1 2 THE GATE OF THE GIANT SCISSORS.



No wonder, for she was only twelve years old,
and she had never been out of the little West-
ern village where she was born, until the day
she started abroad with her Cousin Kate.
  Now she sat perched up on a limb in a dis-
mal bunch, her chin in her hands and her
elbows on her knees. It was a gray afternoon
in November; the air was frosty, although the
laurel-bushes in the garden were all in bloom.
  -I s'pect there is snow on the ground at
home," thought Joyce, "and there's a big,
cheerful fire in the sitting-room grate.
  " Holland and the baby are shelling corn, and
Mary is popping it.  Dear me! I can smell it
just as plain! Jack will be coming in from the
post-office pretty soon, and maybe he'll have
one of my letters.  Mother will read it out
loud, and there they'll all be, thinking that I
am having such a fine time; that it is such a
grand thing for me to be abroad studying, and
having dinner served at night in so many
courses, and all that sort of thing.  They
don't know that I am sitting up here in this
pear-tree, lonesome enough to die.  Oh, if I
could only go back home and see them for
even five minutes," she sobbed, "but I can't I