little harmless mouse. They both ran after it, and tried their
best to catch it, but in vain.

While they were feeling very unhappy, and were trembling with fear, the
gentleman entered, and seeing their great embarrassment, inquired if
they had dared to lift the cover?

The woman replied that she did not see what harm there could be in doing
so. She did not think it kind to place such a temptation before them; it
could do no one any good.

The man added that his wife teazed him so that he had no peace, and
rather than see her unhappy he had lifted the cover.

The gentleman then reminded them of their fault-finding while in the
forest, their hard thoughts of God, of the serpent, and of Adam and Eve.
Had it been their case they should have acted more wisely! But, alas!
they did not know themselves!

He immediately ordered his servants to take off their nice new clothes
and to put on their old garments, and he sent them back to the forest,
ever after to eat their bread _by the sweat_ of their brow.

* * * * *

Original.

OLD JUDA.

Many years since, I took into my service an old colored woman by the
name of Juda. She was a poor, pitiful object, almost worn out by hard
and long service. But I needed just such services as she could render,
and intrusted to her the general supervision of my kitchen department.

Under the care bestowed upon her she fast recruited, and I continued to
employ her for three years. I gave her good wages, and, as for years I
had induced all my help to do, I persuaded her to deposit in the
savings' bank all the money she could spare. Fortunately for poor old
Juda, she laid up during these three years a considerable sum.

Before this, she had always been improvident, careless of her earnings,
and from a disposition to change often out of place. But as one extreme
is apt to follow another, when she found that she had several dollars
laid aside, entirely a new thing for her, there was quite a revolution
in her feelings and character. She now inclined to covetousness, and
could hardly be persuaded to expend a sum sufficient to make herself
comfortable in extreme cold weather which sensibly affected her in her
old age and feeble health. At length her disposition to hoard up her
earnings increased to that degree that she resorted to many unnecessary
and imprudent means to avoid expense and to evade my requirements with
regard to her apparel. But for this par