As gifts for holidays and birthdays, where a
uniform value and appearance is desired, they are excellent.

=LEE & SHEPARD, Publishers, Boston.=

STORIES.

HEPSA AND GENEVIEVE.

Genevieve lived in a large, handsome house, which had beautiful gardens
all about it. She had no brother or sister, but she had a large
play-room, filled with the nicest toys, so that a good many children who
came to play in it thought she must be perfectly happy; but Genevieve
had often thought how willingly she would give the room and all its
playthings for a little brother of her own, whom she might take out in
the garden for a walk, and watch carefully, just as her mother watched
her.

One day, while she was walking in the garden, thinking of the little
brother she so much wanted, who she was sure would look like her dear
mother, with her blue eyes, and golden curls, what should she hear but
the noise of some one crying outside the garden fence. Now, as she
could not look through the fence,--for it was quite high and made of
thick boards,--she ran quickly to the gate, and then round to the place
where she had heard the crying. There she saw a little girl sitting upon
the side-walk, with bare feet and legs, which were none of the whitest,
wearing a dress of brown cloth with many tatters in it, and short black
hair hanging over her face and head. Genevieve looked at her in
amazement.

"Dear me!" she at last exclaimed, "where do you live?"

At this question the child stopped her crying, and pulling away her hair
with both of her hands from her face, disclosed a pair of large black
eyes, which, swollen with tears, regarded little Genevieve with sly,
sleepy wonder.

It was not wonderful she should be astonished to behold so neat and
pretty a child close by her side. Genevieve wore a blue frock and white
apron, neat stockings and slippers, and pantalettes with broad ruffles.
So she only gazed at Genevieve, without dreaming of answering her
question.

"What is your name?" asked Genevieve.

"What is yours?" demanded the child.

"Mine is Genevieve. Tell me what yours is?"

"Hepsa. Do you live in there?" and Hepsa nodded her head towards the
fence. Genevieve replied that she did.

"But tell me why you were crying?" she asked.

"Because Tom beat my black cat this morning and threw her into the pond,
and she was everything I had." Hepsa burst into tears again, and little
Genevieve's heart was so filled with compassion, that