re you not?' said Miss Monflathers.

'Yes, ma'am,' replied Nell, colouring deeply, for the young ladies had
collected about her, and she was the centre on which all eyes were
fixed.

'And don't you think you must be a very wicked little child,' said Miss
Monflathers, who was of rather uncertain temper, and lost no
opportunity of impressing moral truths upon the tender minds of the
young ladies, 'to be a wax-work child at all?'

Poor Nell had never viewed her position in this light, and not knowing
what to say, remained silent, blushing more deeply than before.

'Don't you know,' said Miss Monflathers, 'that it's very naughty and
unfeminine, and a perversion of the properties wisely and benignantly
transmitted to us, with expansive powers to be roused from their
dormant state through the medium of cultivation?'

The two teachers murmured their respectful approval of this
home-thrust, and looked at Nell as though they would have said that
there indeed Miss Monflathers had hit her very hard. Then they smiled
and glanced at Miss Monflathers, and then, their eyes meeting, they
exchanged looks which plainly said that each considered herself smiler
in ordinary to Miss Monflathers, and regarded the other as having no
right to smile, and that her so doing was an act of presumption and
impertinence.

'Don't you feel how naughty it is of you,' resumed Miss Monflathers,
'to be a wax-work child, when you might have the proud consciousness of
assisting, to the extent of your infant powers, the manufactures of
your country; of improving your mind by the constant contemplation of
the steam-engine; and of earning a comfortable and independent
subsistence of from two-and-ninepence to three shillings per week?
Don't you know that the harder you are at work, the happier you are?'

'"How doth the little--"' murmured one of the teachers, in quotation
from Doctor Watts.

'Eh?' said Miss Monflathers, turning smartly round. 'Who said that?'

Of course the teacher who had not said it, indicated the rival who had,
whom Miss Monflathers frowningly requested to hold her peace; by that
means throwing the informing teacher into raptures of joy.

'The little busy bee,' said Miss Monflathers, drawing herself up, 'is
applicable only to genteel children.

"In books, or work, or healthful play"

is quite right as far as they are concerned; and the work means
painting on velvet, fancy needle-work, or embroidery. In such cases as
these,'