ores out of her own money.

Ellen looked a little foolish and hung her head. The poor woman and the
industrious little girl left the room after Mrs. Danvers had promised
to call on the sick man in the evening, and Ellen again took up her
book.

'I am afraid you will never get any pennies for reading well,' said Mrs.
Danvers in a few minutes, for again Ellen's eyes were off her book. The
kitten had frisked into the room; it was playing with a cork under the
sofa, and Ellen laughed aloud as she saw it turn round, and over and
over.

'If you like the kitten better than George,' said Mrs. Danvers, 'you may
continue looking at it, and stay at home and read when your father and I
go out into the fields by-and-by.'

'Then pray, mother, put the kitten out of the room,' said Ellen. Mrs.
Danvers did so, and again Ellen seated herself on her little stool with
her book.

Ellen now really applied to her book, for she was very much afraid of
being left at home when her father and mother went out for their walk.
It was very little trouble to her to learn when she gave her attention
to her lessons, and at length she got over them very creditably and
without another word of reproof from mother.

'Now, Ellen,' said Mrs. Danvers, when the book was closed, 'if you had
attended to your lessons at once it would have been over long since, and
by this time you might have finished your work, and have been running in
the field or garden. It is twelve o'clock, but I must have this
handkerchief hemmed before you move.'

'Oh dear,' said Ellen, with a most sorrowful look, 'I thought I should
have gone out now. What a happy boy George is. Oh dear, I wish I was a
boy, and then I should be running about all day, and should not be
obliged to work.'

'You would not be obliged to work with your needle, Ellen,' said Mrs.
Danvers, as she turned down the hem of the handkerchief, 'but you would
have a great many things to learn much harder than you have now, and
which would take you a great deal of time to get by heart unless you
were more attentive than you frequently are.'

'Oh, I am sure I could learn them, mother,' answered Ellen; 'besides,
George has nothing to do--nothing but to play and amuse himself all day
long.'

'This is not the case when George is at school, I can tell you, Ellen,'
replied Mrs. Danvers, 'nor is it always the case, you know, at home, and
I much question whether the days that George sits down with his father
for a few