hed my feet.
Then the Queen called a halt, and, turning to me, said: "Abby,
Schoolmistress, we commit this precious roll to you. Receive it
as a sacred trust; do our will concerning it, and be forevermore
the Brownies' good friend." She clapped her hands, the herald
blew his shell bugle, and in a moment the entire host had melted
away into the foliage and were lost to sight.

[Illustration: (handwritten) NOTICE (pointing hand) 52 Brownies here.

THE BOY'S ILLUSTRATION.
FIG. 9.--Brownies Bringing the Roll of Records.]

I have not seen them since, but I have tried to fulfill my part
of the trust which came to me so curiously in the drowsy hours of
that June day, and now I deliver my work to you that you in turn
may fulfill your portion of the apportioned duty. That you will
not fail is the confident hope of

Your obedient servant,

ABBY BRADFORD.

"What do you think of that?" I asked, as I finished Abby's letter, for I
had read it aloud to the Mistress.

"Perhaps," said the Mistress, looking up from her embroidery, "we had
better open the parcel."

A familiar twinkle colored her smile, that raised a momentary suspicion
that she perhaps knew something more of the contents than she chose to
tell. The advice was good, albeit deftly dodging my question, so I cut
the wrappings and exposed a roll of fair manuscript. "It is a story," I
remarked, after glancing over the pages, "a sort of historical fairy
tale, I fancy. But, hold! what is this?" My eye had fallen upon some
sentences that arrested attention, and I read several continuous pages.

The Mistress interrupted the reading: "Well, what has interested you?
And what have you to say about the whole affair?"

"I have been reading here a curious adaptation of the habits of my
spider pets, and it is neatly put. And here is another of the same
sort." I turned to a chapter further on, and read with great
satisfaction a few pages more. "Really," I exclaimed, "the natural
history is good, and is fairly inwoven with the tale. I have changed my
opinion of the work; it is evidently an attempt to bring out some of the
most interesting habits of our American spider fauna by personifying
them with the imaginary creatures of fairy lore. You want to know my
opinion of the matter? As to the manuscript I shall not, of course,
venture an opinion until I have read it