"
"Thank you for the intention, my dear child."
"And you, Miss Sophia? It is your turn."
"I wish that all the little children were collected together, and that
every papa and mamma could pick out their own from amongst them."
Here Willis took out his pocket-handkerchief and appeared to be
blowing his nose, it being an idea of his that a sailor ought not to
be caught with a tear in his eye.
"Now then, Willis, we must have a wish from you."
"I wish three things: that there had not been a hurricane lately, that
canoes could be converted into three masters, and that Miss Sophia may
be Queen of England."
"Granted," cried Jack.
And laying hold of a wreath of violets that the young girl had been
braiding, he solemnly placed it on her head.
"You will make her too vain," said Mrs. Wolston.
"Ah mamma, do not scold," and gracefully taking the crown from her own
fair curls, she placed it on the silvery locks of her mother; "I
abdicate in your favor, and, sweetheart, I thank you for placing our
dynasty on the throne. Mary, you are a princess."
"Yes," she replied, "and here is my sceptre," holding up her spindle.
"Well answered, my daughter, that is a woman's best sceptre, and her
kingdom is her house."
"Our conversation," said Becker, "is like those small threads of water
which, flowing humbly from the hollow of a rock, swell into brooks,
then become rivers, and, finally, lose themselves in the ocean.
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