dear!" said gentle Rose.

But Benny said he couldn't remember them if he stood still. "_A_, B,
_C_, D! _E_, F, _jiggle_ G!" This time he jumped backward, and flung his
arms about to illustrate the "jiggle;" and--and he knocked over the
peacock glass vase, and it fell on the marble hearth, and broke into
fifty pieces. Oh! it was very dreadful. Mrs. Grahame had brought the
peacock vase from Paris to Miss Wealthy, and it was among her most
cherished trifles; shaped like a peacock, with outspread tail, and
shining with beautiful iridescent tints of green and blue. Now it lay
in glittering fragments on the floor, and timid Rose felt as if she were
too wicked to live, and wished she were back at the Farm, where there
were no vases, but only honest blue willow-ware.

At this very moment the door opened, and Miss Wealthy came in. Rose
shrank back for a moment behind the tall Japanese screen; not to conceal
herself, but to gather her strength together for the ordeal. Her long
years of illness had left her sensitive beyond description; and now,
though she knew that she had done nothing, and that the child would meet
only the gentlest of plaintive reproofs, her heart was beating so hard
that she felt suffocated, her cheeks were crimson, her eyes suffused
with tears. But Benny was equal to the emergency. His cheeks were very
red, too, and his eyes opened very wide; but he went straight up to Miss
Wealthy and said in a clear, high-pitched voice,--

"I've broke vat glass fing which was a peacock. I'm sorry I broke vat
glass fing which was a peacock. I shouldn't fink you would leave glass
fings round for little boys to hit wiv veir little hands and break vem.
You is old enough to know better van vat. I know you is old enough,
'cause you' hair is all spoons, and people is old when veir hair is
spoons,--I mean silver." Having said this with unfaltering voice, the
child suddenly and without the slightest warning burst into a loud roar,
and cried and screamed and sobbed as if his heart would break.

Rose was at his side in an instant, and told the story of the accident.
And Miss Wealthy, after one pathetic glance at the fragments of her
favorite ornament, fell to wiping the little fellow's eyes with her fine
cambric handkerchief, and telling him that it was "no matter! no matter
at all, dear! Accidents _will_ happen, I suppose!" she added, turning
to Rose with a sad little smile. "But, my dear, pray get the dust-pan at
once. The preci