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Our Boys and Girls
LENA'S SUNNY HOUR.
By ftliss J. L. Glover.
It was a hopelessly rainy day. The raiu fell
in a steady, determined way, as if it had no in
tention of slopping for a month. The children
had managed pretty well all the morning, with
indoor games and books; but when dinner was
over and it was still pouring, their tempers
began to give way. Tom and Archie began to
spar, and Polly to cry because Betty and Kate
were teasing her. Lena, the eldest, hurried to
the rescue.
"Don't fuss, children," she begged! "It's
so horrid; it makes a rainy day worse, not to
have it pleasant inside."
"That's what's the matter," growled Tom.
"We've done everything we can think of, and
the old rain won't stop!"
"Oh, Tom!" pleaded Lena.
"Find something jolly to do, then, and we
won't fuss."
"Well, if you will all be quiet and ask rid
dles for a little while, I'll think up something,"
promised Lena.
She left the room and stood by the staircase
window, looking out to see if there were any
hope of a gleam of sunshine. But no!
"It looks as if it would never stop," she
thought, despairingly; and then suddenly she
remembered the bow in the cloud, and the
promise. Comforted, she turned away. "It
will stop, some time. The rainbow means that;
and in the meantime, we must just make sun
shine in the house."
She stood thinking for a minute; then a
bright thought came to her, and she ran away
smiling.
A word or two to mother gained permission
to make a small bright fire in the nursery, and
to rummage a certain old trunk in the attic for
for some ancient curtains of yellow cretonne
sprinkled with bright birds and flowers. These
she pinned across the lower sashes of the three
windows, shutting out the dismal view of the
outside world. A fourth curtain she spread for
a cover on the table in the middle of the room.
On this she set a vase filled with gay red and
yellow flowers, zinnias and bachelors' buttons,
making a spot of brilliant color. Around the
table she grouped six chairs, and before each
place she laid a sheet of drawing paper and a
box of school crayons. The dancing firelight on
the yellow curtains gave a sunshiny effect and
the birds and flowers seemed almost alive in the
glow. She nodded approvingly, and ran to call
the children.
"It's a surprise." she said. "Shut your eyes
and don't open them till you get inside the
door. There!" She had piloted them care
fully, and now five pairs of eyes flew open at
nnce. Five voices exclaimed in chorus, "IIow
pretty ! And how funny to have a fire in sum
mer, but it's niec!"
"This is the Sunny Room," explained Lena.
"Doesn't it look like sunshine? Now, every
body must sit down and copy these flowers in
the middle of the table; and the one who makes
the best drawing will get the vase for a prize.
Isn't it pretty?"
It was Lena's own cherished vase, her birth
day gift from Uncle Jim, but she gave it will
ingly in the cause of sunshine-making.
The bright room, the new and pleasant occu
pation, had scattered weariness and ill-humor
as by magic. The next hour was a sunny one
indeed, as tongues ran merrily and pencils
worked busily on the sheets of paper, and a per
feet garden of flowers bloomed around the
table.
"Time's up," Lena announced at last.
"Show jour papers."
The papers were passed around, and little
Polly, being chosen judge, fixed presently on
ouc as beijig in her opinion the best.
Everybody crowded to look at it. "That's
mine!" said Lena, laughing. "I never thought
I might win my own prize. But never mind;
everybody has done so well, I think you are
all entitled to a prize: so here goes!"
She took from the mantel a box of choco
lates tied with bright red ribbons, and open
ing it, placed it on the table, with the invitu
tion,
"Help yourselves!"
When the little feast was over, and not a
single chocolate remained in the box, she went
to the window, and drawing aside the "sun
shine" curtain, let in a flood of real sunshine.
The rain was over, and the sun was smiling a
"Goodnight" before he went to bed. And
suddenly Lena cried out and called them all to
look at the lovely rainbow spanning the east
ern sky. The "sunny hour" which might
have been a cloudy and stormy one, had ended
with this beautiful reminder of the rainbow's
promise.
"The sunshine will always come back," said
Lena happily, "and till it doss, we can al
ways make some for each other, indoors!"
McPhersonville, S. C.
THE TRUTH ABOUT MISS MUFFET AND
THE SPIDER.
Yes, it is perfectly true that I sat on a tuffet
to eat my curds and whey. It is also true that
a spider sat down beside rae, and maybe I did
seem frightened away, although as a matter of
fact I did exactly what he told me to do, for
the minute he sat down he sighed : "Dear me,
Miss Muffet, I'm clean tuckered out. Been try
ing a new stitch in cobwebs. Run over and
see how you like, the new patterns. Very in
tricate."
So over I ran to examine the stitch. "It's
a perfect beauty," I said. "If you sold it in
the stores it would bring a fortune."
4 ' Stores ? Sell ? What are you talking about ?
All I ever consent to do in a store is interior
decorating in the corners, etc. And nowhere
am I less appreciated. I have seen my loveliest,
laciest webs swept down in ten seconds ? and
it took me hours of difficult ballooning to make
them."
"Ballooning? Are you an aviator, sir!" I
said.
"Aviator? "Why, of course! I'm the origi
nal aviator ! I don't want to seem to boast, but
all the things that men are trying to learn
about flying in the air in balloons and para
chutes I knew centuries ago. Of course the
birds may go farther and swifter, but that's
because they have a speed mania. Personally
I think it is more refined to decorate the corner
where you are."
"Would you mind telling me how you do it,
sir?"
"I tell you what," said the spider, "we will
do a little stunt, you and I. Run indoors, my
dear, and fill your curds-and-whey bowl with
water."
So I did. And that is when the Mother Goose
poet saw me, of course, and clapped me into a
verse. But I think it would have bee'n a more
interesting poem if he had watched a little
longer and reported the next event. For I
brought out my tlisli full of water, ami as Ec
directed, I put a block of wood in the centcr
of the water and put him on board this floating
island.
He scurried around in every direction, cry
ing: "Water, water everywhere! How shall
1 get to land?"
"Arc you scared?" I asked. "I will lift you
over, sir."
"Tut ! Tut ! that was just playing to the gal
lery, my dear. I shall now proceed to make a
fairy bridge. Kindly watch me! See, I rear
up on my hind legs and begin spinning a
thread. This thread is a lovely liquid substance
with which the Ixml God has equipped all of
us spiders. We spit it out of us, and as we spin
it it becomes a delicate bit of gossamer. Ah,
me ! I made it a bit heavy that time ; it sinks
in the water. But I will try again. Ah! light
as air, isn't it? A bit of thistledown, isn't it?
This isn't conceit, Miss Muqet; it's gratitude to
the Creator for giving me this wonderful
equipment. Ah, watch! watch! Do you see
that zephyr float my tiny thread across the
water? When it is strong enough I will skip
across my suspension bridge. No Robinson
Crusoe-on-a-desert-island about me ! I have my
bridge inside me, ready to weave! See, I am
now on shore again."
"I think that is very wonderful!" I cried.
"What else can you do? That wasn't balloon
ing, was it?"
"Of course not, my dear. This is balloon
ing." And he ran up the side of a high fence.
He wove a long strand of gossamer, he shaped
it into a cradle with his hind feet ,and spun
long threads to buoy it up. Then in he got and
waited for a gust of wind to come along and
launch his little airship. Off he sailed! And,
landing in an apple tree, he spun a lace doily
on top of an apple blossom. It was a lovely
sight.
"I am also a cannibal," he said shrewdly at?
he snapped at an unfortunate fly and gobbled it
up.
"Cruel !" I cried.
"Not a bit of it: Lamb chops were once
nice frisky little animals gamboling in tn?
meadows but you sent the butcher out to get
your dinner for you. Pork was once grunting
in the pigpen contentedly, steaks were once
mooing gently among the buttercups and
chickens were onee clucking in the barnyard.
Every time you eat an egg you eat a baby
chicken! You are really more of a cannibal
than I am."
I sat very quiet and looked at him in a
friendly way. "The thing I like best about you
is when you decorate the fields and fences in
the early morning, and the dewdrops catch in
the gossamer webs so that it looks like fairy
land."
"Those gossamer webs are bridges, my dear
Miss Muflfet ; we spiders spin them on our way
to get our breakfast. It's all very practical,
really." he sighed. ? Miss Mufifet Herself, in the
Baptist.
AIRING THE DOLL BED.
I never make my dolly's bed
Till it's had sun and air,
Because I always give my doll
The very best of care.
Each morning when my dolly's up
I raise the sash and shade
And let the room air for an hour
Before the bed is made.
And so I keep my dolly well.
She's happy at her play.
It's all because I air "he? bod
On every single day.
?? Ex.