"A doll's piano! Why, if there is anything in this world that I've always wanted, it's just this little piano! And oh, to think of Mr. Garland's giving it to me, when he couldn't have known I wanted it! Did you tell him, Preston? And oh, see the keys! Hear me! There, that's the Grasshopper's Dance! Tinkle! tinkle! tinkle! Oh, so sweet! I couldn't play it any better on my big piano, or half so well.

"Hush, Preston Gray, you needn't laugh! What if I am nine years old? Can't I like a little, cunning, beautiful doll's piano? And what's the harm, when you know I needed it to finish off the furniture in my dolls' parlor, and go with the chairs and sofas and tables and lamps and everything grand?

"This chair is just the thing for Princess Aurora Arozarena to sit in when she plays the piano. Now would you ever know any thing had happened to Aurora? Only her hair is a little darker, and her eyes are black instead of blue, and she hasn't quite the same kind of nose and mouth."

So Flaxie talked on and on; and the new treasure, the doll's piano, was kept for a long time in the back parlor in one of the alcoves, that people from far and near might hear and see it. The tiny white and black keys gave all the notes with a merry little tinkling sound that was enough to take a doll right off its feet and set it to dancing.

A wee chair was always before it, and in the chair sat the princess, who had come to life again, and never knew she had been dead. Her happy young mother, Flaxie Frizzle, often knelt behind her, playing little jingling, squeaking tunes, exactly adapted to the ears of her royal highness, who would have played for herself if her long-wristed, light gloves had not been so exquisitely tight.

The piano was a great comfort in itself; and when Flaxie came to understand that it was a token of Mr. Garland's approval and gratitude, she valued it more than ever.

About this time she had a most uncomfortable siege of chicken-pox, and was obliged for two days to keep her room, looking sadly disfigured by the pink, puffy blotches which rose on her skin, and feeling very forlorn because her poor red eyes were too weak to admit of her reading.

"What does make me look so?" said she, almost crying, as she gazed at her face in the glass. "And, oh, Ninny, I feel a great deal worse than I look! I can tell you people wouldn't laugh so much about chicken-pox if they knew how it feels!"

"Yes, dear, I'm sure it must be dreadful," returned Ninny,—her real name was Julia,—with ready sympathy. "You woke me up ever so many times last night screaming."

"Screaming? Why, I didn't know it! I must have been crazy!"

When ill, it was no unusual thing for the Gray children to be slightly delirious; and Flaxie often laughed over the droll speeches which she was reported to have made, but of which she herself could not recall a single word.

"What did I say last night when I was crazy?"

"You sat up in bed and cried for your 'little pinono,'—the doll's piano, I suppose. And sometimes you seemed to think it had turned into a wolf, for you kept saying, 'Why, what great, big teeth you've got! Oh, they're to eat you the better, my dear!'"

Flaxie smiled faintly, and then, feeling very miserable, wiped away a tear, thinking,—

"Perhaps I am very, very ill. How do I know? Fannie Townsend never was crazy in her life, nor Blanche Jones. And what made doctor papa look at my tongue this morning, unless he thought I was growing worse? He gave me powders, too, and told me to stay up-stairs and keep warm. Maybe I'm going to have a fever. I didn't eat anything for my breakfast but half a cracker, and my head aches so I don't want any dinner.—Julia," said she, interrupting herself in the midst of these gloomy musings, "do people ever die of chicken-pox?"

"No, indeed, not that I ever heard of. What put that into your head?"

"Now, Julia, you don't know the least thing about it! What do you know about fevers and medicines and things like that? Just because your papa is a doctor, that's no reason you should shake your head and think there's nothing the matter with me, when I'm feeling so bad!"

Julia would not, on any account, have laughed at her poor little sister; so she slipped quietly out of the room before Flaxie had time to continue this train of absurd and amusing remarks.

Finding herself alone, however, the reflections of the chicken-pox patient grew more and more sombre. What was the difference between this and small-pox? She had heard of a red flag which was hoisted when that good clergyman, Mr. Branch, lay ill in a house away from everybody, and at last died, almost alone. Probably Doctor Papa would never send a little girl like her—his own daughter, too—to a house with a red flag! Still she might die; and if she did, Julia would naturally be very sorry she had spoken so lightly—not to say disrespectfully—of a disease whose miseries she had never felt; that is, the chicken-pox.

An hour or two afterwards, Mrs. Prim called at Flaxie's room, and after feeling her pulse, and saying, "Oh, you are not very ill," she turned to Grandma Gray, who had come in, and began a conversation with her about Blanche Jones's father.

"Yes," said Mrs. Prim, "Mr. Jones is really aware at last that his disease is consumption. He knows he can never recover, and has made his will."

"Has he, indeed?" returned Grandma Gray. "I am truly glad to hear it."

"I tell my husband," went on Mrs. Prim, sitting very straight in her chair,—"I tell my husband I think it is every man's duty to make a will; yes, and every woman's duty, too. Mr. Prim agrees with me, and we each of us intend this very afternoon to have our wills drawn up and signed."

"A wise and proper thing, I am sure," remarked Grandma Gray.

"Grandma," asked Flaxie, as soon as their visitor had gone, "please tell me what's a will, and why is it 'a wise and proper thing'?"

"Perhaps, little Mary, I cannot make you understand. But Mr. Prim has a great deal of money, and so has Mrs. Prim; and if either of them should die, perhaps it would not be known what was best to do with the money that was left. So Mr. Prim is going to write his wishes about his money on a sheet of paper. He is going to say, 'I wish to give so many thousand dollars to my wife, and so many thousand dollars to somebody else,' etc. And Mrs. Prim will do the same about her money. She will say, 'I wish to give so many thousand dollars to Mr. Prim, and so many thousand dollars to somebody else,' etc."

"Well, if she wishes to give it, why doesn't she do it, and not write about it?"

"Oh, she only means that she wishes it to be given away after she is dead! Not now, Mary!"

"Oh, yes'm, I understand, I understand now. Why, grandmamma, I've heard ever so often about people's making wills, but I never knew before what it meant."

In the afternoon, when Madam Gray had quite forgotten this conversation, she was startled by hearing Flaxie say plaintively,—

"Grandma, do little girls ever make wills?"

"Not that I ever heard of, my dear; but they certainly have a right to do so, if they like."

"Well, if they haven't a great deal of money, can they give away something besides money? I mean, have they a right to make a will and give away their books and toys and pretty things?"

"Oh, yes."

"And is it 'wise and proper'? You know," added Flaxie, turning her aching head upon the pillow,—"you know I have a great many beautiful things, and if I ever die there is my sweet little new piano, and—and—I don't expect I shall die, but if I ever do die, you know."

Madam Gray understood her granddaughter's mood in a moment. Flaxie had a touch of 'melancholy.' Though very well aware that her disease was not of a dangerous nature, she liked to fancy that it was dangerous. Even now she had brought herself almost to the verge of tears, just by picturing to her own mind how sorry everybody would feel when she actually died of chicken-pox. Grandma Gray thought it might amuse and interest her to let her make a will, so she brought her a sheet of paper and a pencil, and instructed her as to the proper form of words to use.

Here is a copy of Flaxie's will:—

"I, Mary Gray, of Laurel Grove, N. Y., third child of Dr. Ephraim Gray, do hereby give and bequeath my personal property in the following manner:—

"First. I give and bequeath my pretty doll's piano to Kittyleen Garland, whose real name is Katharine. I give it to her, because I was cross to her for scratching my doll's eyes out, and have been sorry for it ever since. To her heirs and assigns forever.

"Second. I give and bequeath my beautiful wax large doll with the new head to my dear little sister Ethel; but she must not play with it till she knows how to hold it without letting it fall. I give this to Ethel, her heirs and assigns forever.

"Third. My Bible and all my nice books, and my gold pen and handsome inkstand to my sister Julia, if she wants them.

"Fourth. The money in my box,—I don't know whether to give it to my father or mother or the missionaries.

"Fifth. I cannot think of anything more, and am willing my papa and mamma should take care of the rest. Their heirs and assigns forever."

"Shall I say amen at the end?" asked Flaxie, who had become very much interested, and already felt decidedly better.

"Oh, no," replied her father, who had come in and was looking on with no little amusement; "only sign your name, and then your grandmother and Preston and I will add our names also, as witnesses. Then it will be a real will, my daughter, and will stand in court."

Flaxie did not know what he meant by "standing in court," but it sounded business-like and mysterious, and she took the pen her father offered her and signed her name with a feeling of great importance. Then Dr. Gray, grandma, and Preston added their names, and her father put four seals of red wax on the paper, and the whole thing was finished, as she believed, "according to law."

After this, for the first time that day, she felt hungry; and just as she was beginning to wonder if it was not nearly supper-time, her mother appeared with the tea-tray, on which were some slices of thin toast, a glass of ruby-colored jelly, and a goblet of milk. Flaxie's eyes brightened; she felt that life was still worth living, and forgot to weave any more doleful fancies concerning the chicken-pox.

Next day she was well enough to go down-stairs; and to add to the pleasure she felt in meeting the whole family together again, her father announced to her that as soon as the disfiguring blotches should be gone from her face, she might take a little journey to Hilltop to "regain her strength."

That was just like Doctor Papa. He was always giving his children happy surprises; and it was really a blessing to belong to him, and even to be ill once in a while, for the sake of the compensation which he always managed should follow the illness.