everything, even the lowing of the cows in the farm-yard, the murmur of
the brook, and the voices of the workers in the distant hay-field.

"Ah me, old Beauty!" sighed Ruth, as she pressed the milk into the pail,
"mother says that it is the same thing over and over again all our
lives, and I suppose it is true, but I wish I could have something
different."

Beauty only lowed; but if she could have spoken English she might have
said, "If _you_ find life monotonous, what must it be for me? In the
morning I rise and crop the grass, then I come in to be milked. I go
back to the meadow and bathe in the stream or eat as much grass as I
want; in the afternoon I lie under the shade of the trees and chew the
cud; and in the evening I come again to be milked, and once more return
to the meadows. If I have a calf of my own, it is taken from me and
sent--I know not where. Yes, it is the same thing over and over again.
Yet I am quite content."

Whatever Beauty meant as she lowed and looked at Ruth with her great
patient eyes, the young girl did not understand, but went on thinking
aloud: "Yes, it is breakfast, dinner, tea and supper every day, and
mother has to see to it all; and the children to be washed and dressed
and nursed, and the cows to be milked, and the cream to be skimmed; and
then every year father has the ploughing, and sowing, and haying, and
the har----"

"Ah, Ruth, I see you are making yourself useful," cried her father, as
he entered the farm-yard followed by two merry looking boys aged
respectively seventeen and twelve. It was evident from a single glance
that they were Ruth's brothers, although their hands and faces were