eyes like sunlit water. When the child saw the Cake, he
said like the woman, "Oh, what a beautiful Cake!" and put out his hand
to take it.

"I am sure I should be most happy!" said the Cake. "And you will not
take it amiss, I am confident, if I ask with whom you will share me."

"I shall not share you with any one!" said the child. "I shall eat you
myself, every crumb. What do you take me for?"

"Good gracious!" cried the Cake. "This will never do. Consider my
size,--and yours! You would be very ill!"

"I don't care!" said the child. "I'd rather be ill than give any away."
And he fixed greedy eyes on the Cake, and stretched forth his hand
again.

"This is really terrible!" cried the Cake. "What is one's frosting to
this? I will go back to the woman with the ten children."

He turned and ran back, leaving the child screaming with rage and
disappointed greed. But as he ran, a hungry Puppy met him, and swallowed
him at a gulp, and went on licking his chops and wagging his tail.

"Huh!" said the Pan.

THE SERMON

The minister had just finished his great sermon. The air still quivered
with his burning words, and the people sat erect, disturbed,
embarrassed; yet still he lingered a moment in his place.

"Is there," he asked, "one here in whose breast these words strike like
a barbed arrow, for the truth that is in them?" and he sat down.

"That was hard on John," said old James; "but he deserves it, every
word."

"A blow from the shoulder for James!" said old John; "time he got one
too, if it is not too late."

"I wonder if either of those two old sinners will take his medicine and
be helped by it," said old William.

But the little saint, the little saint, hurried home, and knelt by her
little bed, and cried aloud in her anguish: "My God, my God, have mercy
on me, and give me for this stone a heart of flesh!"

THE TANGLED SKEIN

"My dear child," said the Angel-who-attends-to-things, "why are you
crying so very hard?"

"Oh dear! oh dear!" said the child. "No one ever had such a dreadful
time before, I do believe, and it all comes of trying to be good. Oh
dear! Oh dear! I wish I was bad; then I should not have all this
trouble."

"Yes, you would," said the Angel; "a great deal worse. Now tell me what
is the matter!"

"Look!" said the child. "Mother gave me this skein to wind, and I
promised to do it. But then father sent me on an errand, and it was
almost school-time, and I was studyin