In the meantime a strict search for me had been going on below.  They began to be alarmed at my continued absence; and after examining every room, the garden, and every spot on the premises, they sent around the neighborhood.  I was known to be extremely fond of visiting, and every acquaintance was interrogated in turn—­of course, without success.  No one had thought of the cupola, and mamma was getting fairly frightened; when Mammy took a light, and on ascending to my dormitory, discovered me fast asleep, with the book tightly clasped to my bosom.

It afterwards yielded the boys as much delight as it had me; Fred, in particular, had a notion of trying experiments upon the plan there laid out.  He had sat one afternoon for sometime with the book in his hands—­apparently resolving some problem in his own mind; Mammy was stooping over the nursery fire, when she was suddenly startled by an unexpected shower of water sprinkled over her head and neck—­Fred at the same time exclaiming, in a tone that seemed to doubt not:  “I command you instantly to turn into a coal black mare!”

“I don’t know what would become of you, you good-for-naught, if I did!” returned Mammy.

Some years later I read “The Children of the Abbey,” and this opened a new field of thought.  My dreams, instead of being peopled with fairies and genii, were now filled with distressed damsels who met with all sorts of persecutions and Quixotic adventures, and finally ended where they should have commenced.

CHAPTER VIII.

I had a boy-lover who always selected me as his partner in all our plays, and kept me in pointers with blue ribbons attached to them, to point out the towns on the large map in the school-room.  Charles Tracy was about my own age, but in disposition and taste he resembled my brother Henry, and the two were quite inseparable; while his sister Ellen and I formed an acquaintance through the fence by displaying our dolls to each other—­and this was the beginning of an intimacy that lasted a long time for children’s friendships.

Ellen possessed a charm which often caused me to experience the uncomfortable sensation of envy; her hair fell in long, golden-colored ringlets upon her neck and shoulders, and these same curls seemed to shake about so nicely whenever she moved her head.  I sometimes thought that Ellen shook them about much more than was absolutely necessary; but at the same time they excited my warmest admiration.  I felt as though I could do anything—­go through with all sorts of difficulties to have my hair curl naturally; and with a feeling of unspeakable rapture I listened to Ellen one day as she told me in a mysterious whisper that the nurse had said eating crusts made her hair curl.