hair, and stuffing her into the water-pitcher upside down, got into the
bed, drew the lace curtains, and prepared to doze deliciously under the
pink silk bed-cover.

Up came Nelly, and went at once to the dear invalid, saying in her
motherly little voice,--

"Now, my darling child, lie quite still, and I won't hurt you one bit."

But when she drew the curtain, instead of the lovely yellow-haired doll in
her ruffled nightcap, she saw an ugly little black face staring at her,
and a tiny hand holding the sheet fast. Nelly gave one scream, and flew
downstairs into the parlor where the Sewing-circle was at work,
frightening twenty-five excellent ladies by her cries, as she clung to her
mother, wailing,--

"A bogie! a bogie! I saw him, all black; and he snarled at me, and my
dolly is gone! What shall I do? oh, what shall I do?"

There was great confusion, for all the ladies talked at once; and it so
happened that none of them knew anything about the monkey, therefore they
all agreed that Nelly was a foolish child, and had made a fuss about
nothing. She cried dismally, and kept saying to her mother,--

"Go and see; it's in my dolly's bed,--I found it there, and darling Maudie
is gone."

"We _will_ go and see," said Mrs. Moses Merryweather,--a stout old
lady, who kept her six girls in such good order that _they_ would
never have dared to cry if ten monkeys had popped out at them.