The next morning before Harriet and I had breakfasted, Mary came running in, her cheeks glowing and eyes sparkling with pleasure, crying out even before she had said good-morning, "Aunt Kitty, Jessie is to go to school with me and study lessons,—she is to begin to-day, and I am going to tell her to get ready at once, so I have not a minute to stay."

"Stop, stop, my dear," said I, seizing her hand as she was passing me, "just catch your breath and then tell us how all this was arranged."

"Oh, I told Miss Bennett how much Jessie wanted to go to school, and she said she might come if my father had not any objection, and I asked my father, and he said he had not any,—but I must go, Aunt Kitty, indeed I must," and breaking away from me, she bounded off.

She soon came back bringing the smiling Jessie with her, and from that day Jessie might be seen every morning about nine o'clock going to her school. She spent only two hours there each day, but as she really wished to learn, she improved very much, and Miss Bennett said, she repaid her for all trouble in teaching her, by her good example to our good-humored but wild little Mary. Jessie seemed to think she could never say or do enough to thank Mary for inducing Miss Bennett to give her lessons, and though Mary loved Jessie, and would never let any one find the least fault with her without a warm defence, I sometimes feared that Jessie's perfect submission to her will in all things would do her harm—that she would become quite a little despot. But a circumstance which happened in their school a short time after Jessie's lessons with Miss Bennett began, taught us that there was one thing Jessie loved better even than she loved Mary. I will relate the circumstance, and you will find out what that one thing was.

Mary's father had a fine flock of sheep, and one morning as Mary stood by him while he counted them, watching the lambs frisking from side to side, Jessie came from the house to tell her that Miss Bennett had been waiting some time for her.

"Stay just one minute, Jessie, and then I will go back with you," said the little idler; "I want papa to be done counting, that I may beg him for a little lamb—I want a pet lamb. See there, Jessie—that one that is running along so fast, and then stops to wait for the others, is not it a beauty? Oh! do, papa, give it to me," said she, as her father counted the thirtieth sheep, for she knew that this was the full number.

"Give you what, my child?" asked her father, who had not been paying any attention to her.

"That pretty lamb, papa—make haste to say yes, for there is Miss Bennett's bell ringing for the third time. Stop, Jessie," said the little despot, catching hold of her as she would have run in, "you shall not go till I am ready."

"I am sorry my daughter should let any thing keep her from her lessons. Besides, you are treating Miss Bennett with great disrespect, and here she comes herself to see what has become of her truants."

As Mr. Mackay spoke, he took Mary's hand and walked with the children towards the piazza where Miss Bennett stood. He is a very good-natured man, and makes such a pet of his little daughter, that he was quite ready to excuse her; so, as Miss Bennett was about to speak to Mary, he said, "I believe, Miss Bennett, I must ask you to excuse her want of punctuality to-day, for the fault was partly mine. If I had not been as much engaged in counting my sheep as she was in watching the lambs at play, I should have heard your bell and sent her to you."

"I do not wish to punish the fault of to-day," said Miss Bennett, with a smile, "but to reform a habit persisted in for many days. Can you not aid me, sir, in devising some mode by which Mary may be reminded that her studies are of more importance than her play?"

"Yes, she has just been presenting a petition which I will not grant till she can bring me proof that she has been punctual and attentive to her studies for two months."

"Two whole months, papa?" said Mary, looking quite frightened at the length of time.

"Yes, my daughter, two whole months, and—stay, where is Jessie?" looking around for her.

"Stolen away, I suppose," said Miss Bennett, "for fear of hearing Mary scolded. We shall probably find her in the schoolroom."

"Well, I will go there with you," said Mr. Mackay, entering the house with the wondering Mary. On they went, Miss Bennett leading the way to the schoolroom, where, as she had conjectured, they found Jessie, looking very gravely.

"Do not be afraid, Jessie," said Mary, laughing, as she entered, "Miss Bennett has not beaten me. Papa is going to do something to us both, I think, but I do not know what."

"You shall soon hear," said Mr. Mackay. "If Miss Bennett will be so kind as to give to the one who recites the best lesson a card marked merit; and to the one who is not in her place by the time the bell has ceased ringing, a blank card, for two months to come, we will then count both kinds of tickets: for every blank card we will take away one from the others, and to the little girl who has most merit cards left, I will give—listen, Mary—the prettiest lamb in my flock."

"I will gladly agree to perform my part in the arrangement," said Miss Bennett, "but will add another stipulation. As I would have my little pupils careful, as well as studious and attentive, I will make no note of the tickets given for merit, and the girl who loses her tickets will therefore suffer the consequences."

"Do you understand?" said Mr. Mackay.

"Oh yes," said Mary, eagerly clapping her hands, "and I mean to have the lamb."

"Yes, sir," said the smiling Jessie—pleased to see her friend so happy.

"Well," said Mr. Mackay, as he left the schoolroom, "you will begin to-morrow."

For some time Miss Bennett had no blanks to give and few merit cards, for the girls were always in their places at the proper time, and both knew their lessons so perfectly that it could not with truth be said either was best. After some weeks, however, things fell into their old course. Mary got most blanks, and most merit cards too, for though Jessie was both quick and studious, she had less time for study; and what is of more consequence, she had no one at home to help her out of difficulties by explaining what she did not understand. Besides, as Mary had been much longer at school than her friend, the lessons which she was going over for the second, or perhaps third time, were quite new to Jessie, who felt her friend's advantages on this account to be so great that she never dreamed there was any probability of receiving the prize herself.