every mood. Gooseberry eyes may disguise more soul, but they get no
credit for it. Humour seemed to dance in that soft, blue fire; poetry
dreamed in their clear depths; love--but that we have not come to yet;
they were more eloquent than her tongue, for she was neither witty nor
wise, only rich in the exuberant life of seventeen, and as expectant of
good will and innocent of knowledge of the world as a retriever puppy.

Apparently, Miss Bluebell was not in the suavest of humours, for she
flung her hat on to one crazy chair, and herself on another, with a
vehemence that caused a sensible concussion.

"My dear, how brusque you are," said Mrs. Leigh, plaintively.

"So provoking," muttered Bluebell.

"What's gone wrong with the child now?" said Miss Opie, the elder
proprietress of the domicile.

"Why," said Bluebell, "I met the Rollestons, and they asked: me to their
picnic at the Humber on Friday; but how _can_ I go? Look here!" and she
pointed to a pair of boots evidently requiring patching. "Oh, mother!
could you manage another pair now? Miss Scrag has sent home my new
'waist,' and I can do up my hat, but these buckets are only fit for the
dusthole."

Mrs. Leigh sighed,--"A new pair, with side-springs, would cost three
dollars. No, Bluebell, I can't indeed."

"I might as well be a nun, then, at once," said the girl, with tears in
her voice; and a sympathetic dew rose in Mrs. Leigh's weary eyes at the