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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13337 ***
+
+[Illustration: "Two funny fair-haired children with their fingers in
+their mouths"]
+
+
+
+
+MILLY AND OLLY
+
+
+New Revised Edition
+
+
+BY
+
+MRS. HUMPHRY WARD
+
+
+
+Illustrated by RUTH M. HALLOCK
+
+
+
+GARDEN CITY NEW YORK
+DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
+1914
+
+
+
+
+DEDICATION
+
+
+TO F.A., IN THE NAME OF THE CHILDREN OF FOX HOW, THIS REVIVAL OF A
+CHILD'S STORY WRITTEN TWENTY-SEVEN YEARS AGO, UNDER THE SPELL OF ROTHA
+AND FAIRFIELD, IS INSCRIBED BY THE WRITER.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+
+After many years this little book is once more to see the light. The
+children for whom it was written are long since grown up. But perhaps
+the pleasure they once took in it may still be felt by some of the
+Millys and Ollys of to-day. Up in the dear mountain country which it
+describes, the becks are still sparkling; "Brownholme" still spreads its
+green steeps and ferny hollows under rain and sun; the tiny trout still
+leap in its tiny streams; and Fairfield, in its noble curve, still
+girdles the deep valley where these children played: the valley of
+Wordsworth and Arnold--the valley where Arnold's poet-son rambled as a
+boy--where, for me, the shy and passionate ghost of Charlotte Brontë
+still haunts the open door-way of Fox How--where poetry and generous
+life and ranging thought still dwell, and bring their benediction to the
+passers-by. "Aunt Emma" in her beautiful home, unchanged but for its
+vacant chairs, is now as she ever was, the friend of old and young; and
+the children of to-day still press to her side as their elders did
+before them. The parrot alas! is gone where parrots may; but amid the
+voices that breathe around Fox How--the voices of seventy years--his
+mimic speech is still remembered by the children who teased and loved
+him. For love, while love lasts, gives life to all things small and
+great; and in those who have once felt it, the love of the Fairfield
+valley, of the gray stone house that fronts the fells, and of them that
+dwell therein, is "not Time's fool--"
+
+  "Or bends with the remover to remove."
+
+
+MARY A. WARD.
+
+September 18, 1907.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+CHAPTER
+
+     I. Making Plans
+
+    II. A Journey North
+
+   III. Ravensnest
+
+    IV. Out on the Hills
+
+     V. Aunt Emma's Picnic
+
+    VI. Wet Days at Ravensnest
+
+   VII. A Story-telling Game
+
+  VIII. The Story of Beowulf
+
+    IX. Milly's Birthday
+
+     X. Last Days at Ravensnest
+
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+  "Two funny fair-haired children with their fingers in their mouths"
+
+  "'I can't do without my toys, Nana'"
+
+  "The flowers Milly gathered for her mother"
+
+  "So they put Olly up on a tall piece of rock, and he sang"
+
+  "He was quite sure that h-a-y spelt 'ham' and s-a-w spelt 'was'"
+
+  "'Suppose we have a story-telling game'"
+
+  "Haymaking"
+
+  "'Haven't you got a bump?' asked Olly"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+MAKING PLANS
+
+
+"Milly, come down! come down directly! Mother wants you. Do make haste!"
+
+"I'm just coming, Olly. Don't stamp so. Nurse is tying my sash."
+
+But Master Olly went on stamping, and jumping up and down stairs, as his
+way was when he was very much excited, till Milly appeared. Presently
+down she came, a sober fair-haired little maiden, with blue eyes and a
+turn-up nose, and a mouth that was generally rather solemn-looking,
+though it could laugh merrily enough when it tried. Milly was six years
+old. She looked older than six. At any rate she looked a great deal
+older than Olly, who was nearly five; and you will soon find out that
+she was a good deal more than a year and a half wiser.
+
+"What's the matter, Olly? What made you shout so?"
+
+"Oh, come along, come along;" said the little boy, pulling at his
+sister's hand to make her run. "Mother wants to tell us something, and
+she says it's a nice something, and I kissed her like anyfing! but she
+wouldn't tell me without you."
+
+Then the two children set off running, and they flew down a long passage
+to the drawing-room, and were soon scrambling about a lady who was
+sitting working by the window.
+
+"Well, monkeys, don't choke me before I tell you my nice something. Sit
+on my knee Olly. Now, Milly, guess--what have father and I just been
+talking about?"
+
+"Sending Olly to school, perhaps," said Milly. "I heard Uncle Richard
+talking about it yesterday."
+
+"That wouldn't be such a nice something," said Olly, making a long face.
+"I wouldn't like it--not a bit. Boys don't never like going to school. I
+want to learn my lessons with mother."
+
+"I know a little boy that doesn't like learning lessons with mother very
+much," said the lady, laughing. "But my nice something isn't sending
+Olly to school, Milly. You're quite wrong--so try again."
+
+"Oh, mother! is it a strawberry tea?" cried Milly. "The strawberries are
+just ripe, I know. Gardener told nurse so this morning. And we can have
+tea on the lawn, and ask Jacky and Francis!"
+
+"Oh, jolly!" said Oliver, jumping off his mother's knee and beginning to
+dance about. "And we'll gather them ourselves--won't you let us,
+mother?"
+
+"But it isn't a strawberry tea even," said his mother. "Now, look here,
+children, what have I got here?"
+
+"It's a map--a map of England," said Milly, looking very wise. Milly had
+just begun to learn geography, and thought she knew all about maps.
+
+"Well, and what happens when father and I look at maps in the
+summertime?"
+
+"Why," said Milly, slowly, "you and father pack up your things, and go
+away over the sea, and we stay behind with nurse."
+
+"I don't call _that_ a nice something," said Olly, standing still again.
+
+"Oh, mother, _are_ you going away?" said Milly, hanging round her
+mother's neck.
+
+"Yes, Milly, and so's father, and so's nurse"--and their mother began to
+laugh.
+
+"So's nurse?" said Milly and Olly together, and then they stopped and
+opened two pairs of round eyes very wide, and stared at their mother.
+"Oh, mother, mother, take us too!"
+
+"Why, how should father and I get on, travelling about with a pair of
+monkeys?" said their mother, catching hold of the two children and
+lifting them on to her knee; "we should want a cage to keep them in."
+
+"Oh, mother, we'll be _ever_ so good! But where are we going? Oh, do
+take us to the sea!"
+
+"Yes, the sea! the sea!" shouted Olly, careering round the room again;
+"we'll have buckets and spades, and we'll paddle and catch crabbies, and
+wet our clothes, and have funny shoes, just like Cromer. And father'll
+teach me to swim--he said he would next time."
+
+"No," said Mrs. Norton, for that was the name of Milly's and Oliver's
+mother. "No, we are not going to the sea this summer. We are going to a
+place mother loves better than the sea, though perhaps you children
+mayn't like it quite so well. We're going to the mountains. Uncle
+Richard has lent father and mother his own nice house among the
+mountains and we're all going there next week--such a long way in the
+train, Milly."
+
+"What are mountains?" said Olly, who had scarcely ever seen a hill
+higher than the church steeple. "They can't be so nice as the sea,
+mother. Nothing can."
+
+"They're humps, Olly," answered Milly eagerly. "Great, big humps of
+earth, you know; earth mixed with stone. And they reach up ever so high,
+up into the sky. And it takes you a whole day to get up to the top of
+them, and a whole day to get down again. Doesn't it, mother? Fräulein
+told me all about mountains in my geography. And some mountains have got
+snow on their tops all year, even in summer, when it's so hot, and we're
+having strawberries. Will the mountains we're going to, have snow on
+them?"
+
+"Oh, no. The snow mountains are far away over the sea. But these are
+English mountains, kind, easy mountains, not too high for you and me to
+climb up, and covered all over with soft green grass and wild flowers,
+and tiny sheep with black faces."
+
+"And, mother, is there a garden to Uncle Richard's house, and are there
+any children there to play with?"
+
+"There's a delightful garden, full of roses, and strawberries and
+grapes, and everything else that's nice. And it has a baby river all to
+itself, that runs and jumps and chatters all through the middle of it,
+so perhaps Olly may have a paddle sometimes, though we aren't going to
+the sea. And the gardener has got two little children, just about your
+age, Aunt Mary says: and there are two more at the farm, two dear little
+girls, who aren't a bit shy, and will like playing with you very much.
+But who else shall we see there, Milly? Who lives in the mountains too,
+near Uncle Richard?"
+
+Olly looked puzzled, but Milly thought a minute, and then said quickly,
+"Aunt Emma, isn't it, mother? Didn't she come here once? I think I
+remember."
+
+"Yes, she came once, but long ago, when you were quite small. But now we
+shall see a great deal of her I hope, for she lives just on the other
+side of the mountain from Uncle Richard's house, in a dear old house,
+where I spent many, many happy days when I was small. Great-grandpapa
+and grandmamma were alive then. But now Aunt Emma lives there quite
+alone. Except for one creature, at least, an old gray poll-parrot, that
+chatters away, and behaves as if it were quite sensible, and knew all
+about everything."
+
+"Hasn't she got any pussies, mother?" asked Olly.
+
+"Yes, two I believe; but they don't get on with Polly very well, so they
+live in the kitchen out of the way--"
+
+"I like pussies better than pollies," said Olly gravely.
+
+"Why, what do you know about pollies, old man?"
+
+"Pollies bite, I know they do. There was a polly bited Francis once."
+
+"Well, and pussies scratch," said Milly.
+
+"No, they don't, not if you're nicey to them," said Olly; who was just
+then very much in love with a white kitten, and thought there were no
+creatures so delightful as pussies.
+
+"Well, suppose you don't make up your mind about Aunt Emma's Polly till
+you've seen her," said Mrs. Norton. "Now sit down on the rug there and
+let us have a talk."
+
+Down squatted the children on the floor opposite their mother, with
+their little heads full of plans and their eyes as bright as sparks.
+
+"I'll take my cart and horse," began Olly; "and my big ball, and my
+whistle, and my wheelbarrow, and my spade, and all my books, and the big
+scrap-book, and--"
+
+"You can't, Olly," exclaimed Milly. "Nurse could never pack all those
+up. There'd be no room for our clothes. You can take your whistle, and
+the top, and the picture books, and I can take my dolls. That'll be
+quite enough, won't it, mother?"
+
+"Quite enough," said Mrs. Norton. "If it's fine weather you'll see--you
+won't want any toys. But now, look here, children," and she held up the
+map. "Shall I show you how we are going to get to the mountains?"
+
+"Oh yes," said Milly, "that'll be like my geography lesson--come, Olly.
+Now mother'll teach _you_ geography, like Fräulein does me."
+
+"That's lessons," said Olly, with half a pout, "not fun a bit. It's only
+girls like lessons--Boys never do--Jacky doesn't, and Francis doesn't,
+and I don't."
+
+"Never mind about it's being lessons, Olly. Come and see if it isn't
+interesting," said Mrs. Norton. "Now, Milly, find Willingham."
+
+Willingham was the name of the town where Milly and Oliver lived. It is
+a little town in Oxfordshire, and if you look long enough on the map you
+_may_ find it, though I won't promise you.
+
+"There it is," said Milly triumphantly, showing it to her mother and
+Olly.
+
+"Quite right. Now look here," and Mrs. Norton took a pencil out of her
+pocket and drew a little line along the map. "First of all we shall get
+into the train and go to a place called--look, Milly."
+
+"Bletchley," said Milly, following where the pencil pointed. "What an
+ugly name."
+
+"It's an ugly place," said Mrs. Norton, "so perhaps it doesn't deserve a
+better name. And after Bletchley--look again, Milly."
+
+"Rugby," said Milly, reading the names as her mother pointed, "and then
+Stafford, and then Crewe--what a funny name, mother!--and then Wigan,
+and then Warrington, and then Lancaster. Ox-en-holme, Kendal,
+Wind-er-mere. Oh, mother, what a long way! Why, we've got right to the
+top of England."
+
+"Stop a bit, Milly, and let me tell you something about these places.
+First of all we shall get out of the train at Bletchley, and get into
+another train that will go faster than the first. And it will take us
+past all kinds of places, some pretty and some ugly, and some big and
+some small. At Stafford there is an old castle, Milly, where fierce
+people lived in old days and fought their neighbours. And at Crewe we
+shall get out and have our dinner. And at Wigan all the trees grow on
+one side as if some one had come and given them a push in the night; and
+at Lancaster there's another old castle, a very famous one, only now
+they have turned it into a prison, and people are shut up inside it.
+Then a little way after Lancaster you'll begin to see some mountains,
+far, far away, but first you'll see something else--just a little bit of
+blue sea, with mountains on the other side of it. And then will come
+Windermere, where we shall get out and drive in a carriage. And we shall
+drive right into the mountains, Olly, till they stand up all round us
+with their dear kind old faces that mother has loved ever since she was
+a baby."
+
+The children looked up wonderingly at their mother, and they saw her
+face shining and her eyes as bright as theirs, as if she too was a child
+going out for a holiday.
+
+"Oh! And, mother," said Olly, "you'll let us take Spot. She can go in my
+box."
+
+Now Spot was the white kitten, so Milly and mother began to laugh.
+
+"Suppose you go and ask Spot first, whether she'd like it, Olly," said
+Mrs. Norton, patting his sunburnt little face.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+A JOURNEY NORTH
+
+
+Milly and Oliver lived at Willingham, a little town in Oxfordshire, as I
+have already told you. Their father was a doctor, and they lived in an
+old-fashioned house, in a street, with a long shady garden stretching
+away behind it. Milly and Oliver loved their father, and whenever he put
+his brown face inside the nursery door, two pairs of little feet went
+running to meet him, and two pairs of little hands pulled him eagerly
+into the room. But they saw him very seldom; whereas their mother was
+always with them, teaching them their lessons, playing with them in the
+garden, telling them stories, mending their frocks, tucking them up in
+their snug little beds at night, sometimes praising them, sometimes
+scolding them; always loving and looking after them. Milly and Olly
+honestly believed that theirs was the best mother in the whole world.
+Nobody else could find out such nice plays, or tell them such wonderful
+stories, or dress dolls half so well. Two little neighbours of theirs,
+Jacky and Francis, had a poor sick mother who always lay on the sofa,
+and could hardly bear to have her little boys in the room with her.
+Milly and Oliver were never tired of wondering how Jacky and Francis got
+on with a mother like that. "How funny, and how dreadful it must be.
+Poor Jacky and Francis!" It never came into their, heads to say, "Poor
+Jacky's mother" too, but then you see they were such little people, and
+little people have only room in their heads for a very few thoughts at a
+time.
+
+However, Milly had been away from her mother a good deal lately. About
+six months before my story begins she had been sent to school, to a
+kindergarten, as she was taught to call it. And there Milly had learnt
+all kinds of wonderful things--she had learnt how to make mats out of
+paper, blue mats, and pink mats, and yellow mats, and red mats; she had
+learned how to make a bit of soft clay look like a box, or a stool, or a
+bird's nest with three clay eggs inside it; she had begun to add up and
+take away; and, above all, she had begun to learn geography, and
+Fräulein--for Milly's mistress was a German, and had a German name--was
+just now teaching her about islands, and lakes, and capes, and
+peninsulas, and many other things that all little girls have to learn
+about some time or other, unless they wish to grow up dunces.
+
+As for Milly's looks, I have told you already that she had blue eyes and
+a turn-up nose, and a dear sensible little face. And she had very thick
+fair hair, that was always tumbling about her eyes, and making her look,
+as nurse told her, like "a yellow owl in an ivy bush." Milly loved most
+people, except perhaps John the gardener, who was rather cross to the
+children, and was always calling to them not to walk "on them beds," and
+to be sure not to touch any of his fruit or flowers. She loved her
+father and her mother; she loved Olly with all her whole heart, though
+he was a tease, she loved her nurse, whom she and Olly called Nana, and
+who had been with them ever since Milly was born; and she loved
+Fräulein, and was always begging flowers from her mother that she might
+take them to school for Fräulein's table. So you see Milly was made up
+of loving. And she was a thoughtful little girl too, tidy with her
+dress, quick and quiet at her lessons, and always ready to sit still
+with her fairy-book or her doll, when mother was busy or tired. But
+there were two things in which Milly was not at all sensible in spite of
+her sensible face. She was much too ready to cry when any little thing
+went wrong, and she was dreadfully afraid of creatures of all sorts. She
+was afraid of her father's big dog, she was afraid of the dear brown cow
+that lived in the field beyond the garden, she was afraid of earwigs. I
+am even ashamed to say she was afraid of spiders. Once she ran away as
+if a lion were behind her from a white kitten that pulled her dress with
+its frolicsome paws to make her play with it; but that, Milly would tell
+you, was "when I was little," and she was quite sure she was a good deal
+braver now.
+
+Now what am I to tell you about Olly?
+
+Olly was just a round ball of fun and mischief. He had brown hair, brown
+eyes, a brown face, and brown hands. He was always touching and meddling
+with everything, indoors and out, to see what was inside it, or what it
+was made of. He liked teasing Milly, he liked his walks, he liked his
+sleep in the morning, he liked his dinner, he liked his tea, he liked
+everything in the world, except learning to read, and that he hated. He
+could only do one thing besides mischief. He could sing all kinds of
+tunes--quick tunes, slow tunes, and merry tunes. He had been able to
+sing tunes ever since he was quite a tiny baby, and his father and
+mother often talked together of how, in about a year, he should be
+taught to play on the piano, or perhaps on the violin, if he liked it
+better. You might hear his sharp, shrill little voice, singing about the
+house and the garden all day long. John the gardener called it
+"squealin'," and told Olly his songs were "capital good" for frightening
+away the birds.
+
+Now, perhaps, you know a little more about Milly and Olly than you did
+when I began to tell you about them, and it is time you should hear of
+what happened to them on that wonderful journey of theirs up to the
+mountains.
+
+First of all came the packing up. Milly could not make up her mind about
+her dolls; she had three--Rose, Mattie, and Katie--but Rose's frocks
+were very dirty, Mattie had a leg broken, and Katie's paint had been all
+washed off one wet night, when Olly left her out on the lawn. Now which
+of these was the tidiest and most respectable doll to take out on a
+visit? Milly did not know how to settle it.
+
+[Illustration: "'I can't do without my toys, Nana'"]
+
+"I think, Nana," she said at last to her nurse, who was packing the
+children's trunk, "I will take Katie. Mother always sends us away when
+we get white faces to make us look nice and red again; so, perhaps, if I
+take Katie her colour will come back too, you know."
+
+"Perhaps it will, Miss Milly," said nurse, laughing; "anyhow, you had
+better give me the doll you want directly, for it is time I packed all
+the toys now. Now, Master Olly, you know I can't let you take all those
+things."
+
+For there was Olly dragging along his wheelbarrow heaped up with toys
+with one hand, and his cart and horse with a box of bricks standing up
+in it with the other. He would not listen to what Milly said about it,
+and he would scarcely listen to nurse now.
+
+"I can't do without my toys, Nana. I _must_ do mischief if you won't let
+me take all my toys; I can't help it."
+
+"I haven't got room for half those, Master Olly, and you'll have ever so
+many new things to play with when we get to Ravensnest."
+
+"There'll be the new children, Olly," said Milly, "and the little rivers
+and all the funny new flowers."
+
+"Those aren't toys," said Olly, looking ready to cry. "I don't know
+nothing about them."
+
+"Now," said nurse, making a place in the box, "bring me your bricks and
+your big ball, and your picture-books. There, that's all I can spare
+you."
+
+"Wait one minute," said Olly, rushing off; and just then Mrs. Norton
+called nurse away to speak to her in the drawing-room. When nurse came
+back she saw nobody in the nursery. Milly had gone out in the garden,
+Olly was nowhere to be seen. And who had shut down the trunk, which was
+open when she left it? Me-ow, sounded very softly from somewhere close
+by.
+
+"Why--Spot! Spot!" called nurse.
+
+Me-ow, Me-ow, came again; a sad choky little mew, right from the middle
+of the children's trunk. "Master Olly and his tricks again," said nurse,
+running to the box and opening it. There, on the top, lay a quantity of
+frocks that nurse had left folded up on the floor, thrown in anyhow,
+with some toys scattered among them, and the frocks and toys were all
+dancing up and down as if they were bewitched. Nurse took out the
+frocks, and there was the children's collar-box, a large round
+cardboard-box with a lid, jumping from side to side like a box in a
+fairy tale; and such dreadful pitiful little mews coming from the
+inside! Nurse undid the lid, and out sprang Spot like a flash of
+lightning, and ran as if she were running for her life out of the door
+and down the stairs, and safe into the kitchen, where she cuddled
+herself up in a corner of the fender, wishing with all her poor
+trembling little heart that there were no such things in the world as
+small boys. And then nurse heard a kind of kicking and scuffling in the
+china cupboard, and when she opened it there sat Olly doubled up, his
+brown eyes dancing like will-o'-the-wisps, and his little white teeth
+grinning.
+
+"Oh! Nana, she _did_ make a funny me-ow! I just said to her, Now,
+Spottie, _wouldn't_ you like to go in my box? and she said, Yes; and I
+made her such a comfy bed, and then I stuck all those frocks on the top
+of her to keep her warm. Why did you let her out, Nana?"
+
+"You little mischief," said Nana, "do you know you might have smothered
+poor little Spot? And look at all these frocks; do you think I have got
+nothing better to do than to tidy up after your tricks?"
+
+But nurse never knew how to be very hard upon Olly; so all she did was
+to set him up on a high chair with a picture-book, where she could see
+all he was doing. There was no saying what he might take a fancy to pack
+up next if she didn't keep an eye on him.
+
+Well, presently all the packing was done, and Milly and Olly had gone to
+say good-bye to Fräulein, and to Jacky and Francis. Wednesday evening
+came, and they were to start early on Thursday morning. Olly begged
+nurse to put him to bed very early, that he might "wake up krick"--quick
+was a word Olly never could say. So to bed he went at half-past six, and
+his head had scarcely touched the pillow two minutes before he had gone
+cantering away into dreamland, and was seeing all the sights and hearing
+all the delicious stories that children do see and hear in dreamland,
+though they don't always remember them when they wake up. Both Milly and
+he woke up very early on Thursday morning; and directly his eyes were
+open Olly jumped out of bed like an india-rubber ball, and began to put
+on his stockings in a terrible hurry. The noise of his jump woke nurse,
+and she called out in a sleepy voice:
+
+"Get into bed again, Master Olly, directly. It is only just six o'clock,
+and I can't have you out of bed till seven. You'll only be under my
+feet, and in everybody's way."
+
+"Nana, I won't be in _anybody's_ way," exclaimed Olly, running up to her
+and scrambling on to her bed with his little bare toes half way into his
+stockings. "I can't keep still in my bed all such a long time. There's
+something inside of me, Nana, keeps jumping up and down, and won't let
+me keep still. Now, if I get up, you know, Nana, I can help you."
+
+"Help me, indeed!" said nurse, kissing his little brown face, or as much
+of it as could be seen through his curls. "A nice helping that would be.
+Come back to bed, sir, and I'll give you some picture-books till I'm
+ready to dress you."
+
+So back to bed Master Olly went, sorely against his will, and there he
+had to stay till nurse and Milly were dressed, and the breakfast things
+laid. Then nurse gave him his bath and dressed him, and put him up to
+eat his bread and milk while she finished the packing. Olly was always
+very quiet over his meals, and it was the only time in the day when he
+was quiet.
+
+Presently up rattled the cab, and down ran the children with their
+walking things on to see father and John lift the boxes on to the top;
+and soon they were saying good-bye to Susan the cook, and Jenny the
+housemaid, who were going to stay and take care of the house while they
+were away; and then crack went the whip, and off they went to the
+station. On the way they passed Jacky and Francis standing at their
+gate, and all the children waved their hats and shouted "Hurrah!
+hurrah!" At the station nurse kept tight hold of Olly till father had
+got the tickets and put all the boxes into the train, and then he and
+Milly were safely lifted up into the railway carriage, and nurse and
+father and mother came next, with all the bags and shawls and umbrellas.
+
+Such a settling of legs and arms and packages there was; and in the
+middle of it "whew" went the whistle, and off they went away to the
+mountains.
+
+But they had a long way to go before they saw any mountains. First of
+all they had to get to Bletchley, and it took about an hour doing that.
+And oh! what a lovely morning it was, and how fresh and green the fields
+looked as the train hurried along past them. Olly and Milly could see
+hundreds and thousands of moon-daisies and buttercups growing among the
+wet grass, and every now and then came great bushes of wild-roses, some
+pink and some white, and long pools with yellow irises growing along the
+side; and sometimes the train went rushing through a little village, and
+they could see the little children trotting along to school, with their
+books and slates tucked under their arms; and sometimes they went along
+for miles together without seeing anything but the white-and-brown cows
+in the fields, and the great mother-sheep with their fat white lambs
+beside them. The sun shone so brightly, the buttercups were so yellow,
+the roses so pink, and the sky so blue, it was like a fairy world. Olly
+and Milly were always shouting and clapping their hands at something or
+other, for Milly had grown almost as wild as Olly.
+
+Sh-sh-sh-sh went the train, getting slower and slower till at last it
+stopped altogether.
+
+"Bletchley, Bletchley!" shouted Olly, jumping down off the seat.
+
+"No, my boy," said his father, catching hold of him, "we shall stop five
+more times before we get to Bletchley; so don't be impatient."
+
+But at last came Bletchley, and the children were lifted out into the
+middle of such a bustle, as it seemed to Milly. There were crowds of
+people at the station, and they were all pushing backward and forward,
+and shouting and talking.
+
+"Keep hold of me, Olly," said Milly, with an anxious little face. "Oh,
+Nana, don't let him go!"
+
+But nurse held him fast; and very soon they were through the crowd, and
+father had put them safe into their new train, into a carriage marked
+"Windermere," which would take them all the way to their journey's end.
+
+"That was like lions and bears, wasn't it, mother?" said Olly, pointing
+to the crowd in the station, as they went puffing away. Now, "lions and
+bears" was a favourite game of the children's, a romping game, where
+everybody ran about and pretended to be somebody else, and where the
+more people played, and the more they ran and pushed and tumbled about,
+the funnier, it was. And the running, scrambling people at the station
+did look rather as if they were playing at lions and bears.
+
+And now the children had a long day before them. On rushed the train,
+past towns and villages, and houses and trains. The sun got hotter and
+hotter, and the children began to get a little tired of looking out of
+window. Milly asked for a story-book, and was soon very happy reading
+"Snow White and Rose Red." She had read it a hundred times before, but
+that never mattered a bit. Olly came to sit on nurse's knee while she
+showed him pictures, and so the time passed away. And now the train
+stopped again, and father lifted Olly on his knee to see a great church
+far away over the houses, and taught him to say "Lichfield Cathedral."
+And then came Stafford; and Milly looked out for the castle, and
+wondered whether the castles in her story-books looked like that, and
+whether princesses and fairy godmothers and giants ever lived there in
+old times.
+
+After they had left Stafford, Olly began to get tired and fidgety. First
+he went to sit on his father's knee, then on mother's, then on
+nurse's--none of them could keep him still, and nothing seemed to amuse
+him for long together.
+
+"Come and have a sleep, Master Olly," said nurse. "You are just tired
+and hot. This is a long way for little boys, and we've got ever so far
+to go yet."
+
+"I'm not sleepy, Nana," said Olly, sitting straight up, with a little
+flushed face and wide-open eyes. "I'm going to keep awake like father."
+
+"Father's going to sleep, then," said Mr. Norton, tucking himself up in
+a shady corner; "so you go too, Olly, and see which of us can go
+quickest."
+
+When Olly had seen his father's eyes tight shut, and heard him give just
+one little snore--it was rather a make-believe snore--he did let nurse
+draw him on to her knee; and very soon the little gipsy creature was
+fast asleep, with all his brown curls lying like a soft mat over nurse's
+arm. Milly, too, shut her eyes and sat very still; she did not mean to
+go to sleep, but presently she began to think a great many sleepy
+thoughts: Why did the hedges run so fast? and why did the telegraph
+wires go up and down as if they were always making curtsies? and was
+that really mother opposite, or was it Cinderella's fairy godmother? And
+all of a sudden Milly came bump up against a tall blue mountain that had
+a face like a man, and cried out when she bumped upon it!
+
+"Crewe, I declare," exclaimed father, jumping up with a start. "Why,
+Olly and I have been asleep nearly an hour! Wake up, children, it's
+dinner-time."
+
+Nurse had to shake Olly a great many times before he would open his
+sleepy eyes, and then he stood up rubbing them as if he would rub them
+quite away. Father lifted him out, and carried him into a big room, with
+a big table in it, all ready for dinner, and hungry people sitting round
+it. What fun it was having dinner at a station, with all the grown-up
+people. Milly and Olly thought there never was such nice bread and such
+nice apple-tart. Nothing at home ever tasted half so good. And after
+dinner father took them a little walk up and down the platform, and at
+last, just as it was time to get into the train again, he bought them a
+paper full of pictures, called the _Graphic_, that amused Olly for a
+long way.
+
+But it was a long long way to Windermere, and poor Milly and Olly began
+to get very tired. The trees at Wigan did make them laugh a little bit,
+but they were too tired to think them as funny as they would have
+thought them in the morning. They are such comical trees! First of all,
+the smoke from the smoky chimneys at Wigan has made them black, and
+stopped the leaves from growing, and then the wind has blown them all
+over on one side, so that they look like ugly little twisted dwarfs, as
+if some cruel fairy had touched them with her wand. But Olly soon forgot
+all about them; and he began to wander from one end to the other of the
+carriage again, scrambling and jumping about, till he gave himself a
+hard knock against the seat; and that made him begin to cry--poor tired
+little Olly. Then mother lifted him on to her knee, and said to him,
+very softly, "Are you very tired, Olly? Never mind, poor little man, we
+shan't be very long now, and we're all tired, darling--father's tired,
+and I'm tired; and look at Milly there, she looks like a little white
+ghost. Suppose you be brave, and try a little extra hard to be good.
+Then mother'll love you an extra bit. And what do you think we shall see
+soon? such a lovely bit of blue sea with white ships on it. Just you
+shut your eyes a little bit till it comes, I'll be sure to tell you."
+
+And sure enough, after Lancaster, mother gave a little cry, and Olly
+jumped up, and Milly came running over, and there before them lay the
+dancing windy blue sea, covered over with little white waves, running
+and tumbling over each other. And on the other side of it, what did the
+children see?
+
+"Mother, mother! what is it?" cried Olly, pointing with his little brown
+hand far away; "is it a fairy palace, mother?"
+
+"Perhaps it is, Olly; anyway, the hill-fairies live there. For those are
+the mountains, the beautiful mountains we are going to see."
+
+"But how shall we get across the sea to them?" asked Milly, with a
+puzzled face.
+
+"This is only a corner of the sea, Milly--a bay. Don't you remember bays
+in your geography? We can't go across it, but we can go round it, and we
+shall find the mountains on the other side."
+
+Oh! how fast the train seemed to go now that there was something to look
+at. Everywhere mountains were beginning to spring up. And when they had
+said good-bye to the sea, the mountains began to grow taller and taller.
+What had happened to the houses too? They had all turned white or gray;
+there was no red one left. And the fields had stone walls instead of
+hedges; and inside the walls there were small sheep, about as big as the
+lambs they had seen near Oxford in the morning.
+
+Oxenholme, Kendal, Windermere. How glad the tired children were when the
+train ran slowly down into Windermere station, and they could jump out
+and say good-bye to it for a long, long time! They had to wait a little,
+till father had found all the boxes and put them in the carriage that
+was waiting for them, and then in they tumbled, nurse having first
+wrapped them up in big shawls, for it was evening now, and the wind had
+grown cold. That was a nice drive home among the mountains. How tall and
+dark and quiet they were. And what was this shining on their left hand,
+like a white face running beside them, and peeping from behind the
+trees? Why, it was a lake; a great wide lake, with tiny boats upon it,
+some with white sails and some without.
+
+"Mother! mother! may we go in those boats some day?" shouted Olly, in a
+little sharp tired voice, and his mother smiled at him, and said--"Yes,
+very likely."
+
+How happy mother looked. She knew all the mountains like old friends,
+she could tell all their names; and every now and then, when they came
+to a house, she and father would begin to talk about the people who
+lived in it, just as if they were talking about people they knew quite
+well. And now came a little town, the town of Wanwick mother called it,
+right among the mountains, with a river running round it, and a tall
+church spire. It began to get darker and darker, and the trees hung down
+over the road, so that the children could hardly see. On they went, and
+Olly was very nearly asleep again, when the carriage began to crunch
+over gravel, and then it stopped, and father called out--"Here we are,
+children, here we are at Ravensnest."
+
+And out they all jumped. What were those bright lights shining? Olly and
+Milly hardly knew where they were going as nurse took them in, and one
+of Uncle Richard's servants showed them the way upstairs to the nursery.
+Such a nice nursery, with candles lit, and a little fire burning, two
+bowls of hot bread and milk on the table, and in the corner two little
+white beds, as soft and fresh as nests! In twenty minutes Olly was in
+one of these little white beds, and Milly in the other. And you may
+guess whether they were long about going to sleep.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+RAVENSNEST
+
+
+"Poor little souls! How late they are sleeping. They must have been
+tired last night."
+
+So said nurse at eight o'clock, when she came back into the nursery from
+a journey to the kitchen after the breakfast things, and found the
+children still fast asleep; so fast that it looked as if they meant to
+go on sleeping till dinner-time.
+
+"Milly!" she called softly, shaking her very gently, "Milly, it's
+breakfast-time, wake up!"
+
+Milly began to move about, and muttered something about "whistles" and
+"hedges" in her sleep.
+
+Then nurse gave her another little shake, and at last Milly's eyes did
+try very hard to open--"What is it? What do you want, Nana? Where are
+we?--Oh, I know!"
+
+And up sprang Milly in a second and ran to the window, her sleepy eyes
+wide open at last. "Yes, there they are! Come and look, Nana! There,
+past those trees--don't you see the mountains? And there is father
+walking about; and oh! do look at those roses over there. Dress me
+quick, dress me quick, please, dear Nana."
+
+Thump! bump! and there was Olly out of bed, sitting on the floor rubbing
+his eyes. Olly used always to jump out of bed half asleep, and then sit
+a long time on the floor waking up. Nurse and Milly always left him
+alone till he was quite woke up. It made him cross if you began to talk
+to him too soon.
+
+"Milly," said Olly presently, in a sleepy voice, "I'm going right up the
+mountains after breakfast. Aren't you?"
+
+"Wait till you see them, Master Olly," said nurse, taking him up and
+kissing him, "perhaps your little legs won't find it quite so easy to
+climb up the mountains as you think."
+
+"I can climb up three, four, six, seven mountains," said Olly stoutly;
+"mountains aren't a bit hard. Mother says they're meant to climb up."
+
+"Well, I suppose it's like going up stairs a long way," said Milly,
+thoughtfully, pulling on her stockings. "You didn't like going up the
+stairs in Auntie Margaret's house, Olly."
+
+Auntie Margaret's house was a tall London house, with ever so many
+stairs. The children when they were staying there were put to sleep at
+the top, and Olly used to sit down on the stairs and pout and grumble
+every time they had to go up.
+
+But Olly shook his obstinate little head.
+
+"I don't believe it's a bit like going up stairs."
+
+However, as they couldn't know what it was like before they tried, nurse
+told them it was no good talking about it. So they hurried on with their
+dressing, and presently there stood as fresh a pair of morning children
+as anyone could wish to see, with rosy cheeks, and smooth hair, and
+clean print frocks--for Olly was still in frocks--though when the winter
+came mother said she was going to put him into knickerbockers.
+
+And then nurse took them each by the hand and led them through some long
+passages, down a pretty staircase, and through a swing door, into what
+looked like a great nagged kitchen, only there was no fireplace in it.
+The real kitchen opened out of it at one side, and through the door came
+a smell of coffee and toast that made the children feel as hungry as
+little hunters. But their own room was straight in front, across the
+kitchen without a fireplace, a tiny room with one large window hung
+round with roses, and looking out on to a green lawn.
+
+"Nana, isn't it pretty? Nana, I think it's lovely!" said Milly, looking
+out and clapping her hands. And it _was_ a pretty garden they could see
+from the window. An up-and-down garden, with beds full of bright
+flowers, and grass which was nearly all moss, and so soft that no
+cushion could be softer. In the distance they could hear a little
+splish-splash among the trees, which came, Milly supposed, from the
+river mother had told them about; while, reaching up all round the
+house, so that they could not see the top of it from the window, was the
+green wild mountain itself, the mountain of Brownholme, under which
+Uncle Richard's house was built.
+
+The children hurried through their breakfast, and then nurse covered
+them up with garden pinafores, and took them to the dining-room to find
+father and mother. Mr. and Mrs. Norton were reading letters when the
+children's curly heads appeared at the open door, and Mrs. Norton was
+just saying to her husband:
+
+"Aunt Emma sends a few lines just to welcome us, and to say that she
+can't come over to us to-day, but will we all come over to her to-morrow
+and have early dinner, and perhaps a row afterward--"
+
+"Oh, a row, mother, a row!" shouted Olly, clambering on to his mother's
+knee and half-strangling her with his strong little arms; "I can row,
+father said I might. Are we going to-day?"
+
+"No, to-morrow, Olly, when we've seen a little bit of Ravensnest first.
+Which of you remembers Aunt Emma, I wonder?"
+
+"I remember her," said Milly, nodding her head wisely, "she had a big
+white cap, and she told me stories. But I don't quite remember her face,
+mother--not _quite_."
+
+"I don't remember her, not one bit," said Olly. "Mother, does she keep
+saying, 'Don't do that;' 'Go up stairs, naughty boys,' like Jacky's aunt
+does?"
+
+For the children's playfellows, Jacky and Francis, had an aunt living
+with them whom Milly and Olly couldn't bear. They believed that she
+couldn't say anything else except "Don't!" and "Go up stairs!" and they
+were always in dread lest they should come across an aunt like her.
+
+"She's the dearest aunt in the whole world," said mother, "and she never
+says, 'Don't,' except when she's obliged, but when she does say it
+little boys have to mind. When I was a little girl I thought there was
+nobody like Aunt Emma, nobody who could make such plans or tell such
+splendid stories."
+
+"And, mother, can't she cut out card dolls? asked Milly. Don't you know
+those beautiful card dolls you have in your drawer at home--didn't Aunt
+Emma make them?"
+
+"Yes, of course she did. She made me a whole family once for my
+birthday, a father and a mother, and two little girls and two little
+boys. And each of the children had two paper dresses and two hats, one
+for best and one for every day--and the mother had a white evening dress
+trimmed with red, and a hat and a bonnet."
+
+"I know, mother! they're all in your drawer at home, only one of the
+little boys has his head broken off. Do you think Aunt Emma would make
+me a set if I asked her?"
+
+"I can't say, Milly. But I believe Aunt Emma's fingers are just as quick
+as ever they were. Now, children, father says he will take you out while
+I go and speak to cook. Olly, how do you think we're going to get any
+meat for you and Milly here? There are no shops on the mountains."
+
+"Then we'll eat fisses, little fisses like those!" cried Olly, pointing
+to a plate of tiny red-spotted fish that father and mother had been
+having for breakfast.
+
+"Thank you, Olly," said Mr. Norton, laughing; "it would cost a good deal
+to keep you in trout, sir. I think we'll try for some plain mutton for
+you, even if we have to catch the sheep on the mountains ourselves. But
+now come along till mother is ready, and I'll show you the river where
+those little fishes lived."
+
+Out ran the children, ready to go anywhere and see anything in this
+beautiful new place, which seemed to them a palace of wonders. And
+presently they were skipping over the soft green grass, each holding one
+of father's hands, and chattering away to him as if their little tongues
+would never stop. What a hot day it was going to be! The sky overhead
+was deep blue, with scarcely a cloud, they could hear nothing in the
+still air but the sleepy cooing of the doves in the trees by the gate,
+and the trees and flowers all looked as if they were going to sleep in
+the heat.
+
+"Father, why did that old gentleman at Willingham last week tell mother
+that it always rained in the mountains?" asked Milly, looking up at the
+blue sky.
+
+"Well, Milly, I'm afraid you'll find out before you go home that it does
+know how to rain here. Sometimes it rains and rains as if the sky were
+coming down and all the world were going to turn into water. But never
+mind about that now--it isn't going to rain to-day."
+
+Down they went through the garden, across the road, and into a field on
+the other side of it, a beautiful hay-field full of flowers, with just a
+narrow little path through it where the children and Mr. Norton could
+walk one behind another. And at the end of the path what do you think
+they found? Why, a chattering sparkling river, running along over
+hundreds and thousands of brown and green pebbles, so fast that it
+seemed to be trying to catch the birds as they skimmed across it. The
+children had never seen a river like this before, where you could see
+right to the very bottom, and count the stones there if you liked, and
+which behaved like a river at play, scrambling and dancing and rushing
+along as if it were out for a holiday, like the children themselves.
+
+"What do you think of that for a river, children?" said Mr. Norton.
+"Very early this morning, when you little sleepyheads were in bed, I got
+up and came down here, and had my bath over there, look--in that nice
+brown pool under the tree."
+
+"Oh, father!" cried both children, dancing round him. "Let us have our
+baths in the river too. Do ask Nana--do, father! We can have our bathing
+things on that we had at the sea, and you can come too and teach us to
+swim."
+
+"Well, just once perhaps, if mother says yes, and it's very warm
+weather, and you get up very _very_ early. But you won't like it quite
+as much as you think. Rivers are very cold to bathe in, and those pretty
+stones at the bottom won't feel at all nice to your little toes."
+
+"Oh, but, father," interrupted Milly, "we could put on our sand shoes."
+
+"And wouldn't we splash!" said Olly. "Nurse won't let us splash in our
+bath, father, she says it makes a mess. I'm sure it doesn't make a
+_great_ mess."
+
+"What do you know about it, shrimp?" said Mr. Norton, "you don't have to
+tidy up. Hush, isn't that mother calling? Let's go and fetch her, and
+then we'll go and see Uncle Richard's farm, where the milk you had for
+breakfast came from. There are three children there, Milly, besides cows
+and pigs, and ducks and chickens."
+
+Back ran Milly and Olly, and there was mother watching for them with a
+basket on her arm which had already got some roses lying in it.
+
+"Oh, mother! where did you get those roses?" cried Milly.
+
+"Wheeler, the gardener, gave them to me. And now suppose we go first of
+all to see Mrs. Wheeler, and gardener's two little children. They live
+in that cottage over there, across the brook, and the two little ones
+have just been peeping over the wall to try and get a look at you."
+
+Up clambered Milly and Olly along a steep path that seemed to take them
+up into the mountain, when suddenly they turned, and there was another
+river, but such a tiny river, Milly could almost jump across it, and it
+was tumbling and leaping down the rocks on its way to the big river
+which they had just seen, as if it were a little child hurrying to its
+mother.
+
+"Why, mother, what a lot of rivers," said Olly, running on to a little
+bridge that had been built across the little stream, and looking over.
+
+"Just to begin with," said Mrs. Norton. "You'll see plenty more before
+you've done. But I can't have you calling this a river, Olly. These baby
+rivers are called becks in Westmoreland--some of the big ones, too,
+indeed."
+
+On the other side of the little bridge was the gardener's cottage, and
+in front of the door stood two funny fair-haired little children with
+their fingers in their mouths, staring at Milly and Olly. One was a
+little girl who was really about Milly's age, though she looked much
+younger, and the other was a very shy small boy, with blue eyes and
+straggling yellow hair, and a face that might have been pretty if you
+could have seen it properly. But Charlie seemed to have made up his mind
+that nobody ever should see it properly. However often his mother might
+wash him, and she was a tidy woman, who liked to see her children look
+clean and nice, Charlie was always black. His face was black, his hands
+were black, his pinafore was sure to be covered with black marks ten
+minutes after he had put it on. Do what you would to him, it was no use,
+Charlie always looked as if he had just come out of the coal-hole.
+
+"Well, Bessie," said Mrs. Norton to the little girl, "is your mother
+in?"
+
+"Naw," said Bessie, without taking her fingers out of her mouth.
+
+"Oh, I'm sorry for that. Do you know when she's likely to be in?"
+
+"Naw," said Bessie again, beginning to eat her pinafore as well as her
+fingers. Meanwhile Charlie had been creeping behind Bessie to get out of
+Olly's way; for Olly, who always wanted to make friends, was trying to
+shake hands with him, and Charlie was dreadfully afraid that he wanted
+to kiss him too.
+
+"What a pity," said Mrs. Norton, "I wanted to ask her a question. Come
+away, Olly, and don't tease Charlie if he doesn't want to shake hands.
+Can you remember, Bessie, to tell your mother that I came to see her?"
+
+"Yis," said Bessie.
+
+"And can you remember, too, to ask her if she will let you and Charlie
+come down to tea with Miss Milly and Master Olly, this afternoon, at
+five o'clock?"
+
+"Yis," said Bessie, getting shyer and shyer, and eating up her pinafore
+faster than ever.
+
+"Good-bye, then," said Mrs. Norton.
+
+"Good-bye, Bessie," said Milly, softly, taking her hand.
+
+Bessie stared at her, but didn't say anything.
+
+Olly, having quite failed in shaking hands, was now trying to kiss
+Charlie; but Charlie wouldn't have it at all, and every time Olly came
+near, Charlie pushed him away with his little fists. This made Olly
+rather cross, and he began to try with all his strength to make Charlie
+kiss him, when suddenly Charlie got away from him, and running to a pile
+of logs of wood which was lying in the yard he climbed up the logs like
+a little squirrel, and was soon at the top of the heap, looking down on
+Olly, who was very much astonished.
+
+"Mother, _do_ let me climb up too!" entreated Olly, as Mrs. Norton took
+his hand to lead him away. "I want to climb up krick like that! Oh, do
+let me try!"
+
+"No, no, Olly! come along. We shall never get to the farm if you stay
+climbing here. And you wouldn't find it as easy as Charlie does, I can
+tell you."
+
+"Why, I'm bigger than Charlie," said Olly, pouting, as they walked away.
+
+"But you haven't got such stout legs; and, besides, Charlie is always
+out of doors all day long, climbing and poking about. I daresay he can
+do outdoor things better than you can. You're a little town boy, you
+know."
+
+"Charlie's got a black face," said Olly, who was not at all pleased that
+Charlie, who was smaller than he was, and dirty besides, could do
+anything better than he could.
+
+"Well, you see, he hasn't got a Nana always looking after him as you
+have."
+
+"Hasn't he got _any_ Nana?" asked Olly, looking as if he didn't
+understand how there could be little children without Nanas.
+
+"He hasn't got any nurse but his mother, and Mrs. Wheeler has a great
+deal else to do than looking after him. What would you be like, do you
+think, Olly, if I had to do all the housework, and cook the dinner, and
+mind the baby, and there was no nurse to wash your face and hands for
+you?"
+
+"I should get just like shock-headed Peter," said Olly, shaking his head
+gravely at the idea. Shock-headed Peter was a dirty little boy in one of
+Olly's picture-books; but I am sure you must have heard about him
+already, and must have seen the picture of him with his bushy hair, and
+his terrible long nails like birds' claws. Olly was never tired of
+hearing about him, and about all the other children in that
+picture-book.
+
+"What a funny little girl Bessie is, mother!" said Milly. "Do they
+always say _Naw_ and _Yis_ in this country, instead of saying No and
+Yes, like we do?"
+
+"Well, most of the people that live here do," said Mrs. Norton. "Their
+way of talking sounds odd and queer at first, Milly, but when you get
+used to it you will like it as I do, because it seems like a part of the
+mountains."
+
+All this time they had been climbing up a steep path behind the
+gardener's house, and now Mr. Norton opened a door in a high wall, and
+let the children into a beautiful kitchen-garden made on the mountain
+side, so that when they looked down from the gate they could see the
+chimneys of Ravensnest just below them. Inside there were all kinds of
+fruit and vegetables, but gooseberry bushes and the strawberries had
+nothing but green gooseberries and white strawberries to show, to Olly's
+great disappointment.
+
+"Why aren't the strawberries red, mother?" he asked in a discontented
+voice, as if it must be somebody's fault that they weren't red. "Ours at
+home were ripe."
+
+"Well, Olly, I suppose the strawberries know best. All I can tell you
+is, that things always get ripe here later than at Willingham. Their
+summer begins a little later than ours does, and so everything gets
+pushed on a little. But there will be plenty by-and-by. And suppose just
+now, instead of looking at the strawberries, you give just one look at
+the mountains. Count how many you can see all round."
+
+"One, two, three, five," counted Olly. "What great big humps! Should we
+be able to touch the sky if we got up to the top of that one, mother?"
+and he pointed to a great blue mountain where the clouds seemed to be
+resting on the top.
+
+"Well, if you were up there just now, you would be all among the clouds,
+and it would seem like a white fog all round you. So you would be
+touching the clouds at any rate."
+
+Olly opened his eyes very wide at the idea of touching the clouds.
+
+"Why, mother, we can't touch the clouds at home!"
+
+"That comes of living in a country as flat as a pancake," said Mr.
+Norton. "Just you wait till we can buy a tame mountain, and carry it to
+Willingham with us. Then we'll put it down in the middle of the garden,
+and the clouds will come down to sit on the top of it just as they do
+here. But now, who can scramble over that gate?"
+
+For the gate at the other end of the garden was locked, and as the
+gardener couldn't be found, everybody had to scramble over, mother
+included. However, Mr. Norton helped them all over, and then they found
+themselves on a path running along the green mountain side. On they
+went, through pretty bits of steep hay-fields, where the grass seemed
+all clover and moon-daisies, till presently they came upon a small
+hunched-up house, with a number of sheds on one side of it and a
+kitchen-garden in front. This was Uncle Richard's farm; a very tiny
+farm, where a man called John Backhouse lived, with his wife and two
+little girls and a baby-boy. Except just in the hay-time, John Backhouse
+had no men to help him, and he and his wife had to do all the work, to
+look after the sheep, and the cows, the pigs, the horse, and the
+chickens, to manage the garden and the hayfield, and to take the butter
+and milk to the people who wanted to buy it. When their children grew up
+and were able to help, Backhouse and his wife would be able to do it all
+very well; but just now, when they were still quite small, it was very
+hard work; it was all the farmer and his wife could do to make enough to
+keep themselves and their children fed and clothed.
+
+Milly and Olly were very anxious to see the farmer's children and looked
+out for them in the garden as they walked up to the house, but there
+were no signs of them. The door was opened by Mrs. Backhouse, the
+farmer's wife, who held a fair-haired baby in her arms sucking a great
+crust of brown bread, and when Mr. and Mrs. Norton had shaken hands with
+her--"I'm sure, ma'am, I'm very pleased to see you here," said Mrs.
+Backhouse. "John told me you were come (only Mrs. Backhouse said
+'coom'), and Becky and Tiza went down with their father when he took the
+milk this morning, hoping they would catch a sight of your children.
+They have been just wild to see them, but I told them they weren't
+likely to be up at that time in the morning."
+
+"Where are they now?" asked Mrs. Norton. "Mine have been looking out for
+them as we came along."
+
+"Well, ma'am, I can't say, unless they're in the cherry-tree. Becky!
+Tiza!"
+
+A faint "Yis" came from the other end of the garden, but still Milly and
+Olly could see nothing but a big cherry-tree growing where the voice
+seemed to come from.
+
+"You go along that path, missy, and call again. You'll be sure to find
+them," said Mrs. Backhouse, pointing to the tree. "And won't you come
+in, ma'am, and rest a bit? You'll be maybe tired with walking this hot
+day."
+
+So Mr. and Mrs. Norton went into the farmhouse, and the children went
+hand-in-hand down the garden, looking for Becky and Tiza.
+
+Suddenly, as they came close to the cherry-tree, they heard a laugh and
+a little scuffling, and looking up, what should they see but two little
+girls perched up on one of the cherry-tree branches, one of them sewing,
+the other nursing a baby kitten. Both of them had coloured print
+bonnets, but the smaller had taken hers off and was rolling the kitten
+up in it. The little girl sewing had a sensible, sober face; as for the
+other, she could not have looked sober if she had tried for a week of
+Sundays. It made you laugh only to look at Tiza. From the top of her
+curly head to the soles of her skipping little feet, she was the
+sauciest, merriest, noisiest creature. It was she who was always playing
+tricks on the cows and the horse, and the big sheep-dogs; who liked
+nothing so well as teasing Becky and dressing up the kittens, and who
+was always tumbling into the milkpail, or rolling downstairs, or losing
+herself in the woods, without somehow ever coming to any harm. If she
+and Olly had been left alone in the world together they _must_ have come
+to a bad end, but luckily each of them had wiser people to take care of
+them.
+
+"Becky," said Milly, shyly, looking up into the tree, "will you come
+down and say how do you do to us?"
+
+Becky stuck her needle in her work and scrambled down with a red shy
+face to shake hands; but Tiza, instead of coming down, only climbed a
+little higher, and peeped at the others between the branches.
+
+"We came down to the house when fayther took the milk this morning,"
+said Becky. "We thought maybe we'd see you in the garden. Only Tiza said
+she'd run away if she did see you."
+
+"Why doesn't Tiza come down?" asked Olly, looking hard up into the tree.
+"I want to see her."
+
+Thump! What was that rattling down on Olly's head? He looked down at his
+feet very much astonished, and saw a bunch of green cherries which Tiza
+had just thrown at him.
+
+"Throw some more! Throw some more!" he cried out, and Tiza began to pelt
+him fast, while Olly ran here and there picking them up, and every now
+and then trying to throw them back at Tiza; but she was too high up for
+him to reach, and they only came rattling about his head again.
+
+"She won't come down," said Becky, looking up at her sister. "Maybe she
+won't speak to you for two or three days. And if you run after her she
+hides in such queer places you can never find her."
+
+"But mother wants you and her to come to tea with us this afternoon,"
+said Milly; "won't Tiza come?"
+
+"I suppose mother'll make her," said Becky, "but she doesn't like it.
+Have you been on the fell?"
+
+Milly looked puzzled. "Do you mean on the mountain? No, not yet. We're
+going to-morrow when we go to Aunt Emma's. But we've been to the river
+with father."
+
+"Did you go over the stepping-stones?"
+
+"No," said Milly, "I don't know what they are. Can we go this evening
+after tea?"
+
+"Oh yes," said Becky, "they're just close by your house. Does your
+mother let you go in the water?"
+
+Now Becky said a great many of these words very funnily, so that Milly
+could hardly understand her. She said "doos" and "oop," and "knaw," and
+"jist," and "la-ike," but it sounded quite pretty from her soft little
+mouth, and Milly thought she had a very nice way of talking.
+
+"No, mother doesn't let us go in the water here, at least, not unless
+it's very warm. We paddle when we go to the sea, and some day father
+says we may have our bath in the river if it's very fine."
+
+"We never have a bath in the river," said Becky, looking very much
+astonished at the idea.
+
+"Do you have your bath in the nursery like we do?" asked Milly.
+
+"We haven't got a nursery," said Becky, staring at her, "mother puts us
+in the toob on Saturday nights. I don't mind it but Tiza doesn't like it
+a bit. Sometimes she hides when it's Saturday night, so that mother
+can't find her till it's too late."
+
+"Don't you have a bath except on Saturday?" said Milly. "Olly and I have
+one every morning. Mother says we should get like shock-headed Peter if
+we didn't."
+
+"I don't know about him," said Becky, shaking her head.
+
+"He's a little boy in a picture-book. I'll show him you when you come to
+tea. But there's mother calling. Come along, Olly. Tiza won't come down
+Becky says."
+
+"She's a very rude girl," said Olly, who was rather hot and tired with
+his game, and didn't think it was all fun that Tiza should always hit
+him and he should never be able to hit Tiza. "I won't sit next her when
+she comes to tea with us."
+
+"Tiza's only in fun," said Becky, "she's always like that. Tiza, are you
+coming down? I am going to get baby out, I heard him crying just now."
+
+"May you take baby out all by yourself?" asked Milly.
+
+"Why, I always take him out, and I put him to sleep at nights; and
+mother says he won't go to sleep for anybody as quick as for me," said
+Becky proudly.
+
+Milly felt a good deal puzzled. It _must_ be funny to have no Nana.
+
+"Will you and he," said Becky, pointing to Olly, "come up this afternoon
+and help us call the cows?"
+
+"If we may," said Milly; "who calls them?"
+
+"Tiza and I," answered Becky; "when I'm a big girl I shall learn how to
+milk, but fayther says I'm too little yet."
+
+"I wish I lived at a farm," said Milly disconsolately.
+
+Becky didn't quite know what to say to this, so she began to call Tiza
+again.
+
+"Swish!" went something past them as quick as lightning. It was Tiza
+running to the house. Olly set out to run after her as fast as he could
+run, but he came bang up against his mother standing at the farmhouse
+door, just as Tiza got safely in and was seen no more.
+
+"Ah, you won't catch Tiza, master," said Mrs. Backhouse, patting his
+head; "she's a rough girl, always at some tricks or other--we think she
+ought to have been a boy, really."
+
+"Mother, isn't Becky very nice?" said Milly, as they walked away. "Her
+mother lets her do such a lot of things--nurse the baby, and call the
+cows, and make pinafores. Oh, I wish father was a farmer."
+
+"Well, it's not a bad kind of life when the sun shines, and everything
+is going right," said Mrs. Norton; "but I think you had better wait a
+little bit till the rain comes before you quite make up your mind about
+it, Milly."
+
+But Milly was quite sure she knew enough about it already to make up her
+mind, and all the way home she kept saying to herself, "If I could only
+turn into a little farmer's girl! Why don't people have fairy godmothers
+now like Cinderella?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+OUT ON THE HILLS
+
+
+Milly and Olly, and the four little Westmoreland children, had a very
+pleasant tea together in the afternoon of the Nortons's first day at
+Ravensnest. Bessie and Charlie certainly didn't talk much; but Tiza,
+when once her mother had made her come, thought proper to get rid of a
+great deal of her shyness, and to chatter and romp so much that they
+quite fell in love with her, and could not be persuaded to go anywhere
+or do anything without her. Nurse would not let Milly and Olly go to
+call the cows, though she promised they should some other day; but she
+took the whole party down to the stepping-stones after tea, and great
+fun it was to see Becky and Tiza running over the stepping-stones, and
+jumping from one stone to another like little fawns. Milly and Olly
+wanted sorely to go too, but there was no persuading Nana to let them go
+without their father to fish them out if they tumbled in, so they had to
+content themselves with dangling their legs over the first
+stepping-stone and watching the others. But perhaps you don't quite
+known what stepping-stones are? They are large high stones, with flat
+tops, which people put in, a little way apart from each other, right
+across a river, so that by stepping from one to the other you can cross
+to the opposite side. Of course they only do for little rivers, where
+the water isn't very deep. And they don't always do even there.
+Sometimes in the river Thora, where Milly and Olly's stepping-stones
+were, when it rained very much, the water rose so high that it dashed
+right over the stepping-stones and nobody could go across. Milly and
+Olly saw the stepping-stones covered with water once or twice while they
+were at Ravensnest; but the first evening they saw them the river was
+very low, and the stones stood up high and dry out of the water. Milly
+thought that stepping-stones were much nicer than bridges, and that it
+was the most amusing and interesting way of getting across a river that
+she knew. But then Milly was inclined to think everything wonderful and
+interesting at Ravensnest--from the tall mountains that seemed to shut
+them in all around like a wall, down to the tiny gleaming wild
+strawberries, that were just beginning to show their little scarlet
+balls on the banks in the Ravensnest woods. Both she and Olly went to
+bed after their first day at Ravensnest with their little hearts full of
+happiness, and their little heads full of plans. To-morrow they were to
+go to Aunt Emma's, and perhaps the day after that father would take them
+to bathe in the river, and nurse would let them go and help Becky and
+Tiza call the cows. Holidays _were_ nice; still geography lessons were
+nice too sometimes, thought Milly sleepily, just as she was slipping,
+slipping away into dreamland, and in her dreams her faithful little
+thoughts went back lovingly to Fräulein's kind old face, and to the
+capes and islands and seas she had been learning about a week ago.
+
+[Illustration: "The flowers Milly gathered for her mother"]
+
+The next morning Mr. and Mrs. Norton were busy indoors till about twelve
+o'clock; and the children wandered about the garden with nurse, finding
+out many new nooks and corners, especially a delightful steep path which
+led up and up into the woods, till at last it took the children to a
+little brown summer-house at the top, where they could sit and look over
+the trees below, away to the river and the hay-fields and the mountains.
+And between the stones and this path grew the prettiest wild
+strawberries, only, as Milly said, it was not much good looking for them
+yet, for there were so few red ones you could scarcely get enough to
+taste what they were like. But in a week or two, she and Olly planned
+that they would take up a basket with some green leaves in it, and
+gather a lot for father and mother--enough for regular dessert--and some
+wild raspberries too, for these also grew in the wood, to the great
+delight of the children, who had never seen any before. They began to
+feel presently as if it would be nothing very extraordinary to find
+trees covered with barley sugar or jam tarts in this wonderful wood. And
+as for the flowers Milly gathered for her mother, they were a sight to
+see--moon-daisies and meadow-sweet, wild roses and ragged-robins, and
+bright bits of rhododendrons. For both the woods and the garden at
+Ravensnest were full of rhododendrons of all colours, pink and red, and
+white and flame colour; and Milly and Olly amused themselves with making
+up bunches of different coloured flowers with as many different colours
+in them as they could find. There were no rhododendrons at Willingham;
+and the children thought them the loveliest, gayest things they had ever
+seen.
+
+But at last twelve o'clock came. Nurse tidied the children, gave them
+some biscuits and milk, and then sent them to the drawing-room to find
+father and mother. Only Mrs. Norton was there, but she said there was no
+need to wait for father, as he was out already and would meet them on
+the way. They were to go straight over the mountain instead of walking
+round by the road, which would have taken much longer. So off they
+set--Olly skipping, and chattering as he always did; while Milly stuck
+close to her mother, telling her every now and then, when Olly left off
+talking, about their morning in the wood, the flowers they had gathered
+and the strawberries they had found. At the top of the garden was a
+little gate, and beside the gate stood Bessie and Charlie, who had
+really been watching for the children all the morning, though they
+didn't dare to come into the garden without leave.
+
+"Bessie, we are going to Aunt Emma's," said Milly, running up to them.
+"Where are you and Charlie going to?"
+
+"Nawhere," said Bessie, who, as usual, had her pinafore in her mouth,
+and never said more than one word at a time if she could help it.
+
+"Nowhere! what do you do all the morning, Bessie?"
+
+"I doan't know," said Bessie, gravely looking up at her; "sometimes I
+mind the baby."
+
+"Do you mind the baby, too? Dear, dear! And what does Charlie do?"
+
+"Nawthing," said Bessie again. "He only makes himself dirty."
+
+"Don't you go to school ever?"
+
+"No, but mother's going to send us," said Bessie, whose big eyes grew
+round and frightened at the idea, as if it was a dreadful prospect. "Are
+you going to be away for all day?"
+
+"Yes; we shan't be back till quite evening, mother says. Here she is.
+Good-bye, Bessie; good-bye, Charlie. Will you come and play with us
+to-morrow morning?"
+
+Bessie nodded, but Charlie ran off without answering; for he saw Olly
+coming, and was afraid he might want to kiss him. On the other side of
+the gate they had to begin to climb up a steep bit of soft green grass;
+and very hard work it was. After quite a little way the children began
+to puff and pant like two little steam engines.
+
+"It _is_ a little bit like going upstairs, don't you think, Olly?" said
+Milly, sitting down by her mother on a flat bit of gray stone.
+
+"No, it isn't a bit like going upstairs," said Olly, shaking his head;
+for Olly always liked contradicting Milly if he could. "It's like--it's
+like--walking up a house!"
+
+Suddenly they heard far above them a shout of "Hullo!" Both the children
+started up and looked about them. It was like father's voice, but they
+couldn't see him anywhere.
+
+"Where are you, father?"
+
+"Hullo!" again. And this time it sounded much nearer to them. Where
+could it be? The children began to run about and look behind the bushes
+and the rocks, till all of a sudden, just as Milly got near a big rock,
+out jumped Mr. Norton from behind it with a great shout, and began to
+run after her. Away ran Milly and Olly as fast as their small feet could
+carry them, up and down, up and down, till at last there came a steep
+place--one of Milly's feet tripped up, down she went, rolling over and
+over--down came Olly on the top of her, and the two of them rolled away
+together till they stopped at the bottom of the steep place, all mixed
+up in a heap of legs and arms and hats and pinafores.
+
+"Here's a boy and girl tied up in a knot," said Mr. Norton, scrambling
+down after them and lifting them up. "There's no harm done, is there?"
+
+"I've got a bump on my arm," said Milly, turning up her sleeve.
+
+"And I've got a scratch on my nose," said Olly, rubbing it.
+
+"That's not much for a nice tumble like that," said Mr. Norton, "you
+wouldn't mind another, would you, Milly?"
+
+"Not a bit," said Milly, merrily skipping along beside him. "Hide again,
+father."
+
+"Another day, not now, for we want to get to Aunt Emma's. But tomorrow,
+if you like, we'll come up here and have a capital game. Only we must
+choose a nice dry place where there are no bogs."
+
+"What are bogs?" asked Olly.
+
+"Wet places, where your feet go sinking deeper and deeper into the mud,
+and you can't find any stiff firm bit to stand on. Sometimes people sink
+down and down into a bog till the mud comes right over their head and
+face and chokes them; but we haven't got any bogs as bad as that here.
+Now, children, step along in front. Very soon we shall get to the top of
+the mountain, and then we shall see wonderful things on the other side."
+
+So Milly and Olly ran on, pushing their way through the great tall fern,
+or scampering over the short green grass where the little mountain sheep
+were nibbling, and where a beautiful creeping moss grew all over the
+ground, which, mother told Milly, was called "Stags' horn moss," because
+its little green branches were so like stags' horns.
+
+"Now look, children," shouted their father to them from behind. "Here we
+are at the top."
+
+And then, all of a sudden, instead of only the green mountain and the
+sheep, they could see far away on the other side of the mountain. There,
+all round them, were numbers of other mountains; and below, at their
+feet, were houses and trees and fields, while straight in front lay a
+great big blue lake stretching away ever so far, till it seemed to be
+lost in the sky.
+
+"Look, look, mother!" cried Milly, clapping her hands, "there's
+Windermere lake, the lake we saw when we were coming from the station.
+Look at that steamer, with all the people on board! What funny little
+black people. And oh, mother, look at that little boat over there! How
+can people go out in such a weeny boat as that?"
+
+"It isn't such a weeny boat, Milly. It only looks so small because it's
+such a long way off. When father and I take you and Olly on the lake, we
+shall go in a boat just like that. And now, instead of looking so far
+away, look just down here below you, and tell me what you see."
+
+"Some chimneys, and some trees, and some smoke, ever so far down,"
+shouted the children. "Is it a house, mother?"
+
+"That's Aunt Emma's house, the old house where I used to come and stay
+when I was a little girl, and when your dear great-grandfather and
+great-grandmother were alive. I used to think it the nicest place in the
+world."
+
+"Were you a very little girl, mother, and were you ever naughty?" asked
+Milly, slipping her little hand into her mother's and beginning to feel
+rather tired with her long walk.
+
+"I'm afraid I was very often naughty, Milly. I used to get into great
+rages and scream, till everybody was quite tired out. But Aunt Emma was
+very good to me, and took a great deal of pains to cure me of going into
+rages. Besides, it always did naughty children good to live in the same
+house with great-grandmamma, and so after a while I got better. Take
+care how you go, children, it's very steep just here, and you might soon
+tumble over on your noses. Olly, take care! take care! where _are_ you
+going?"
+
+Where, indeed, was Olly going? Just the moment before the little man had
+spied a lovely flower growing a little way off the path, in the middle
+of some bright yellow-green moss. And without thinking of anything but
+getting it, off he rushed. But oh! splish, splash, splish, down went
+Olly's feet, up splashed the muddy water, and there was Olly stuck in a
+bog.
+
+"Father, pull me out, pull me out!" cried the little boy in terror, as
+he felt his feet stuck fast. But almost before he could speak there was
+father close beside him, standing on a round little hump of dry grass
+which was sticking up out of the bog, and with one grip he got hold of
+Olly under his arm, and then jump! on to another little hump of grass,
+jump! on to another, and there they were safe on the path again.
+
+"Oh, you black boy!" cried father and mother and Milly all together. Was
+there ever such a little object! All his nice clean holland frock was
+splashed with black mud; and what had happened to his stockings?
+
+"I've got mud-stockings on," shouted Olly, capering about, and pointing
+to his legs which were caked with mud up to his knees.
+
+"You're a nice respectable boy to take out to dinner," said Mrs. Norton.
+"I think we'll leave you on the mountain to have dinner with the sheep."
+
+"Oh no, father," pleaded Milly, taking Olly fast by the hand. "We can
+wash him at Aunt Emma's, you know."
+
+"Don't go too close to him, Milly!" exclaimed Mrs. Norton, "or you'll
+get as black as he is. We shall have to put him under the pump at Aunt
+Emma's, that's quite certain. But there's nothing to wash him with here,
+so he must just go as he is for a bit. Now, Olly, run along and your
+feet will soon dry. Father's going first, you go next, just where he
+goes, I'm coming after you, and Milly shall go last. Perhaps in that way
+we shall get you down safe."
+
+"Oh, but, mother, look at my flower," said Olly, holding it up
+triumphantly. "Isn't it a beauty?"
+
+"Shall I tell you what it's called, Olly? It's called a butterwort, and
+it always grows in boggy places; I wouldn't advise you to go after one
+again without asking father first."
+
+It was a very different thing going down the mountain from climbing up
+it. It seemed only a few minutes before they had got almost to the
+bottom, and there was a gate leading into a road, and a little village
+of white houses in front of them. They walked up the road a little way,
+and then father opened a big gate and let them into a beautiful garden
+full of rhododendrons like the Ravensnest garden. And who was this
+walking down the drive to meet them? Such a pretty little elderly lady,
+with gray hair and a white cap.
+
+"Dear Aunt Emma!" said Mrs. Norton, running up to her and taking both
+her hands and kissing her.
+
+"Well, Lucy," said the little lady, holding her hands and looking at her
+(Lucy was Mrs. Norton's Christian name), "it _is_ nice to see you all
+here. And there's dear little Milly, I remember her. But where's Olly?
+I've never seen that small creature, you know. Come, Olly, don't be shy.
+Little boys are never shy with Aunt Emma."
+
+"Except when they tumble into bogs," said Mr. Norton, laughing and
+pulling Olly forward, who was trying to hide his mud-stockings behind
+his mother. "There's a clean tidy boy to bring to dinner, isn't he, Aunt
+Emma? I think I'll take him to the yard and pump on him a little before
+we bring him in."
+
+Aunt Emma put up her spectacles to look at Olly.
+
+"Why, Olly, I think Mother Quiverquake has been catching hold of you.
+Don't you know about old Mother Quiverquake, who lives in the bogs? Oh,
+I can tell you splendid stories about her some day. But now catch hold
+of my hand, and keep your little legs away from my dress, and we'll soon
+make a proper boy of you again."
+
+And then Aunt Emma took one of Milly's hands and one of Olly's, and up
+they went to the house. But I must start another chapter before I begin
+to tell you what the children saw in Aunt Emma's house, and of the happy
+time they spent there.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+AUNT EMMA'S PICNIC
+
+
+Instead of taking them straight into the house, however, Aunt Emma took
+the children up a little shady path which very soon brought them to a
+white cottage covered with honeysuckle and climbing roses.
+
+"This is where my coachman's wife lives," said Aunt Emma, "and she owns
+a small boy who might perhaps find you a pair of stockings, Olly, to put
+on while your own are washed."
+
+Olly opened his brown eyes very wide at the idea of wearing some other
+little boy's stockings, but he said nothing.
+
+Aunt Emma tapped at the door, and out came a stout kind-looking woman.
+
+"Mrs. Tyson, do you think your Johnny could lend my little nephew a pair
+of his stockings while we get his own washed? Master Olly has been
+tumbling into a bog by way of making friends with the mountains, and I
+don't quite know how I am to let those legs into my dining-room."
+
+"Dear me, ma'am, but Johnny'll be proud if he's got any clean, but I'll
+not answer for it. Won't ye come in?"
+
+In they walked, and there was a nice tidy kitchen, with a wooden cradle
+in the corner, and a little fair-haired boy sitting by it and rocking
+the baby. This was Johnny, and Olly looked at him with great curiosity.
+"I've got bigger legs than Johnny," he whispered solemnly at last to
+Aunt Emma, while they were waiting for Mrs. Tyson, who had gone upstairs
+to fetch the stockings.
+
+"Perhaps you eat more bread and milk than Johnny does," said Aunt Emma,
+very solemnly too, "However, most likely Johnny's stockings will
+stretch. How's the baby, Johnny?"
+
+"She's a great deal better, ma'am," said the little boy, smiling at her.
+Milly and Olly made him feel shy, but he loved Aunt Emma.
+
+"Have you been taking care of her all the morning for mother?"
+
+"Yes, ma'am, and she's never cried but once," said Johnny proudly.
+
+"Well done! Ah! there comes Mrs. Tyson. Now, Olly, sit up on that chair,
+and we'll see to you."
+
+Off came the dirty stockings, and Mrs. Tyson slipped on a pair of woolen
+socks that tickled Olly very much. They were very thick, and not a bit
+like his own stockings; and when he got up again he kept turning round
+and round to look at his legs, as if he couldn't make them out.
+
+"Do they feel funny to you?" said Mrs. Tyson, patting his shoulder.
+"Never you mind, little master; I know they're nice and warm, for I
+knitted them myself."
+
+"Mother buys our stockings in the shop," said Olly, when they got
+outside again; "why doesn't Mrs. Tyson?"
+
+"Perhaps we haven't so many shops, or such nice ones here, Olly, as you
+have at Willingham; and the people here have always been used to do a
+great many things for themselves. Some of them live in such lonely
+places among the mountains that it is very difficult for them to get to
+any shops. Not very long ago the mothers used to make all the stuffs for
+their own dresses and their children's. What would you say, Milly, if
+mother had to weave the stuff for it every time you had a new dress?"
+
+"Mother wouldn't give me a great many new dresses," said Milly, gravely,
+shaking her head. "I like shops best, Aunt Emma."
+
+"Well, I suppose it's best to like what we've got," said Aunt Emma,
+laughing.
+
+Indoors, Olly's muddy stockings were given to Aunt Emma's maid, who
+promised to have them washed and dried by the time they had to go home,
+and then, when Mrs. Norton had covered up the black spots on his frock
+with a clean pinafore she had brought with her, Olly looked quite
+respectable again.
+
+The children thought they had never seen quite such a nice house as Aunt
+Emma's. First of all it had a large hall, with all kinds of corners in
+it, just made for playing hide-and-seek in; and the drawing-room was
+full of the most delightful things. There were stuffed birds in cases,
+and little ivory chessmen riding upon ivory elephants. There were
+picture-books, and there were mysterious drawers full of cards and
+puzzles, and glass marbles and old-fashioned toys, that the children's
+mother and aunts and uncles, and their great-aunts and uncles before
+that, had loved and played with years and years ago. On the wall hung a
+great many pictures, some of them of funny little stiff boys in blue
+coats with brass buttons, and some of them of little girls with mob-caps
+and mittens, and these little boys and girls were all either dead now,
+or elderly men and women, for they were the great-aunts and uncles; and
+over the mantelpiece hung a picture of a lovely old lady, with bright,
+soft brown hair and smiling eyes and lips, that looked as if they were
+just going to speak to the two strange little children who had come for
+their first visit to their mother's old home. Milly knew quite well that
+it was a picture of great-grandmamma. She had seen others like it
+before, only not so large as this one, and she looked at it quietly,
+with her grave blue eyes, while Olly was eagerly wandering round the
+room, spying into everything, and longing to touch this, that, and the
+other, if only mother would let go his hand.
+
+"You know who that is, don't you, little woman?" said Aunt Emma, taking
+her up on her knee.
+
+"Yes," said Milly, nodding, "it's great-grandmamma. I wish we could have
+seen her."
+
+"I wish you could, Milly. She would have smiled at you as she is smiling
+in the picture and you would have been sure to have loved her; all
+little children did. I can remember seeing your mother, Milly, when she
+was about as old as you, cuddled up in a corner of that sofa over there,
+in 'grandmamma's pocket,' as she used to call it, listening with all her
+ears to great-grandmamma's stories. There was one story called 'Leonora'
+that went on for years and years, till all the little children in
+it--and the little children who listened to it--were almost grown up;
+and then great-grandmamma always carried about with her a wonderful
+blue-silk bag full of treasures, which we used to be allowed to turn out
+whenever any of us had been quite good at our lessons for a whole week."
+
+"Mother has a bag like that," said Milly; "it has lots of little toys in
+it that father had when he was a little boy. She lets us look at it on
+our birthdays. Can you tell stories, Aunt Emma?"
+
+"Tell us about old Mother Quiverquake," cried Olly, running up and
+climbing on his aunt's knee.
+
+"Oh dear, no!" said Aunt Emma; "it's much too fine to-day for
+stories--indoors, at any rate. Wait till we get a real wet day, and then
+we'll see. After dinner to-day, what do you think we're going to do?
+Suppose we have a row on the lake to get water-lilies, and suppose we
+take a kettle and make ourselves some tea on the other side of the lake.
+What would you say to that, Master Olly?"
+
+The children began to dance about with delight at the idea of a row and
+a picnic both together, when suddenly there was a knock at the door, and
+when Aunt Emma said, "Come in!" what do you think appeared? Why, a great
+green cage, carried by a servant, and in it a gray parrot, swinging
+about from side to side, and cocking his head wickedly, first over one
+shoulder and then over the other.
+
+"Now, children," said Aunt Emma, while the children stood quite still
+with surprise, "let me introduce you to my old friend, Mr. Poll Parrot.
+Perhaps you thought I lived all alone in this big house. Not at all.
+Here is somebody who talks to me when I talk to him, who sings and
+chatters and whistles and cheers me up wonderfully in the winter
+evenings, when the rains come and make me feel dull. Put him down here,
+Margaret," said Aunt Emma to the maid, clearing a small table for the
+cage. "Now, Olly, what do you think of my parrot?"
+
+"Can it talk?" asked Olly, looking at it with very wide open eyes.
+
+"It _can_ talk; whether it _will_ talk is quite another thing. Parrots
+are contradictious birds. I feel very often as if I should like to beat
+Polly, he's so provoking. Now, Polly, how are you to-day?"
+
+"Polly's got a bad cold; fetch the doc--" said the bird at once, in such
+a funny cracked voice, that it made Olly jump as if he had heard one of
+the witches in Grimm's "Fairy Tales" talking.
+
+"Come, Polly, that's very well behaved of you; but you mustn't leave off
+in the middle, begin again. Olly, if you don't keep your fingers out of
+the way Polly will snap them up for his dinner. Parrots like fingers
+very much." Olly put his hands behind his back in a great hurry, and
+mother came to stand behind him to keep him quiet. By this time,
+however, Polly had begun to find out that there were some new people in
+the room he didn't know, and for a long time Aunt Emma could not make
+him talk at all. He would do nothing but put his head first on one side
+and then on the other and make angry clicks with his beak.
+
+"Come, Polly," said Aunt Emma, "what a cross parrot you are.
+One--two--three--four. Now, Polly, count."
+
+"Polly's got a bad cold, fetch the doc--" said Polly again while Aunt
+Emma was speaking. "One--two--six--seven--eight--nine--two--_Quick_
+march!"
+
+And then Polly began to lift first one claw and then the other as if he
+were marching, while the children shouted with laughter at his
+ridiculous ways and his gruff cracked voice.
+
+Then Aunt Emma went behind him and rapped gently on the table. The
+parrot stopped marching, stuck his head on one side and listened. Aunt
+Emma rapped again.
+
+"Come in!" said the parrot suddenly, quite softly, as if he had turned
+into quite another person. "Hush--sh--sh, cat's got a mouse!"
+
+"Well, Polly," said Aunt Emma, "I suppose she may have a mouse if she
+likes. Is that all you've got to tell us? Polly, where's gardener?"
+
+"Get away! get away!" screamed Polly, while all his feathers began to
+stand up straight, and his eyes looked fierce and red like two little
+live coals.
+
+"That always makes him cross," said Aunt Emma; "he can't bear gardener.
+Come, Polly, don't get in such a temper."
+
+"Oh, isn't he like the witches on the broom-sticks in our fairy-book,
+Olly?" cried Milly. "Don't you think, Aunt Emma, he must have been
+changed into something? Perhaps he was a wicked witch once, or a
+magician, you know, and the fairies changed him into a parrot."
+
+"Well, Milly, I can't say. He was a parrot when I had him first, twelve
+years ago. That's all I know about it. But I believe he's very old. Some
+people say he's older than I am--think of that! So you see he's had time
+to be a good many things. Well, Polly, good-night. You're not a nice
+bird to-night at all. Take him away, Margaret."
+
+"Jane! Jane!" screamed Polly, as the maid lifted up the cage again.
+"Make haste, Jane! cat's in the larder!"
+
+"Oh, you bad Polly," said Aunt Emma, "you're always telling tales.
+Jane's my cook, Milly, and Polly doesn't like cats, so you see he tries
+to make Jane believe that our old cat steals the meat out of the larder.
+Good-bye, Polly, good-bye. You're an ill-natured old bird, but I'm very
+fond of you all the same."
+
+"Do get us a parrot, mother!" said Olly, jumping about round his mother,
+when Polly was gone.
+
+"How many more things will you want before you get home, Olly, do you
+think?" asked his mother, kissing him. "Perhaps you'll want to take home
+a few mountains, and two or three little rivers, and a bog or two, and a
+few sheep--eh, young man?"
+
+By this time dinner was ready, and there was the dinner-bell ringing. Up
+ran the children to Aunt Emma's room to get their hands washed and their
+hair brushed, and presently there were two tidy little folks sitting on
+either side of Aunt Emma's chair, and thinking to themselves that they
+had never felt quite so hungry before. But hungry as Milly was she
+didn't forget to look out of the window before she began her dinner, and
+it was worth while looking out of the window in Aunt Emma's dining-room.
+
+Before the windows was a green lawn, like the lawn at Ravensnest, only
+this lawn went sloping away, away till there was just a little rim of
+white beach, and then beyond came the wide, dancing blue lake, that the
+children had seen from the top of the mountain. Here it was close to
+them, so close that Milly could hear the little waves plashing, through
+the open window.
+
+"Milly," whispered Aunt Emma when they were all waiting for pudding, "do
+you see that little house down there by the water's edge? That's where
+the boat lives--we call it a boathouse. Do you think you'll be
+frightened of the water, little woman?"
+
+"No, I don't think so," said Milly, shaking her little wise head
+gravely. "I am frightened sometimes, very. Mother calls me a little
+goose because I run away from Jenny sometimes--that's our cow at home,
+Aunt Emma, but then she's got such long horns, and I can't help feeling
+afraid."
+
+"Well, the lake hasn't got horns, Milly," said Aunt Emma, laughing, "so
+perhaps you will manage not to be afraid of it."
+
+How kind and nice Aunt Emma looked as she sat between the children, with
+her pretty soft gray hair, and her white cap and large white collar.
+Mrs. Norton could not help thinking of the times when she was a little
+girl, and used always to insist on sitting by Aunt Emma at dinner-time.
+That was before Aunt Emma's hair had turned gray. And now here were her
+own little children sitting where she used to sit at their age, and
+stealing their small hands into Aunt Emma's lap as she used to do so
+long ago.
+
+After dinner the children had to sit quiet in the drawing-room for a
+time, while Aunt Emma and father and mother talked; but they had
+picture-books to look at, and Aunt Emma gave them leave to turn out
+everything in one of the toy-drawers, and that kept them busy and happy
+for a long time. But at last, just when Olly was beginning to get tired
+of the drawer, Aunt Emma called to them from the other end of the room
+to come with her into the kitchen for a minute. Up jumped the children
+and ran after their aunt across the hall into the kitchen.
+
+"Now, children," said Aunt Emma, pointing to a big basket on the kitchen
+table, "suppose you help me to pack up our tea-things. Olly, you go and
+fetch the spoons, and, Milly, bring the plates one by one."
+
+The tea things were all piled up on the kitchen table, and the children
+brought them one after another to Aunt Emma to pack them carefully into
+the big basket.
+
+"Ain't I a useful boy, Aunt Emma?" asked Olly proudly, coming up laden
+with a big table-cloth which he could scarcely carry.
+
+"Very useful, Olly, though our table-cloth won't look over tidy at tea
+if you crumple it up like that. Now, Milly, bring me that tray of bread
+and the little bundle of salt; and, Olly, bring me that bit of butter
+over there, done up in the green leaves, but mind you carry it
+carefully. Now for some knives too; and there are the cups and saucers,
+Milly, look, in that corner; and there is the cake all ready cut up, and
+there is the bread and butter. Now have we got everything? Everything, I
+think, but the kettle, and some wood and some matches, and these must go
+in another basket."
+
+"Aunt Emma," said Milly, creeping up close to her, "were you ever a
+fairy godmother?"
+
+"Not that I know of, Milly. Would you like me better if I had a wand and
+a pair of pet dragons, like old Fairy Blackstick?"
+
+"No," said Milly, stroking her aunt's hand, "but you do such nice
+things, just like fairy godmothers do."
+
+"Do I, little woman? Aunt Emma likes doing nice things for good
+children. But now come along, it's quite time we were off. Let us go
+and fetch father and mother. Gardener will bring the baskets."
+
+Such a merry party they were, trooping down to the boathouse. There lay
+the boat; a pretty new boat, painted dark blue, with a little red flag
+floating at her bows, and her name, "Ariel," written in large white
+letters on the stern. And all around the boathouse stretched the
+beautiful blue water, so clear and sunny and sparkling that it dazzled
+Milly's eyes to look at it. She and Olly were lifted into the boat
+beside Aunt Emma and mother, father sat in the middle and took the oars,
+while gardener put the baskets into the stern, and then, untying the
+rope which kept the boat tied into the boathouse, he gave it a good push
+with one hand and off she went out into the blue lake, rising up and
+down on the water like a swan.
+
+"Oh! mother, mother, look up there," shouted Olly, "there's the
+mountain. Isn't that where we climbed up this morning?"
+
+Yes, there it was, the beautiful green rocky mountain, rising up above
+Aunt Emma's house. They could see it all so clearly as they got farther
+out into the lake; first the blue sky, then the mountain with the little
+white dots on it, which Milly knew were sheep; then some trees, and in
+front, Aunt Emma's house with the lawn and the boathouse. And as they
+looked all round them they could see far bigger and grander mountains
+than Brownholme, some near and green like Brownholme, and some far away
+and blue like the sky, while down by the edge of the lake were hayfields
+full of flowers, or bits of rock with trees growing on the top of them.
+The children hardly knew what it was made them so quiet; but I think it
+was because everything was so beautiful. They were really in the
+hill-fairies' palace now.
+
+"Aren't there any water-fairies in this lake, mother?" whispered Milly,
+presently, looking down into the clear blue water, and trying to see the
+bottom.
+
+"I can't tell, Milly, I never saw any. But there used to be
+water-fairies in old days. After tea suppose we ask Aunt Emma to tell us
+a story about a king in olden times whom the water-fairies loved; she
+used to tell it to me when I was small, and I liked it best of all
+stories. But, Olly, you must sit still, or the boat will go tipping over
+to one side, and father won't be able to row."
+
+"Do let me row, father," begged Olly.
+
+"Not yet, old man--I must get used to the boat first, and find out how
+to manage her, but presently you shall come and try, and so shall Milly
+if she likes."
+
+On they rowed, farther and farther from the shore, till Aunt Emma's
+house began to look quite small, and they could hardly see the gardener
+working on the lawn.
+
+"Father, what a long way we've come," cried Milly, looking all round.
+"Where are we going to?"
+
+"Well, presently, Milly, I am going to turn the boat a little bit, so as
+to make her go over to that side of the lake over there. Do you see a
+big rock with some trees on it, far away, sticking out into the lake?"
+
+"Yes," said the children, looking very hard.
+
+"Well, that's where we're going to have tea. It's called Birdsnest
+Point, because the rocks come out in a point into the lake. But first I
+thought I would bring you right out into the middle of the lake, that
+you might see how big it is, and look at the mountains all round."
+"Father," said Olly, "if a big stone fell down out of the sky and made
+ever such a big hole in the boat, and the water came into the hole,
+should we all be dead?"
+
+"I daresay we should, Olly, for I don't think I could carry mother, and
+Aunt Emma, and Milly, and you on my back, safe home again, and you see
+none of you can swim but me."
+
+"Then I hope a big stone won't come," said Milly, feeling just a little
+bit frightened at Olly's suggestion.
+
+"Well, big stones don't grow in the sky generally, Milly, if that's any
+comfort to you. But do you know, one day long ago, when I was out rowing
+on this lake, I thought all of a sudden I heard some one shouting and
+screaming, and for a long time I looked and waited, but could see
+nothing; till at last I fancied I could see, a long distance off, what
+looked like a pole, with something white tied to it. And I rowed, and
+rowed, and rowed, as fast as I could, and all the time the shouting and
+screaming went on, and at last what do you think I saw? I saw a boat,
+which looked as if something was dragging it down into the water. Part
+of it had already sunk down into the lake, and in the part which was
+still above the water there were three people sitting, a gentleman, and
+two little girls who looked about ten years old. And they were shouting
+'Help! help!' at the top of their voices, and waving an oar with a
+handkerchief tied to it. And the boat in which they sat was sinking
+farther and farther into the water, and if I had'n't come up just when I
+did, the gentleman and the two little girls would have been drowned."
+
+"Oh, father!" cried Milly, "what made their boat do like that? And did
+they get into yours?"
+
+"There was a great hole in the bottom of their boat, Milly, and the
+water was coming through it, and making the boat so heavy that it was
+sinking down and down into the lake, just as a stone would sink if you
+threw it in. How the hole came there we never quite knew: I thought they
+must have knocked their boat against a sharp rock--in some parts of the
+lake there are rocks under the water which you can't see--and the rock
+had made the hole; but other people thought it had happened in some
+other way. However, there they were, and when I took them all into my
+boat you never saw such miserable little creatures as the two little
+girls were. They were wet through, they were as white as little ghosts,
+and when they were safe in my boat they began to cry and shake so, poor
+little souls, though their father and I wrapped them up in our coats,
+that I did want their mother to come and comfort them."
+
+"Oh, but, father, you took them safe home to their mother, didn't you?
+And do tell me what she said."
+
+"They had no mother, Milly, they had only their father, who was with
+them. But he was very good to them, and I think on the whole they were
+happy little girls. The Christmas after that I got a little parcel one
+morning, and what do you think was in it? Why, two photographs of the
+same little girls, looking so neat and tidy and happy, I could hardly
+believe they were really the same as the little drowned rats I had
+pulled out of the water. Ask mother to show you the pictures when we get
+home; she has them somewhere. Now, Olly, would you like to row?"
+
+"Oh, father, don't bump against any rocks," said Milly, whose thoughts
+were very full of the little girls.
+
+"Don't you trouble your head about rocks, old woman. I know a good deal
+more about this lake than those little girls' father did, and I won't
+take you into any harm. Come along, Olly."
+
+Olly was helped along the boat by mother and Aunt Emma till his father
+caught hold of him and pulled him on to his seat, where he let him put
+his two small paws on one of the oars, and try what he could do with it.
+Mr. Norton pulled too; but Olly thought it was all his doing, and that
+it was really he who was making the boat go.
+
+"Don't we go fast, father?" he cried out presently, his little face
+flushed with pleasure and excitement. "You couldn't row so fast without
+me, could you, father?"
+
+"You little fly-on-the-wheel," said his father, smiling at him.
+
+"What does that mean, father?"
+
+"Never mind, you'll know when you're bigger. But now look, children, how
+close we are coming to the shore. And quick, Milly, quick! What do you
+see over there?"
+
+Mr. Norton pointed over the water to a place where some green rushes
+were standing up out of the water, not very far from the edge. What were
+those great white and gold things shining among the rushes; and what
+were those large round green leaves lying on the water all about them?
+
+"Water-lilies! water-lilies!" cried Milly, stamping her little feet with
+delight. "Oh, mother, look! it was on one of those leaves that the old
+toad put little Tiny in my fairy-book, don't you remember? Only the
+little fishes came and bit off the stalk and set her free. Oh, I wish we
+could see little Tiny sitting on one of those leaves!"
+
+"Well," said Aunt Emma, "there's no saying what you may find in these
+parts if you look long enough. This is a very strange country. But now,
+Milly, look out for the lilies. Father's going to take us in among them,
+and I'll hold you, while you gather them."
+
+And presently, swish went the boat up against the rushes, and there were
+the lovely white lilies lying spread out on the water all round them,
+some quite open and showing their golden middles, and some still buds,
+with their wet green cases just falling off, and their white petals
+beginning to unclose. But what slippery stalks they had. Aunt Emma held
+Milly, and father held Olly, while they dived their hands under the
+water and pulled hard. And some of the lilies came out with such short
+bits of stalk you could scarcely hold them, and sometimes, flop! out
+came a long green stalk, like a long green snake curling and twisting
+about in the boat. The children dabbled, and splashed, and pulled, to
+their hearts' content, till at last Mr. Norton told them they had got
+enough and now they must sit quite still while he rowed them in to the
+land.
+
+"Oh, father, just those two over there!" pleaded Milly, who could not
+bear leaving so many beauties behind.
+
+"No, Milly, no more. Look where the sun is now. If we don't make haste
+and have our tea, we shall never get back to Ravensnest to-night."
+
+Milly's face looked as if it would like to cry, as the boat began to
+move away from the rushes, and the beautiful lilies were left behind. I
+told you, to begin with, that Milly was ready to cry oftener than a
+sensible little girl should. But Aunt Emma was not going to have any
+crying at her picnic.
+
+"Who's going to gather me sticks to make my fire?" she said suddenly, in
+a solemn voice.
+
+"I am! I am!" shouted both the children at once, and out came Milly's
+smiles again, like the sun from behind a cloud.
+
+"And who's going to lay the table-cloth?"
+
+"We are! we are!"
+
+"And who's going to hand the bread and butter?"
+
+"I am!" exclaimed Milly, "and Olly shall hand the cake."
+
+"And who's going to _eat_ the bread and butter?"
+
+"All of us!" shouted the children, and Milly added, "Father will want a
+_big_ plate of bread and butter, I daresay."
+
+"I should think he would, after all this rowing," said Mr. Norton. "Now
+then, look out for a bump!"
+
+[Illustration: "So they put Olly up on a tall piece of rock, and he
+sang."]
+
+Bump! Splash! there was the boat scraping along the pebbles near the
+shore; out sprang Mr. Norton, first on to a big stone, then on to the
+shore, and with one great pull he brought the boat in till it was close
+enough for Aunt Emma and Mrs. Norton to step on to the rocks, and for
+the children to be lifted out.
+
+"Oh! what a nice place!" cried Milly, looking about her, and clapping
+her hands, as she always did when she was pleased. It was a point of
+rock running out into the lake, a "peninsula" Milly called it, when she
+had been all round it, and it was covered with brown heather spread all
+over the ground, and was delightfully soft and springy to sit upon. In
+the middle of the bit of rock there were two or three trees standing up
+together, birch trees with silvery stems, and on every side but one
+there was shallow brown water, so clear that they could see every stone
+at the bottom. And when they looked away across the lake, there were the
+grand old mountains pushing their heads into the clouds on the other
+side, and far away near the edge of the lake they saw a white dot which
+they knew was Aunt Emma's house. How the sun shone on everything! How it
+made the water of the lake sparkle and glitter as if it were alive! And
+yet the air was not hot, for a little wind was coming to them across the
+water, and moving the trees gently up and down.
+
+And what was this under the trees? Why, a kind of fireplace made of
+stones, and in front of it a round green bit of grass, with tufts of
+heather all round it, just like a table with seats.
+
+"Who put these stones here, Aunt Emma?" asked Olly, as she and mother
+and Mr. Norton brought up the baskets, and put them in the green place
+by the stones.
+
+"Well, Olly, long ago, when all your uncles and aunts were little, and
+they used to come here for picnics, they thought it would be very nice
+to have a stone fireplace, built up properly, so that they needn't make
+one every time. It was Uncle Richard's idea, and we had such fun
+building it up. The little ones brought the stones; and the big ones
+piled them together till you see we made quite a nice fireplace. And it
+has lasted ever since. Whenever I come here I mend it up if any of the
+stones have tumbled down. Numbers of little children come to picnic here
+every summer, and they always use our fireplace. But now, come along
+into the woods, children, and gather sticks."
+
+Off they ran after Aunt Emma, and soon they were scrambling about the
+wood which grew along the shore, picking up the dry sticks and dry fern
+under the trees. Milly filled her cotton frock full, and gathered it up
+with both her hands; while Olly of course went straight at the biggest
+branch he could see, and staggered along with it, puffing and panting.
+
+"You grasshopper, you!" said Mr. Norton, catching hold of him, "don't
+you think you'd better try a whole tree next time? There, let me break
+it for you." Father broke it up into short lengths, and then off ran
+Olly with his little skirts full to Aunt Emma, who was laden too with an
+armful of sticks. "That'll do to begin with, old man. Come along, and
+you and I'll light the fire."
+
+What fun it was, heaping up the sticks on the stones, and how they did
+blaze and crackle away when Aunt Emma put a match to them. Puff! puff!
+out came the smoke; fizz--crack--sputter--went the dry fir branches, as
+if they were Christmas fireworks.
+
+"Haven't we made a blazey fire, Aunt Emma?" said Olly, out of breath
+with dragging up sticks, and standing still to look.
+
+"Splendid," said Mr. Norton, who had just come out of the wood with his
+bundle. "Now, Olly, let me just put you on the top of it to finish it
+off. How you would fizz!"
+
+Off ran Olly, with his father after him, and they had a romp among the
+heather till Mr. Norton caught him, and carried him kicking and laughing
+under his arm to Aunt Emma.
+
+"Now, Aunt Emma, shall I put him on?"
+
+"Oh dear, no!" said Aunt Emma, "my kettle wouldn't sit straight on him,
+and it's just boiling beautifully. We'll put him on presently when the
+fire gets low."
+
+"Olly, do come and help mother and me with the tea-things," cried Milly,
+who was laying the cloth as busily and gravely as a little housemaid.
+
+"Run along, shrimp," said his father, setting him down.
+
+And off ran Olly, while Mr. Norton and Aunt Emma heaped the wood on the
+fire, and kept the kettle straight, so that it shouldn't tip over and
+spill.
+
+Laying the cloth was delightful, Milly thought. First of all, they put a
+heavy stone on each corner of the cloth to keep it down, and prevent the
+wind from blowing it up, and then they put the little plates all round,
+and in the middle two piles of bread and butter and cake.
+
+"But we haven't got any flowers," said Milly, looking at it presently,
+with a dissatisfied face, "you always have flowers on the table at home,
+mother."
+
+"Why, Milly, have you forgotten your water-lilies; where did you leave
+them?"
+
+"Down by the water," said Milly. "Father told me just to put their
+stalks in the water, and he put a stone to keep them safe. Oh! that'll
+be splendid, mother. Do give me a cup, and we'll get some water for
+them."
+
+Mother found a cup, and the children scrambled down to the edge of the
+lake. There lay the lilies with their stalks in the water, close to the
+boat.
+
+"They look rather sad, mother, don't they?" said Milly, gathering them
+up. "Perhaps they don't like being taken away from their home."
+
+"They never look so beautiful out of the water," said mother; "but when
+we get home we'll put them into a soup-plate, and let them swim about in
+it. They'll look very nice then. Now, Olly, fill the cup with water, and
+we'll put five or six of the biggest in, and gather some leaves."
+
+"There, look! look! Aunt Emma," shouted Milly, when they had put the
+lilies and some fern leaves in the middle of the table. "Haven't we made
+it beautiful?"
+
+"That you have," said Aunt Emma, coming up with the kettle which had
+just boiled. "Now for the tea, and then we're ready."
+
+"We never had such a nice tea as this before," said Olly, presently
+looking up from a piece of bread and butter which had kept him quiet for
+some time. "It's nicer than having dinner at the railway station even."
+
+Aunt Emma and mother laughed; for it doesn't seem so delightful to
+grown-up people to have dinner at the railway station.
+
+"Well, Olly," said mother, "I hope we shall often have tea out of doors
+while we are at Ravensnest."
+
+Milly shook her head. "It'll rain, mother. That old gentleman said it
+would be sure to rain."
+
+"That old gentleman is about right, Milly," said Mr. Norton. "I think it
+rains dreadfully here, but mother doesn't seem to mind it a bit. Once
+upon a time when mother was a little girl, there came a funny old fairy
+and threw some golden dust in her eyes, and ever since then she can't
+see straight when she comes to the mountains. It's all right everywhere
+else, but as soon as she comes here, the dust begins to fly about in her
+eyes, and makes the mountains look quite different to her from what they
+look to anybody else."
+
+"Let me look, mother," said Olly, pulling her down to him.
+
+Mrs. Norton opened her eyes at him, smiling.
+
+"I can't see any dust, father."
+
+"Ah, that's because it's fairy dust," said Mr. Norton, gravely. "Now,
+Olly, don't you eat too much cake, else you won't be able to row."
+
+"It'll be my turn first, father," said Milly, "you know I haven't rowed
+at all yet."
+
+"Well, don't you catch any crabs, Milly," said Aunt Emma.
+
+"Catch crabs, Aunt Emma!" said Milly, very much puzzled. "Crabs are only
+in the sea, aren't they?"
+
+"There's a very big kind just about here," said Mr. Norton, "and they're
+always looking out for little children, particularly little girls."
+
+"I don't understand, father," said Milly, opening her eyes very wide.
+
+"Have some more tea, then," said Mr. Norton, "that always makes people
+feel wiser."
+
+"Father, aren't you talking nonsense?" said Olly, stopping in the middle
+of a piece of cake to think about what his father was saying.
+
+"Very likely, Olly. People always do at picnics. Aunt Emma, when are you
+going to tell us your story?"
+
+"When we've washed the things and put them away," said Aunt Emma, "then
+Olly shall sing us two songs, and I'll tell you my story."
+
+But the children were so hungry that it was a long time before they gave
+up eating bread and butter, and then, when at last tea was over, what
+fun it was washing the cups and plates in the lake! Aunt Emma and Olly
+washed, and mother and Milly dried the things on a towel, and then
+everything was packed away into the baskets, and mother and Aunt Emma
+folded up the table-cloth, and put it tidily on the top of everything.
+
+"I did like that," said Milly, sighing as the last basket was fastened
+down. "I wish you'd let me help Sarah wash up the tea-things at home,
+mother."
+
+"If Sarah liked to let you, I shouldn't say no, Milly," said Mrs.
+Norton. "How soon would you get tired of it, old woman, I wonder? But
+come along, let's put Olly up on a rock, and make him sing, and then
+we'll have Aunt Emma's story."
+
+So they put Olly up on a tall piece of rock, and he sang "The Minstrel
+Boy," and "Bonnie Dundee," and "Hot Cross Buns," just as if he were a
+little musical box, and you had nothing to do but to wind him up. He had
+a sweet, clear, little voice, and he looked a delightful brown gipsy, as
+he sat perched up on the rock with his long legs dangling, and his curls
+blowing about his face.
+
+"There!" said Olly, when he had shouted out the last note of "Hot Cross
+Buns." "I have singed three whole songs; and now, Aunt Emma, tell us
+about the king and the fairies. Krick, please."
+
+"It must be 'krick' indeed," said Aunt Emma, "if we want to get home
+to-night."
+
+For the sun had almost sunk behind the mountains at their back, and the
+wind blowing across the lake was beginning to get a little cold, while
+over their heads the rooks went flying, singing "caw, caw," on their way
+to bed. And how the sun was turning the water to gold! It seemed to be
+making a great golden pathway across the lake, and the mountains were
+turning a deep blue, and plash, plash, went the little waves on the
+rocks, so softly they seemed to be saying "Good-night! good-night!"
+
+"Well," said Aunt Emma, settling herself on a soft piece of heather, and
+putting her arms round Milly and Olly, "Once upon a time there was a
+great king. He was a good king and a wise man, and he tried to make all
+the people round about him wiser and better than they were before he
+came to rule over them; and for a long time he was very powerful and
+happy, and he and the brave men who helped him and were his friends did
+a great deal of good, and kept the savage people who lived all about him
+in order, and taught them a great many things. But at last some of the
+savage people got tired of obeying the king, and they said they would
+not have him to reign over them any more; so they made an army, and they
+came together against the king to try and kill him and his friends. And
+the king made an army too, and there was a great battle; and the savage
+people were the strongest, and they killed nearly all the king's brave
+men, and the king himself was terribly hurt in the fight. And at last,
+when night came on, there were left only the king and one of his
+friends--his knights, as they were called. The king was hurt so much
+that he could not move, and his friend thought he was dying. They were
+left alone in a rocky desert place, and close by there was a great lake
+with mountains round it--like this, Olly. It was very cold, and the moon
+was shining, and the king lay so still that once or twice his friend
+almost thought that he was dead. But at last, about the middle of the
+night, he began to speak, and he told his friend to take his sword that
+was by his side and to go down to the side of the lake and throw it as
+far as he could into the water. Now, this sword was a magic sword. Long
+before, the king was once walking beside this lake, when he suddenly saw
+an arm in a long white sleeve rising out of the lake, and in the hand at
+the end of it was a splendid sword with a glistening handle. And the
+king got into a boat and rowed as fast as he could till he got near
+enough to take hold of the sword, and then the arm sank down under the
+water and was seen no more. And with the sword the king won a great many
+battles, and he loved it, and never would part with it; but now that he
+was dying, he told his friend to take the sword and throw it back into
+the lake where he had found it, and see what would happen. And his
+friend took it, and went away over the rocks till he came to the edge of
+the lake, and then he took the sword out of its case and swung it above
+his head that he might throw it far into the water; but as he lifted it
+up the precious stones in the handle shone so splendidly in the
+moonlight that he could not make up his mind to throw it into the water,
+it seemed such a pity. So he hid it away among the rushes by the water
+side, and went back to the king. And the king said, 'What did you see by
+the lake?'
+
+"And the knight said, 'I saw nothing except the water, and the
+mountains, and the rushes.'
+
+"And the king said, 'Oh, unkind friend! Why will you not do as I ask
+you, now that I am dying and can do nothing for myself? Go back and
+throw the sword into the lake, as I told you.'
+
+"And the knight went back, and once more he lifted the sword to throw it
+into the water but it looked so beautiful that he _could_ not throw it
+away. There would be nothing left, he thought, to remember the king by
+when he was dead if he threw away the sword; so again he hid it among
+the rushes, and then he went back to the king. And again the king asked,
+'What did you see by the lake?' and again the knight answered, 'I saw
+nothing except the water and the mountains.'
+
+"'Oh, unkind, false friend!' cried the king, 'you are crueller to me
+than those who gave me this wound. Go back and throw the sword into the
+water, or, weak as I am, I will rise up and kill you.'
+
+"Back went the knight, and this time he seized the sword without looking
+at it, so that he should not see how beautiful it was, and then he swung
+it once, twice, thrice, round his head, and away it went into the lake.
+And as it fell, up rose a hand and arm in a long white sleeve out of the
+water, and the hand caught the sword and drew it down under the water.
+And then for a moment, all round the lake, the knight fancied he heard a
+sound of sobbing and weeping, and he thought in his heart that it must
+be the water-fairies weeping for the king's death.
+
+"'What did you see by the lake?' asked the king again, when he came
+back, and the knight told him. Then the king told him to lift him up and
+carry him on his back down to the edge of the lake, and when they got
+there, what do you think they saw?"
+
+But the children could not guess, and Milly pressed Aunt Emma's hand
+hard to make her go on.
+
+"They saw a great black ship coming slowly over the water, and on the
+ship were numbers of people in black, sobbing and crying, so that the
+air was full of a sound of weeping, and in front sat three queens in
+long black dresses, and with gold crowns on their heads, and they, too,
+were weeping and wringing their hands.
+
+"'Lift me up,' said the king, when the ship came close beside them, 'and
+put me into the ship.' And the knight lifted him up, while the three
+queens stretched out their hands and drew him into the ship.
+
+"'Oh, king! take me with you,' said the knight, 'take me too. What shall
+I do all alone without you?' But the ship began to move away, and the
+knight was left standing on the shore. Only he fancied he heard the
+king's voice saying, 'Wait for me, I shall come again. Farewell!'
+
+"And the ship went faster and faster away into the darkness, for it was
+a fairy ship, till at last the knight could see it no more. So then he
+knew that the king had been carried away by the fairies of the lake--the
+same fairies who had given him the sword in old days, and who had loved
+him and watched over him all his life. But what did the king mean by
+saying, 'I shall come again'?"
+
+Then Aunt Emma stopped and looked at the children.
+
+"What did he mean, auntie?" asked Milly, who had been listening with all
+her ears, and whose little eyes were wet, "and did he ever come back
+again?"
+
+"Not while the knight lived, Milly. He grew to be quite an old man, and
+was always hoping that the fairies would bring the king again. But the
+king never came, and his friend died without seeing him."
+
+"But did he _ever_ come again?" asked Olly.
+
+"I don't know, Olly. Some people think that he is still hidden away
+somewhere by the kind water-fairies, and that some day, when the world
+wants him very much, he will come back again."
+
+"Do you think he is here in this lake?" whispered Milly, looking at the
+water.
+
+"How can we tell what's at the bottom of the lake?" said Aunt Emma,
+smiling. "But no, I don't think the king is hidden in this lake. He
+didn't live near here."
+
+"What was his name?" asked Milly.
+
+"His name was King Arthur. But now, children, hurry; there is father
+putting all the baskets into the boat. We must get home as quick as we
+can."
+
+They rowed home very quickly, except just for a little time when Milly
+rowed, and they did not go quite so fast as if father were rowing alone.
+It was quite evening now on the lake, and there were great shadows from
+the mountains lying across the water. Somehow the children felt much
+quieter now than when they started in the afternoon. Milly had curled
+herself up inside mother's arm, and was thinking a great deal about King
+Arthur and the fairy ship, while Olly was quite taken up with watching
+the oars as they dipped in and out of the water, and occasionally asking
+his father when he should be big enough to row quite by himself. It
+seemed a very little time after all before they were stepping out of the
+boat at Aunt Emma's boathouse, and the picnic and the row were both
+over.
+
+"Good-bye, dear lake," said Milly, turning with her hands full of
+water-lilies to look back before they went up to the house. "Good-night,
+mountains; good-night, Birdsnest Point. I shall soon come and see you
+again."
+
+A few minutes more, and they were safely packed into a carriage which
+drove them back to Ravensnest, and Aunt Emma was saying good-bye to
+them.
+
+"Next time, I shall come and see you, Milly," she said, as she kissed
+Milly's little sleepy face. "Don't forget me till then."
+
+"Then you'll tell us about old Mother Quiverquake," said Olly, hugging
+her with his small arms. "Aunt Emma, I haven't given Johnny back his
+stockings. They did tickle me so in the boat."
+
+"We'll get them some time," said Aunt Emma. "Good-night, good-night."
+
+It was a sleepy pair of children that nurse lifted out of the carriage
+at Ravensnest. And though they tried to tell her something about it, she
+had to wait till next morning before she could really understand
+anything about their wonderful day at Aunt Emma's house.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+WET DAYS AT RAVENSNEST
+
+
+For about a week after the row on the lake the weather was lovely, and
+Milly wondered more than ever what the old gentleman who warned them of
+the rain in the mountains could have been thinking about. She and Olly
+were out all day, and nearly every afternoon nurse lifted the tea-table
+through the low nursery window on to the lawn, and let them have their
+tea out of doors among the flowers and trees and twittering birds. They
+had found out a fly-catcher's nest in the ivy above the front door, and
+every evening the two children used to fetch out their father to watch
+the parent birds catching flies and carrying them to the hungry little
+ones, whom they could just hear chirping up above the ivy. Olly was wild
+to get the gardener's ladder that he might climb up and look into the
+nest, but Mr. Norton would not have it lest it should frighten away the
+old birds.
+
+One delicious warm morning, too, the children had their long-promised
+bathe, and what fun it was. Nurse woke them up at five o'clock in the
+morning--fancy waking up as early as that!--and they slipped on their
+little blue bathing gowns, and their sand shoes that mother had bought
+them in Cromer the year before, and then nurse wrapped them up in
+shawls, and she and they and father went down and opened the front door
+while everybody else in the house was asleep, and slipped out. What a
+quiet strange world it seemed, the grass and the flowers dripping with
+dew, and overhead such a blue sky with white clouds sailing slowly about
+in it.
+
+"Why don't we always get up at five o'clock, father?" asked Olly, as he
+and Milly skipped along--such an odd little pair of figures--beside Mr.
+Norton. "Isn't it nice and funny?"
+
+"Very," said Mr. Norton. "Still, I imagine Olly, if you had to get up
+every day at five o'clock, you might think it funny, but I'm sure you
+wouldn't always think it nice."
+
+"Oh! I'm sure we should," said Milly, seriously. "Why, father, it's just
+as if everything was ours and nobody else's, the garden and the river I
+mean. Is there _anybody_ up yet do you think--in those houses?" And
+Milly pointed to the few houses they could see from the Ravensnest
+garden.
+
+"I can't tell, Milly. But I'll tell you who's sure to be up now, and
+that's John Backhouse. I should think he's just beginning to milk the
+cows."
+
+"Oh then, Becky and Tiza'll be up too," cried Milly, dancing about. "I
+wish we could see them. Somehow it would be quite different seeing them
+now, father. I feel so queer, as if I was somebody else."
+
+If you have ever been up _very_ early on a summer morning, you will know
+what Milly meant, but if not I can hardly explain it. Such a pretty
+quiet little walk they had down to the river. Nobody on the road, nobody
+in the fields, but the birds chattering and the sun shining, as if they
+were having a good time all to themselves, before anybody woke up to
+interrupt them. Mr. Norton took the children down to the
+stepping-stones, and then, while Milly and nurse stayed on the bank he
+lifted Olly up, and carried him to the middle of the stepping-stones,
+where the water would about come up to his chest. Mr. Norton had already
+taken off his own shoes and stockings, and when they came to the middle
+stone, he put Olly down on the stone, and stepped into the water
+himself. "Now, Olly, give me your hands and jump in. Mind, it'll feel
+very cold."
+
+Olly shut his eyes, and opened his mouth, as he always did when he felt
+just a little frightened, and then in he went; splash! ugh! it was so
+cold--much colder than the sea used to feel--but after a few splashes
+Olly began to get used to it, and to think it fine fun.
+
+"Oh, father, fetch Milly, and then we'll all dance about," entreated
+Olly.
+
+"Come, Milly," called Mr. Norton. "Try whether you can manage the
+stepping-stones by yourself." So Milly came, holding up her bathing
+dress, and stepping from one big stone to another with a very grave
+face, as if she felt that there would be an end of her altogether if she
+tumbled in. And then, splash! In she jumped by the side of Olly, and
+after a little shiver or two she also began to think that the river was
+a delightful bathing place, almost as nice as the sea, perhaps in some
+ways nicer, because it was such a strange and funny one. They danced and
+splashed about in the brown sparkling water till they were tired, and at
+last Olly stopped to take breath.
+
+"I should think the fishes must be frightened of us," he said, peering
+down into the river. "I can't see any, father."
+
+"Well, they wouldn't choose to swim about just where little children are
+shouting and capering. The fishes are hidden safe away under the banks
+and the big stones. Besides, it's going to be a very hot day, and they
+like the shady bits of the river. Just here there's no shade."
+
+Suddenly there was a great commotion in the river, and when Mr. Norton
+looked round for a second he could see nothing of Milly, till up came a
+dripping head and a pair of hands, and there was Milly kneeling on the
+stones at the bottom of the river, with just her head above water,
+looking very much astonished and rather frightened.
+
+"Why, what happened, old woman?" said Mr. Norton, holding out his hand
+to help her up.
+
+"I--I--don't quite know, father; I was standing on a big stone, and all
+of a sudden it tipped up, and I tumbled right in."
+
+"First of all I thought you was a big fish, and then I thought you was
+going to be drowned," said Olly, cheerfully. "I'm glad you wasn't
+drowned."
+
+"Miss Milly! Miss Milly!" shouted nurse from the bank, "it's quite time
+you came out now. If you stay in so long you'll get cold, and you, too,
+Master Olly."
+
+Olly was not inclined to come. He would have liked to go on dabbling and
+splashing till breakfast-time, but Mr. Norton hurried him out, and the
+two dripping little creatures were well wrapped up in large shawls which
+nurse had brought with her. Then nurse took up Olly in her arms, and
+father took up Milly, who was small and light for her age, and they set
+off up the bit of road to the house. By this time it was past six
+o'clock, and whom should they meet at the Ravensnest gate but John
+Backhouse, with Becky and Tiza, and his two dogs. He was just bringing
+the milk, and both he and his children looked as brisk and wide awake as
+if they had been up and about for hours.
+
+Milly and Olly were very much excited at the sight of them, and Olly
+struggled hard to get down, but nurse held him tight.
+
+"Oh, Becky! we've had such a nice bathe," cried Milly, as she passed
+them muffled up in her shawl, her little wet feet dangling out.
+
+Becky and Tiza looked longingly after them as they disappeared into the
+house. They wished they could have had a bathe too, but they knew very
+well that their hard-worked father and mother had something else to do
+on a fine summer's morning than to take them to bathe, and in a few
+minutes they had forgotten all about it, and were busy playing with the
+dogs, or chattering to their father about the hay-making, which was soon
+to begin now.
+
+That evening there were strange clouds at sunset time, and Mr. Norton
+shook his head as he heard Mrs. Norton arrange to take the children next
+day to a small mountain village near Ravensnest, to call on some old
+friends of hers.
+
+"I wouldn't make much of a plan for to-morrow if I were you," he said to
+his wife, "the weather doesn't look promising."
+
+"Oh, father!" said Milly, protesting. "There are some red clouds over
+there--look! and Nana always says it's going to be fine when there are
+red clouds."
+
+"Well, Milly, your red clouds may be right and I may be wrong. We shall
+see."
+
+But, alas! father was quite right. When Milly woke up next morning there
+was no nice sunshine creeping on to her bed as it had done almost ever
+since they came to Ravensnest; but instead there was rain beating
+steadily against the window, coming down out of a heavy gray sky, and
+looking as if it meant to go on for ever.
+
+"Oh dear!" sighed Milly, as she began to dress, "we can't go out, and
+the wild strawberries will get so wet. I meant to have gathered some for
+mother to-day. There would have been such nice ones in the wood."
+
+But it was no use thinking about woods or strawberries, and when Mrs.
+Norton came into the children's room just as they were finishing
+breakfast, she found a pair of dull little faces staring out at the
+rain, as if looking at it would make it stop.
+
+"Nasty rain," said Olly, climbing up on his mother's knee. "Go to Spain.
+I don't want you to come and spoil my nicey time."
+
+"I am afraid scolding the rain won't make it go away," said his mother,
+smiling into his brown face as he knelt on her lap, with his arms round
+her neck. "Now what are we going to do to-day?"
+
+"I don't know," said Milly, sitting down opposite her mother, and
+resting her face gravely on her hands. "Well, we brought _some_ toys,
+you know, mother. Olly's got his top; I can help him spin it, and I can
+play with Katie a bit."
+
+"That won't take very long," said Mrs. Norton. "Suppose we do some
+lessons first of all."
+
+"Oh, mother, lessons!" said Milly, in a very doubtful voice.
+
+"It's holidays, mother, it's holidays," cried Olly. "I don't like
+lessons--not a bit."
+
+"Well, but, Olly, think a bit; you can't spin your top and look at
+picture-books all day, and I'm afraid it's going to rain all day--it
+looks very like it. If you come and do some reading and counting with me
+this morning, I can give you some spills to make, or some letters to
+tear up for me afterwards. That will save the toys for this afternoon;
+and some time this afternoon, if it doesn't stop raining, we'll all
+have a romp. And as for you, Milly, don't you think it's quite time
+Katie had a new frock? I believe I can find a beautiful bit of blue silk
+in my bag, and I'm sure nurse will show you how to make it."
+
+Milly's face brightened up very much at this, and the two children went
+skipping upstairs to the drawing-room after their mother, in very fair
+spirits again. Olly did some reading, while Milly wrote in her copybook,
+and then Olly had his counting-slate and tried to find out what 6 and 4
+made, and 5 and 3, and other little sums of the same kind. He yawned a
+good deal over his reading, and was quite sure several times that h-a-y
+spelt "ham," and s-a-w spelt "was," but still, on the whole, he got
+through very well. Milly wrote her copy, then she learnt some verses of
+a poem called "Lucy Gray," and last of all mother found her a big map of
+Westmoreland, the county in which the mountains are, and they had a most
+delightful geography lesson. Mother pretended to take Milly a drive all
+about the mountains, and made her find out their names, and the names of
+the towns and the lakes, beginning with Lake Windermere. Olly was
+interested too, for Mrs. Norton told them a great many things about the
+places, and made quite a story out of it.
+
+[Illustration: "He was quite sure that h-a-y spelt 'ham' and s-a-w spelt
+'was.'"]
+
+"Why, mother, I never could go all that long way all at once--_really_,
+could I?" asked Milly, when they had been all round the mountains, in
+and out and round about.
+
+"No, Milly, not quite," said Mrs. Norton, laughing, "but it's very easy
+to go a long way in a pretendy drive. It would only take us about ten
+minutes that way to get to the other side of the world."
+
+"How long would it take really?" asked Olly.
+
+"About three months."
+
+"If we could fly up, and up, ever so far," said Olly, standing on
+tiptoe, and stretching out his little arms as high as they would reach,
+"it wouldn't take us long. Mother, don't you wish you was a bird?"
+
+"No, I don't think so, Olly; why do you?"
+
+"Because I should like to go so _krick_. Mother, the fly-catchers do fly
+so krick; I can't see them sometimes when they're flying, they go so
+fast. Oh, I do wish father would let me get up a ladder to look at
+them."
+
+"No Olly, you'll frighten them," said Milly, putting on her wise face.
+"Besides, father says you're too little, and you'd tumble down."
+
+Olly looked as if he didn't believe a word of it, as he generally did
+when Milly talked wisely to him; but just then he found that mother had
+put into his lap a whole basketful of letters to tear up, and that
+interested him so much that he forgot the fly-catchers. Nurse cut out a
+most fashionable blue dress for Katie, and Milly was quite happy all the
+rest of the morning in running up the seams and hemming the bottom. So
+the morning passed away. After dinner there were the toys to play with,
+and Katie's frock to try on, for nurse had taken a turn at the body
+while Milly had been making the skirt. It fitted very well, and Milly
+had only the band to put on and the sleeves to make before it would be
+quite finished. Then nurse promised to put a little white lace round the
+neck, and cut out a blue sash, that Katie might be quite turned into an
+elegant young lady. Tea came very soon, and when it was cleared away
+father and mother came into the big kitchen without a fireplace, next to
+the children's room, and they all had a splendid romp. Mr. Norton made
+himself into a tiger, with a tiger-skin in the hall, that Uncle Richard
+had brought home from India, and Olly shot him all over with a
+walking-stick from the tip of his nose to the tip of his tail. When they
+were tired of this, mother set them to play hide-and-seek, and Milly hid
+herself in such out-of-the-way cupboards, and squeezed herself into such
+small corners, that mother said she was like a needle in a bundle of
+hay--there was no finding her.
+
+Seven o'clock came before they had time to think about it, and the
+children went chattering and skipping up to bed, though on fine evenings
+they had been staying up much later. How the rain did rattle on the
+window while they were undressing.
+
+"Oh, you tiresome rain," said Milly, standing by the window in her
+nightdress, and gazing up into the sky. "Where does it all come from, I
+wonder? Won't it be wet to-morrow, Nana? and oh, what is that roaring
+over there?"
+
+"That's the beck," said nurse, who was brushing Olly's hair, and trying
+hard to make him stand still for two minutes.
+
+"The beck! why, what's the matter with it?"
+
+"It's the rain has made it so full I suppose," said nurse. "To-morrow,
+gardener says, it'll be over the lawn if the rain goes on."
+
+"Oh, but it mustn't go on," said Milly. "Now, rain, dear rain, good
+rain, do go away to-night, right away up into the mountains. There's
+plenty of room for you up there, and down here we don't want you a bit.
+So do be polite and go away."
+
+But the rain didn't see any good reason for going away, in spite of
+Milly's pretty speeches, and next morning there was the same patter on
+the window, the same gray sky and dripping garden. After breakfast there
+was just a hope of its clearing up. For about an hour the rain seemed to
+get less and the clouds a little brighter. But it soon came on again as
+fast as ever, and the poor children were very much disappointed.
+
+"Mother," said Milly, when they had settled down to their lessons again
+in the drawing-room, "when we get back to Willingham, do you know what I
+shall do?"
+
+"No, Milly."
+
+"I shall ask you to take me to see that old gentleman--you know who I
+mean--who told you about the rain. And I shall say to him, 'please, Mr.
+Old Gentleman, at first I thought you were quite wrong about the rain,
+but afterwards I thought you were quite right, and it does rain
+dreadfully much in the mountains.'"
+
+"Very well, Milly. But you have only just had a taste of what the rain
+can do in the lakes you know, so far. Father and I have been here
+sometimes when it has rained two or three weeks without stopping."
+
+"Oh dear!" said Milly, looking extremely melancholy. "I like the
+mountains very much, mother; but _do_ you think we'd better come to
+Ravensnest again after this year?"
+
+"Oh you ungrateful little woman!" said Mrs. Norton, whose love for the
+place was so real that Milly's speech gave her quite a pang. "Have you
+forgotten all your happy sunshiny days here, just because it has rained
+for two? Why, when I was a little girl, and used to come here, the rainy
+days never made me love the place a bit the less. I always used to think
+the fine days made up."
+
+"But then, mother, you were a nice little girl," said Milly, throwing
+her arms round her mother's neck and kissing her. "Now, I don't feel a
+bit nice this morning. It makes me so cross not to be able to go out and
+get flowers and wild strawberries. And you know at home it hardly ever
+rains all day."
+
+"Gardener says sometimes it rains all over the road," interrupted Olly,
+"and people can't walk along, and they have to go right up on the
+mountains to get past the water place. And sometimes they have to get a
+boat to take people across. Do you think we shall have to go in a boat
+to church on Sunday, mother?"
+
+"Well, we're a long way off that yet, Olly. It will take a good many
+days' rain to flood the roads so deep that we can't get along them, and
+this is only the second rainy day. Come, I don't think we've got much
+to complain of. Now suppose, instead of doing all your lessons this
+morning, you were presently to write to Jacky and Francis--you write to
+Jacky, Milly, and Olly to Francis. Don't you think that would be a good
+thing?"
+
+"Oh yes, yes!" cried Milly, shutting up her copybook in a great hurry.
+"They'll be so much astonished, mother, for we didn't _promise_ to write
+to them. I don't believe they ever get any letters."
+
+The children had a great deal of affection and some secret pity for
+these playfellows of theirs, who had a sick mother, and who did not get
+half the pleasures and amusements that they did. And, as I have already
+told you, they could not bear Miss Chesterton, the little boys' aunt,
+who lived with them. They felt sure that Jacky and Francis must be
+unhappy, only because they had to live with Miss Chesterton.
+
+This was Milly's letter when it was done. Milly could only write very
+slowly, in rather big hand, so that her letters were never very long:
+
+    MY DEAR JACKY--Don't you think it very odd getting a letter from
+    me? It is nearly a fortnight since we came here. At first it was
+    _very_ nice. We went up the mountains, and Aunt Emma took us in
+    a boat on the lake. And we gathered some wild strawberries, only
+    some of them were quite white--not red a bit. But now it has
+    begun to rain, and we don't like it at all. Perhaps we sha'n't
+    be able to get home because the rain will cover up the roads. It
+    is _very_ dull staying in, only mother makes us such nice plays.
+    Good-bye, Jacky. I send my love to Francis. Mind you don't
+    forget us.
+
+    Your loving little friend,
+    MILLY.
+
+Olly wrote a much longer letter, that is to say, mother wrote for him,
+and he told her what to say, and as this was a much easier way of
+writing than Milly's way, he got on very fast, and Mrs. Norton had to
+write as quickly as she could, to keep up with him. And this was what
+Olly had to say:
+
+    MY DEAR FRANCIS--I wonder what you'll say to-morrow morning
+    when the postman brings you this letter. I hope you'll write
+    back, because it won't be fair if you don't. It isn't such fun
+    here now because it does rain so. Milly and I are always telling
+    the rain to go away, but it won't--though it did at home. Last
+    week we went out in a boat, and I rowed. I rowed a great way,
+    much farther than Milly. We went very slow when Milly rowed. It
+    was very jolly at the picnic. Aunt Emma gave me some cake, and
+    mother gave me some bread and jam. Nana won't let us have cake
+    and jam both, when we have tea at home. Aunt Emma told us a
+    story about King Arthur. I don't believe you ever heard it. The
+    water-fairies took him away, and his friend wanted to go too,
+    but the king said 'No! you must stop behind.' Milly cried
+    because she felt sad about the king. I didn't cry, because I'm a
+    little boy. Mother says you won't understand about the story,
+    and she says we must tell it you when we get home. So we will,
+    only perhaps we sha'n't remember. Do you do lessons now? We
+    don't do any--only when it rains. Milly's writing a letter to
+    Jacky--mine's much longer than hers.
+
+    Your little friend,
+    OLLY.
+
+Then came the putting up the letters, addressing them, and stamping
+them, all of which the children enjoyed very much, and by the time they
+were laid on the hall table ready to go to the post it was nearly
+dinner-time.
+
+How the beck did roar that afternoon. And when the children looked out
+from the drawing-room window they could see a little flood on the lawn,
+where the water had come over the side of the stream. While they were
+having their tea, with mother sitting by, working and chattering to
+them, they heard a knock at the door, and when they opened it there was
+father standing in the unused kitchen, with the water running off his
+waterproof coat, making little streams all over the stone floor.
+
+"I have been down to look at the river," he said to Mrs. Norton. "Keep
+off, children! I'm much too wet to touch. Such rain! It does know how
+to come down here! The water's over the road just by the
+stepping-stones. John Backhouse says if it goes on another twenty-four
+hours like this, there'll be no getting to Wanwick by the road, on
+foot."
+
+"Father," said Milly, looking at him with a very solemn face, "wouldn't
+it be dreadful if it went on raining and raining, and if the river came
+up and up, right up to the drive and into the hall, and we all had to
+sit upstairs, and the butcher couldn't bring us any meat, and John
+Backhouse couldn't bring us any milk, and we all _died_ of hunger."
+
+"Then they would put us into some black boxes," said Olly, cheerfully,
+with his mouth full of bread and butter, "and they would put the black
+boxes into some boats, and take us right away and bury us
+krick--wouldn't they, mother?"
+
+"Well, but--" said Mr. Norton, who had by this time got rid of his wet
+coat, and was seated by Milly, helping himself to some tea, "suppose we
+got into the boats before we were dead, and rowed away to Windermere
+station?"
+
+"Oh no! father," said Milly, who always liked her stories to be as
+gloomy as possible, "they wouldn't know anything about us till we were
+dead you know, and then they'd come and find us, and be _very_ sorry for
+us, and say, 'Oh dear! oh dear! what a pity!'"
+
+Olly began to look so dismal as Milly's fancies grew more and more
+melancholy, that Mrs. Norton took to laughing at them all. What did they
+know about Westmoreland rain indeed. This was nothing--just nothing at
+all; she _could_ remember some floods in the wintertime, when she was a
+little girl, and used to stay with Aunt Emma and great-grandmamma; but
+as for this, why, it was a good summer wetting, and that was all.
+
+A romp sent the children to bed in excellent spirits again. This time
+both Milly and Olly stood at the window together, and told the rain to
+be sure to go to Spain that night, and never come back again while they
+were at Ravensnest.
+
+"Or you might go to Willingham, you know, dear Mr. Rain," said Milly; "I
+daresay mother's flowers want a good watering. And there's Spot--you
+might give her a good washing--she _can_ wash herself, but she won't.
+Only we don't want you here, Mr. Rain."
+
+But what an obstinate disagreeable Mr. Rain it was! All that night it
+went on pouring, till the little beck in the garden was so full it was
+almost choked, and could only get along by sputtering and foaming as if
+some wicked water-fairies were driving it along and tormenting it. And
+all the little pools on the mountain, the "tarns," as Becky and Tiza
+called them, filled up, and the rain made the mountain itself so wet
+that it was like one big bog all over.
+
+When the children woke up the flood on the lawn was growing bigger, and
+it seemed to them as if the house and garden were all wrapped up in a
+wet white cloud-blanket. They could not see the mountain at all from the
+window, it was all covered with a thick white mist, and the dark fir
+trees in the garden looked sad and drooping, as if the weight of
+raindrops was too much for them to carry.
+
+The children had made up their minds so completely the night before that
+it _couldn't_ rain more than two days running, that they felt as if they
+could hardly be expected to bear this third wet morning cheerfully.
+Nurse found them cross and out of spirits at breakfast. Even a prospect
+of asking Becky and Tiza to tea did not bring any smiles to their
+forlorn little faces. It would be no fun having anybody to tea. They
+couldn't go out, and there was nothing amusing indoors.
+
+After breakfast, Olly set to work to get into mischief, as he generally
+did when he felt dull. Nurse discovered him smearing Katie's cheeks with
+raspberry jam "to make them get red kricker" as he said, and alas! some
+of the jam had stuck to the new silk frock, and spoilt all its smart
+fresh look.
+
+When Milly found it out she began to cry, and when Mrs. Norton came in
+she saw a heap on the floor, which was Milly, sobbing, while Olly sat
+beside her with his mouth wide open, as if he was a good deal astonished
+at the result of his first attempt at doctoring.
+
+"Pick up the pieces, old woman," said Mrs. Norton, taking hold of the
+heap and lifting it up. "What's the matter with you both?"
+
+"Olly's spoilt my doll," sobbed Milly, "and it _will_ go on raining--and
+I feel so--so--dull."
+
+"I didn't spoil her doll, mother," cried Olly, eagerly. "I only rubbed
+some jam on its cheeks to make them a nicey pink--only some of it
+_would_ sticky her dress--I didn't mean to."
+
+"How would you like some jam rubbed on your cheeks, sir?" said Mrs.
+Norton, who could scarcely help laughing at poor Katie's appearance when
+nurse handed the doll to her. "Suppose you leave Milly's dolls alone for
+the future; but cheer up, Milly! I think I can make Katie very nearly
+right again. Come upstairs to my room and we'll try."
+
+After a good deal of sponging and rubbing, and careful drying by the
+kitchen fire, Katie came very nearly right again, and then Mrs. Norton
+tried whether some lessons would drive the rain out of the children's
+heads. But the lessons did not go well. It was all Milly could do to
+help crying every time she got a figure wrong in her sum, and Olly took
+about ten minutes to read two lines of his reading-book. Olly had just
+begun his sums, and Milly was standing up to say some poetry to her
+mother, looking a woebegone little figure, with pale cheeks and heavy
+eyes, when suddenly there was a noise of wheels outside, and both the
+children turned to look out of the window.
+
+"A carriage! a carriage!" shouted Olly, jumping down, and running to the
+window.
+
+There, indeed, was one of the shut-up "cars," as the Westmoreland people
+call them, coming up the Ravensnest drive.
+
+"It's Aunt Emma," said Mrs. Norton, starting up, "how good of her to
+come over on such a day. Run, children, and open the front door."
+
+Down flew Milly and Olly, tumbling over one another in their hurry; but
+father had already thrown the door open, and who should they see
+stepping down the carriage-steps but Aunt Emma herself, with her soft
+gray hair shining under her veil, and her dear kind face as gentle and
+cheery as ever.
+
+"Aunt Emma! Aunt Emma!" shouted Olly, dancing up to her, and throwing
+his arms round her, "_are_ you come to tell us about old Mother
+Quiverquake?"
+
+"You gipsy, don't strangle me! Well, Lucy dear, here I am. Will you have
+me to dinner? I thought we'd all be company for each other this bad day.
+Why, Milly, what have you been doing to your cheeks?"
+
+"She's been crying," said Olly, in spite of Milly's pulling him by the
+sleeve to be quiet, "because I stickened her doll."
+
+"Well, and quite right too. Dolls weren't made to be stickied. But now,
+who's going to carry my bag upstairs? Take it gently, Milly, it's got my
+cap inside, and if you crumple my cap I shall have to sit with my head
+in a bandbox at dinner. Old ladies are _never_ seen without their caps
+you know. The most dreadful things would happen if they were! Olly, you
+may put my umbrella away. There now, I'll go to mother's room and take
+off my things."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+A STORY-TELLING GAME
+
+
+When Aunt Emma was safely settled, cap and all, in one of the
+drawing-room arm-chairs, it seemed to the children as if the rain and
+the gray sky did not matter nearly so much as they had done half an hour
+before. In the first place, her coming made something new and
+interesting to think about; and in the second place, they felt quite
+sure that Aunt Emma hadn't brought her little black bag into the
+drawing-room with her for nothing. If only her cap had been in it, why
+of course she would have left it in mother's bedroom. But here it was in
+her lap, with her two hands folded tight over it, as if it contained
+something precious! How very puzzling and interesting!
+
+However, for a long time it seemed as if Aunt Emma had nothing at all to
+say about her bag. She began to tell them about her drive--how in two
+places the horse had to go splashing through the water, and how once,
+when they were crossing a little river that ran across the road, the
+water came so far up the wheels that "I put my head out of the window,"
+said Aunt Emma, "and said to my old coachman, 'Now, John, if it's going
+to get any deeper than this, you'd better turn him round and go home,
+for I'm an old woman, not a fish, and I can't swim. Of course, if the
+horse can swim with the carriage behind him it's all right, but I have
+my doubts.' Now John, my dears, has been with me a great many years, and
+he knows very well that I'm rather a nervous old woman. It's very sad,
+but it is so. Don't you be nervous when you're old people. So all he
+said was 'All right, ma'am. Bless you, he can swim like a trout.' And
+crack went the whip, splash went the water! It seemed to me it was just
+going to come in under the door, when, lo and behold! there we were safe
+and sound on dry ground again. But whether my old horse swam through or
+walked through I can't tell you. I like to believe he swam, because I'm
+so fond of him, and one likes to believe the creatures one loves can do
+clever things."
+
+"I'll ask John when he comes to take you away, Aunt Emma," said Olly. "I
+don't believe horses can swim when they're in a carriage."
+
+"You're a matter-of-fact monkey," said Aunt Emma. "Dear me, what's
+that?"
+
+For a loud squeak had suddenly startled the children, who were now
+looking about them everywhere in vain, to find out where it came from.
+Squeak! again. This time the voice certainly came from near Aunt Emma's
+chair, but there was nothing to be seen.
+
+"What a strange house you live in," said Aunt Emma, with a perfectly
+grave face. "You must have caught a magician somehow. That's a
+magician's squeak."
+
+Again came the noise!
+
+"I know, I know!" shouted Olly. "It's Aunt Emma's bag! I'm sure it came
+out of the bag."
+
+"My bag!"--holding it up and looking at it. "Now does it look like a bag
+that squeaks? It's a perfectly well-behaved bag, and never did such a
+thing in its life."
+
+"I know, Aunt Emma," said Olly, dancing round her in great excitement.
+"You've got the parrot in there!"
+
+"Well now," said Aunt Emma. "This is really serious. If you think I am
+such a cruel old woman as to shut up a poor poll-parrot in a bag,
+there's no help for it, we must open the bag. But it's a very curious
+bag--I wouldn't stand too near it if I were you."
+
+Click! went the fastening of the bag, and out jumped--what do you think?
+Why, the very biggest frog that was ever seen, in this part of the world
+at any rate, a green speckled frog, that hopped on to Aunt Emma's knee,
+and then on to the floor, where it went hopping and squeaking along the
+carpet, till all of a sudden, when it got to the door, it turned over on
+its back, and lay there quite quiet with its legs in the air.
+
+The children followed it with looks half of horror, half of amazement.
+
+"What is it, Aunt Emma? Is it alive?" asked Milly, jumping on to a chair
+as the frog came near her, and drawing her little skirts tight round her
+legs, while Olly went cautiously after it, with his hands on his knees,
+one step at a time.
+
+"You'd better ask it," said Aunt Emma, who had at last begun to laugh a
+little, as if it was impossible to keep grave any longer. "I'm sure it
+looks very peaceable just now, poor thing."
+
+So the children crept up to it, and examined it closely. Yes, it was a
+green speckled frog, but what it was made of, and whether it was alive,
+and if it was not alive how it managed to hop and squeak--these were the
+puzzles.
+
+"Take hold of it, Milly," said Mr. Norton, who had just come up from his
+work, and was standing laughing near the door. "Turn it over on its legs
+again."
+
+"No, I'll turn it," cried Olly, making a dash, and turning it over in a
+great hurry, keeping his legs and feet well out of the way. Hop! squeak!
+there it was off again, right down the room with the children after it,
+till it suddenly came up against a table leg, and once more turned over
+on its back and lay quite still.
+
+"Oh, Aunt Emma, is it a toy?" asked Milly, who now felt brave enough to
+take it up and look at it.
+
+"Well, Milly, I believe so--a very lively one. Bring it here, and I'll
+tell you something about it."
+
+So the children brought it very cautiously, as if they were not quite
+sure what it would do next, and then Aunt Emma explained to them that
+she had once paid a visit to a shop in London where Japanese toys--toys
+made in the country of Japan--far away on the other side of the
+world--were sold, and that there she found master froggy.
+
+"And there never was such a toy as froggy for a wet day," said Aunt
+Emma. "I have tried him on all sorts of boys and girls, and he never
+fails. He's as good a cure for a cross face as a poultice is for a sore
+finger. But, Milly, listen! I declare there's something else going on in
+my bag. I really think, my dear bag, you might be quiet now that you
+have got rid of froggy! What can all this chattering be about? Sh! sh!"
+and Aunt Emma held up her finger at the children, while she held the bag
+up to her ear, and listened carefully. Olly was almost beside himself
+with excitement, but Milly had got his little brown hands tight in hers
+for fear he should make a jump at the bag. "Yes," said Aunt Emma. "It's
+just as I thought. The bag declares it's not his fault at all, but that
+if I will give him such noisy creatures to carry I must take the
+consequences. He says there's a whole family now inside him, making such
+a noise he can hardly hear himself speak. It's enough, he says, to drive
+a respectable bag mad, and he must blow up if it goes on. Dear me! I
+must look into this. Milly, come here!"
+
+Milly came near, and Aunt Emma opened the bag solemnly.
+
+"Now, Milly, I'll hold it for fear it should take it into its poor head
+to blow up, and you put your hand in and see what you can find."
+
+So Milly put her hand in, feeling a good deal excited as to what might
+happen--and what do you think she brought out? A whole handful of the
+most delicious dolls:--cardboard dolls of all sorts and kinds, like
+those in mother's drawer at home; paper dolls, mamma dolls, little boy
+dolls and little girl dolls, baby dolls and nurse dolls; dolls in suits
+and dolls in frocks; dolls in hats and dolls in nightgowns; a papa in
+trousers and a mamma in a magnificent blue dress with flounces and a
+train; a nurse in white cap and apron and the most bewitching baby doll
+you ever saw, with a frilled paper cap that slipped on and off, and a
+white frock with pink ribbons. And the best of these dolls was, that
+each of them had a piece of cardboard fastened on behind and a little
+bit of cardboard to stand on, so that when you spread out the piece
+behind they stood up as naturally as possible, and looked as if they
+were going to talk to you.
+
+"Oh, Aunt Emma, dear Aunt Emma!" cried Milly, beside herself with
+delight as she spread them all out in her lap. "They're just like
+mother's at home, mother's that you made for her when she was a little
+girl--only ever so many more."
+
+"Well, Milly, I made mother's for her long ago, when it rained for days
+and days without stopping, and she had grown tired of pretty nearly
+everything and everybody indoors; and now I have been spending part of
+these rainy days in making a new set for mother's little girl. There,
+dear little woman, I think you must have given me a kiss for each of
+them by this time. Suppose you try and make them stand up."
+
+"But, Aunt Emma," said Olly, who was busy examining the mysterious
+bag--how could the dolls talk? they're only paper."
+
+"I know nothing about it," answered Aunt Emma, rescuing the bag, and
+putting it safely under her chair. "You _might_ ask the bag--but it
+wouldn't answer you. Magical bags never do talk except to their masters
+or mistresses."
+
+So Olly had to puzzle it out for himself while he played with the
+Japanese frog. That was an extraordinary frog! You should have seen
+nurse's start when Olly hid himself in the passage and sent the frog
+hopping and squeaking through the open door of the night nursery, where
+nurse was sitting sewing; and as for cook, when the creature came
+flopping over her kitchen floor she very nearly spoilt the hash she was
+making for dinner by dropping a whole pepper-box into the middle of it!
+There was no end to the fun to be got out of froggy, and Olly amused
+himself with it the whole of the morning, while Milly went through long
+stories with her dolls upstairs, helped every now and then by Aunt Emma,
+who sat knitting and talking to mother.
+
+At dinner the children had to sit quiet while Mr. and Mrs. Norton and
+Aunt Emma talked. Father and mother had been almost as much cheered up
+by Aunt Emma's coming as the children themselves, and now the
+dinner-table was lively with pleasant talk; talk about books, and talk
+about pictures, and talk about foreign places, and talk about the
+mountains and the people living near Ravensnest, many of whom mother had
+known when she was a little girl. Milly, who was old enough to listen,
+could only understand a little bit here and there; but there was always
+Aunt Emma's friendly gentle face to look at, and her soft old hand in
+its black mitten, to slip her own little fingers into; while Olly was so
+taken up with the prospects of the black-currant pudding which he had
+seen cook making in the morning, and the delight of it when it came,
+that it seemed no trouble to him to sit still.
+
+As for the rain, there was not much difference. Perhaps there were a few
+breaks in the clouds, and it might be beating a little less heavily on
+the glass conservatory outside the dining-room, still, on the whole, the
+weather was much the same as it had been. It was wonderful to see how
+little notice the children had taken of it since Aunt Emma came, and
+when they escorted her upstairs after dinner, they quite forgot to rush
+to the window and look out, as they had been doing the last three days
+at every possible opportunity.
+
+The children got her safe into a chair, and then Olly brought a stool to
+one side of her, and Milly brought a stool to the other.
+
+"_Now,_ can you remember about old Mother Quiverquake?" said Olly,
+resting his little sunburnt chin on Aunt Emma's knee, and looking up to
+her with eager eyes.
+
+[Illustration: "'Suppose we have a story-telling game'"]
+
+"Well, I daresay I shall begin to remember about her presently; but
+suppose, children, we have a _story-telling game_. We'll tell
+stories--you and Olly, father, mother, and everybody. That's much fairer
+than that one person should do all the telling."
+
+"We couldn't," said Milly, shaking her head gravely, "we are only little
+children. Little children can't make up stories."
+
+"Suppose little children try," said mother. "I think Aunt Emma's is an
+excellent plan. Now, father, you'll have to tell one too."
+
+"Father's lazy," said Mr. Norton, coming out from behind his newspaper.
+"But, perhaps, if you all of you tell very exciting stories you may stir
+him up."
+
+"Oh, father!" cried Olly, who had a vivid remembrance of his father's
+stories, though they only came very seldom, "tell us about the rat with
+three tails, and the dog that walked on its nose."
+
+"Oh dear, no!" said Mr. Norton, "those won't do for such a grand
+story-telling as this. I must think of some story which is all long
+words and good children."
+
+"_Don't_ father," said Milly, imploringly, "it's ever so much nicer when
+they get into scrapes, you know, and tumble down, and all that."
+
+"Who's to begin?" said Aunt Emma. "I think mother had better begin.
+Afterwards it will be your turn, Olly; then father, then Milly, and then
+me."
+
+"I don't believe I've got a scrap of a story in my head," said Mrs.
+Norton. "It's weeks since I caught one last."
+
+"Then look here, Olly," said Aunt Emma, "I'll tell you what to do. Go up
+gently behind mother, and kiss her three times on the top of the head.
+That's the way to send the stories in. Mother will soon begin to feel
+one fidgeting inside her head after that."
+
+So Olly went gently up behind his mother, climbed on a stool at the back
+of her chair, and kissed her softly three times at the back of her head.
+Mrs. Norton lay still for a few moments after the kisses, with closed
+eyes.
+
+"Ah!" she said at last. "Now I think I've caught one. But it's a very
+little one, poor little thing. And yet, strange to say, though it's very
+little, it's very old. Now, children, you must be kind to my story. I
+caught him first a great many years ago in an old book, but I am afraid
+you will hardly care for him as much as I did. Well, once upon a time
+there was a great king."
+
+"Was it King Arthur, mother?" interrupted Olly, eagerly.
+
+"Oh no! this king lived in a different country altogether. He lived in a
+beautiful hot country over the sea, called Spain."
+
+"Oh, mother! a _hot_ country!" protested Milly, "that's where the rain
+goes to."
+
+"Well, Milly, I don't think you know any more about it, except that you
+_tell_ the rain to go there. Don't you know by this time that the rain
+never does what it's told? Really, very little rain goes to Spain, and
+in some parts of the country the people would be very glad indeed if we
+could send them some of the rain we don't want at Ravensnest. But now,
+you mustn't interrupt me, or I shall forget my story--Well there was
+once a king who lived in a _very_ hot part of Spain, where they don't
+have much rain, and where it hardly ever snows or freezes. And this king
+had a beautiful wife, whom he loved very much. But, unluckily, this
+beautiful wife had one great fault. She was always wishing for the most
+unreasonable and impossible things, and though the king was always
+trying to get her what she wanted she was never satisfied, and every day
+she seemed to grow more and more discontented and exacting. At last, one
+day in the winter, a most extraordinary thing happened. A shower of snow
+fell in Cordova, which was the name of the town where the king and queen
+lived, and it whitened the hills all around the town, so that they
+looked as if somebody had been dusting white sugar over them. Now snow
+was hardly ever seen in Cordova, and the people in the town wondered at
+it, and talked about it a great deal. But after she had looked at it a
+little-while the queen began to cry bitterly. None of her ladies could
+comfort her, nor would she tell any of them what was the matter. There
+she sat at her window, weeping, till the king came to see her. When he
+came he could not imagine what she was crying about, and begged her to
+tell him why. 'I am weeping,' she said, sobbing all the time, 'because
+the hills--are not always--covered with snow. See how pretty they look!
+And yet--I have never, till now, seen them look like that. If you really
+loved me, you would manage some way or other that it should snow once a
+year at any rate.'
+
+"'But how can I make it snow?' cried the king in great trouble, because
+she would go on weeping and weeping, and spoiling her pretty eyes.
+
+"'I'm sure I don't know,' said the queen, crossly, 'but you can't love
+me a bit, or you'd certainly try.'
+
+"Well, the king thought and thought, and at last he hit upon a beautiful
+plan. He sent into all parts of Spain to buy almond trees, and planted
+them on the hills all round the town. Now the almond tree, as you know,
+has a lovely pinky-white blossom, so when the next spring arrived all
+these thousands of almond trees came out into bloom all over the hills
+round Cordova, so that they looked at a distance as if they were covered
+with white snow. And for once the queen was delighted, and could not
+help saying a nice 'Thank you' to the king for all the trouble he had
+taken to please her. But it was not very long before she grew
+discontented again, and began once more to wish for all kinds of
+ridiculous things. One day she was sitting at her window, and she saw
+some ragged little children playing by the river that ran round the
+palace. They were dabbling in the mud at the side, sticking their little
+bare feet into it, or scooping up pieces which they rolled into balls
+and threw at one another. The queen watched them for some time, and at
+last she began to weep bitterly. One of her maidens ran and told the
+king that the queen was weeping, and he came in a great hurry to see
+what was the matter.
+
+"'Just look at those children down there!' said the queen, sobbing and
+pointing to them. 'Did you ever see anybody so happy? Why can't I have
+mud to dabble in too, and why can't I take off my shoes and stockings,
+and amuse myself like the children do, instead of being so dull and
+stuck-up all day long?'
+
+"'Because it isn't proper for queens to dabble in the mud,' said the
+poor king in great perplexity, for he didn't at all like the idea of
+his beautiful queen dabbling in the mud with the little ragged children.
+
+"'That's just like you,' said the queen, beginning to cry faster than
+ever,' you never do anything to please me. What's the good of being
+proper? What's the good of being a queen at all?'
+
+"This made the king very unhappy, and again he thought and thought, till
+at last he hit upon a plan. He ordered a very large shallow bath of
+white marble to be made in the palace-garden. Then he poured into it all
+kinds of precious stones, and chips of sweet-smelling wood, besides a
+thousand cartloads of rose-leaves and a thousand cartloads of orange
+flowers. All these he ordered to be stirred up together with a great
+ivory spoon, till they made a kind of wonderful mud, and then he had the
+bath filled up with scented water.
+
+"'Now then,' he said to the queen, when he had brought her down to look
+at it, 'you may take off your shoes and stockings and paddle about in
+this mud as much as you like.' You may imagine that this was a very
+pleasant kind of mud to dabble in, and the queen and her ladies amused
+themselves with it immensely for some time. But nothing could keep this
+tiresome queen amused for long together, and in about a fortnight she
+had grown quite tired of her wonderful bath. It seemed as if the king's
+pains had been all thrown away. She grew cross and discontented again,
+and her ladies began to say to each other, 'What will she wish for next,
+I wonder? The king might as well try to drink up the sea as try to get
+her all she wants.' At last, one day, when she and her ladies were
+walking near the palace, they met a shepherdess driving a flock of sheep
+up into the hills. The shepherdess looked so pretty and bright in her
+red petticoat and tall yellow cap, that the queen stopped to speak to
+her.
+
+"'Where are you going, pretty maiden, with your woolly white sheep?' she
+asked.
+
+"'I am going up to the hills,' said the shepherdess. 'Now the sun has
+scorched up the fields down below we must take our sheep up to the cool
+hills, where the grass is still fresh and green. Good-day, good-day, the
+sheep are going so fast I cannot wait.' So on she tripped, singing and
+calling to her sheep, who came every now and then to rub their soft
+coats against her, as if they loved her. The queen looked after her, and
+her face began to pucker up.
+
+"'Why am I not a shepherdess?' she exclaimed, bursting into tears. 'I
+_hate_ being a queen! I never sang as merrily as that little maiden in
+all my life. I must and will be a shepherdess, and drive sheep up into
+the mountain, or I shall die!"
+
+"And all that night the foolish queen sat at her window crying, and when
+the morning came she had made herself look quite old and ugly. When the
+king came to see her he was dreadfully troubled, and begged her to tell
+him what was the matter now.
+
+"'I want to be a shepherdess, and drive sheep up into the mountains,'
+sobbed the queen. 'Why should the little shepherdess girls look always
+so happy and merry, while I am dying of dulness?'
+
+"The king thought it was very unkind of her to say she was dying of
+dulness when he had taken so much trouble to get her all she wanted; but
+he knew it was no good talking to her while she was in such a temper. So
+all he said was:
+
+"'How can I turn you into a shepherdess? These shepherdesses stay out
+all night with their sheep on the hills, and live on water and a crust
+of bread. How would you like that?'
+
+"'Of course I-should like it,' said the queen, 'anything for a change.
+Besides, nothing could be nicer than staying out of doors these lovely
+nights. And as for food, you know very well that I am never hungry here,
+and that it doesn't matter in the least to me what I eat!'
+
+"'Well,' said the king, 'you shall go up to the hills, if you promise to
+take your ladies with you, and if you will let me send a tent to shelter
+you at night, and some servants to look after you.'
+
+"'As if that would give me any pleasure!' said the queen, 'to be
+followed about and waited upon is just what I detest. I will go alone;
+just like that pretty little shepherdess, if I go at all.'
+
+"But the king declared that nothing would induce him to let her go
+alone. So the queen set to work to cry, and she cried for two days and
+two nights without stopping, and at the end of that time the poor king
+was ready to let her go anywhere or do anything for the sake of a little
+peace.
+
+"So she had her own way. They found her a flock of the loveliest white
+sheep, all with blue ribbons round their necks, and blue rosettes on
+their little white tails; and the queen dressed herself up in a red silk
+petticoat and a cap embroidered in gold and silver, and then she set out
+by herself.
+
+"At first it was all delightful. She drove the sheep up the soft green
+hillsides, and laughed with delight to see them nibbling the fresh
+grass, and running hither and thither after her, and after each other.
+The evening sun shone brightly, and she sat herself down on a rock and
+sang all the tunes she knew, that she might be just like the little
+shepherdess. But while she was singing the sheep strayed away, and she
+had to run after them as fast as she could, to catch them up. This made
+her hot and tired, so she tried to make them lie down under a chestnut
+tree, that she might rest beside them. But the sheep were not a bit
+tired, and had no mind to rest at all. While she was calling one set of
+them together the other set ran scampering off, and the queen found out
+that she must just give up her way for once and follow theirs. On went
+the sheep, up hill and down dale, nibbling and frisking and trotting to
+their hearts' content, till the queen was worn out.
+
+"At last, by the time the sun was setting, the poor queen was so tired
+that she could walk no longer. Down she sat, and the ungrateful sheep
+kicked up their little hind legs and trotted away out of sight as fast
+as they could trot. There she was left on the hillside all alone. It
+began to get dark, and the sky, instead of being blue and clear as it
+had been, filled with black clouds.
+
+"'Oh dear! oh dear!' sighed the queen, 'here is a storm coming. If I
+could only find my way down the hill, if I could only see the town!'
+
+"But there were trees all about her, which hid the view, and soon it was
+so dark there was nothing to be seen, not even the stars. And presently,
+crash came the thunder, and after the thunder the rain--such rain! It
+soaked the queen's golden cap till it was so heavy with water she was
+obliged to throw it away, and her silk petticoat was as wet as if she
+had been taking a bath in it. In vain she ran hither and thither, trying
+to find a way through the trees, while the rain blinded her, and the
+thunder deafened her, till at last she was forced to sink down on the
+ground, feeling more wretched and frightened and cold than any queen
+ever felt before. Oh, if she were only safe back in her beautiful
+palace! If only she had the tent the king wanted to send with her! But
+there all night she had to stay, and all night the storm went on, till
+the queen was lying in a flood, and the owls and bats, startled out of
+their holes, went flying past her in the dark, and frightening her out
+of her senses. When the morning came there was such a shivering,
+crumpled up queen sitting on the grass, that even her own ladies would
+scarcely have known her.
+
+"'Oh, husband! husband!' she cried, getting up and wringing her cold
+little hands. 'You will never find me, and your poor wicked wife will
+die of cold and hunger.'
+
+"Tirra-lirra! tirra-lirra! What was that sounding in the forest?
+Surely--surely--it was a hunting horn. But who could be blowing it so
+early in the cold gray morning, when it was scarcely light? On ran the
+queen toward where the sound came from. Over rocks and grass she ran,
+till, all of a sudden, stepping out from behind a tree, came the king
+himself, who had been looking for her for hours. And then what do you
+think the discontented queen did? She folded her hands, and hung her
+head, and said, quite sadly and simply:
+
+"'Oh, my lord king, make me a shepherdess really. I don't deserve to be
+a queen. Send me away, and let me knit and spin for my living. I have
+plagued you long enough.'
+
+"And suddenly it seemed to the king as if there had been a black speck
+in the queen's heart, which had been all washed away by the rain; and he
+took her hands, and led her home to the palace in joy and gladness. And
+so they lived happy ever afterward."
+
+"Thank you _very_ much, mother," said Milly, stretching up her arms and
+drawing down Mrs. Norton's face to kiss her. "Do you really think the
+queen was never discontented any more?"
+
+"I can't tell you any more than the story does," said Mrs. Norton. "You
+see there would always be that dreadful night to think about, if she
+ever felt inclined to be; but I daresay the queen didn't find it very
+easy at first."
+
+"I would have made her be a shepherdess," said Olly, shaking his head
+gravely. "She wasn't nice, not a bit."
+
+"Little Mr. Severity!" said Aunt Emma, pulling his brown curls. "It's
+your turn next, Olly."
+
+"Then Milly must kiss me first," said Olly, looking rather scared, as if
+something he didn't quite understand was going to happen to him.
+
+So Milly went through the operation of kissing him three times on the
+back of the head, and then Olly's eyes, finding it did no good to stare
+at Aunt Emma or mother, went wandering all round the room in search of
+something else to help him. Suddenly they came to the window, where a
+brown speck was dancing up and down, and then Olly's face brightened,
+and he began in a great hurry:
+
+"Once upon a time there was a daddy-long-legs--"
+
+"Well," said Milly, when they had waited a little while, and nothing
+more came.
+
+"I don't know any more," said Olly.
+
+"Oh, that _is_ silly," said Milly, "why, that isn't a story at all. Shut
+your eyes tight, that's much the best way of making a story."
+
+So Olly shut his eyes, and pressed his two hands tightly over them, and
+then he began again:
+
+"Once upon a time there was a daddy-long-legs--"
+
+Another stop.
+
+"Was it a _good_ daddy-long-legs?" asked Milly, anxious to help him on.
+
+"Yes," said Olly, "that's it, Milly. Once upon a time there was a good
+daddy-long-legs--"
+
+"Well, what did he do?" asked Milly, impatiently.
+
+"He--he--flewed on to father's nose!" said Olly, keeping his hands tight
+over his eyes, while his little white teeth appeared below in a broad
+grin.
+
+"And father said, 'Who's that on my nose?' and the daddy-long-legs said,
+'It's me, don't you know?' And father said, 'Get away off my nose, I
+don't like you a bit.' And the daddy-long-legs said, 'I shan't go away.
+It's hot on the window, the sun gets in my eyes. I like sitting up here
+best.' So father took a big sofa-cushion and gave his nose _ever_ such a
+bang! And the daddy-long-legs tumbled down dead. And the cushion tumbled
+down dead. And father tumbled down dead. And that's all," said Olly
+opening his eyes, and looking extremely proud of himself.
+
+"Oh, you silly boy!" cried Milly, "that isn't a bit like a real story."
+
+But Aunt Emma and father and mother laughed a good deal at Olly's story,
+and Aunt Emma said it would do very well for such a small boy.
+
+Whose turn was it next?
+
+"Father's turn! father's turn!" cried the children, in great glee,
+looking round for him; but while Olly's story had been going on, Mr.
+Norton, who was sitting behind them in a big arm-chair, had been
+covering himself up with sofa cushions and newspapers, till there was
+only the tip of one of his boots to be seen, coming out from under the
+heap. The children were a long time dragging him out, for he pelted them
+with cushions, and crumpled the newspapers over their heads, till they
+were so tired with laughing and struggling they had no strength left.
+
+"Father, it isn't fair, I don't think," said Milly at last, sitting a
+breathless heap on the floor. "Of course little people can't _make_ big
+people do things, so the big people ought to do them without making."
+
+"That's not at all good reasoning, Milly," said Mr. Norton, who could
+not resist the temptation of throwing one more sofa cushion at her
+laughing face. "You can't _make_ nurse stand on her head, but that's no
+reason why nurse should stand on her head."
+
+Just then Olly, moving up a stool behind his father's chair, brought his
+little mouth suddenly down on his father's head, and gave him three
+kisses in a great hurry, with a shout of triumph at the end.
+
+"Dear me!" said Mr. Norton, shutting his eyes and falling back as if
+something had happened to him. "This is very serious. Aunt Emma, that
+spell of yours is really _too_ strong. My poor head! It will certainly
+burst if I don't get this story out directly! Come, jump up,
+children--quick!"
+
+Up jumped the children, one on each knee, and Mr. Norton began at once.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE STORY OF BEOWULF
+
+
+Once upon a time there was a great--"
+
+"Father," interrupted Milly, "I shall soon be getting tired of 'Once
+upon a time there was a great king.'"
+
+"Don't cry till you're hurt, Milly; which means, wait till I get to the
+end of my sentence. Well, once upon a time there was a great--hero."
+
+"What is a hero?" asked Olly.
+
+"I know," said Milly, eagerly, "it's a brave man that's always fighting
+and killing giants and dragons and cruel people."
+
+"That'll do to begin with," said Mr. Norton, "though, when you grow
+older, you will find that people can be heroes without fighting or
+killing. However, the man I am going to tell you about was just the kind
+of hero you're thinking of, Milly. He loved fighting with giants and
+dragons and wild people, and my story is going to be about two of his
+fights--the greatest he ever fought. The name of this hero was Beowulf,
+and he lived in a country called Sweden (Milly knows all about Sweden,
+Olly, and you must get her to show it you on the map), with a number of
+other brave men who were his friends, and helped him in his battles. And
+one day a messenger came over the sea from another country close by,
+called Denmark, and the messenger said, 'Which of all you brave men will
+come over and help my master, King Hrothgar, who is in sore trouble?'
+And the messenger told them how Hrothgar, for many years past, had been
+plagued by a monster--the hateful monster Grendel--half a man and half a
+beast, who lived at the bottom of a great bog near the king's palace.
+Every night, he said, Grendel the monster came out of the bog with his
+horrible mother beside him--a wolf-like creature, fearful to look
+upon--and he and she would roam about the country, killing and slaying
+all whom they met. Sometimes they would come stalking to the king's
+palace, where his brave men were sleeping round the fire in the big
+hall, and before anyone could withstand him Grendel would fall upon the
+king's warriors, kill them by tens and twenties, and carry off their
+dead bodies to his bog. Many a brave man had tried to slay the monster,
+but none had been able so much as to wound him.
+
+"When Beowulf and his friends had heard this story they thought a while,
+and then each said to the other, 'Let us go across the sea and rid King
+Hrothgar of this monster.' So they took ship and went across the sea to
+Hrothgar's country, and Hrothgar welcomed them royally, and made a great
+feast in their honour. And after the feast Hrothgar said to Beowulf,
+'Now, I give over to you the hall of my palace, that you may guard it
+against the monster.' So Beowulf and the brave men who had come over
+with him made a great fire in the hall, and they all lay down to sleep
+beside it. You may imagine that they did not find it very easy to get to
+sleep, and some of them thought as they lay there that very likely they
+should never see their homes in Sweden again. But they were tired with
+journeying and feasting, and one after another they all fell asleep.
+Then in the dead of the night, when all was still, Grendel rose up out
+of the bog, and came stalking over the moor to the palace. His eyes
+flamed with a kind of horrible light in the darkness, and his steps
+seemed to shake the earth; but those inside the palace were sleeping so
+heavily that they heard nothing, not even when Grendel burst open the
+door of the hall and came in among them. Before anyone had wakened, the
+monster had seized one of the sleeping men and torn him to pieces. Then
+he came to Beowulf; but Beowulf sprang up out of his sleep and laid hold
+upon him boldly. He used no sword to strike him, for there was no sword
+which men could make was strong enough to hurt Grendel; but he seized
+him with his strong hands, and the two struggled together in the palace.
+And they fought till the benches were torn from the walls, and
+everything in the hall was smashed and broken. The brave men, springing
+up all round, seized their swords and would gladly have helped their
+lord, but there was no one but Beowulf could harm Grendel.
+
+"So they fought, till at last Beowulf tore away Grendel's hand and arm,
+and the monster fled away howling into the darkness. Over the moor he
+rushed till he came to his bog, and there he sank down into the middle
+of the bog, wailing and shrieking like one whose last hour was come.
+Then there was great rejoicing at Heorot, the palace, and King Hrothgar,
+when he saw Grendel's hand which Beowulf had torn away, embraced him and
+blessed him, and he and all his friends were laden with splendid gifts.
+
+"But all was not over yet. When the next night came, and Hrothgar's men
+and Beowulf's men were asleep together in the great hall, Grendel's
+horrible mother, half a woman and half a wolf, came rushing to the
+palace and while they were all asleep she carried off one of Hrothgar's
+dearest friends--a young noble whom he loved best of all his nobles. And
+she killed him, and carried his body back to the bog. Then the next
+morning there was grief and weeping in Heorot; but Beowulf said to the
+king, 'Grieve not, O king! till we have found out Grendel's mother and
+punished her for her evil deeds. I promise you she shall give an account
+for this. She shall not be able to hide herself in the water, nor under
+the earth, nor in the forest, nor at the bottom of the sea; let her go
+where she will, I will find a way after her.'
+
+"So Beowulf and his friends put on their armour and mounted their
+horses, and set out to look for her. And when they had ridden a long and
+weary way over steep lonely paths and past caves where dragons and
+serpents lived, they came at last to Grendel's bog--a fearful place
+indeed. There in the middle of it lay a pool of black water, and over
+the water hung withered trees, which seemed as if they had been poisoned
+by the air rising from the water beneath them. No bird or beast would
+ever come near Grendel's pool. If the hounds were hunting a stag, and
+they drove him down to the edge, he would sooner let them tear him to
+pieces than hide himself in the water. And every night the black water
+seemed to burn and flame, and it hissed and bubbled and groaned as if
+there were evil creatures tossing underneath. And now when Beowulf and
+his men came near it, they saw fierce water dragons lying near the edge
+or swimming about the pool. There also, beside the water, they found the
+dead body of Hrothgar's friend, who had been killed by Grendel's mother,
+and they took it up, and mourned over him afresh.
+
+"But Beowulf took an old and splendid sword that Hrothgar had given him,
+and he put on his golden helmet and his iron war shirt that no sword
+could cut through, and when he had bade his friends farewell he leapt
+straight into the middle of the bog. Down he sank, deeper and deeper
+into the water, among strange water beasts that struck at him with their
+tusks as he passed them, till at last Grendel's mother, the water-wolf,
+looked up from the bottom and saw him coming. Then she sprang upon him,
+and seized him, and dragged him down, and he found himself in a sort of
+hall under the water, with a pale strange light in it. And then he
+turned from the horrible water-wolf and raised his sword and struck her
+on the head; but his blow did her no harm. No sword made by mortal men
+could harm Grendel or his mother; and as he struck her Beowulf stumbled
+and fell. Then the water-wolf rushed forward and sat upon him as he lay
+there, and raised aloft her own sharp dagger to drive it into his
+breast; but Beowulf shook her off, and sprang up, and there, on the
+wall, he saw hanging a strange old sword that had been made in the old
+times, long, long ago, when the world was full of giants. So he threw
+his own sword aside and took down the old sword, and once more he smote
+the water-wolf. And this time his sword did him good service, and
+Grendel's fierce mother sank down dead upon the ground.
+
+"Then Beowulf looked round him, and he saw lying in a corner the body of
+Grendel himself. He cut off the monster's head, and lo and behold! when
+he had cut it off the blade of the old sword melted away, and there was
+nothing left in his hands but the hilt, with strange letters on it,
+telling how it was made in old days by the giants for a great king. So
+with that, and Hrothgar's sword and Grendel's head, Beowulf rose up
+again through the bog, and just as his brave men had begun to think they
+should never see their dear lord more he came swimming to land, bearing
+the great head with him.
+
+"Then Hrothgar and all his people rejoiced greatly, for they knew that
+the land would never more be troubled by these hateful monsters, but
+that the ploughers might plough, and the shepherds might lead their
+sheep, and brave men might sleep at night, without fear any more of
+Grendel and his mother."
+
+"Oh, father!" said Milly, breathlessly, when he stopped. "Is that all?"
+
+But Olly sat quite still, without speaking, gazing at his father with
+wide open brown eyes, and a face as grave and terrified as if Grendel
+were actually beside him.
+
+"That's all for this time," said Mr. Norton. "Why, Olly, where are your
+little wits gone to? Did it frighten you, old man?"
+
+"Oh!" said Olly, drawing a long breath. "I did think he would never have
+comed up out of that bog!"
+
+"It was splendid," said Milly. "But, father, I don't understand about
+that pool. Why didn't Beowulf get drowned when he went down under the
+water?"
+
+"The story doesn't tell us anything about that," said Mr. Norton. "But
+heroes in those days, Milly, must have had something magical about them
+so that they were able to do things that men and women can't do now. Do
+you know, children, that this story that you have been listening to is
+more than a thousand years old? Can you fancy that?"
+
+"No," said Milly, shaking her head. "I can't fancy it a bit, father.
+It's too long. It makes me puzzled to think of so many years."
+
+"Years and years and years and _years_!" said Olly. "When father's
+grandfather was a little boy."
+
+Mr. Norton laughed. "Can't you think of anything farther back than that,
+Olly? It would take a great many grandfathers, and grandfathers'
+grandfathers, to get back to the time when the story of Beowulf was
+made. And here am I telling it to you just in the same way as fathers
+used to tell it to their children a thousand years ago."
+
+"I suppose the children liked it so, they wouldn't let their fathers
+forget it," said Milly. "And then when they grew up they told it to
+their children. I shall tell it to my children when I grow up. I think I
+shall tell it to Katie to-morrow."
+
+"Father," said Olly, "did Beowulf die--ever?"
+
+"Yes. When he was quite an old man he had another great fight with a
+dragon, who was guarding a cave full of golden treasure on the
+sea-shore; and though he killed the dragon, the dragon gave him a
+terrible wound, so that when his friends came to look for him they found
+him lying all but dead in the cave. He was just able to tell them to
+make a great mound of earth over him when he was dead, on a high rock
+close by, that sailors might see it from their ships and think of him
+when they saw it, and then he died. And when he was dead they carried
+him up to the rock, and there they burned his body, and then they built
+up a great high mound of earth, and they put Beowulf's bones inside, and
+all the treasure from the dragon's cave. They were ten days building up
+the mound. Then when it was all done they rode around it weeping and
+chanting sorrowful songs, and at last they left him there, saying as
+they went away that never should they see so good a king or so true a
+master any more. And for hundreds of years afterwards, when the sailors
+out at sea saw the high mound rising on its point of rock, they said one
+to another, 'There is Beowulf's Mount,' and they began to tell each
+other of Beowulf's brave deeds--how he lived and how he died, and how he
+fought with Grendel and the wild sea dragons. There, now, I have told
+you all I know about Beowulf," said Mr. Norton, getting up and turning
+the children off his knee, "and if it isn't somebody else's turn now it
+ought to be."
+
+"Aunt Emma! Aunt Emma!" shouted Olly, who was so greedy for stories that
+he could almost listen all day long without being tired.
+
+But Aunt Emma only smiled through her spectacles and pointed to the
+window. The children ran to look out, and they could hardly believe
+their eyes when they saw that it had actually stopped raining, and that
+over the tree-tops was a narrow strip of blue sky, the first they had
+seen for three whole days.
+
+"Oh you nice blue sky!" exclaimed Milly, dancing up and down before the
+window with a beaming face. "Mind you stay there and get bigger. We'll
+get on our hats presently and come out to look at you. Oh! there's John
+Backhouse coming down the hill with the dogs. Mother, may we go up
+ourselves and ask Becky and Tiza to come to tea?"
+
+"But Aunt Emma must tell us her story first," persisted Olly, who hated
+being cheated out of a story by anything or anybody. "She promised."
+
+"You silly boy!" said Aunt Emma, "as if I was going to keep you indoors
+listening to stories just now, when the sun's shining for the first time
+for three whole days. I promised you my story on a wet day, and you
+shall have it--never fear. There'll be plenty more wet days before you
+go away from Ravensnest, I'm afraid. There goes my knitting, and
+mother's putting away her work, and father's stretching himself--which
+means we're all going for a walk."
+
+"To fetch Becky and Tiza, mother?" asked Milly; and when mother said
+"Yes, if you like," the two children raced off down the long passage to
+the nursery in the highest possible spirits.
+
+Soon they were all walking along the dripping drive past high banks of
+wet fern, and under trees which threw down showers of rain-drops at
+every puff of wind. And when they got into the road beside the river the
+children shouted with glee to see their brown shallow little river
+turned into a raging flood of water, which went sweeping and hurrying
+through the fields, and every now and then spreading itself over them
+and making great pools among the poor drowned hay. They ran on to look
+for the stepping-stones, but to their amazement there was not a stone to
+be seen. The water was rushing over them with a great roar and swirl,
+and Milly shivered a little bit when she remembered their bathe there a
+week before.
+
+"Well, old woman," said Mr. Norton, coming up to them, "I don't suppose
+you'd like, a bathe to-day--quite."
+
+"If we were in there now," said Olly, watching the river with great
+excitement, "the water would push us down krick! and the fishes would
+come and etten us all up."
+
+"They'd be a long time gobbling you up, Master Fatty," said his father.
+"Come, run along; it's too cold to stand about."
+
+But how brilliant and beautiful it was after the rain! Little tiny
+trickling rivers were running down all the roads, and sparkling in the
+sun; the wet leaves and grass were glittering, and the great mountains
+all around stood up green and fresh against the blue sky, as if the rain
+had washed the dust off them from top to toe, and left them clean and
+bright. Two things only seemed the worse for the rain--the hay and the
+wild strawberries. Milly peered into all the banks along the road where
+she generally found her favourite little red berries, but most of them
+were washed away, and the few miserable things that were left tasted of
+nothing but rain water. And as for the hay-fields, they looked so wet
+and drenched that it was hard to believe any sunshine could ever dry
+them.
+
+"Poor John Backhouse!" said Aunt Emma; "I'm afraid his hay is a good
+deal spoilt. Aren't you glad father's not a farmer, Milly?"
+
+"Why, Aunt Emma," said Milly, "I'm always wishing father _was_ a farmer.
+I want to be like Becky, and call the cows, and mind the baby all by
+myself. It must be nice feeding the chickens, and making the hay, and
+taking the milk around."
+
+"Yes, all that's very nice, but how would you like your hay washed away,
+and your corn beaten down, and your fruit all spoilt? Those are things
+that are constantly happening to John Backhouse, I expect, in the rainy
+country."
+
+"Yes, and it won't always be summer," said Milly, considering. "I don't
+think I should like to stay in that little weeny house all the winter.
+Is it very cold here in the winter, Aunt Emma?"
+
+"Not very, generally. But last winter was very cold here, and the snow
+lay on the ground for weeks and weeks. On Christmas eve, do you know,
+Milly, I wanted to have a children's party in my kitchen, and what do
+you think I did? The snow was lying deep on the roads, so I sent out two
+sledges."
+
+"What are sledges?" asked Olly.
+
+"Carriages with the wheels taken off and two long pieces of wood
+fastened on instead, so that they slip along smoothly over the snow. And
+my old coachman drove one and my gardener the other, and they went round
+all the farmhouses near by, and gathered up the children, little and
+big, into the sledges, till the coachman had got eight in his sledge,
+and the gardener had got nine in his, and then they came trotting back
+with the bells round the horses' necks jingling and clattering, and two
+such merry loads of rosy-faced children. I wish you had been there; I
+gave them tea in the kitchen, and afterward we had a Christmas tree in
+the drawing-room."
+
+"Oh what fun," said Milly. "Why didn't you ask us too, Aunt Emma? We
+could have come quite well in the train, you know. But how did the
+children get home?"
+
+"We covered them up warm with rugs and blankets, and sent them back in
+the sledges. And they looked so happy with their toys and buns cuddled
+up in their arms, that it did one's heart good to see them."
+
+"Mind you ask us next time, Aunt Emma," said Milly, hanging round her
+neck coaxingly.
+
+"Mind you get two pairs of wings by that time, then," said Aunt Emma,
+"for mother's not likely to let you come to my Christmas tree unless you
+promise to fly there and back. But suppose, instead of your coming to
+me, I come to you next Christmas?"
+
+"Oh yes! yes!" cried Olly, who had just joined Aunt Emma and Milly,
+"come to our Christmas tree, Aunt Emma. We'll give you ever such nice
+things--a ball and a top, and a train--perhaps--and--"
+
+"As if Aunt Emma would care for those kind of things!" said Milly. "No,
+you shall give her some muffetees, you know, to keep her hands warm, and
+I'll make her a needlebook. But, Aunt Emma, do listen! What can be the
+matter?"
+
+They were just climbing the little bit of steep road which led to the
+farm, and suddenly they heard somebody roaring and screaming, and then
+an angry voice scolding, and then a great clatter, and then louder
+roaring than ever.
+
+"What _is_ the matter?" cried Milly, running on to the farm door, which
+was open. But just as she got there, out rushed a tattered little figure
+with a tear-stained face, and hair flying behind.
+
+"Tiza!" cried Milly, trying to stop her. But Tiza ran past her as quick
+as lightning down the garden path towards the cherry tree, and in
+another minute, in spite of the shower of wet she shook down on herself
+as she climbed up, she was sitting high and safe among the branches,
+where there was no catching her nor even seeing her.
+
+"Ay, that's the best place for ye," said Mrs. Backhouse, appearing at
+the door with an angry face, "you'll not get into so much mischief there
+perhaps as you will indoors. Oh, is that you, Miss Elliot (that was Aunt
+Emma's surname)? Walk in please, ma'am, though you'll find me sadly
+untidy this afternoon. Tiza's been at her tricks again; she keeps me
+sweeping up after her all day. Just look here, if you please, ma'am."
+
+Aunt Emma went in, and the children pressed in after her, full of
+curiosity to see what crime Tiza had been committing. Poor Mrs.
+Backhouse! all over her clean kitchen floor there were streams of water
+running about, with little pieces of cabbage and carrot sticking up in
+them here and there, while on the kitchen table lay a heap of meat and
+vegetables, which Mrs. Backhouse had evidently just picked up out of the
+grate before Aunt Emma and the children arrived.
+
+"Yes," said Mrs. Backhouse, pointing to the floor, "there's the supper
+just spoilt. Tiza's never easy but when she's in mischief. I'm sure
+these wet days I have'nt known what to do with her indoors all day. And
+what must she do this afternoon but tie her tin mug to the cat's tail,
+till the poor creature was nearly beside herself with fright, and went
+rushing about upstairs like a mad thing. And then, just when I happened
+to be out a minute looking after something, she lets the cat in here,
+and the poor thing jumps into the saucepan I had just put on with the
+broth for our supper, and in her fright and all turns it right over. And
+now look at my grate, and the fender, and the floor, and the meat there
+all messed! I expect her father'll give Tiza a good beating when he
+comes in, and I'm sure I shan't stand in the way."
+
+"Oh no, please, Mrs. Backhouse!" said Milly, running up to her with a
+grave imploring little face. "Don't let Mr. Backhouse beat her; she
+didn't mean it, she was only in fun, I'm sure."
+
+"Well, missy, it's very troiblesome fun I'm sure," said Mrs. Backhouse,
+patting Milly kindly on the shoulder, for she was a good-natured woman,
+and it wasn't her way to be angry long. "I don't know what I'm to give
+John for his supper, that I don't. I had nothing in the house but just
+those little odds and ends of meat, that I thought would make a nice bit
+of broth for supper. And now he'll come in wet and hungry, and there'll
+be nothing for him. Well, we must do with something else, I suppose, but
+I expect her father'll beat her."
+
+Milly and Olly looked rather awestruck at the idea of a beating from
+John Backhouse, that great strong brawny farmer; and Milly, whispering
+something quickly to Aunt Emma, slipped out into the garden again. By
+this time father and mother had come up, and Becky appeared from the
+farmyard, wheeling the baby in a little wooden cart, and radiant with
+pleasure at the sight of Aunt Emma, whose godchild she was, so that
+Milly's disappearance was not noticed.
+
+She ran down the garden path to the cherry tree, and as, in the various
+times they had been together, Becky and Tiza had taught her a good deal
+of climbing, she too clambered up into the wet branches, and was soon
+sitting close by Tiza, who had turned her cotton pinafore over her head
+and wouldn't look at Milly.
+
+"Tiza," said Milly softly, putting her hand on Tiza's lap, "do you feel
+very bad?"
+
+No answer.
+
+"We came to take you down to have tea with us," said Milly, "do you
+think your mother will let you come?"
+
+"Naw," said Tiza shortly, without moving from behind her pinafore.
+
+It certainly wasn't very easy talking to Tiza. Milly thought she'd
+better try something else.
+
+"Tiza," she began timidly, "do your father and mother tell you stories
+when it rains?"
+
+"Naw," said Tiza, in a very astonished voice, throwing down her pinafore
+to stare at Milly.
+
+"Then what do you do, Tiza, when it rains?"
+
+"Nothing," said Tiza. "We has our dinners and tea, and sometimes Becky
+minds the baby and sometimes I do, and father mostly goes to sleep."
+
+"Tiza," said Milly hurriedly, "did you _mean_ pussy to jump into the
+saucepan?"
+
+Up went Tiza's pinafore again, and Milly was in dismay because she
+thought she had made Tiza cry; but to her great surprise Tiza suddenly
+burst into such fits of laughter, that she nearly tumbled off the cherry
+tree. "Oh, she did jump so, and the mug made such a rattling! And when
+she comed out there was just a little bit of carrot sticking to her
+nose, and her tail was all over cabbage leaf. Oh, she did look funny!"
+
+Milly couldn't help laughing too, till she remembered all that Mrs.
+Backhouse had been saying.
+
+"Oh, but, Tiza, Mrs. Backhouse says your father won't have anything for
+his supper. Aren't you sorry you spoilt his supper?"
+
+"Yis," said Tiza, quickly. "I know father'll beat me, he said he would
+next time I vexed mother."
+
+And this time the pinafore went up in earnest, and Tiza began to cry
+piteously.
+
+"Don't cry, Tiza," said Milly, her own little cheeks getting wet, too.
+"I'll beg him not. Can't you make up anyway? Mother says we must always
+make up if we can when we've done any harm. I wish I had anything to
+give you to make up."
+
+Tiza suddenly dried her eyes and looked at Milly, with a bright
+expression which was very puzzling.
+
+"You come with me," she said suddenly, swinging herself down from the
+tree. "Come here by the hedge, don't let mother see us."
+
+So they ran along the far side of the hedge till they got into the
+farmyard, and then Tiza led Milly past the hen-house, up to the corner
+where the hayricks were. In and out of the hayricks they went, till in
+the very farthest corner of all, where hardly anybody ever came, and
+which nobody could see into from the yard, Tiza suddenly knelt down and
+put her hand under the hay at the bottom of the rick.
+
+"You come," she whispered eagerly to Milly, pulling her by the skirt,
+"you come and look here."
+
+Milly stooped down, and there in a soft little place, just between the
+hayrick and the ground, what do you think she saw? Three large brownish
+eggs lying in a sort of rough nest in the hay, and looking so round and
+fresh and tempting, that Milly gave a little cry of delight.
+
+"Oh, Tiza, how be--utiful! How did they get there?"
+
+"It's old Sally, our white hen you know, laid them. I found them just
+after dinner. Mother doesn't know nothing about them. I never told
+Becky, nor nobody. Aren't they beauties?"
+
+And Tiza took one up lovingly in her rough, little brown hands, and laid
+it against her cheek, to feel how soft and satiny it was.
+
+"Oh, and Tiza, I know," exclaimed Milly eagerly, "you meant these would
+do for supper. That would be a lovely make up. There's three. One for
+Mr. Backhouse, one for Mrs. Backhouse, and one for Becky.--There's none
+for you, Tiza."
+
+"Nor none for Becky neither," answered Tiza shortly. "Father'll want
+two. Becky and me'll get bread and dripping."
+
+"Well, come along, Tiza, let's take them in."
+
+"No, you take them," said Tiza. "Mother won't want to see me no more,
+and father'll perhaps be coming in."
+
+"Oh, but, Tiza, you'll come to tea with us?"
+
+"I don't know," said Tiza. "You ask."
+
+And off she ran as quick as lightning, off to her hiding-place in the
+cherry tree, while Milly was left with the three brown eggs, feeling
+rather puzzled and anxious. However, she put them gently in the skirt of
+her frock, and holding it up in both hands she picked her way through
+the wet yard back to the house.
+
+When she appeared at the kitchen door, Aunt Emma and Mrs. Backhouse were
+chatting quietly. Mr. and Mrs. Norton, and Olly, had gone on for a
+little stroll along the Wanwick road, and Becky was sitting on the
+window-sill with the baby, who seemed very sleepy, but quite determined
+not to go to sleep in spite of all Becky's rocking and patting.
+
+"Oh, Mrs. Backhouse," began Milly, coming in with a bright flushed face,
+"just look here, what I've brought. Tiza found them just after dinner
+to-day. They were under the hayrick right away in the corner, and she
+wanted to make up, so she showed me where they were, so I brought them
+in, and there's two for Mr. Backhouse, and one for you, you know. And,
+please, won't you let Tiza come to tea with us?"
+
+Mrs. Backhouse looked in astonishment at the three eggs lying in Milly's
+print skirt, and at Milly's pleading little face.
+
+"Ay, that's Sally, I suppose. She's always hiding her eggs is Sally,
+where I can't find them. So it was Tiza found them, was it, Missy? Well,
+they will come, in very handy for supper as it happens. Thank you kindly
+for bringing them in."
+
+And Mrs. Backhouse took the eggs and put them safely away in a pie-dish,
+while Becky secretly pulled Milly by the sleeve, and smiled up at her as
+much as to say,
+
+"Thank you for helping Tiza out of her scrape."
+
+"And you'll let Becky and Tiza come to tea?" asked Milly again.
+
+"Well, I'm sure, Miss, I don't know," said Mrs. Backhouse, looking
+puzzled; "Becky may come and welcome, but perhaps it would do Tiza good
+to stay at home."
+
+"Don't you think she'd better have a little change?" said Aunt Emma in
+her kind voice, which made Milly want to hug her. "I daresay staying
+indoors so long made her restless. If you will let me carry them both
+off, I daresay between us, Mrs. Backhouse, we can give Tiza a talking
+to, and perhaps she'll come back in a more sensible mood."
+
+"Well, Miss Elliot, she shall go if you wish it. Come Becky, give me the
+baby, and go and put your things on." And then going to the door, Mrs.
+Backhouse shouted "Tiza!" After a second or two a little figure dropped
+down out of the cherry tree and came slowly up the walk. Tiza had shaken
+her hair about her face so that it could hardly be seen, and she never
+looked once at Aunt Emma and Milly as she came up to her mother.
+
+"There, go along, Tiza, and get your things on," said Mrs. Backhouse,
+taking her by the arm. "I wouldn't have let you go out to tea, you know,
+if Miss Elliot and Missy hadn't asked particular. Mind you don't get
+into no more mischief. And very like those eggs'll do for father's
+supper; so, I daresay, I'll not say anything to him this time--just for
+once. Now go up."
+
+Tiza didn't want to be told twice, and presently, just as Mr. and Mrs.
+Norton and Olly were coming back from their walk, they met Aunt Emma
+coming back from the farm holding Becky's hand, while Milly and Tiza
+walked in front.
+
+"Well, Tiza," said Mr. Norton, patting her curly head, I declare I think
+you beat Olly for mischief. Olly never spoilt my dinner yet, that I
+remember. What should I do to him do you think, if he did?"
+
+"Beat him," said Tiza, looking up at Mr. Norton with her quick birdlike
+eyes.
+
+"Oh dear, no!" said Mr. Norton, "that wouldn't do my dinner any good. I
+should eat him up instead."
+
+"I don't believe little boys taste good a bit," said Olly, who always
+believed firmly in his father's various threats. "If you ettened me,
+father, you'd be ill."
+
+"Oh no," said Mr. Norton, "not if I eat you with plenty of bread-sauce.
+That's the best way to cook little boys. Now, Milly, which of you three
+girls can get to that gate first?"
+
+Off ran the three little girls full tilt down the hill leading to
+Ravensnest, with Olly puffing and panting after them. Milly led the way
+at first, for she was light and quick, and a very fair runner for her
+age; but Tiza soon got up to her and passed her, and it was Tiza's
+little stout legs that arrived first at Ravensnest gate.
+
+"Oh, Becky!" said Milly, putting her arm round Becky's neck as they went
+into the house together, "I hope you may stay a good long time. What
+time do you go to bed?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know," said Becky. "We go when fayther goes."
+
+"When fayther goes!" exclaimed Milly. "Why, we go ever so long before
+father. Why do you stay up so late?"
+
+"Why, it isn't late," said Becky. "Fayther goes to bed, now it's
+summertime, about half-past eight; but in winter, of course, he goes
+earlier. And we all goes together, except baby. Mother puts him out of
+the way before supper."
+
+"Well, but how funny," said Milly, "I can't think why you should be so
+different from us."
+
+And Milly went on puzzling over Becky and her going to bed, till nurse
+drove it all out of her head by fetching them to tea. Such a merry tea
+they had, and after tea a romp in the big kitchen with father, which
+delighted the little farm children beyond measure. Some time in the
+evening, I believe, Aunt Emma managed to give Tiza a little talking to,
+but none of the other children knew anything about it, except perhaps
+Becky, who generally knew what was happening to Tiza.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+MILLY'S BIRTHDAY
+
+
+Now we have come to a chapter which is going to be half merry and half
+sad. I have not told you any sad things about Milly and Olly up till
+now, I think. They were such happy little people, that there was nothing
+sad to tell you. They cried sometimes, of course--you remember Milly
+cried when Olly stickied her doll--but generally, by the time they had
+dried up their tears they had quite forgotten what they were crying
+about; and as for any real trouble, why they didn't know what it could
+possibly be like. But now, just as they were going away from Ravensnest,
+came a real sad thing, and you'll hear very soon how it happened.
+
+After those three wet days it was sometimes fine and sometimes rainy at
+Ravensnest, but never so rainy as to keep the Nortons in all day. And
+every now and then there were splendid days, when the children and their
+father and mother were out all day long, wandering over the mountains,
+or walking over to Aunt Emma's or tramping along the well-known roads to
+Wanwick on one side, and the little village of Rydal and Rydal Lake on
+the other. They had another row on Windermere; and one fine evening Mr.
+Norton borrowed a friend's boat, and they went out fishing for perch on
+Rydal Lake, the loveliest little lake in the world, lying softly in a
+green mountain cup, and dotted with islands, which seemed to the
+children when they landed on them like little bits of fairyland dropped
+into the blue water.
+
+[Illustration: "Haymaking"]
+
+And then! crown of delights! came the haymaking. There were long fine
+days, when the six small creatures--Milly, Olly, Becky, Tiza, Bessie,
+and Charlie--followed John Backhouse and his men about in the hayfields
+from early morning till evening, helping to make the hay, or simply
+rolling about like a parcel of kittens in the flowery fragrant heaps.
+
+Aunt Emma was often at Ravensnest, and the children learned to love her
+better and better, so that even wild little Olly would remember to bring
+her stool, and carry her shawl, and change her plate at dinner; and
+Milly, who was always clinging to somebody, was constantly puzzled to
+know whose pocket to sit in, mother's or Aunt Emma's.
+
+Then there was the farmyard, the cows, and the milking, and the
+chickens. Everything about them seemed delightful to Milly and Olly, and
+the top of everything was reached when one evening John Backhouse
+mounted both the children on his big carthorse Dobbin, and they and
+Dobbin together dragged the hay home in triumph.
+
+And now they had only one week more to stay at Ravensnest. But that week
+was a most important week, for it was to contain no less a day than
+Milly's birthday. Milly would be seven years old on the 15th of July,
+and for about a week before the 15th, Milly's little head could think of
+nothing else. Olly too was very much excited about it, for though Milly
+of course was the queen of the day, and all the presents were for her,
+not for him, still it was good times for everybody on Milly's birthday;
+besides which, he had his own little secret with mother about his
+present to Milly, a secret which made him very happy, but which he was
+on the point of telling at least a hundred times a day.
+
+"Father," said Milly, about four days before the birthday, when they
+were all wandering about after tea one evening in the high garden which
+was now a paradise of ripe red strawberries and fruit of every kind,
+"does everybody have birthdays? Do policemen have birthdays?"
+
+"I expect so, Milly," said Mr. Norton, laughing, "but they haven't any
+time to remember them."
+
+"But, father, what's the good of having birthdays if you don't keep
+them, and have presents and all that? And do cats and dogs have
+birthdays? I should like to find out Spot's birthday. We'd give her
+cream instead of milk, you know, and I'd tie a blue ribbon round her
+neck, and one round her tail like the queen's sheep in mother's story."
+
+"I don't suppose Spot would thank you at all," said Mr. Norton. "The
+cream would make her ill, and the ribbon would fidget her dreadfully
+till she pulled it off."
+
+"Oh dear!" sighed Milly. "Well, I suppose Spot had better not have any
+birthday then. But, father, what do you think? Becky and Tiza don't care
+about their birthdays a bit. Becky could hardly remember when hers was,
+and they never have any presents unless Aunt Emma gives them one, or
+people to tea, or anything.'
+
+"Well, you see, Milly, when people have only just pennies and shillings
+enough to buy bread and meat to eat, and clothes to put on, they can't
+go spending money on presents; and when they're very anxious and busy
+all the year round they can't be remembering birthdays and taking pains
+about them like richer people can, who have less to trouble them, and
+whose work does not take up quite so much time."
+
+"Well, but why don't the rich people remember the poor people's
+birthdays for them, father? Then they could give them presents, and ask
+them to tea and all, you know."
+
+"Yes, that would be a very good arrangement," said Mr. Norton, smiling
+at her eager little face. "Only, somehow, Milly, things don't come right
+like that in this world."
+
+"Well, I'm going to try and remember Becky's and Tiza's birthdays," said
+Milly. "I'll tell mother to put them down in her pocket-book--won't you,
+mother? Oh, what fun! I'll send them birthday cards, and they'll be so
+surprised, and wonder why; and then they'll say, 'Oh, why, of course
+it's our birthday!'--No, not _our_ birthday--but you know what I mean,
+father."
+
+"Well, but, Milly," asked Mrs. Norton, "have you made up your mind what
+you want to do this birthday?"
+
+Milly stopped suddenly, with her hands behind her, opposite her mother,
+with her lips tightly pressed together, her eyes smiling, as if there
+was a tremendous secret hidden somewhere.
+
+"Well, monkey, out with it. What have you got hidden away in your little
+head?"
+
+"Well, mother," said Milly, slowly, "I don't want to _have_ anybody to
+tea. I want to go out to tea with somebody. Now can you guess?"
+
+"With Aunt Emma?"
+
+"Oh no, Aunt Emma's coming over here all day. She promised she would."
+
+"With Becky and Tiza?"
+
+Milly nodded, and screwed up her little lips tighter than ever.
+
+"But I don't expect Mrs. Backhouse will want the trouble of having you
+two to tea.
+
+"Oh mother, she won't mind a bit. I know she won't; because Becky told
+me one day her mother would like us very much to come some time if you'd
+let us. And Nana could come and help Mrs. Backhouse, and we could all
+wash up the tea-things afterwards, like we did at the picnic."
+
+"Then Tiza mustn't sit next me," said Olly, who had been listening in
+silence to all the arrangements. "She takes away my bread and butter
+when I'm not looking, and I don't like it, not a bit."
+
+"No, Olly dear, she shan't," said Milly, taking his hand and fondling
+it, as if she were at least twenty years older. "I'll sit on one side of
+you and Becky on the other," a prospect with which Olly was apparently
+satisfied, for he made no more objections.
+
+"Well, you must ask Mrs. Backhouse yourselves," said Mrs. Norton. "And
+if it is her washing-day, or inconvenient to her at all, you mustn't
+think of going, you know."
+
+So early next morning, Milly and Nana and Olly went up to the farm, and
+came back with the answer that Mrs. Backhouse would be very pleased to
+see them at tea on Thursday, the 15th, and that John Backhouse would
+have cut the hay-field by the river by then, and they could have a romp
+in the hay afterwards.
+
+Wednesday was a deeply interesting day to Olly. He and his mother went
+over by themselves to Wanwick, and they bought something which the
+shopwoman at the toy-shop wrapped up in a neat little parcel, and which
+Olly carried home, looking as important as a little king.
+
+"Milly," he began at dinner, "_wouldn't_ you like to know about your
+presents? But of course I shan't tell you about mine. Perhaps I'm not
+going to give you one at all. Oh, mother," in a loud whisper to Mrs.
+Norton, "did you put it away safe where she can't see?"
+
+"Oh, you silly boy," said Milly, "you'll tell me if you don't take
+care."
+
+"No, I shan't. I wouldn't tell you if you were to go on asking me all
+day. It isn't very big, you know, Milly, and--and--it isn't pretty
+outside--only--"
+
+"Be quiet, chatterbox," said Mr. Norton putting his hand over Olly's
+mouth, "you'll tell in another minute, and then there'll be no fun
+to-morrow."
+
+So Olly with great difficulty kept quiet, and began eating up his
+pudding very fast, as if that was the only way of keeping his little
+tongue out of mischief.
+
+"Father," he said after dinner, "do take Milly out for a walk, and
+mother shall take me. Then I can't tell, you know."
+
+So the two went out different ways, and Olly kept away from Milly all
+day, in great fear lest somehow or other his secret should fly out of
+him in spite of all his efforts to keep it in. At night the children
+made nurse hurry them to bed, so that when mother came to tuck them up,
+as she generally did, she found the pair fast asleep, and nothing left
+to kiss but two curly heads buried in the pillows.
+
+"Bless their hearts," said nurse to Mrs. Norton, "they can think of
+nothing but to-morrow. They'll be sadly disappointed if it rains."
+
+But the stars came out, and the new moon shone softly all night on the
+great fir trees and the rosebuds and the little dancing beck in the
+Ravensnest garden; and when Milly awoke next morning the sun was
+shining, and Brownholme was towering up clear and high into the breezy
+blue sky, and the trees were throwing cool shadows on the dewy lawn
+around the house.
+
+"Oh dear!" said Milly, jumping up, her face flushing with joy "it's my
+birthday, and it's fine. Nana, bring me my things, please.--But where's
+Olly?"
+
+Where indeed was Olly? There was his little bed, but there was a
+nightdress rolled up in it, and not a wisp of his brown curls was to be
+seen anywhere.
+
+"Why, Miss Milly, are you woke up at last? I hardly thought you'd have
+slept so late this morning. Many happy returns of the day to you," said
+nurse, giving her a hearty hug.
+
+"Thank you, _dear_ nurse. Oh, it is so nice having birthdays. But where
+can Olly be?"
+
+"Don't you trouble your head about him," said nurse mysteriously, and
+not another word could Milly get out of her. She had just slipped on her
+white cotton frock when mother opened the door.
+
+"Well, birthday-girl! The top of the morning to you, and many, many
+happy returns of the day."
+
+Whereupon Milly and mother went through a great deal of kissing which
+need not be described, and then mother helped her brush her hair, and
+put on her ribbon and tie her sash, so that in another minute or two she
+was quite ready to go down.
+
+"Now, Milly, wait one minute till you hear the bell ring, and then you
+may come down as fast as you like."
+
+So Milly waited, her little feet dancing with impatience, till the bell
+began to ring as if it had gone quite mad.
+
+"Oh, that's Olly ringing," cried Milly, rushing off. And sure enough
+when she got to the hall there was Olly ringing as if he meant to bring
+the house down. He dropped the bell when he saw Milly, and dragged her
+breathlessly into the dining-room.
+
+And what did Milly see there I wonder? Why, a heap of red and white
+roses lying on the breakfast table, a big heap, with odd corners and
+points sticking up all over it, and under the roses a white napkin, and
+under the napkin treasures of all sorts--a book from father, a little
+work-box from mother, with a picture of Windermere on the outside, and
+inside the most delightful cottons and needles and bits of
+bright-coloured stuffs; a china doll's dinner-service from Aunt Emma, a
+mug from nurse, a little dish full of big red strawberries from
+gardener, and last, but not least, Olly's present--a black paint-box,
+with colours and brushes and all complete, and tied up with a little
+drawing-book which mother had added to make it really useful. At the top
+of the heap, too, lay two letters addressed in very big round hand to
+"Miss Milly Norton," and one was signed Jacky and the other signed
+Francis. Each of these presents had neat little labels fastened on to
+them, and they were smothered in roses--deep red and pale pink roses,
+with the morning dew sprinkled over them.
+
+"We got all those roses, mother and me, this morning, when you was fast
+asleep, Milly," shouted Olly, who was capering about like a mad
+creature. "Mother pulled me out of bed ever so early, and I putted on my
+goloshes, and didn't we get wet just! Milly, _isn't_ my paint-box a
+beauty?"
+
+But it's no good trying to describe what Milly felt. She felt as every
+happy little girl feels on a happy birthday, just a little bit
+bewitched, as if she had got into another kind of world altogether.
+
+"Now," said father, after breakfast, "I'm yours, Milly, for all this
+morning. What are you going to do with me?"
+
+"Make you into a tiger, father, and shoot you," said Olly, who would
+have liked to play at hunting and shooting games all day long.
+
+"I didn't ask you, sir," said Mr. Norton, "I'm not yours, I'm Milly's.
+Now, Milly, what shall we do?"
+
+"Will you take us right to the top of Brownholme, father? You know we
+haven't been to the very top yet."
+
+"Very well, we'll go if your legs will carry you. But you must ask them
+very particularly first how they feel, for it'll be stiff work for
+them."
+
+Not very long after breakfast, and before they started for their walk,
+Aunt Emma's pony carriage came rattling up the drive, and she, too,
+brought flowers for Milly, above all a bunch of water-lilies all wet
+from the lake; and then she and mother settled under the trees with
+their books and work while the children started on their walk.
+
+But first Milly had drawn mother into a corner where no one could see,
+and there, with a couple of tears in her two blue eyes, she had
+whispered in a great hurry, so that Mrs. Norton could scarcely hear, "I
+don't want to have everything just as _I_ like, to-day, mother. Can't I
+do what somebody else likes? I'd rather."
+
+Which means that Milly was a good deal excited, and her heart very full,
+and that she was thinking of how, a year before, her birthday had been
+rather spoilt toward the end of it by a little bit of crossness and
+self-will, that she remembered afterward with a pang for many a long
+day. Since then, Milly had learnt a good deal more of that long, long
+lesson, which we go on learning, big people and little people, all our
+lives--the lesson of self-forgetting--of how love brings joy, and to be
+selfish is to be sad; and her birthday seemed to bring back to her all
+that she had been learning.
+
+"Dear little woman," said Mrs. Norton, putting back her tangled hair
+from her anxious little face, "go and be happy. That's what we all like
+to-day. Besides, you'll find plenty of ways of doing what other people
+like before the end of the day without my inventing any. Run along now,
+and climb away. Mind you don't let Olly tumble into bogs, and mind you
+bring me a bunch of ferns for the dinner-table--and there'll be two
+things done at any rate."
+
+So away ran Milly; and all the morning she and Olly and father scrambled
+and climbed, and raced and chatted, on the green back of old Brownholme.
+They went to say good-morning to John Backhouse's cows in the "intake,"
+as he called his top field, and they just peeped over the wall at the
+fierce young bull he had bought at Penrith fair a few days before, and
+which looked as if, birthdays or no birthdays, he could have eaten Milly
+at two mouthfuls, and swallowed Olly down afterwards without knowing it.
+
+Then they climbed and climbed after father, till, just as Olly was
+beginning to feel his legs to make sure they weren't falling off, they
+were so tired and shaky--there they were standing on the great pile of
+stones which marks the top of the mountain--the very tip-top of all its
+green points and rocks and grassy stretches. By this time the children
+knew the names of most of the mountains around, and of all the lakes.
+They went through them now like a lesson with their father; and even
+Olly remembered a great many, and could chatter about Helvellyn, and
+Fairfield, and Langdale Pikes, as if he had trudged to the top of them
+all himself.
+
+Then came the getting down again. Father and Milly and Olly
+hand-in-hand, racing over the short fine grass, startling the little
+black-faced sheep, and racing down the steep bits, where Milly and Olly
+generally tumbled over in some sort of a heap at the bottom. As for the
+flowers they gathered, there were so many I have no time to tell you
+about them--wood-flowers and bog-flowers and grass-flowers, and ferns of
+all sizes to mix with them, from the great Osmunda, which grew along the
+Ravensnest Beck, down to the tiny little parsley fern. It was all
+delightful--the sights and the sounds, and the fresh mountain wind that
+blew them about on the top so that long afterward Milly used to look
+back to that walk on Brownholme when she was seven years old as one of
+the merriest times she ever spent.
+
+Dinner was very welcome after all this scrambling; and after dinner came
+a quiet time in the garden, when father read aloud to mother and Aunt
+Emma, and the children kept still and listened to as much as they could
+understand, at least until they went to sleep, which they both did lying
+on a rug at Aunt Emma's feet. Milly couldn't understand how this had
+happened at all, when she found herself waking up and rubbing her eyes,
+but I think it was natural enough after their long walk in the sun and
+wind.
+
+At four o'clock nurse came for them, and when they had been put into
+clean frocks and pinafores, she took them up to the farm. Milly and Olly
+felt that this was a very solemn occasion, and they walked up to the
+farmhouse door hand-in-hand, feeling as shy as if they had never been
+there before. But at the door were Becky and Tiza waiting for them, as
+smart as new pins, with shining hair, and red ribbons under their little
+white collars; and the children no sooner caught sight of one another
+than all their shyness flew away, and they began to chatter as usual.
+
+In the farmhouse kitchen were Bessie and Charlie, and such a comfortable
+tea spread out on a long table, covered with a red and black woollen
+table-cloth instead of a white one. Becky and Tiza had filled two
+tumblers with meadow-sweet and blue campanula, which stood up grandly in
+the middle, and there were two home-made cakes at each end, and some of
+Sally's brown eggs, and piles of tempting bread and butter.
+
+Each of the children had their gift for Milly too: Becky had plaited her
+a basket of rushes, a thing she had often tried to teach Milly how to
+make for herself, and Tiza pushed a bunch of wild raspberries into her
+hand, and ran away before Milly could say thank you; Bessie shyly
+produced a Christmas card that somebody had once sent to her; and even
+Charlie had managed to provide himself with a bunch of the wild yellow
+poppies which grew on the wall of the Ravensnest garden, and were a joy
+to all beholders.
+
+Then Mrs. Backhouse put Milly at one end of the table, while she began
+to pour out tea at the other, and the feast began. Certainly, Milly
+thought, it was much more exciting going out to tea at a farmhouse than
+having children to tea with you at home, just as you might anywhere, on
+any day in the year. There were the big hens coming up to the door and
+poking in their long necks to take a look at them; there were the
+pigeons circling round and round in the yard; there was the sound of
+milking going on in the shed close by, and many other sights and sounds
+which were new and strange and delightful.
+
+As for Olly, he was very much taken up for a time with the red and black
+table-cloth, and could not be kept from peering underneath it from time
+to time, as if he suspected that the white table-cloth he was generally
+accustomed to had been hidden away underneath for a joke. But when the
+time for cake came, Olly forgot the table-cloth altogether. He had never
+seen a cake quite like the bun-loaf, which kind Mrs. Backhouse had made
+herself for the occasion, and of which she had given him a hunch, so in
+his usual inquisitive way he began to turn it over and over, as if by
+looking at it long enough he could find out how it was made and all
+about it. Presently, when the others were all quietly enjoying their
+bun-loaf, Olly's shrill little voice was heard saying--while he put two
+separate fingers on two out of the few currants in his piece:
+
+"_This_ currant says to _that_ currant, 'I'm here, where are you? You're
+so far off I can't see you nowhere.'"
+
+"Olly, be quiet," said Milly.
+
+"Well, but, Milly, I can't help it; it's so funny. There's only three
+currants in my bit, and cookie puts such a lot in at home. I'm
+pretending they're little children wanting to play, only they can't,
+they're so far off. There, I've etten one up. Now there's only two.
+That's you and me, Milly. I'll eat you up first--krick!"
+
+"Never mind about the currants, little master," said Mrs. Backhouse,
+laughing at him. "It's nice and sweet any way, and you can eat as much
+of it as you like, which is more than you can of rich cakes."
+
+Olly thought there was something in this, and by the time he had got
+through his second bit of bun-loaf he had quite made up his mind that he
+would get Susan to make bun-loaves at home too.
+
+They were just finishing tea when there was a great clatter outside, and
+by came the hay-cart with John Backhouse leading the horse, and two men
+walking beside it.
+
+"We're going to carry all the hay in yon lower field presently," he
+shouted to his wife as he passed. "Send the young 'uns down to see."
+
+Up they all started, and presently the whole party were racing down the
+hill to the riverfield, with Mrs. Backhouse and her baby walking soberly
+with nurse behind them. Yes, there lay the hay piled up in large cocks
+on the fresh clean-swept carpet of bright green grass, and in the middle
+of the field stood the hay-cart with two horses harnessed, one man
+standing in it to press down and settle the hay as John Backhouse and
+two other men handed it up to him on pitchforks. Olly went head over
+heels into the middle of one of the cocks, followed by Charlie, and
+would have liked to go head over heels into all the rest, but Mr.
+Norton, who had come into the field with mother and Aunt Emma, told him
+he must be content to play with two cocks in one of the far corners of
+the field without disturbing the others, which were all ready for
+carrying, and that if he and Charlie strewed the hay about they must
+tidy it up before John Backhouse wanted to put it on the cart. So Olly
+and Charlie went off to their corner, and for a little while all the
+other children played there too. Milly had invented a game called the
+"Babes in the Wood," in which two children were the babes and pretended
+to die on the grass, and all the rest were the robins, and covered them
+up with hay instead of leaves. She and Tiza made beautiful babes: they
+put their handkerchiefs over their faces and lay as still as mice, till
+Olly had piled so much hay on the top of them that there was not a bit
+of them to be seen anywhere, while Bessie began to cry out as if she was
+suffocated before they had put two good armfuls over her.
+
+Presently, however, Milly got tired; and she and Tiza walked off by
+themselves and sat down by the river to get cool. The water in the river
+was quite low again now, and the children could watch the tiny minnows
+darting and flashing about by the bank, and even amuse themselves by
+fancying every now and then that they saw a trout shooting across the
+clear brown water. Tiza had quite left off being shy now with Milly, and
+the two chattered away, Milly telling Tiza all about her school, and
+Jacky and Francis, and Spot and the garden at home; and Tiza telling
+Milly about her father's new bull, how frightened she and Becky were of
+him, and how father meant to make the fence stronger for fear he should
+get out and toss people.
+
+"What a happy little party," said Aunt Emma to mother looking round the
+field; "there's nothing like hay for children."
+
+By this time the hay-cart was quite full, and crack went John
+Backhouse's whip, as he took hold of the first horse's head and gave him
+a pull forward to start the cart on its way to the farm.
+
+"Gee-up," shouted John in his loud cheery voice, and the horse made a
+step forward, while the children round cried "Hurrah!" and waved their
+hands. But suddenly there was a loud piteous cry which made John give
+the horse a sudden push back and drop his whip, and then, from where
+they sat, Milly and Tiza heard a sound of crying and screaming, while
+everybody in the field ran toward the hay-cart. They ran too; what could
+have happened?
+
+Just as they came up to the crowd of people round the cart, Milly saw
+her father with something in his arms. And this something was
+Becky--poor little Becky, with a great mark on her temple, and her eyes
+quite shut, and such a white face!
+
+"Oh, mother! mother!" cried Milly, rushing up to her, "tell me, mother,
+what is the matter with Becky?"
+
+But Mrs. Norton had no time to attend to her. She was running to meet
+Mrs. Backhouse, who had come hurrying up from another part of the field
+with the baby in her arms.
+
+"She was under the cart when it moved on," said Mrs. Norton, taking the
+baby from her. "We none of us know how it happened. She must have been
+trying to hand up some hay at the last moment and tumbled under. I don't
+think her head is much hurt."
+
+On ran Mrs. Backhouse, and Milly and her mother followed.
+
+"Better let me carry her up now without moving her," said Mr. Norton, as
+Mrs. Backhouse tried to take the little bundle from him. "She has
+fainted, I think. We must get some water at the stream." So on he went,
+with the pale frightened mother, while the others followed. Aunt Emma
+had got Tiza and Milly by the hand, and was trying to comfort them.
+
+"We hope she is not much hurt, darlings; the wheel did not go over her,
+thank God. It was just upon her when her father backed the horse. But it
+must have crushed her I'm afraid, and there was something hanging under
+the cart which gave her that knock on the temple. Look, there is one of
+the men starting off for the doctor."
+
+Whereupon Tiza, who had kept quiet till then, burst into a loud fit of
+crying, and threw herself down on the grass.
+
+"Nurse," called Aunt Emma, "stay here with these two poor little ones
+while I go and see if I can be of any use."
+
+So nurse came and sat beside them, and Milly crept up to her for
+comfort. But poor little Tiza lay with her face buried in the grass and
+nothing they could say to her seemed to reach her little deaf ears.
+
+Meanwhile, Aunt Emma hurried after the others, and presently caught them
+up at a stream where Mr. Norton had stopped to bathe Becky's head and
+face. The cold water had just revived her when Aunt Emma came up, and
+for one moment she opened her heavy blue eyes and looked at her mother,
+who was bending over her, and then they shut again. But her little hand
+went feebly searching for her mother, who caught it up and kissed it.
+
+"Oh, Miss Emma, Miss Emma," she said, pointing to the child, "I'm afeard
+but she's badly hurt."
+
+"I hope not, with all my heart," said Aunt Emma, gently taking her arm.
+"But the doctor will soon be here; we must get her home before he
+comes."
+
+So on they went again, Mr. Norton still carrying Becky, and Mr.
+Backhouse helping his wife along. Mrs. Norton had got the baby safe in
+her motherly arms, and so they all toiled up the hill to the farmhouse.
+What a difference from the merry party that ran down the hill only an
+hour before!
+
+They laid Becky down on her mother's bed, and then Aunt Emma, finding
+that Mrs. Norton wished to stay till the doctor came, went back to the
+children. She found a sad little group sitting in the hay-field; Milly
+in nurse's lap crying quietly every now and then; Tiza still sobbing on
+the grass, and Olly who had just crept down from the farmhouse, where he
+and Charlie had seen Becky carried in, talking to nurse in eager
+whispers, as if he daren't talk out loud.
+
+"Oh, Aunt Emma," cried Milly, when she opened the gate, "is she better?"
+
+"A little, I think, Milly, but the doctor will soon be here, and then we
+shall know all about it. Tiza, you poor little woman, Mrs. Wheeler says
+you must sleep with them to-night. Your mother will want the house very
+quiet, and to-morrow, you know, you can go and see Becky if the doctor
+says you may."
+
+At this Tiza began to cry again more piteously than ever. It seemed so
+dreary and terrible to her to be shut out from home without Becky. But
+Aunt Emma sat down on the grass beside her, and lifted her up and talked
+to her; with anybody else Tiza would have kicked and struggled, for she
+was a curious, passionate child, and her grief was always wild and
+angry, but nobody could struggle with Aunt Emma, and at last she let
+herself be comforted a little by the tender voice and soft caressing
+hand. She stopped crying, and then they all took her up to the
+Wheelers's cottage, where Mrs. Wheeler, a kind motherly body, took her
+in, and promised that she should know everything there was to be known
+about Becky.
+
+"Aunt Emma," said Milly, presently, when they were all sitting in the
+conservatory which ran round the house, waiting for Mr. Norton to bring
+them news from the farm, "how did Becky tumble under the cart?"
+
+"She was lifting up some hay, I think, which had fallen off, and one of
+the men was stooping down to take it on his fork, and then she must have
+slipped and fallen right under the cart, just as John Backhouse told the
+horse to go on."
+
+"Oh, if the wheel _had_ gone over!" said Milly, shuddering. "Isn't it a
+sad birthday, Aunt Emma, and we were so happy a little while ago? And
+then I can't understand. I don't know why it happens like this."
+
+"Like what, Milly?"
+
+"Why, Aunt Emma, always in stories, you know, it's the bad people get
+hurt and die. And now it's poor little Becky that's hurt. And she's such
+a dear little girl, and helps her mother so. I don't think she ought to
+have been hurt."
+
+"We don't know anything about 'oughts,' Milly, darling, you and I. God
+knows, we trust, and that helps many people who love God to be patient
+when they are in trouble or pain. But think if it had been poor
+mischievous little Tiza who had been hurt, how she would have fretted.
+And now very likely Becky will bear it beautifully, and so, without
+knowing it, she will be teaching Tiza to be patient, and it will do Tiza
+good to have to help Becky and take care of her for a bit, instead of
+letting Becky always look after her and get her out of scrapes."
+
+"Oh, and Aunt Emma, can't we all take care of Becky? What can Olly and I
+do?" said Milly, imploringly.
+
+"I can go and sing all my songs to Becky," said Olly, looking up
+brightly.
+
+"By-and-by, perhaps," said Aunt Emma, smiling and patting his head. "But
+hark! isn't that father's step?"
+
+It had grown so dark that they could hardly see who it was opening the
+gate.
+
+"Oh yes, it is," cried Milly. "It's father and mother." Away they ran to
+meet them, and Mrs. Norton took Milly's little pale face in both her
+hands and kissed it.
+
+"She's not _very_ badly hurt, darling. The doctor says she must lie
+quite quiet for two or three weeks, and then he hopes she'll be all
+right. The wheel gave her a squeeze, which jarred her poor little back
+and head very much, but it didn't break anything, and if she lies very
+quite the doctor thinks she'll get quite well again." "Oh mother! and
+does Tiza know?"
+
+"Yes, we have just been to tell her. Mrs. Wheeler had put her to bed,
+but she went up to give her our message, and she said poor little Tiza
+began to cry again, and wanted us to tell her mother she would be _so_
+quiet if only they would let her come back to Becky."
+
+"Will they, mother?"
+
+"In a few days, perhaps. But she is not to see anybody but Mrs.
+Backhouse for a little while."
+
+"Oh dear!" sighed Milly, while the tears came into her eyes again. "We
+shall be going away so soon, and we can't say good-bye. Isn't it sad,
+mother, just happening last thing? and we've been so happy all the
+time."
+
+"Yes, Milly," said Mr. Norton, lifting her on to his knee. "This is the
+first really sad thing that ever happened to you in your little life I
+think. Mother, and I, and Aunt Emma, tell you stories about sad things,
+but that's very different, isn't it?"
+
+"Yes," said Milly, thinking. "Father, are there as many sad things
+really as there are in stories?--you know what I mean."
+
+"There are a great many sad things and sad people in the world, Milly.
+We don't have monsters plaguing us like King Hrothgar, but every day
+there is trouble and grief going on somewhere, and we happy and strong
+people must care for the sad ones if we want to do our duty and help to
+straighten the world a little."
+
+"Father," whispered Milly, softly, "will you tell us how--Olly and me?
+We would if we knew how."
+
+"Well, Milly, suppose you begin with Becky, and poor Tiza too, indeed. I
+wonder whether a pair of little people could make a scrap-book for Becky
+to look at when she is getting better?"
+
+"Oh yes, yes!" said Milly, joyfully, "I've got ever so many pictures in
+mother's writing-book, she let me cut out of her 'Graphics,' and Olly
+can help paste; can't you, Olly?"
+
+"Olly generally pastes his face more than anything else," said Mr.
+Norton, giving a sly pull at his brown curls. "If I'm not very much
+mistaken, there is a little fairy pasting up your eyes, old man."
+
+"I'm not sleepy, not a bit," said Olly, sitting bolt upright and
+blinking very fast.
+
+"I think you're not sleepy, but just asleep," said Mr. Norton, catching
+him up in his arms, and carrying him to his mother to say good-night.
+
+Milly went very soberly and quietly up to bed, and for some little time
+she lay awake, her little heart feeling very sore and heavy about the
+"sad things" in the world. Then with her thoughts full of Becky she fell
+asleep.
+
+So ended Milly's birthday, a happy day and a sorrowful day, all in one.
+When Milly grew older there was no birthday just before or after it she
+remembered half so clearly as that on which she was seven years old.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+LAST DAYS AT RAVENSNEST
+
+
+On Friday morning the children and their father trudged up very early to
+the farm to get news of Becky. She had had a bad night Mr. Backhouse
+said, but she had taken some milk and beef-tea; she knew her father and
+mother quite well, and she had asked twice for Tiza. The doctor said
+they must just be patient. Quiet and rest would make her well again, and
+nothing else, and Tiza was not to go home for a day or two.
+
+As for poor Tiza, a long sleep had cheered her up greatly, and when
+Milly and Olly went to take her out with them after breakfast, they
+found her almost as merry and chatty as usual. But she didn't like being
+kept at the Wheelers's, though they were very kind to her; and it was
+all Mrs. Wheeler could do to prevent her from slipping up to the farm
+unknown to anybody.
+
+"They don't have porridge for breakfast," said Tiza, tossing her head,
+when she and Milly were out together. "Mother always gives us porridge.
+And I won't sit next Charlie. He's always dirtying hisself. He stickied
+hisself just all over this morning with treacle. Mother would have given
+him a clout."
+
+However, on the whole, she was as good as such a wild creature could be,
+and the children and she had some capital times together. Wheeler the
+gardener let them gather strawberries and currants for making jam, a
+delightful piece of work, which helped to keep Tiza out of mischief and
+make her contented with staying away from home more than anything else.
+At last, after three days, the doctor said she might come home if she
+would promise to be quiet in the house. So one bright evening Tiza
+slipped into the farmhouse and squeezed in after her mother to the
+little room where Becky was lying, a white-faced feverish little
+creature, low down among the pillows.
+
+"Becky," said Tiza, sitting down beside her sister, as if nothing had
+happened, "here's some strawberries. Wheeler gave me some. You can have
+some if you want."
+
+"Just one," said Becky, in her weak shaky voice, smiling at her; and
+Tiza knelt on the bed and stuffed one softly into her mouth.
+
+"You'll have to nurse baby now, Tiza," said Becky presently; "he's been
+under mother's feet terrible. Mind you don't let him eat nasty things.
+He'll get at the coals if you don't mind him."
+
+"I'll not let him," said Tiza shortly, setting to work on her own
+strawberries.
+
+All this didn't sound very affectionate; but I think all the same Tiza
+did love Becky, and I believe she tried to do her best in her own funny
+way while Becky was ill. Baby screamed a good deal certainly when she
+nursed him, and it was quite impossible of course for Tiza to keep out
+of mischief altogether for two or three weeks. Still, on the whole, she
+was a help to her mother; while as for Becky she was never quite happy
+when Tiza was out of the house. Becky, like Milly, had a way of loving
+everybody about her, and next to her mother she loved Tiza best of
+anybody.
+
+After all, the children were able to say good-bye to Becky. Just the day
+before they were to go away Mr. Backhouse came down to say that Becky
+would like to see them very much if they could come, and the doctor said
+they might.
+
+So up they went; Milly a good deal excited, and Olly very curious to see
+what Becky would look like. Mr. Backhouse took them in, and they found
+Becky lying comfortably on a little bed, with a patchwork counterpane,
+and her shoulders and arms covered up in a red flannel dressing-gown
+that Aunt Emma had sent her.
+
+[Illustration: "'Haven't you got a bump?' asked Olly"]
+
+Milly kissed her, and Olly shook her hand, and they didn't all quite
+know what to say.
+
+"Is your back better?" said Milly at last. "I'm so glad the doctor let
+us come."
+
+"Haven't you got a bump?" asked Olly, looking at her with all his eyes.
+"We thought you'd have a great black bump on your fore-head, you
+know--ever so big."
+
+"No, it's a cut," said Becky; "there now, you can see how it's plastered
+up."
+
+"Did it hurt?" said Olly, "did you kick? I should have kicked. And does
+the doctor give you nasty medicine?"
+
+"No," said Becky, "I don't have any now. And it wasn't nasty at all what
+I had first. And now I may have strawberries and raspberries, and Mr.
+Wheeler sends mother a plate everyday."
+
+"I don't think it's fair that little boys shouldn't never be ill," said
+Olly, with his eyes fastened on Becky's plate of strawberries, which was
+on the chest of drawers.
+
+"Oh, you funny boy," said Milly, "why, mother gives you some every day
+though you aren't ill; and I'm sure you wouldn't like staying in bed."
+
+"Yes, I should," said Olly, just for the sake of contradicting. "Do you
+know, Becky, we've got a secret, and we're not to tell it you, only
+Milly and I are going to--"
+
+"Don't!" said Milly, putting her hand over, his mouth. "You'll tell in a
+minute. You're always telling secrets."
+
+"Well, just half, Milly, I won't tell it all you know. It's just like
+something burning inside my mouth. We're going to make you something,
+Becky, when we get home. Something be--ootiful, you know. And you can
+look at it in bed, and we won't make it big, so you can turn over the
+pages, and--"
+
+"Be quiet, Olly," said Milly, "I should think Becky'll guess now. It'll
+come by post, Becky. Mother's going to help us make it. You'll like it
+I know."
+
+"It's--it's--a picture-book!" said Olly, in a loud whisper, putting his
+head down to Becky. "You won't tell, will you?"
+
+"Oh, you unkind boy," said Milly, pouting. "I'll never have a secret
+with you again."
+
+But Becky looked very pleased, and said she would like a picture-book
+she thought very much, for it was dull sometimes when mother was busy
+and Tiza was nursing baby. So perhaps, after all, it didn't matter
+having told her.
+
+"I'm going to write to you, Becky," said Milly, when the time came to go
+away, "and at Christmas I'll send you a Christmas card, and perhaps
+some day we'll come here again you know."
+
+"And then we'll milk the cows," said Olly, "won't we, Becky? And I'll
+ride on your big horse. Mr. Backhouse says I may ride all alone some day
+when I'm big; when I'm sixty--no, when I'm ninety-five you know."
+
+And then Milly and Olly kissed Becky's pale little face and went away,
+while poor little Becky looked after them as if she was _very_ sorry to
+see the last of them; and outside there were Tiza and baby and Mrs.
+Backhouse and even John Backhouse himself, waiting to say good-bye to
+them. It made Milly cry a little bit, and she ran away fast down the
+hill, while Tiza and Olly were still trying which could squeeze hands
+hardest.
+
+"Oh, you dear mountains," said Milly, as she and nurse walked along
+together. "Look Nana, aren't they lovely?"
+
+They did look beautiful this last evening. The sun was shining on them
+so brightly that everything on them, up to the very top, was clear and
+plain, and high up, ever so far away, were little white dots moving,
+which Milly knew were cows feeding.
+
+"Good-bye river, good-bye stepping-stones, good-bye doves, good-bye
+fly-catchers! Mind you don't any of you go away till we come back
+again."
+
+But I should find it very hard to tell you all the good-byes that Milly
+and Olly said to the places and people at Ravensnest, to the woods and
+the hay-fields, and the beck, to Aunt Emma's parrot, John Backhouse's
+cows, to Windermere Lake and Rydal Lake, above all to dear Aunt Emma
+herself.
+
+"Mind you come at Christmas," shouted both the children, as the train
+moved away from Windermere station and left Aunt Emma standing on the
+platform; and Aunt Emma nodded and smiled and waved her handkerchief to
+them till they were quite out of sight.
+
+"Mother," said Milly, when they could not see Aunt Emma any more, and
+the last bit of Brownholme was slipping away, away, quite out of sight,
+"I think Ravensnest is the nicest place we ever stopped at. And I don't
+think the rain matters either. I'm going to tell your old gentleman so.
+He said it rained in the mountains, and it does, mother--doesn't it? but
+he said the rain spoilt everything, and it doesn't--not a bit."
+
+"Why, there's that curious old fairy been sprinkling dust in your eyes
+too, Milly!"
+
+But something or other had been sprinkling tears in mother's. For to the
+old people there is nothing sweeter than to see the young ones opening
+their hearts to all that they themselves have loved and rejoiced over.
+So the chain of life goes on, and joy gives birth to joy and love to
+love.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Milly and Olly, by Mrs. Humphry Ward
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13337 ***