.

The next morning, directly after breakfast, the hack drove up to the door,
and the cousins were borne away to the depot in care of Mr. Carlton. As
the carriage left the lawn, Uncle Morris patted his niece on the head, and
said:

"As vinegar to the teeth, and smoke to the eyes, so are self-willed guests
to those who entertain them."

"O Uncle Morris!" exclaimed Jessie, with an air of mock gravity, which
showed that, harsh as her uncle's remark sounded, she felt its justice. In
fact, the departure of the ungracious cousins was to the inmates of Glen
Morris, like the flight of the angry storm-cloud to a company of mariners,
after weary weeks of squalls and tempests.

CHAPTER IX.

The Wizard in the Field Again.

"I'm glad they are gone, and yet I'm sorry. Em seemed sorry to go, and she
cried when I kissed her good-by. I really think Em loves me after all; and
if it wasn't for that ugly Charlie, she would be a nice girl. But that
Charlie! Oh dear! I don't think there is another such boy anywhere. I
don't wonder my uncle compares him to a burr, a sting-nettle, and a
hedgehog. I'm sure he's been nothing but a plague to everybody, ever since
he came here. I'm glad _he's_ gone, anyhow. And yet, poor fellow, I pity
him. He must be miserable himself, or he wouldn't torment everybody else
so--but I must go to work, I s'pose."

Thus did Jessie talk to herself, after seeing her cousins off. She had
returned to the parlor, and seated herself in her small rocking-chair. She
now drew the two pieces of cloth for her uncle's slippers, from her
work-basket, and after handling them awhile with a languid air, put them
in her lap, sighed, and said--

"Oh dear! I do wish these slippers were done. This is a hard pattern, and
it will take me ever so many days to finish it. Heigho! I 'most wish I
hadn't begun them. Let me see if I have worsted enough to finish them."

Here Jessie leaned over and began to explore the tangled depths of her
work-basket. It was a complete olio. Old letters, pieces of silk, velvet,
linen, and woollen, scraps of paper, leaves of books, old cords and rusty
tassels, spools of cotton, skeins of thread and knots,--in short, almost
every thing that could by any sort of chance, or mischance, get into a
young lady's work-basket, was there in rare confusion. Jessie's love of
order was not very large. Her temper was often sorely tried by the trouble
which her careless habit caused her when seeking a pair of