sore need of
it. They had never had any children of their own, and Ann Ginnins was
the first child who had ever lived with them. But she seemed to have
the freaks of a dozen or more in herself, and they bade fair to have
the experience of bringing up a whole troop with this one. They tried
faithfully to do their duty by her, but they were not used to
children, and she was a very hard child to manage. A whole legion of
mischievous spirits seemed to dwell in her at times, and she became
in a small and comparatively innocent way, the scandal of the staid
Puritan neighborhood in which she lived. Yet, withal, she was so
affectionate, and seemed to be actuated by so little real malice in
any of her pranks, that people could not help having a sort of liking
for the child, in spite of them.

She was quick to learn, and smart to work, too, when she chose.
Sometimes she flew about with such alacrity that it seemed as if her
little limbs were hung on wires, and no little girl in the
neighborhood could do her daily tasks in the time she could, and they
were no inconsiderable tasks, either.

Very soon after her arrival she was set to "winding quills," so many
every day. Seated at Mrs. Polly's side, in her little homespun gown,
winding quills through sunny forenoons--how she hated it! She liked
feeding the hens and pigs better, and when she got promoted to
driving the cows, a couple of years later, she was in her element.
There were charming possibilities of nuts and checkerberries and
sassafras and sweet flag all the way between the house and the
pasture, and the chance to loiter, and have a romp.

She rarely showed any unwillingness to go for the cows; but once,
when there was a quilting at her mistress's house, she demurred. It
was right in the midst of the festivities; they were just preparing
for supper, in fact. Ann knew all about the good things in the
pantry, she was wild with delight at the unwonted stir, and anxious
not to lose a minute of it. She thought some one else might go for
the cows that night. She cried and sulked, but there was no help for
it. Go she had to. So she tucked up her gown--it was her best Sunday
one--took her stick, and trudged along. When she came to the pasture,
there were her master's cows waiting at the bars. So were Neighbor
Belcher's cows also, in the adjoining pasture. Ann had her hand on
the topmost of her own bars, when she happened to glance over at
Neighbor Belcher's, and a thought struc