The pie was cut; but alas! for the hollowness of human triumphs; the knife met a wilderness of crust and vacancy, but no cherries.  The bed-room pantry had a window opening on a shed, and into that window Fred, the scape-grace, had adroitly climbed, carefully lifted the upper crust from the cherished pie, and abstracted all the cherries.  My mother locked him up, for punishment, but having unfortunately selected a sort of store-room pantry, he made himself sick with sweetmeats, broke all the jars he could lay hands on, and, finally, discovering a pair of scissors, he worked at the lock, spoiled it, and let himself out.

At one time, being rather short of cash, he helped himself to a five-dollar bill from my mother’s drawer; but even his conscience scarcely resting under so heavy an embezzlement, he got it changed, took half a dollar, and then put the rest back in the drawer.  This considerateness led to a discovery; they all knew that no one but Fred would have been guilty of so foolish, and at the same time so dishonest a thing.

My favorite brother was Henry; just three years older than myself, manly, amiable, and intellectual in his tastes, he appeared to me infinitely superior to any one I had ever seen; and we two were almost inseparable.  In winter he always carried me to school on his sled, saw that Fred did not rob me of my dinner, and was always ready to explain a difficult lesson.  He was an extremely enterprising boy, with an inexhaustible fund of ingenuity and invention; but, like most geniuses, received more blame than praise.  When quite small he constructed a sort of gun made of wood, which would discharge a small ball of paper, pebble, &c.  This became a very popular plaything in the nursery, and for once the inventor received due praise, on account of its keeping the children so quiet.  But one day Fred undertook to teach the year old baby the art of shooting with it; and with a small corn for a bullet, he placed the toy in the child’s hands, turning the mouth the wrong way.  The young soldier pulled the trigger in delight, and by some strange mischance, the corn flew up his nose.  The doctor was hastily brought, the child relieved with a great deal of difficulty, the dangerous plaything burned, and poor Henry sent to coventry for an unlimited time.

CHAPTER IV.

We had a girl named Jane Davis whom my mother had brought up from childhood.  At the period to which I refer, she could not have been more than fourteen, and as she was always good-humored and willing to oblige, she became a general favorite.  Often, in the early winter evenings, with the nursery as tidy as hands could make it, (for Mammy, although not an old maid, was a mortal enemy to dirt and slovenliness) we all gathered round the fire, while the old nurse and Jane spun out long stories, sometimes of things which had happened to them, sometimes of things which had happened