Having been asked to write a preface to the new edition of the Gypsy books, I am not a little perplexed.

I was hardly more than a girl myself, when I recorded the history of this young person; and I find it hard, at this distance, to photograph her as she looks, or ought to look to-day.
She does not sit still long enough to be "taken." I see a lively girl in pretty short dresses and very long stockings,--quite a Tom-boy, if I remember rightly.

She paddles a raft, she climbs a tree, she skates and tramps and coasts, she is usually very muddy, and a little torn.

There is apt to be a pin in her gathers; but there is sure to be a laugh in her eyes.

Wherever there is mischief, there is Gypsy.