Willie’s Education. Il

being very well and having gone to lie down, his
father being out, as he so often was, upon Scramble
the old horse, and Tibby, their only servant; being
busy with the ironing, Willie ran off to Widow
Wilson’s, and was soon curled up in the chair, like
a little Hindoo idol that had grown weary of sitting
upright, and had tumbled itself into a corner.

. Now, before he came, the old woman had been
thinking about him, and wishing very much that
he would come; turning over also in her mind, as
she spun, all her stock of stories, in the hope of
finding in some nook or other one she had not yet
told him; for although he had not yet begun to
grow tired even of those he knew best, it was a
special treat to have a new one; for by this time
Mrs Wilson’s store was all but exhausted, and a
new one turned up very rarely. This time, how-
ever, she was successful, and did call to mind one
that she had not thought of before. It had not
only grown very dusty, but was full of little holes,
which she at once set about darning up with the
needle dnd thread of her imagination, so that, by ©
the time Willie arrived, she had a treat, as she
thought, quite ready for him.

I am not going to tell you the story, which was
‘about a poor boy who received from a fairy to
whom he had. shown some kindness the gift of a
marvellous wand, in the shape of a common black-
Hosa Walaa sticks which nobody could suspect