the time of the American Revolution.

In Flatbush, which is now a part of Brooklyn, was a family that spoke
the Dutch language, while they were true Americans in feeling. When
the British landed on Long Island, they got ready to leave the town.
The horses were hitched to the wagon, and such things as were thought
most valuable were put in. The first thing they put into the wagon was
the great Dutch Bible with heavy brass clasps. A tall clock was also
carefully lifted into the wagon. Then clothing and other things
followed.

The father of the family told the two faithful negro men, Caesar and
his son Mink, how to take care of things. Femmetia, the most active of
the daughters, had the whip in her hand, and, as the sound of firing
was coming nearer and nearer, she tapped the horses on their ears, and
the family dashed away to the house of a cousin who lived beyond the
region where the fight was to be.

That evening Femmetia helped her father, who was an invalid, to climb
to the top of a little hill from which they could see a fire raging in
the village of Flatbush. The direction of the fire showed the father
and daughter that it was their own house which was burning.

When the fight was over, General Washington's troops had been driven
from Long Island. The good Dutch family went back and found their
house burned. They moved into another house, whose owner was still
away, and then began to build a new house. The mother bought some
boards with what money she had saved, but she could not get any nails.
In that day nails were not made by machinery, as they are now. Each
nail had to be hammered out separately by a blacksmith. Nails made in
this way cost a great deal of money.

There was but one way to do. Femmetia and her sister had to find nails
by raking over the ashes of the old house. Some of these nails were
crooked, and they had to be hammered to make them straight enough to
use.

Some American officers had been made prisoners at the battle of Long
Island. They were allowed to go about the village after having given
their word not to go farther. They liked to help the girls find nails
in the ashes, and hammer them straight on the stones. Other young
girls came to help them, so that there was a party of young people
talking, joking, laughing, and digging in the ashes, every day. It was
fun for all of them. There were not boards enough to finish the house.
The room in which the two sisters slept was upstairs. It ha