The Dove Child. r23

behind the beam, where he kept a bird-trap and fishing-rod.
When supper was served, the dove child pecked daintily at the
coarse bread, but she could not talk beyond making little coo-
ing sounds quite like a dove.

“Aunt Katrine took off her star-spangled robe, and laid it
away carefully for holidays; then she was dressed just like So-
phia in a woollen petticoat and apron, yet she seemed a prin-
cess beside the honest little peasant lass; and you could have
made nothing else of her, she was so delicate and pretty. The
children both learned to love her after their own fashion. Otto
considered that he owned her, and he scolded her as he did
Sophia when she displeased him; yet he would not allow
others to be rude to her, especially in the school, where all
the village children met together.

“A long time passed, and the dove child appeared to have
grown quite contented with her new life; she never tried to
find the chain which Otto had concealed so cleverly. One day
she paused in the meadow, and the other dove hovered down
to alight on her hand. She received it with delight, cooing
over it in her own tongue, just as if she had never learned
another language.

“Otto found them talking together, and bade her catch the
dove; but this she would not do, so the bird flew above the
boy’s reach.

“*Tf it comes again I will shoot it with a gun, cried Otto,
shaking his fist angrily.

“Then the dove child wept, and told her mate what the
naughty boy had said; and the dove went away, not daring
to return. The little girl begged Otto to restore her chain.