she hastened to arm herself. Two bees, as her body guard, placed upon her head for helmet a flower of the snapdragon. Two wasps, redoubtable hussars, brought her for a shield a piece of the gold bronze wing shell of a beetle.

At last, she extended her hand to seize her lance, when a clap of thunder shook the lily, dispersed the court, and the army, and Piccolissima awoke, and found herself in the hands of her mother, Mrs. Thomas Thumb, who said, very gently, "Tell me, dear little one, are you not very weary?"

"It is strange," said Mr. Tom Thumb, some months after, "that I always find now my ball of soap in its right place."

"It is because Piccolissima no longer rolls it into the corners for a plaything," replied Mrs. Tom Thumb. "The little creature improves—grows really intelligent."

"I am glad of it," said, a little while afterwards, one of the elder sisters of the miniature woman; "I am no longer obliged to hunt from place to place for my thimble and my scissors they are now always in my work box."

"The reason is, Piccolissima does not now make a well of your thimble, nor a spade of your scissors," answered her brother; "she has become tiresome; she no longer frisks around me when I return home; she has no longer any droll fancies which once amused me so much; she is now a genuine doll; I really believe that this minikin is putting on airs."

"Hold your peace, Monsieur," answered the busy chambermaid, in a scolding tone, while she cleaned the runnels of a chair, upon which the feet of the young man had left a good portion of the soil of the garden; "I should like to see the day when you are as well behaved as Mademoiselle Piccolissima. It was once Mademoiselle Touch-every-thing. Six months ago, no one dared to leave a drawer in the house open; now every thing remains quiet in its place; she is neither more nor less than a reasonable being; she is a waxen image, I tell you."

"Did I say any thing else, Madam Scold?" answered the school boy; "she is a real Liliputian statue, fit for nothing but to watch the flies fly. Ah! come, Piccola, Piccolissima!" he cried to the little one, who was behind the shutter of a half-open window, absorbed in the contemplation of a gnat who was up the window, singing a little air through his nasal trumpet, "tell us, Piccola, a little of what the flies say to you."

Piccolissima, who was always alarmed at a big voice, trembling, turned round and stared at her brother, who, shouting with laughter, made a pirouette, jumped over the balcony, which was near the ground, into the garden.

The complaints of Piccolissima's brother were not quite without foundation; she had become more reflecting, more observing; she was less restless and less communicative; more amused, but less amusing. She did not dare to repeat to her sisters her conversation with the flies, lest they should laugh at her, and she became more frequently occupied with her own thoughts, and more silent. Her silver voice was heard no longer in every corner of the house; she was no longer under every one's feet; the fragments of her dress were no longer caught by the nails in her brothers' shoes, under the legs of her sisters' chairs, or under the castors of the furniture; and her mother, who had a habit of saying, "This little wild thing gives me more trouble than all her brothers and sisters," said now, "Truly, if she does not help me, she does not hinder me." As for Mr. Tom Thumb, who loved to complete a remark by a proverb, instead of exclaiming, "It is not strange that she does not grow,—a rolling stone gathers no moss," murmured, rubbing his hands, "Whoever lives will see what I have always said: It is only weeds that grow fast."

In order to employ the activity of Piccolissima, her father had at one time given her some pots of flowers; for a long time, nothing came of them, for she turned over the earth incessantly, and kept looking at the roots to see if they began to sprout. Now that she no longer asked ten questions, one after the other, without waiting for an answer, and that she left her plants to grow, and no longer took them up to look at their roots, she had in her garden, just under the window, one foot of potatoes, three feet of hemp, a bean, and a strawberry plant, in pots. Her brother, in jumping out of the window, had broken off some ripe strawberries, which the little girl had cherished for her mother, and Piccolissima went sorrowfully to examine the havoc, and pick up the fruit.

She no longer supported herself upon the flexible stalks of the nasturtiums and the convolvulus, which Mr. Tom Thumb cultivated, and who more than once had complained at finding them broken. She no longer seated herself on the branches of the mignonette, and then let the wind blow her at its will, backwards and forwards, a dangerous and monotonous amusement, which soon wearied. Now, with her elbow resting on the edge of the pot of strawberries, under the shadow of the Persian lilac, she remained in contemplation.

She observed running about some little creatures that she had never seen before, and which appeared to her so wild that she dared not begin a conversation.

"O, what is that?" she said at last, stooping down and resting her head on her hand, and forgetting her lost harvest of strawberries; "here is something very curious. They are smaller than the flies. A myosotis could accommodate a number of them in its delicate cup; their heads are wider than they are long, and on each side I perceive a sort of fine leg, which has a sort of elbow, and which the insect does not use in walking; the body is in three parts, all of a shining black; the head has these two threads, which are always moving, and which are of a lighter color at the ends; the corselet is smaller, rounder, and more brilliant than that of the flies; and the belly is covered with black scales. But these little beasts trot away, scamper away so fast with their nimble legs, that one cannot see them. What delicate forms they have! they must have worn corsets when they were young. Ah! there is a sort of knot in this thread which fastens the corselet to the belly. Wait, little fellow, wait while I look at you a little nearer!" The small, thin finger of Piccolissima caught one of the little creatures, but she found some difficulty in holding him.

"Ah! at last I have you!" She held between her thumb and finger the two hind legs of the insect, who stretched himself out stiff and without motion, just as if he was sitting for his portrait. She then saw above the arms and hands of the head, (thus she chose to call the antennae,) two shining eyes, like two black buttons—naturalists discover three with a microscope. "He has no trunk," said Piccolissima, as she looked at a formidable mouth. At this moment, the insect disengaged one of his legs, and twisting himself with fury, and biting the finger which held him, he showed two jaws, which worked like a pair of pincers. Piccolissima was not sufficiently hardened to natural history. She shook her hand violently, and uttered a cry that brought her brother to her in a moment.

"Ha! ha! the great body," cried he, as he saw the trouble, and the cause of it; "this is not a worthy enemy; it is only one of the smallest ants. What would you say if you had to contend with the herculean wood borer? Your ferocious animal is only a modest fuliginosa, Madam Piccola; it is Formica fuliginosa, Latin words, which mean soot-colored ant."

"I should much prefer that they should be called at once by a name that I could comprehend, 'little blackeys,' instead of these long words, that it almost takes away your breath to pronounce."

"This is because you are ignorant, sister; but for that, you would love the Latin names, because they are so fine sounding, and can express so many things. For example, formica; can you guess? O, no, you will never guess," added he, with a knowing tone. "Very well! formica means crumb carriers, because the little cunning beasts carry all sorts of knickknacks."

Piccolissima, who once had only frisked and frolicked around her