LESSON XLV.
THE MOUNTAIN SISTER.
1. The home of little Jeannette is far away, high up among
the mountains. Let us call her our mountain sister.
2. There are many things you would like to hear about her,
but I can only tell you now how she goes with her father and
brother, in the autumn, to help gather nuts for the long
winter.

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3. A little way down the mountain side is a chestnut wood.
Did you ever see a chestnut tree? In the spring its branches
are covered with bunches of creamy flowers, like long
tassels. All the hot summer these are turning into sweet nuts,
wrapped safely in large, prickly, green balls.
4. But when the frost of autumn comes, these prickly balls
turn brown, and crack open. Then you may see inside one,
two, three, and even four, sweet, brown nuts.
5. When her father says, one night at supper time, "I think
there will be a frost tonight," Jeannette knows very well what
to do. She dances away early in the evening to her little bed,
made in a box built up against the wall.
6. Soon she falls asleep to dream about


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the chestnut wood, and the little brook that springs from rock
to rock down under the tall, dark trees. She wakes with the
first daylight, and is out of bed in a minute, when she hears