A rag-carpet covered the floor; green rush-bottomed chairs, a settee with chintz cover, and a straight-backed rocking-chair were distributed around the walls; and for ornament there was an alphabetical sampler in a frame, over the low wooden mantel-piece.

"Will you help console me with my primer and that altogether dreadful sampler when my Betty is away?" "Indeed will I," replied Sally, much amused with Moppet's view of the sampler; "and you shall come and see me every fine day, and the wet ones I am sure to be here with Pamela, who has proclaimed her intention of adopting me when Betty goes.

Certainly we do it with as conscientious a care as ever watched over the stitches of the little girls of old as they made the faded samplers we cherish so affectionately.

At such times Bill explained glibly enough that no pay dump carried steady values, and that an inexperienced sampler was apt to get "skunked" under the best of circumstances.

"W is a hard letter," said Miss Bidwell, laying down one of the perpetual stockings with which she seemed always supplied for mending purposes; "you will have to rip this out again; the first stroke is too near the letter before it;" and she handed the unhappy sampler back to the child.