king look.

"My apron, sir, is not to be appropriated for any such purpose. You seem
to covet it for everything."

"Indeed, ma petite, I think it very unbecoming and very ugly, and never
could see any good reason why you and Mamma and Mathilde should wear
such frightful things."

"It is to keep our gowns clean, Louis, when we are milking and
scrubbing, and doing all sorts of household duties," said Catharine.

"Well, ma belle, you have neither cows to milk, nor house to clean,"
replied the annoying boy; "so there can be little want of the apron. I
could turn it to fifty useful purposes."

"Pooh, nonsense," said Hector, impatiently, "let the child alone, and do
not tease her about her apron."

"Well, then, there is another good thing I did not think of before,
water mussels. I have heard my father and old Jacob the lumberer say,
that, roasted in their shells in the ashes, with a seasoning of salt and
pepper, they are good eating when nothing better is to be got."

"No doubt, if the seasoning can be procured," said Hector, "but, alas
for the salt and the pepper!"

"Well, we can eat them with the best of all sauces--hunger; and then,
no doubt, there are crayfish in the gravel under the stones, but we must
not mind a pinch to our fingers in taking them."

"To-morrow then let us breakfast on fish," said Hector. "You and I will
try our luck, while Kate gathers strawberries; and if our line should
break, we can easily cut those long locks from Catharine's head, and
twist them into lines,"--and Hector laid his hands upon the long fair
hair that hung in shining curls about his sister's neck.

"Cut my curls! This is even worse than cousin Louis's proposal of making
tinder and fishing-nets of my apron," said Catharine, shaking back the
bright tresses, which, escaping from the snood that bound them, fell in
golden waves over her shoulders.

"In truth, Hec, it were a sin and a shame to cut her pretty curls, that
become her so well," said Louis. "But we have no scissors, ma belle, so
you need fear no injury to your precious locks."

"For the matter of that, Louis, we could cut them with your
_couteau-de-chasse_. I could tell you a story that my father told me,
not long since, of Charles Stuart, the second king of that name in
England. You know he was the grand-uncle of the young Chevalier Charles
Edward, that my father talks of, and loves so much."

"I know all about him," said Catharine, nodding sagaciously; "let us