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I remain, Your loving PAPA.

I, too, MAMMA.

"Isn't it droll?" cried Anne, who had listened smilingly.

"It's about dolls, isn't it?" queried Tilly, whose eyes had been intent upon the reader.

"Yes, like those," and Nellie pointed to a picture, or rather a fashion plate, hanging on the wall. "If you'd like to see them here they are," and she produced a little box, and took there-from several magnificently attired paper women, dressed in wonderful trains and flounces.

"This," she said, holding them up separately, "is Mrs. D. Baby. You see what an exquisite purple satin dress she has on, and a dear little bonnet, with three purple and white feathers. Here are her two daughters; this one in the lovely white lace dress (a bridal costume, I suppose, for she has a long white veil), is the married daughter; and these are Hattie and Cornelia. You see how very fashionable Miss Cornelia is. I think I like Madge the best. Here she is, what a pretty face, isn't it? and how simply and beautifully she is dressed. This one with the parasol in her hand, a white one lined with pink is Cousin Emma; I am very fond of her, also, and Grace, and Eugenie. I don't know but I like Eugenie a little the best, she has a good countenance, much handsomer, I think, than that of the Empress of the French, and then papa described her as being so very amiable. I don't know why it is, but I am very fond of these paper dolls, and I think I shall keep them all of my life, because of papa's letter. Madame Lisle, our principal, read it to all the school, and I sat and showed the babies as they were named, or rather I should say the ladies; their name is only Doll Baby, you know."

"Surely it's a scolard your papa must be," said Tilly's mother, smilingly, "to write such a fine letter as that."

"And now shall we have Uncle Ralph's story?" asked one of the girls, anxiously. Anne lifted the roll of manuscript, and appointing another reader, they all listened with intense pleasure, while the little lady read: --

In our humble room Uncle Sam stood, waiting for father's decision. He was a very tall man, over six feet, and had been obliged to stoop as he entered the door.

Our little wee Harry held my mother's dress in his chubby fingers, and looked in awe at the hard face of Uncle Sam. It was a hard face. Not one line of tenderness softened it. He never smiled, but seemed to me, as he always had, grim and forbidding. But little Harry, oh, a dear, sweet fellow he was, a loving, darling little cherub. I cannot tell you how loving and beautiful, because he was my own little brother, and you never saw him.

I may, however, say that he had glorious blue eyes, the color of a pure sky; long yellow rings of fine fair hair, that it was my enviable office to curl in the morning, and which the sun used to love to turn with shining gold; and an expression upon the beautiful features as calm, as sweet, as heavenly, almost as an angel's face.

My beautiful, and my seraph, my darling, were the pet names which I called him.

And this boy, this idol of our hearth-stone, Uncle Sam wanted to take away with him. He was a stern man, and some years before had married a stern woman, and these two stern people had no children to make their hard hearts human. They loved money, and had all they wanted, and more than they needed, a great deal more.

My heart swelled with grief and indignation. I did not dare then to speak aloud, but I thought thus: --

"You tell us we are poor, and offer to take what, in your ignorance, you call a burden from us. You claim the darling of our hearts, wee Harry, the beautiful, laughing, loving sunbeam.

"You hard man, you are rich. You see that we are struggling with narrow means, sickness, trouble. Why don't you give us of your great abundance?

"How can you see your own brother, your less fortunate relative, sitting there crippled and sorrowful, and instead of sharing with him all the goods of life, offering to take the very pulse of our hearts, the dear baby who sweetens our toil with his smiles, and say coldly, 'It will lessen your expenses.'

"And what else will it lessen!" my soul cried, angrily, "our hopes, our joys, our love. You want him for your own. We must never say, 'brother,' 'son;' he must never says 'sister,' 'father,' 'mother.' You would teach him to forget, to despise our poor home. You would clothe him, rear him in splendor, and our 'sunbeam' would be forever lost to us."

"It would be better for my boy's future, I suppose," said father, faintly. He was so weakened by illness, and long and bitter struggling against poverty, that he had no strength left to fight this new enemy of our peace.

"O, but my own boy, my darling Harry! I can't give him up," said my mother, her eyes dry and shining.

"Yes, but, my dear," said my father, "we must think of the child's future. What can I do for him, sick and helpless."

I was wrought almost to frenzy. I ran to the dear child and caught him in my arms; his dimpled fingers closed about my neck.