Jacob and the Raven Tes

mere fancy. So they only flung a few stones
and shouted, ‘‘Who stares at the clouds!”
and made faces.

But by-and-by, when his figure had grown
smaller and smaller, and the church clock
struck twelve, and the schoolmaster’s cat
crept into the house, they began to wonder
whether Jacob had really gone. Some of
the boys looked foolishly at each other, and
others declared that it was a good riddance,
but a little sickly girl, the child of the school-
master, wept bitterly, because she loved
Jacob. If she could, she would have run
after him, but her legs and her back were
too weak to carry her, and all she could do
was to stretch out her hands and cry—

‘Oh, Jacob, come back, come back !”

She was so taken up with sorrow, and
her eyes were so blurred with tears, that
she did not at first notice that an old woman
in a beggar’s dress was standing close by,
and looking hard at her, until at last she
spoke.

‘“What is the matter, little R6schen?”