"And it was. I have never reconciled myself to teaching the baker's
two boys and the grocer's little girl. You were wrong, Johanna, you
ought to have drawn the line somewhere, and it ought to have excluded
trades-people."

"Beggars can not be choosers," began Hilary.

"Beggars!" echoed Selina.

"No, my dear, we were never that," said Miss Leaf, interposing
against one of the sudden storms that were often breaking out between
these two. "You know well we have never begged or borrowed from any
body, and hardly ever been indebted to any body, except for the extra
lessons that Mr. Lyon would insist upon giving to Ascott at home."

Here Johanna suddenly stopped, and Hilary, with a slight color rising
in her face, said--

"I think, sisters, we are forgetting that the staircase is quite
open, and though I am sure she has an honest look and not that of a
listener, still Elizabeth might hear. Shall I call her down stairs,
and tell her to light a fire in the parlor?"

While she is doing it, and in spite of Selina's forebodings to the
contrary, the small maiden did it quickly and well, especially after
a hint or two from Hilary--let me take the opportunity of making a
little picture of this same Hilary.

Little it should be, for she was a decidedly little woman: small
altogether, hands, feet, and figure being in satisfactory proportion.