w Tom's step, and her heart began to beat violently with the
sudden shock of hope. He only stood still at the top of the stairs and
said, "Maggie, you're to come down." But she rushed to him and clung
around his neck, sobbing, "Oh, Tom, please forgive me--I can't bear
it--I will always be good--always remember things--do love me--please,
dear Tom!"

We learn to restrain ourselves as we get older. We keep apart when we
have quarreled, express ourselves in well-bred phrases, and in this way
preserve a dignified alienation, showing much firmness on one side, and
swallowing much grief on the other. We no longer approximate in our
behavior to the mere impulsiveness of the lower animals, but conduct
ourselves in every respect like members of a highly civilized society.
Maggie and Tom were still very much like young animals, and so she could
rub her cheek against his, and kiss his ear in a random sobbing way; and
there were tender fibres in the lad that had been used to answer to
Maggie's fondling, so that he behaved with a weakness quite inconsistent
with his resolution to punish her as much as she deserved. He actually
began to kiss her in return, and say,--

"Don't cry, then, Magsie; here, eat a bit o' cake."

Maggie's sobs began to subside, and she put out her mouth for the cake
and bit a piece; and then Tom bit a piece, just for company, and they
ate together and rubbed each other's cheeks and brows and noses
together, while they ate, with a humiliating resemblance to two friendly
ponies.

"Come along, Magsie, and have tea," said Tom at last, when there was no
more cake except what was downstairs.

So ended the sorrows of this day, and the next morning Maggie was
trotting with her own fishing rod in one hand and a handle of the basket
in the other, stepping always, by a peculiar gift, in the muddiest
places, and looking darkly radiant from under her beaver-bonnet because
Tom was good to her. She had told Tom, however, that she should like him
to put the worms on the hook for her, although she accepted his word
when he assured her that worms couldn't feel (it was Tom's private
opinion that it didn't much matter if they did). He knew all about
worms, and fish, and those things; and what birds were mischievous, and
how padlocks opened, and which way the handles of the gates were to be
lifted. Maggie thought this sort of knowledge was very wonderful,--much
more difficult than remembering what was in the books; and she wa