is father was at work. He presently saw his father's
paper hat through the light over the door, and said:

"Let me tell you some other time, uncle. They will laugh at me if I tell
you now."

"Benjamin," said his mother, "we are going to have a family gathering
this year on the anniversary of the day when your father landed here in
1685. The family are all coming home, and the two Folger girls--the
schoolmarms--will be here from Nantucket. You will have to take the
guinea-pig box out of your room under the eaves. The Folger girls are
very particular. What would your aunts Hannah and Patience Folger, the
schoolmarms, say if they were to find your room a sty for a guinea pig?"

"My little covey, mother," said Ben. "I'll put the cage into the shop.
No, he would be killed there. I'll put him where he will not offend my
aunts, mother."

Abiah Folger began to spin again, and the wheel and the wind united did
indeed make a lonely atmosphere. Uncle Benjamin punched the fire, which
roared at times lustily under the great shelf where were a row of pewter
platters.

Little Ben drew near the fire. Suddenly Uncle Ben started.

"Oh, my eyes! what is that, Ben?"

Ben looked about.

"I don't see anything, uncle."

"Your coat sleeve keeps jumping. I have seen it four or five times. What
is the matter there?"

Uncle Ben put the tongs in the chimney nook, and said:

"There is a bunch on your arm, Ben."

"No, no, no, uncle."

"There is, and it moves about."

"I have no wound, or boil, nor anything, uncle."

"There it goes again, or else my head is wrong. There! there! Abiah,
stop spinning a minute and come here."

The wheel stopped. Abiah, with a troubled look, came to the hearth and
leaned over it with one hand against the shelf.

"What has he been doing now?" she asked in a troubled tone.

"Look at his arm there! It bulges out."

Uncle Ben put out his hand to touch the protrusion. He laid his finger
on the place carefully, when suddenly the bunch was gone, and just then
appeared a little head outside the sleeve.

"I told you that there was something there! I knew that there was all
the time."

There was--it was the little covey or guinea pig.

"What did I tell you before Ben came in?" said Uncle Benjamin.

Little Ben did not know what his uncle had said to his mother before he
opened the door; but he heard him say now mysteriously:

"It is a cold day for shelterless things. That little bunch on his arm
illu