"Who will be invited to your party?" asked Harriet of Anna Melville, the eldest daughter of my old friends, Col. and Mrs. Melville, who resided in the town of H., and to whom I had been making a visit of some weeks.

Anna was a lively good-tempered girl, who wanted only two days of being twelve years old. For the last week, she had scarcely been able to speak of any thing but the party which was to be given on her birth-day, and to which Harriet's question referred.

"Who?" said Anna in reply; "oh, all the girls I know. Let me see—there are Helen Lamar, and Lucy Liston, and Mary and Ellen Leslie—"

"Ellen Leslie," exclaimed Emma, a younger sister of Anna who stood near her listening, "Ellen Leslie—why, Anna, you surely will not ask her. You know she will get into a passion with somebody before the evening is over; or even if she should not, we shall all be so much afraid of offending her that there will be no fun."

"But, Emma, if we do not ask Ellen, Mary will not come, and you know none of us would enjoy ourselves half so much if Mary were not here."

"No, we should not; but at any rate I will take care not to bring out my handsome doll and my best teacups, for if Miss Ellen gets angry, she will not mind breaking them."

Having overheard this dialogue, I felt no little curiosity to see the two sisters who were so differently regarded by their young friends.

The two days passed away slowly enough to the expecting children; but they did pass, and the birth-day arrived. All was bustle and preparation at Col. Melville's. Anna superintended and directed and hurried every one, and was dressed herself an hour before the time appointed for her visiters. At length, just as she had become weary of watching for them, and was beginning to express her opinion that no one was coming, a group was seen approaching. Then came another and another, till twenty young girls, neatly dressed, and with smiling, happy faces, were collected. Among the latest arrivals were Mary and Ellen Leslie. I had seen them from the windows before they entered the house, and was much pleased with their appearance. They wore very simple white dresses, and their hair fell in natural ringlets over their shoulders, unconfined and without ornament of any kind. As they entered the parlor, all the girls went forward to welcome them; but it was easy to see that the gladness which all expressed was more for Mary than for Ellen—their greetings being made something in this way:

"Oh, Mary! I am so delighted to see you—and Ellen too!"

But for the conversation between Anna and Emma Melville which I had overheard, I should not have known how to account for this difference, for Ellen was not at all less pleasing in appearance than Mary. Indeed she would have impressed many persons more agreeably, for Mary's countenance, though very gentle, was very serious, while Ellen's was gay and animated.

All was pleasantness in the little party for about an hour, when the children were called to tea. I did not go to the table till they were seated. When I did, I saw that there was a cloud on Ellen Leslie's face, but what had caused it I could not discover. When tea was over, the various entertainments of the evening commenced. On one side of the parlor, around a table, was seated a group of girls playing what they called an historical game—that is, amusing themselves with cards containing questions and answers on historical subjects. In this game, the questions were held by one person, and the cards containing the answers were distributed equally among the rest of the players. As a question was asked, any girl who found among her cards an answer which seemed to her the correct one, read it. Sometimes two or three would begin to read together, and so long as they could bear to be laughed at without losing their tempers, those who made the greatest mistakes, perhaps contributed most to the merriment of the party. At this game about eight or ten girls were engaged. A few others amused themselves with dissected maps, and the rest gathered together in one corner of the room with Emma's cups and saucers, baby-house and doll.

From the brightening up of Ellen Leslie's countenance when the historical cards were produced, and her evident desire to make one in that game, I had felt quite sure that she was well acquainted with its subjects, and so it proved. For some time her answers were ready and correct, while her laugh was first and loudest at the blunders made by others. At length, the questions seemed to relate to a portion of history on which Ellen was not so much at home, and once and again her answer was followed by a laugh. In the first laugh which she thus excited Ellen made a feeble effort to join, but it was very feeble. At the second, her face flushed, she looked gloomily down, and from that time, though she sat with the cards in her hands, she did not answer a question or take any part in the game. After a while some wonder was expressed that no answers could be found to several of the questions. All around the table carefully examined their cards and declared they did not have them, except Ellen—she remained silent, and held her cards without looking at them.

"Ellen, perhaps you have them," said Anna Melville.

"You can see," said Ellen, laying her cards down before Anna.

"Oh no!" said Anna quickly, "you look at them yourself."

"I do not suppose I should know the answers if I saw them," said Ellen sulkily; "and besides, I am tired playing," and she rose from the table. As she moved off to a distant part of the room and seated herself alone, I glanced at Mary and saw her eyes fixed on her sister with such an expression of sorrowing tenderness, that for her sake I determined to try whether I could not restore Ellen to a happier mood. I approached her with a book of prints, and seating myself near her, drew a stand towards us and invited her to look at them with me. She looked as if she would like to refuse, but ashamed probably to do this to one so much older than herself, she contented herself with remaining sulkily silent, scarcely glancing at first at the pictures as I turned the leaves and announced the different subjects. At length, however, some anecdote I told attracted her attention. She asked a question—she smiled—she laughed aloud. Again I turned my eyes upon Mary Leslie. She was looking at me with a countenance so full of thankfulness and lit up with so sweet a smile, that I no longer wondered at her young companions loving her so tenderly.