on with his drinking. Nimpo gathered up her skirt, and very wet, and very hot, she seized the bridle and dragged the animal out. On the bank a good-natured boy slipped the saddle up to its place, and Nimpo started for home, leading the horse, and dragging her mother's dress through the dust.

The boys laughed and shouted at her, but she pulled her friendly sun-bonnet over her burning face, and, wet and draggled, she at last reached home. Anna sympathized with her, and they tied old Charley in the stall, bridle and all. And great was the wonder of Cousin Will that night, when he went to feed Charley, to find him sadIdled and bridled.

"Rush," asked Nimpo the next time she saw him, in a careless sort of way, "how do you get the bits into a horse's mouth?"

"Just stick in your thumb back of the front teeth," said Rush, "and poke it right open."

66

'Humph!" said Nimpo, "I think I see myself putting my thumbs into a horse's mouth!"

"Oh, that's nothing!" said Rush, scornfully.

CHAPTER XXI.

THE FATE OF NIMPO'S DOLL.

แ "ANNA," said Nimpo, the next day, "you remember that cunning little girl at Sarah's?"

"Yes," said Anna. "You mean the one with the yellow flannel frock."

"Well, I've been thinking about her, and I'm going to give her my doll."

"What, your big one that your mother made?" asked Anna, aghast.

"Yes. I don't want it any more, and I most know she hasn't any."

"What'll your mother say?" asked Anna.

"Mother won't care. It's been lying in the attic ever so long, and I don't know as I can find her dress. Come over after school and help me fix her up, and we'll go out to Sarah's with it. Will you?"

"Yes, and maybe Sarah'll tell us another story," said Anna, eagerly.

After school the neglected doll was hunted up, and a droll looking object she was, with her face very dirty, and half the hair gone from her head. Her limbs were all there, for she was not one of your store dolls, whose legs and arms are held by one stitch. This doll was of home manufacture, and I'm afraid you young girls with your dolls of wax and bisque would turn up your nose at her, and call her a rag-baby.

I don't suppose you ever saw one of her kind, so I will tell you about her. Her body was cut and made, by Nimpo's mother, of stout cotton. Her arms were made of kid. Her head was about the size, and nearly the shape, of an ordinary sauce plate, made of cotton also, and ornamented on the face with the brightest of red lips and cheeks, and the bluest of eyes, all done in oil paint, and on the back, covered with a grand wig of real hair, which hung down her back in ringlets. Her head was covered with black to hide any shortcomings in the curls. When she came

in Nimpo's Christmas stocking, two or three years before, she was completely dressed, from her red morocco shoes, to a black silk dress and quilted hood; and every thing would come off, which was a rare virtue in those days.

It took so long to hunt up her clothes, that it was almost dark when Anna and Nimpo reached the log house in the woods. As they came near they heard singing and Nimpo whispered,

"Let's go up still. I guess Sarah's singing, and it's real fun to hear her. We can hardly ever get her to sing."

So they stole up to the door, and looked in. There sat Sarah on a low stool before the fire, rolling from side to side in a kind of ecstacy, beating time with her hands and singing to the most unearthly, wailing tune, these words,

"O come 'long, Moses, yo won't get lost,

Let my people go.

With a lighted can'l at yo breast,

Let my people go.

Go down, Moses, way down in Egypt's land,

Go an' tell ole Pharo fur to let my people go."

"Keep still!" whispered Nimpo, "there's lots more of it, it's real funny."

Sarah went on:

"O take y'r shoes frum off y'r feet,

Let my people go.

Walkin' in de golden street,

Let my people go.

Go down, Moses, way down in Egypt's land,
Go an' tell ole Pharo fur to let my people go."

Just then they heard the whole family returning from the woods, each one with an armful of wood. Sarah heard them too, and came out. She started when she saw the two girls.

"Lor! how ye scairt me! y'r ma done come home?"

"No," said Nimpo. "I came to bring my to the little girl I saw here.

doll

"What! to Sabriny!" exclaimed Sarah, "won't she be tickled! Law! she never saw such a powerful fine doll, let alone ownin' on't herself."

By that time the family had come in, and the doll was handed from one to the other, and praised, till Nimpo felt as though she had done some he