sized doll, when there comes a knock
upon the door. When it is opened there is disclosed a young fellow known
to his friends and employer, as Sloppy.

Sloppy was full private No 1 in the Awkward Squad of the rank and file
of life, and yet had his glimmering notions of standing true to his
colors, and in instinctive refinement of feeling was much above others
who outranked him in birth and education.

"Come in, sir," said Miss Wren, "and who may you be?"

Mr. Sloppy introduced himself by name and buttons.

"Oh, indeed," cried Jenny, "I have heard of you."

Sloppy, grinning, was so glad to hear it that he threw back his head and
laughed.

"Bless us!" exclaimed Miss Wren, with a start, "Don't open your mouth as
wide as that, young man, or it'll catch so, and not shut again,
some day."

Mr. Sloppy opened it, if possible, wider, and kept it open, until his
laugh was out.

"Why, you're like the giant," said Miss Wren, "when he came home in the
land of Beanstalk, and wanted Jack for supper."

"Was he good looking, Miss?" asked Sloppy.

"No," said Miss Wren. "Ugly."

Her visitor glanced round the room--which had many comforts in it now,
that it had not had before--and said:

"This is a pretty place, Miss.

"Glad you think so, sir," returned Miss Wren. "And what do you think of
Me?"

The honesty of Mr. Sloppy being severely taxed by the question, he
twisted a button, grinned, and faltered.

"Out with it," said Miss Wren, with an arch look. "Don't you think me a
queer little comicality?" In shaking her head at him after asking the
question, she shook her hair down.

"Oh!" cried Sloppy in a burst of admiration. "What a lot, and what a
color!"

Miss Wren with her usual expressive hitch, went on with her work. But
left her hair as it was, not displeased by the effect it had made.

"You don't live here alone, do you, Miss?" asked Sloppy.

"No," said Miss Wren with a chop. "Live here with my fairy godmother."

"With;" Mr. Sloppy couldn't make it out; "with, who did you say, Miss?"

"Well!" replied Miss Wren more seriously. "With my second father. Or
with my first, for that matter." And she shook her head and drew a sigh.
"If you had known a poor child I used to have here," she added, "you'd
have understood me. But you didn't and you can't. All the better!"

"You must have been taught a long time, Miss," said Sloppy, glancing at
the array of dolls on hand, "before you came to work so neatly, Miss,
and with