She was standing there quite white, with tears in her widely opened orbs.

The master felt that the right moment had come.

Going up to her, he took both her hands, and looking in her tearful eyes, said, gravely, "Lissy, do you remember the first evening you came to see me ?" Lissy remembered.
"You asked me if you might come to school, for you wanted to learn something and be better, and I said--" "Come," responded the child, promptly.
"What would YOU say if the master now came to you and said that he was lonely without his little scholar, and that he wanted her to come and teach him to be better ?" The child hung her head for a few moments in silence.

The master waited patiently.

Tempted by the quiet, a hare ran close to the couple, and raising her bright eyes and velvet forepaws, sat and gazed at them.
A squirrel ran halfway down the furrowed bark of the fallen tree, and there stopped.
"We are waiting, Lissy," said the master, in a whisper, and the child smiled.