only be gone three or four weeks, and in her aunt's family was not
likely to be homesick.

It was a very slow morning to Dotty. "Seems to me," said she, vibrating
between the parlor and the kitchen like a discontented little
pendulum,--"seems to me it was a great deal later than this yesterday!"

She had eaten as many mouthfuls of breakfast as she possibly could in
her excited condition, had kissed everybody good by twice over, and now
thought it was time to be starting.

Just as her patience was wearing to a thread the hack arrived, looking
as black and glossy as if some one had been all this time polishing it
for the occasion. Dotty disdained the help of the driver, and stepped
into the carriage as eagerly as Jack climbed the bean-stalk. She flirted
her clean dress against the wheel, but did not observe it. She was as
happy as Jack when he reached the giant's house; happier too, for she
had mounted to a castle in the air; and everybody knows a castle in the
air is gayer than all the gold houses that ever grew on the top of a
stalk. To the eye of the world she seemed to be sitting on a drab
cushion, behind a gray horse; but no, she was really several thousand
feet in the air, floating on a cloud.

Her father smiled as he stepped leisurely into the hack; and he could
not forbear kissing the little face which sparkled with such
anticipation.

"It is a real satisfaction," thought he, "to be able to make a child so
happy."