sir, please,' said the cook, 'we're out of salt; we sailed so quick that I couldn't get any.'
"So Carl fetched the mill, and set it on the cabin table, and said, 'Little mill, grind salt, open sesame.'
"And immediately a stream of beautiful white salt came pouring out, till two bags which the cook had brought were quite full, and then the captain said, 'That's enough, now stop it.'
"Just at that moment Carl recollected that he didn't know how to stop the Mill."
Here Eyebright made a dramatic pause.
"Oh, what next? What did he do?" cried the others.
"He said all the words he could think of," continued Eyebright; "'Shut, sesame!' and 'Stop!' and 'Please stop!' and 'Don't!' and ever so many others; but he couldn't say the right one, because he didn't know it, you see! So the salt kept pouring on, and it filled all the bags, and boxes, and barrels, and – and – all the – salt-cellars, in the ship, and it ran on to the table, and it ran on to the floor; and the pirate captain caught hold of the handle and tried to keep it from turning; and it gave him such a pinch that he put his fingers into his mouth, and danced with pain. Then he was so mad that he got an axe and chopped the mill in two, to punish it for knocking him. But immediately another handle sprouted out on the half which hadn't any, and that made two mills, and the salt came faster than ever. At last, when it was up to their knees, Carl and the pirate captain ran to the deck to consult what they should do; and, while they were consulting, the mills went on grinding. And the ship got so full, and the salt was so heavy, that, all of a sudden, down they all sank, ship and Carl and the pirates and the mills and all, to the bottom of the sea."
Eyebright came to a full stop. The children drew long breaths.
"Didn't anybody ever get the mill again?" asked Bessie.
"No, never. There they both are at the bottom, grinding away as hard as they can; and that's the reason why the sea is so salt!"
"Is it salt?" asked little Rosy, who never had seen the sea.
"Why, Rosy, of course. Didn't you ever eat codfish? They come out of the sea, and they're just as salt as salt can be," said Tom, who was about a year older than Rosy.
"Now, Molly, you tell one," said Eyebright. "Tell us that one which your grandma told you, – the story about the Indian. Don't you recollect?"
"Oh, yes; the one I told you that day in the pasture. It's a true story, too, every bit of it. My grandma knew the lady it happened to. It was ever and ever so long ago, when the country was all over woods and Indians, you know, and this lady went to the West to live with her husband. He was a pio-nary, – no, pioneer, – no, missionary, – that was what he was. Missionaries teach poor people and preach, and this one was awfully poor himself, for all the money he had was just a little bit which a church in the East gave him.
"Well, after they had lived at the West for a year, the missionary had to come back, because some of the people said he wasn't orthodox. I don't know what that means. I asked father once, and he said it meant so many things that he didn't think he could explain them all; but ma, she said, it means 'agreeing with the neighbors.' Anyhow, the missionary had to come back to tell the folks that he was orthodox, and his wife and children had to stay behind, in the woods, with wolves and bears and Indians close by.
"The very day after he started, his wife was sitting by the fire with her baby in her lap, when the door opened, and a great, enormous Indian walked in and straight up to her.
"I guess she was frightened; don't you?
"'He gone?' asked the Indian in broken English.
"'Yes,' she said.
"Then the Indian held out his hands and said, – 'Pappoose. Give.'"
"Oh, my!" cried Romaine. "I'd have screamed right out."
"Well, the lady didn't," continued Molly. "What was the use? There wasn't any one to scream to, you know. Beside, she thought perhaps the Indian was trying her to see if she trusted him. So she let him take the child, and he marched away with it, not saying another word.
"All that night, and all next day, she watched and waited, but he did not come back. She began to think all sorts of dreadful things, – that perhaps he had killed the child. But just at sunset he came with the baby in his arms, and the little fellow was dressed like a chief, in a suit of doe-skins which the squaws had made, with cunning little moccasins on his feet and a feather stuck in his hair. The Indian put him in his mother's lap, and said, —
"'Now red man know white squaw friend, for she not afraid give child.'
"And after that, all the time her husband was gone, the Indians brought venison and game, and were real kind to the lady. Wasn't it nice?"
The children drew long breaths of relief.
"I don't think I could have been so brave," declared Kitty.
"Now I'll tell you a story which I made up myself," said Romaine, who was of a sentimental turn. "It's called the Lady and the Barberry Bush.
"Once upon a time, long, long ago, there was a lady who loved a barberry bush, because its berries were so pretty, and tasted so nice and sour. She used to water it, and come at evening to lay her snow-white hand upon its leaves."
"Didn't they prick?" inquired Molly, who was as practical as Romaine was sentimental.
"No, of course they didn't prick, because the barberry bush was enchanted, you know. Nobody else cared for barberry bushes except the lady. All the rest liked roses and honeysuckles best, and the poor barberry was very glad when it saw the lady coming. At last, one night, when she was watering it, it spoke, and it said, – 'The hour of deliverance has arrived. Lady, behold in me a Prince and your lover!' and it changed into a beautiful knight with barberries in his helmet, and knelt at her feet, and they were very happy for ever after."
"Oh, how short!" complained the rest. "Eyebright's was a great deal longer."
"Yes, but she read hers in a book, you know. I made mine up, all myself."
"I'll tell you a 'tory now," broke in little Rosy. "It's a nice 'tory, – a real nice one. Once there was a little girl, and she wanted some pie. She wanted some weal wich pie. And her mother whipped her because she wanted the weal wich pie. Then she kied. And her mother whipped her. Then she kied again. And her mother whipped her again. And the wich pie made her sick. And she died. She couldn't det well, 'cause the dottor he didn't come. He couldn't come. There wasn't any dottor. He was eated up by tigers. Isn't that a nice 'tory?"
The girls laughed so hard over Rosy's story that, much abashed, she hid her face in Kitty's lap, and wouldn't raise it for a long time. Eyebright tried to comfort her.
"It's a real nice story," she said. "The nicest of all. I'm so glad you came, Rosy, else you wouldn't have told it to us."
"Did you hear me tell how the dottor was eated up by tigers?" asked Rosy, peeping with one eye from out of the protection of Kitty's apron.
"Yes, indeed. That was splendid."
"I made that up!" said Rosy, triumphantly revealing her whole face, joyful again, and bright as a full moon.
"Who'll be next?" asked Eyebright.
"I will," said Laura. "Listen now, for it's going to be perfectly awful, I can
