Tempest and Sunshine

"Very likely you have put it in your drawer and forgotten it; let me

look," said Julia.

There was a moment's silence, and then Julia was heard to exclaim, "There

it is, just as I thought. Here it is, safe in your box. I do wish, sister,

you would not be quite so hasty, but stop a little before you condemn

others." So saying, the party left the room.

While this scene was taking place, Fanny was quietly seated by the fire in

the sitting room, getting her lesson for the next day. At last her eye

chanced to fall upon a purse which Julia was knitting for her father and

which she had promised to finish that night.

"I wonder," said Fanny to herself--"I wonder where Julia is gone so long?

She told father she would finish his purse this evening, and he will scold

so, if it is not done, that I believe I'll knit on it till she returns."

Suiting the action to the word, she caught up the purse, and when Julia

returned to the sitting room, she found her sister busily engaged in

knitting for her.

"Why, Julia," said Fanny, "where have you been so long; I though you were

never coming back, so I have been knitting on your purse, for I was afraid

you would not get it done, and then father would scold, you know."

As Julia looked into her sister's bright, innocent face and thought of all

her kindness, her conscience smote her for the wrong she had done, but

quickly hushing the faithful monitor, she thought, "Never mind; it is

natural for me to be bad. I cannot help it."

Meantime the gentlemen above were discussing the conversation which they

had overheard.

"Is it possible," said Mr. Miller, "that I have been so deceived in Fanny,

and that, after all, she is as passionate as her sister?"

"As passionate as her sister," repeated Mr. Wilmot; "I think we have good

proof that she is much more so. I hope you are now convinced that Fanny is

not infallible, though I will confess I am surprised and disappointed, for

I thought she was really of a very gentle nature."

Mr. Miller did not reply directly, but went on, as if speaking to himself,

"Oh, Fanny, Fanny, how has my idol fallen! I never would have believed it,

but for such convincing evidence."

He was indeed sorely disappointed. He had always thought of Fanny as the

embodiment of almost every female virtue, and although she was so young,

hope had often whispered to him of a joyous future when she, whom her

father designated as "Sunshine," should also shed a halo of sunlight

around another fireside. But now the illusion was painfully dispelled, for

sooner would he have taken the Egyptian asp to his bosom than chosen for a

companion one whom he knew to possess a hasty, violent temper.