and the chickens. The white hen had a fine brood of chickens; and Emma clapped her hands when she saw them running about to pick up seeds in the barn yard.

When the sun was setting, she had some good new milk to drink; and then the children went into the fields to gather flowers.

While they were in the fields, Emma saw a little chipping squirrel run along the top of the wall. She cried out joyfully, and ran after him. She thought she could catch him, and teach him to live with her little kitten in New York, and eat milk from a saucer. But the squirrel hid himself in his hole, and Emma could not find him. Her mother told her she was very glad she could not catch the squirrel; for if she had taken hold of him, it would have frightened him very much, and made his little heart beat very fast. She told her the squirrel would be very unhappy in a city; and unless he were shut up in a cage, he would run away. When Emma knew this, she did not want the pretty squirrel any more. She loved dearly to hear about his snug house under the ground, and the nuts he stored away in his little closet.

In the evening, Emma saw a great many fireflies in the meadows. She said to her uncle, "See how the ground is covered with pretty little stars! Did the sky sprinkle them down?"

Her uncle told her they were not stars, but little insects, that gave light from their wings. Then the little girl asked, “What is their name, uncle?" He told her people in the country called them lightning bugs.

Emma had never seen any fireflies before, and she talked a great deal about them. But when she tried to tell her mother all about it, she forgot the name, and said, "O mother, I have seen a great many beautiful thunder bugs!" This made them all laugh; and George called fireflies thunder bugs for a long time after.

The next day, Emma went into the meadow, with her cousin George, to gather cranberries. "Where are all the fireflies

now?" said she. "I don't know," said George. "I suppose they have put their lamps out." Emma had never seen cranberries growing before. She called them little red apples, and wanted to carry some home for her doll.

When they went back to the house, the children heard a great noise behind the barn, and they ran to see what it was. A cross dog was trying to bite a poor little calf. But there was a great ox feeding in the same pasture, and he ran to the calf and stood by him; and whichever way the dog turned, the ox turned too, and pointed his horns at him. So the naughty dog was driven off, and the calf was not much hurt. Emma called him a good ox, and wanted to give him some of the cranberries from her little basket. But George told her the ox would not eat cranberries.

When Emma found her cousins were going to school, she wanted to go too. She had never been to school; but her mother had taught her to read and spell a little. She went with her cousins, and sat very still while the scholars said their lessons. When the schoolmistress asked her to read, she read as well as she could, and did not make any trouble at all.

When she came home, her mother asked her what she did at school. Emma said, "I sat as still as a mouse; and I read 'Chain up a child, and away she will go!' This made her uncle and all her cousins laugh very much; for Emma did not say the verse right. She meant to say she had read, "Train up a child in the way he should go.”

In the afternoon, her uncle went into the orchard to gather apples to send to New York. Emma stood under the tree, holding her apron for some, while George tried to catch them in his hands, as they fell. A pretty little lady bug lighted on her apron, and that pleased Emma very much. It had red wings, with little black spots. "O, look here, George," said Emma; "here is a pretty little fly with a calico gown on." Presently she saw a great many ants, crawling out of a hole in the ground near her feet. the apples that had fallen. said she; "will they sting me?"

Some of them were eating into "What are these black things?" George told her they would

not sting her, and that they were called ants. "Aunts!" said she; "who are they aunts to? Your mother is my aunt; but who are these black things aunts to? Are they aunts to the lady bugs?" George told her that ant, an insect, was a different word from aunt, a relation. But Emma did not understand very well about it. When she grows bigger, she will understand better.

When they came home through the fields, after sunset, she heard a noise all the time. "What is that?" said she. George told her it was the crickets singing. Poor little Emma was puzzled again. "Crickets!" said she; "why, I sit on a cricket." Her uncle smiled. “Little Emma finds many things in the country that she does not understand,” said he. Then he told her that a cricket was a little thing with wings, that made a noise at nightfall.

When they came to the house, Emma ran and emptied her apron full of apples into her mother's lap. "What has my little girl been doing all the afternoon?" said her mother. "I have been helping uncle pick apples," said she; “and I have seen a sweet pretty fly with a calico gown, that had a great many black aunts. When we came home, I heard some little birds singing their prayers. The birds have a queer name, mother. They call them crickets; and I sit on a cricket."

Then they all had a laugh at Emma. Her mother kissed her, and said, “My little girl does not know much about country things; and she makes a great many mistakes. A cricket is not a bird, my dear. It is an insect. If you were to see one, you would call it a bug."

When it was time to go home, Emma cried. But her mother told her how much father wanted to kiss his good little girl; and how he would love to hear about the things she had seen. Emma loved her father, and she was willing to go home.

She told him all about the chickens, and the ox, and the lady bug, and the squirrel, and the crickets. "I am glad I did not catch the pretty little squirrel," said she; "he would not love to live in New York. I suppose he was made on purpose to live in the country. I wish I was a squirrel."

XXXVII. THE COUNTRY GIRL IN THE CITY.

MRS. CHILD.

LITTLE Fanny lived in the country. She had one brother and two sisters. They had never been in a city. When Fanny was four or five years old, her father and mother promised to take her to New York. There never was a little girl so glad as she was. From morning till night, she talked about her journey. When she first awoke in the morning, she would say to her sister, "Ah, Mary, I am going to New York." And when she laid her head on the pillow, the last question always was, "Mother, when do you think we shall go to New York?" The important day came at last. The baskets and boxes, and little Fanny, were all safely stowed in the steamboat. Fanny had never been in a steamboat before. She asked what made the trees and fields run so; and when she looked at an old cow on the shore, she said, "What makes her go away so fast? She did not move her feet.”

COW.

Her mother told her the boat was moving away from the Then little Fanny looked at the water, and saw that the boat was moving through it. But she thought there was soap in the water, because the bright foam looked so white.

When they came to New York, she was afraid in the street, because there were so many horses and so many people. She met a woman carrying a very small poodle dog in her arms. His hair was white and soft as silk, and fell all over his face in pretty curls. Fanny stopped to look back at the poodle, and a boy with a basket of matches ran against her, and knocked her bonnet all in a bunch.

"Mother, is this another steamboat?" asked Fanny. "No, this is a city," said her mother; "don't you see the houses?" “Yes, I see the houses," said Fanny; "but I thought may be it was another kind of steamboat; the folks run over me so." Fanny had great pleasure in looking at the toy shops. She saw many things that she never saw before, and she wanted

to buy them all. But after a few days, she began to be very homesick. She wanted to get back and see the children, and her little red and white calf, and her bantam chickens. She wanted to be where she could run out of doors, without getting lost. She was glad enough when the day came to go home.

Her brother and sisters were waiting for her with great impatience. When the wagon came from the steamboat, they saw it a great way off, and began to wave their handkerchiefs for joy. They all crowded round Fanny, and began to kiss her. “O, I have had such a good time," said Fanny; "and I have brought some things for you." She was so impatient, that she broke the string of her bonnet, trying to get it off. Before her mother could unpin her shawl, she seated herself on the floor, and began to open the big basket. "Susan, here is a doll for you," said she; "and here is a little pail for Mary, and here is a top for Willie. It will spin, spin, spin, — O, how it will spin!".

"Spin what? Spin yarn for stockings?" asked little Mary. "No, no," said Willie, laughing, "it will not spin yarn, it will spin round."

"And what is round?" asked little Mary.

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"O, you don't know any thing. You never went to New York," said Fanny. "Look at me. That is round." As she spoke, she whirled round, till her gown stood out, as stiff as a churn.

"That is going; that is not spinning," said Mary.

"Well, they call it spinning; for they said so in New York," answered Fanny.

"They say so here, as well as in New York," said Willie; "I suppose they call it so, because the top makes a noise like a spinning wheel."

Fanny thought her brother did know something, though he had never been in New York. She said no more about his top.

"Come, tell us what you have seen," said Susan.

"O, I have seen such a many things," said Fanny; "I can