid it before him.

"This," she said, "is what you saw me looking at just now."

"Why," he said in great surprise, "this is the mirror that I brought as
a gift to your mother when I went up to the capital many years ago! And
so you have kept it all this time? Now, why do you spend so much of
your time before this mirror?"

Then she told him of her mother's last words, and of how she had
promised to meet her child whenever she looked into the glass. But
still the father could not understand the simplicity of his daughter's
character in not knowing that what she saw reflected in the mirror was
in reality her own face, and not that of her mother.

"What do you mean?" he asked. "I do not understand how you can meet the
soul of your lost mother by looking in this mirror?"

"It is indeed true," said the girl: "and if you don't believe what I
say, look for yourself," and she placed the mirror before her. There,
looking back from the smooth metal disk, was her own sweet face. She
pointed to the reflection seriously:

"Do you doubt me still?" she asked earnestly, looking up into his face.

With an exclamation of sudden understanding the father smote his two
hands together.

"How stupid I am! At last I understand. Your face is as like your
mother's as the two sides of a melon--thus you have looked at the
reflection of your face ail this time, thinking that you were brought
face to face with your lost mother! You are truly a faithf