“I think you can,” he said.  “Stand here by my side, and let me see you try.”

She succeeded, and was full of joy.

“There is nothing like trying, my little girl,” he said, smiling at her exultation and delight.

She came to him again after lessons were done, and Max and Grace had left the room once more.

“May I talk a little to you, papa?” she asked.

“Yes, more than a little, if you wish,” he replied, laying aside the book he had taken up.  “What is it?”

“Papa, I want to thank you for sending me out to take that run, and then helping me so nicely and kindly with my arithmetic.”

“You are very welcome, my darling,” he said, drawing her to a seat upon his knee.

“If you hadn’t done it, papa, or if you had spoken sternly to me, as grandpa Dinsmore would have done in your place, I’d have been in a great passion in a minute.  I was feeling like just picking up my slate, and dashing it to pieces against the corner of the desk.”

“How grieved I should have been had you done so!” he said; “very, very sorry for your wrong-doing, and that I should have to keep my word in regard to the punishment to be meted out for such conduct.”

“Yes, papa,” she murmured, hanging her head, and blushing deeply.

“Would breaking the slate have helped you?” he asked with grave seriousness.

“Oh, no, papa! you cannot suppose I’m so foolish as to think it would.”

“Was it the fault of the slate that you had such difficulty with your examples?”

“Why, no, papa, of course not.”

“Then, was it not extremely foolish, as well as wrong, to want to break it just because of your want of success with your ciphering?”

“Yes, sir,” she reluctantly admitted.

He went on, “Anger is great folly.  The Bible says, ’Be not hasty in thy spirit to be angry; for anger resteth in the bosom of fools.’  It seems to be the sort of foolishness that, more than any other, is bound in the heart of this child of mine.  It seems, too, that nothing but ’the rod of correction’ will drive it out.”

She gave him a frightened look.

“No,” he said, “you need not be alarmed:  as you did not indulge your passionate impulse, I have no punishment to inflict.

“My dear, dear child, try, try to conquer the propensity!  Watch and pray against this besetting sin.”

“I will, papa,” she murmured with a half despairing sigh.

Some weeks later—­it was on an afternoon early in December—­Lulu and Grace were in their own little sitting-room, busied in the manufacture of some small gifts for “papa and Maxie,” who were, of course, to be kept in profound ignorance on the subject till the time for presentation; therefore, the young workers sat with locked doors; and when presently Maxie’s boyish footsteps were heard rapidly approaching, their materials were hastily gathered up, thrust into a closet close at hand, and the key turned upon them.  Then Lulu ran and opened the door.