r
half her time."

Next morning the children were very glad to go home, and Mary, though
she would hardly have said so to any one, could not help thinking she
should never like Siller Noonin quite so well after this as she had done
before.

They were climbing the fence to run across the fields, when some one
said,--

"Patience Lyman!"

It was Deacon Turner, the tithing-man; but his voice was very mild this
morning, and he did not look like the same man Patty had seen at prayer
meeting. His face was almost smiling, and he had a double red rose in
his hand.

"Good morning, little ladies," said he, giving the rose to Patty, who
blushed as red as the rose herself, and hung her head in bashful shame.

"Thank you, sir," she stammered.

"I can't bring myself to believe you meant to disturb the meetin' last
night," said the deacon, taking her unwilling little hand.

"No, O, no!" replied Patty, with dripping eyes.

"It was in the school-'us, but then the school-'us is just as sacred as
the meetin'-'us, when it's used for religious purposes. I'm afeared,
Patience, you forgot you went there to hold communion 'long of His
saints. I'm afeared your mind warn't in a fit state to receive much
benefit from the occasion."

Patty felt extremely uncomfortable. Good Deacon Turner seldom took the
least notice of children--having none of his own, and no nieces or
nephews;--and when he did try to talk to little folks, he always made a
sad piece of work of it. He did not know how to put himself in sympathy
with them, and could not remember how he used to feel when he was young.

"We shall always be glad to see you at the regular Wednesday evenin'
prayer meetin'," said he, "or to the prayer meetin's in the school-'us;
but you must remember it ain't like a meetin' for seckler pupposes,
Patience,--it's for prayer, and praise, and the singing of psalms; and
you should conduct yourself in a circumspect and becoming manner, as is
fittin' for the house of worship; and remember and feel that it's a
privilege for you to be there."

This was about the way the deacon talked to Patty, and of course she did
not understand one word of it. She tells Flyaway Clifford and Dotty
Dimple that grown people in old times almost always talked "too old,"
and children were afraid of them.

"Yes, my child," added the deacon, "you should realize that it is a
precious privilege, and feel to say with the Psalmist,--

"'I joyed when to the house of God