idered "thee" the most important word of all.
"Why, _thee_ may behave; I mean, behave _thyselves_."

The new teacher had not collected her ideas yet.

"Let's get our books together," said Susy, "and then we'll all sit on
the sofa and study."

"Me, me," chimed in Dotty Dimple, dropping the little carriage in which
she was wheeling her kitty; "me, too!"

"Well, if you must, you must; snuggle in here between Flossy and me,"
said Susy, who was determined that to-day everything should go on
pleasantly.

"Sixteenth class in joggerphy," said Miss Rosy Frances, peeping severely
over her spectacles. "Be spry quick!"

The three pupils stood up in a row, holding their books close to their
faces.

"Thee may hold out your hands now, and I shall ferule thee--the whole
school," was the stern remark of the young teacher, as she took off her
spectacles to wipe the holes.

"Why, we haven't been doing anything," said Ruthie, affecting to cry.

"No, I know it; but thee'd _ought_ to have been doing something; thee'd
ought to have studied thy lessons."

"But, teacher, we didn't have time," pleaded Flossy; "you called us out
so quick! Won't you forgive us!"

"Yes, I will," said Rosy Frances, gently; "I will, if thee'll speak up
_'xtremely_ loud, and fix _thine_ eyes on thy teacher."

The pupils replied, "Yes, ma'am," at the top of their voices.

"Now," said Rosy Frances, appearing to read from the book, "where is the
Isthmus of _Susy?_"

The scholars all laughed, and answered at random. They did not know that
their teacher was trying to say the "Isthmus of Suez."

The next question took them by surprise:--

"Is there any man in the moon?"

"What a queer idea, Rosy," said Susy; "what made you ask that?"

"'Cause I wanted to know," replied the Quaker damsel. "They said he
came down when the other man was eatin' porridge. I should think, if he
went back up there, and didn't have any wife and children, he'd be real
lonesome!"

This idea of Prudy's set the whole school to romancing, although it was
in the midst of a recitation. Flossy said if there was a man in the
moon, he must be a giant, or he never could get round over the
mountains, which she had heard were very steep.

Ruthie asked if there was anything said about his wife! Susy, who had
read considerable poetry was sure she had heard something of a woman up
there, named "Cynthia;" but she supposed it was all "moonshine," or
"made up," as she expressed it. She said