A cheerful fire was burning in the grate, when the family returned to the parlor, from the tea-table.  The lamps were not yet lit, although the gray twilight was fast settling down, and the ruddy coals began to reflect themselves from the polished furniture.  Mrs. Preston was about to light the lamps, when Ella exclaimed: 

“No, no, mother, don’t light the lamps—­let’s sit in the dark awhile, and then grandmother’s stories will seem twice as romantic.  You don’t want a light, do you, grandmother?”

“No,” said the grandmother, “I can talk just as well in the dark.  But I don’t know as I can tell you any very interesting stories.  I can’t think of anything now but what you have already heard.  That’s just the way when I want to tell a story.  If I was all alone, I should think of lots of things to tell you.”

“Can’t you tell us something about the Indians?—­I like to hear about them,” said Oscar.

“You would like to know how they served naughty boys, would n’t you?” inquired his grandmother; and if the room had not been quite so dark, Oscar would have seen something like a roguish twinkle in her sober gray eye, as she spoke.

“O yes, grandmother,” interrupted Ella, “that will suit him, I know.  At any rate, it ought to interest him—­so please to tell us what they did to their bad boys, and perhaps we shall learn how to serve Oscar.”

“And while you are about it, grandmother,” said Oscar, “tell us what they did to naughty girls, too.”

“I don’t know how they punished girls,” said the old lady; “but I have heard it said that when they wished to punish a boy very severely, they made him lie down on the ground, upon his back.  They then put their knees on his arms, and held his head back, while they took into their mouth some very bitter stuff, made from the roots of a certain plant, and squirted it into the boy’s nose.  They kept repeating the dose, till the poor fellow was almost strangled, and I suppose by that time he was cured of his fault.”

“Pooh, was that all?” said Oscar; “I thought something terrible was coming.”

“I guess you would not like to try the Indian remedy more than once,” replied his mother; “but if you think it is so pleasant to take, perhaps your father will give you a taste of it, one of these days, if you do not behave better than you have done of late.”

“Did you ever get frightened by the Indians, grandmother?” inquired Ralph.

“No,” replied the old lady; “there were plenty of them around, when I was a little girl, but they had got to be quite civil, and we were not afraid of them.  I wish I could remember all the stories my mother used to tell me about them—­they were plenty and troublesome, too, in her day.  I recollect one fight that took place in our neighborhood, when she was young.  One evening, a man who was returning from another settlement, happened to discover a party of Indians, making their way very quietly