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Transcriber's Note: Some printer's errors, such as missing periods,
commas printed as periods and other minor punctuation errors have
been corrected. Variations in spelling and capitalisation have been
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  EYEBRIGHT.



  _A STORY._



  By SUSAN COOLIDGE,

  AUTHOR OF "THE NEW YEAR'S BARGAIN," "WHAT KATY DID,"
  "WHAT KATY DID AT SCHOOL," "MISCHIEF'S THANKSGIVING,"
  "NINE LITTLE GOSLINGS."


  With Illustrations.


  BOSTON:
  ROBERTS BROTHERS.
  1894.


 _Copyright_,
  By Roberts Brothers.
  1879.


  UNIVERSITY PRESS:
  John Wilson & Son, Cambridge.




  CONTENTS.


  CHAPTER                                  PAGE

    I.  LADY JANE AND LORD GUILDFORD          1

   II.  AFTER SCHOOL                         18

  III.  MR. JOYCE                            43

   IV.  A DAY WITH THE SHAKERS               66

    V.  HOW THE BLACK DOG HAD HIS DAY        85

   VI.  CHANGES                             104

  VII.  BETWEEN THE OLD HOME AND THE NEW    122

 VIII.  CAUSEY ISLAND                       143

   IX.  SHUT UP IN THE OVEN                 166

    X.  A LONG YEAR IN A SHORT CHAPTER      188

   XI.  A STORM ON THE COAST                204

  XII.  TRANSPLANTED                        226




EYEBRIGHT.




CHAPTER I.

LADY JANE AND LORD GUILDFORD.


[Illustration: "THE FALCON'S NEST."]

It wanted but five minutes to twelve in Miss Fitch's schoolroom, and a
general restlessness showed that her scholars were aware of the fact.
Some of the girls had closed their books, and were putting their desks
to rights, with a good deal of unnecessary fuss, keeping an eye on the
clock meanwhile. The boys wore the air of dogs who see their master
coming to untie them; they jumped and quivered, making the benches
squeak and rattle, and shifted their feet about on the uncarpeted
floor, producing sounds of the kind most trying to a nervous teacher.
A general expectation prevailed. Luckily, Miss Fitch was not nervous.
She had that best of all gifts for teaching,--calmness; and she
understood her pupils and their ways, and had sympathy with them. She
knew how hard it is for feet with the dance of youth in them to keep
still for three long hours on a June morning; and there was a
pleasant, roguish look in her face as she laid her hand on the bell,
and, meeting the twenty-two pairs of expectant eyes which were fixed
on hers, rang it--dear Miss Fitch--actually a minute and a half before
the time.

At the first tinkle, like arrows dismissed from the bow-string, two
girls belonging to the older class jumped from their seats and flew,
ahead of all the rest, into the entry, where hung the hats and caps of
the school, and their dinner-baskets. One seized a pink sun-bonnet
from its nail, the other a Shaker-scoop with a deep green cape; each
possessed herself of a small tin pail, and just as the little crowd
swarmed into the passage, they hurried out on the green, in the middle
of which the schoolhouse stood. It was a very small green, shaped like
a triangle, with half a dozen trees growing upon it; but

    "Little things are great to little men,"

you know, and to Miss Fitch's little men and women "the Green" had all
the importance and excitement of a park. Each one of the trees which
stood upon it possessed a name of its own. Every crotch and branch in
them was known to the boys and the most daring among the girls; each
had been the scene of games and adventures without number. "The
Castle," a low spreading oak with wide, horizontal branches, had been
the favorite tree for fights. Half the boys would garrison the boughs,
the other half, scrambling from below and clutching and tugging, would
take the part of besiegers, and it had been great fun all round. But
alas, for that "had been!" Ever since one unlucky day, when Luther
Bradley, as King Charles, had been captured five boughs up by Cromwell
and his soldiers, and his ankle badly sprained in the process, Miss
Fitch had ruled that "The Castle" should be used for fighting purposes
no longer. The boys might climb it, but they must not call themselves
a garrison, nor pull nor struggle with each other. So the poor oak was
shorn of its military glories, and forced to comfort itself by bearing
a larger crop of acorns than had been possible during the stirring and
warlike times, now for ever ended.

Then there was "The Dove-cote," an easily climbed beech, on which rows
of girls might be seen at noon-times roosting like fowls in the sun.
And there was "The Falcon's Nest," which produced every year a few
small, sour apples, and which Isabella Bright had adopted for her
tree. She knew every inch of the way to the top; to climb it was like
going up a well-known staircase, and the sensation of sitting there
aloft, high in air, on a bough which curved and swung, with another
bough exactly fitting her back to lean against, was full of delight
and fascination. It was like moving and being at rest all at once;
like flying, like escape. The wind seemed to smell differently and
more sweetly up there than in lower places. Two or three times lost in
fancies as deep as sleep, Isabella had forgotten all about recess and
bell, and remained on her perch, swinging and dreaming, till some one
was sent to tell her that the arithmetic class had begun. And once,
direful day! marked with everlasting black in the calendar of her
conscience, being possessed suddenly, as it were, by some idle and
tricksy demon, she stayed on after she was called, and, called again,
she still stayed; and when, at last, Miss Fitch herself came out and
stood beneath the tree, and in her pleasant, mild voice told her to
come down, still the naughty girl, secure in her fastness, stayed. And
when, at last, Miss Fitch, growing angry, spoke severely and ordered
her to descend, Isabella shook the boughs, and sent a shower of hard
little apples down on her kind teacher's head. That was dreadful,
indeed, and dreadfully did she repent it afterward, for she loved Miss
Fitch dearly, and, except for being under the influence of the demon,
could never have treated her so. Miss Fitch did not kiss her for a
whole month afterward,--that was Isabella's punishment,--and it was
many months before she could speak of the affair without feeling her
eyes fill swiftly with tears, for Isabella's conscience was tender,
and her feelings very quick in those days.

This, however, was eighteen months ago, when she was only ten and a
half. She was nearly twelve now, and a good deal taller and wiser. I
have introduced her as Isabella, because that was her real name, but
the children and everybody always called her Eyebright. "I. Bright" it
had been written in the report of her first week at Miss Fitch's
school, when she was a little thing not more than six years old. The
droll name struck some one's fancy and from that day she was always
called Eyebright because of that, and because her eyes were bright.
They were gray eyes, large and clear, set in a wide, low forehead,
from which a thick mop of hazel-brown hair, with a wavy kink all
through it, was combed back, and tied behind with a brown ribbon. Her
nose turned up a little; her mouth was rather wide, but it was a
smiling, good-tempered mouth; the cheeks were pink and wholesome, and
altogether, though not particularly pretty, Eyebright was a
pleasant-looking little girl in the eyes of the people who loved her,
and they were a good many.

[Illustration: To her there was a great charm in all that goes to the
making of pictures.--PAGE 7.]

The companion with whom she was walking was Bessie Mather, her most
intimate friend just then. Bessie was the daughter of a
portrait-painter, who didn't have many portraits to paint, so he was
apt to be discouraged, and his family to feel rather poor. Eyebright
was not old enough to perceive the inconveniences of being poor. To
her there was a great charm in all that goes to the making of
pictures. She loved the shining paint-tubes, the palette set with its
ring of many- dots, and the white canvases; even the smell of
oil was pleasant to her, and she often wished that her father, too,
had been a painter. When, as once in a great while happened, Bessie
asked her to tea, she went with a sort of awe over her mind, and
returned in a rapture, to tell her mother that they had had biscuits
and apple-sauce for supper, and hadn't done any thing in particular;
but she had enjoyed it so much, and it had been so interesting! Mrs.
Bright never could understand why biscuits and apple-sauce, which
never created any enthusiasm in Eyebright at home, should be so
delightful at Bessie Mather's, neither could Eyebright explain it, but
so it was. This portrait-painting father was one of Bessie's chief
attractions in Eyebright's eyes, but apart from that, she was
sweet-tempered, pliable, and affectionate, and--a strong bond in
friendship sometimes--she liked to follow and Eyebright to lead; she
preferred to listen and Eyebright to talk; so they suited each other
exactly. Bessie's hair was dark; she was not quite so tall as
Eyebright; but their heights matched very well, as, with arms round
each other's waist, they paced up and down "the green," stopping now
and then to take a cookie, or a bit of bread and butter, from the
dinner-pails which they had set under one of the trees.

Not the least attention did they pay to the rest of the scholars, but
Eyebright began at once, as if reading from some book which had been
laid aside only a moment before:

"At that moment Lady Jane heard a tap at the door.

"'See who it is, Margaret,' she said.

"Margaret opened the door, and there stood before her astonished eyes
a knight clad in shining armor.

"'Who are you, Sir Knight, and wherefore do you come?' she cried, in
amaze.

"'I am come to see the Lady Jane Grey,' he replied; 'I have a message
for her from Lord Guildford Dudley.'

"'From my noble Guildford,' shrieked Lady Jane, rushing forward.

"'Even so, madam,' replied the