ery just begun in one of its corners. A needle carelessly stuck
into it showed that Jessie had been working on it when her eyes were
attracted by the pictures she was now studying with such close attention.

After a few minutes the little girl moved her right arm for the purpose of
looking at another picture, when her thimble dropped from her finger to
the table with a loud ringing sound. She started to pick it up, and in so
doing pushed her scissors to the floor. The noise they made in falling led
Jessie to glance towards the sofa, and to say in a very soft whisper--

"Oh dear! I'm afraid those naughty scissors have waked Uncle Morris out of
his nap!"

Jessie was right. The noise had started Uncle Morris from a cozy little
nap into which he had fallen after dinner. It was not often that the
active old gentleman indulged himself in this way; but a long walk in the
morning had made him weary, and he had quietly roamed into dreamland as he
sat reading. He now opened his eyes, looked round the room, and seeing his
niece looking askance at him, said--

"What's the matter, Jessie? I heard something fall with a great crash,
what was it?"

Jessie laughed outright. It was not very polite, but she could not very
well keep the fun out of her face. It seemed so queer that her uncle
should call the noise made by the fall of a pair of scissors _a great
crash_. At last she said--

"There was no great crash, Uncle. Only my scissors fell from the table."

"Was that all? Why it sounded to me just like the crash of a tray full of
crockery ware. That was because I was half asleep, I suppose. Well, never
mind, I'm not the first old gentleman who has magnified a little noise
into a great one in his sleep--but what are you so busy about this
afternoon, little puss!"

As Uncle Morris put this question he arose, walked up to the table and
began to look at Jessie's work, for by this time she had begun stitching
on the cambric handkerchief again. Blushing deeply, she said--

"I am embroidering a pocket-handkerchief, Uncle."

"Indeed! how fond you little ladies are of finery!" said Uncle Morris,
smiling and patting Jessie's head.

"I'm not doing it for myself, Uncle," replied the child.

"Not for yourself, eh? Is it for papa, then?"

"No, Sir."

"For your brother Guy, perhaps?"

"No, Sir. Not for Guy," and looking slyly at her uncle, she added. "I
guess that you are not Yankee enough to guess whom it is for."

"For your brother