not," said Sammy indignantly.

"Then come and sit on the see-saw."

"Oh, have you a see-saw?" he asked, immediately diverted.

"Yes--this way--under the pear-tree. It's a swing, you know, tied to
the branch, and I put this board across it. I pulled the board up out
of the floor of the wood-house. Do you like see-sawing?"

"Yes," said Sammy with animation.

"Catch hold, then," said Beth, tipping up the board at her end. "What
are you doing, butter-fingers?" she cried, as Sammy failed to catch
hold. "I'm sorry I said you were a girl. You're much too clumsy."

She held the board until Sammy got astride of it at one end, then she
bestrode it herself at the other, and started it with a vigorous kick
on the ground. Up and down they went, shaking showers of leaves from
the old tree, and an occasional winter pear, which fell with a thud,
being hard and heavy.

"Golly! this is fine!" Sammy burst out. "I say, Beth, what a jolly
sort of a girl you are!"

"Do you think so?" said Beth, amply rewarded for all her trouble.

"Yes. And you _can_ write a letter! My! What a time it must 'a' took
you! But, I say, it's all rot about stops, you know. Stops is things
in books. _You'd_ never learn stops."

"How do you know?" Beth demanded, bridling.

"Men write books," said Sammy, proud of his sex, "not women, let alone
gels!"

"That's all you know about it, then!" cried Beth, better informed.
"Women _do_ write books, and girls too. Jane Austen wrote books, and
Maria Edgeworth wrote books, and Fanny Burney wrote a book when she
was only seventeen, called 'Evelina' and all the great men read it."

"Oh!" said Sammy, jeering, "so you're as clever as they are, I
suppose!"

Sammy was up in the air as he spoke; the next moment he came down bump
on the ground.

"There," said Beth, "that'll teach you. You be rude again if you
dare."

"I'll not come near you again, spit-cat," cried Sammy, picking himself
up.

"I know you won't," Beth rejoined. "You daren't. You're afraid."

"Who's afraid?" said Sammy, blustering.

"Sammy Lee," said Beth. "Oh, Sammy Lee's afraid of me, riding the
see-saw under the tree."

"I say, Beth," said Sammy, much impressed, "did you make that
yourself?"

"Make what myself? Make you afraid? Yes, I did."

"No, you didn't," said Sammy, plucking up spirit. "I'm not afraid."

"Then don't be a fool," said Beth.

"Fool yourself," Sammy muttered, but not very valiantly.

The church-clock struck nine. The