Aunt Madge's Story

"You will have to wait till the school begins," said my mother, "and that is all the better, for then little Fel can go too." I was willing to wait, for Fel was the other half of me. In three weeks she was as old as I was, and in the rosy month of June we began to go to the district school.

Your grandfather lived a little way out of town, and Squire Allen much farther; so every morning Ruphelle and her brother Augustus called for me, and we girls trudged along to school together, while Gust followed like a little dog with our dinner baskets. This was one of the greatest trials in the whole world; for, do you see, he had a pair of ears which heard altogether too much, and when we said anything which was not remarkably wise, he had a habit of crying "Pooh!" which was very provoking. We went hand in hand, Fel and I, and counted the steps we took, or hopped on one foot like lame ducklings, and "that great Gust" would look on and laugh. I had so much to say to Fel that I couldn't help talking, though