room, her face all lighted up with smiles, and threw her arms around her
cousin's neck, and kissed her. This was no uncommon thing with Jeannette.
She had a very happy and a very affectionate disposition. Every body loved
her, and she loved every body.

One not acquainted with Angeline, might very naturally suppose that she
would return her cousin's embrace. But she did no such thing. Her manner
was quite cool and distant. Human nature is a strange compound, is it not?

"Why, cousin," said the light-hearted Jeannette, "what is the matter? You
are not well, are you?"

"Yes, well enough," the other replied, rather crustily. Take care,
Angeline, there's a cloud coming over your cousin's face. Speak a kind word
or two, now. Then the sun will beam out again, brightly as ever. Jeannette
was silent for a moment, for she was astonished, and did not know what to
make of her cousin's manner. It would have appeared uncivil and rude to
most little girls. But the sweet spirit of Jeannette--loving, hoping,
trusting--was differently affected. She saw only the brighter side of the
picture. So the bee, as she flies merrily from flower to flower, finds a
store of honey where others would find only poison.

"Dear Angeline," said her cousin, at length, "I'm sure something is the
matter. Tell me what it is, won't you? Oh, I should love to make you happy,
if I only knew how!"

Angeline seemed scarcely to hear these words of love. That is strange
enough, I hear you say. So it is, perhaps, and it may be stranger still,
that she read not the language of love and sympathy that was written so
plainly in her cousin's countenance. It is true, though, for all that. She
did not say much of any thing to this inquiry--she simply muttered, between
her teeth,

"I don't believe any body loves me."

Jeannette was no philosopher. She could not read essays nor preach sermons.
Her argument to convince her cousin that there was, at least, one who loved
her, was drawn from the heart, rather than from the head. It was very
brief, and very much to the point. She burst into tears, and sobbed,

"Don't say so, dear."

Jeannette could not stay long. Her mother had sent her on an errand, and
told her she must make haste back. Perhaps it was as well that she could
not stay--and perhaps not. Human nature is a strange sort of compound, as I
said before; and it may be that the ice which had covered over the streams
leading from Angeline's heart would not have mel