who offered an insult to a lieutenant, received one dozen.

"Well, you see, really it's this way: he sells something to boil in other people's pots so he can have something to boil in ours, he says. It's stuff from the garden, you know. We raise it to sell. Poor Jack--and he does hate it so!"

"I know--and it must be awful, just hoeing and weeding all the time."

"Still, of course he knows he's got to do it, because it's out of doors, and he just has to be out of doors all he can," rejoined the girl. "He's sick, you know, and sometimes he's so unhappy! He doesn't say much. Jack never says much--only with his face. But I know, and it--it just makes me want to cry."

At David's dismayed exclamation Jill jumped to her feet. It owned to her suddenly that she was telling this unknown boy altogether too many of the family secrets. She proposed at once a race to the foot of the hill; and then, to drive David's mind still farther away from the subject under recent consideration, she deliberately lost, and proclaimed him the victor.

Very soon, however, there arose new complications in the shape of a little gate that led to a path which, in its turn, led to a footbridge across the narrow span of the little stream.

Above the trees on the other side peeped the top of Sunnycrest's highest tower.

"To the Lady of the Roses!" cried David eagerly. "I know it goes there. Come, let's see!"

The little girl shook her head.