Stories for Helen

They took her up stairs into the apartment they called their play-room, and showed her a variety of things which would have been very amusing to a girl that knew how to be amused. There was a lacquered Chinese cabinet, containing a great number of curiosities brought by their uncle from Canton: and a large box with shelves, on which were various specimens of Indian ingenuity, presented to the children by a gentleman who had travelled all over the country beyond the Mississippi. Their library consisted of a beautiful and entertaining selection of juvenile books; and they had a port-folio filled with fine prints of such subjects as are particularly interesting to young people. They showed her a representation of the grand procession at the coronation of the sovereign of England, printed on a long narrow roll of 74 paper pasted on silk; which paper was unwound like a ribbon-yard from a Tunbridge-ware box, and it could be screwed up again after being sufficiently seen.