CHAPTER VIII.

FLOWER-DAY.

"Cousin Wealthy," said Hildegarde at breakfast the next morning, "may I tell you what it was that made me so rude as to interrupt you last night?"

"Certainly, my dear," said Miss Wealthy; "you may tell me, and then you may forget the little accident, as I had already done."

"Well," said Hildegarde, "you spoke of the time when Mamma was a 'harum-scarum girl;' and the idea of her ever having been anything of the sort was so utterly amazing that—that was why I cried out. Is it possible that Mammy was not always quiet and blessed and peaceful?"

"Mildred!" exclaimed Miss Wealthy. "Mildred peaceful! My dear Hilda!"

An impressive pause followed, and Hildegarde's eyes began to twinkle. "Tell us!" she murmured, in a tone that would have persuaded an oyster to open his shell. Then she stroked Miss Wealthy's arm gently, and was silent, for she saw that speech was coming in due time.

Miss Wealthy looked at her teacup, and shook her head slowly, smiled, and then sighed. "Mildred!" she said again. "My dear, your mother is now forty years old, and I am seventy. When she came to visit me for the first time, I was forty years old, and she was ten. She had on, when she arrived, a gray stuff frock, trimmed with many rows of narrow green braid, and a little gray straw bonnet, with rows of quilled satin ribbon, green and pink." The girls exchanged glances of horror and amazement at the thought of this headgear, but made no sound. "I shall never forget that bonnet," continued Miss Wealthy, pensively, "nor that dress. In getting out of the carriage her skirt caught on the step, and part of a row of braid was ripped; this made a loop, in which she caught her foot, and tumbled headlong to the ground. I mended it in the evening, after she was in bed, as it was the frock she was to wear every morning. My dears, I mended that frock every day for a month. It is the truth! the braid caught on everything,—on latches, on brambles, on pump-handles, on posts, on chairs. There was always a loop of it hanging, and the child was always putting her foot through it and tumbling down. She never cried, though sometimes, when she fell downstairs, she must have hurt herself. A very brave little girl she was. At last I took all the braid off, and then things went a little better."

Miss Wealthy paused to sip her coffee, and Hildegarde tried not to look as if she begrudged her the sip. "Then," she went on, "Mildred was always running away,—not intentionally, you understand, but just going off and forgetting to come back. Once—dear, dear! it gives me a turn to think of it!—she had been reading 'Neighbor Jackwood,' and was much delighted with the idea of the heroine's hiding in the haystack to escape her cruel pursuers. So she went out to the great haystack in the barnyard, pulled out a quantity of hay, crept into the hole, and found it so comfortable that she fell fast asleep. You may imagine, my dears, what my feelings were when dinner-time came, and Mildred was not to be found. The house was searched from garret to cellar. Martha and I—Martha had just come to me then—went down to the wharf and through the orchard and round by the pasture, calling and calling, till our throats were sore. At last, as no trace of the child could be found, I made up my mind that she must have wandered away into the woods and got lost. It was a terrible thought, my dears! I called Enoch, the man, and bade him saddle the horse and ride round to call out the neighbors, that they might all search together. As he was leading the horse out, he noticed a quantity of hay on the ground, and wondered how it had come there. Coming nearer, he saw the hole in the stack, looked in, and—there was the child, fast asleep!"

"Oh! naughty little mother!" cried Hildegarde. "What did you do to her, Cousin Wealthy?"

"Nothing, my dear," replied the good lady. "I was quite ill for several days from the fright, and that was enough punishment for the poor child. She never meant to be naughty, you know. But my heart was in my mouth all the time. Once, coming home from a walk, I heard a cheery little voice crying, 'Cousin Wealthy! Cousin! see where I am!' I looked up. Hilda, she was sitting on the ridge-pole of the house, waving her bonnet by a loop of the pink quilled ribbon,—it was almost as bad as the green braid about coming off,—and smiling like a cherub. 'I came through the skylight,' she said, 'and the air up here is so fresh and nice! I wish you would come up, Cousin!'

"Another time—oh, that was the worst time of all! I really thought I should die that time." Miss Wealthy paused, and shook her head.

"Oh, do go on, dear!" cried Hildegarde; "unless you are tired, that is. It is so delightful!"

"It was anything but delightful for me, my dear, I can assure you," rejoined Miss Wealthy. "This happened several years later, when Mildred was thirteen or fourteen. She came to me for a winter visit, and I was delighted to find how womanly she had grown. We had a great deal of bad weather, and she was with me in the house a good deal, and was most sweet and helpful; and as I did not go out much, I did not see what she did out of doors, and she always came home in time for dinner and tea. Well, one day—it was in March, and the river was just breaking up, as we had had some mild weather—the minister came to see me, and I began to tell him about Mildred, and how she had developed, and how much comfort I took in her womanly ways. He was sitting on the sofa, from which, you know, one can see the river very well. Suddenly he said, 'Dear me! what is that? Some one on the river at this time! Very imprudent! Very—' Then he broke off short, and gave me a strange look. I sprang up and went to the window. What did I see, my dear girls? The river was full of great cakes of ice, all pressed and jumbled together; the current was running very swiftly; and there, in the middle of the river, jumping from one cake to another like a chamois, or some such wild creature, was Mildred Bond."

"Oh!" cried Rose, "how dreadful! Dear Miss Bond, what did you do?"

Hildegarde was silent. It was certainly very naughty, she thought; but oh, what fun it must have been!

"Fortunately," said Miss Wealthy, "I became quite faint at the sight. Fortunately, I say; for I might have screamed and startled the child, and made her lose her footing. As it was, the minister went and called Martha, and she, like the sensible girl she is, simply blew the dinner-horn as loud as she possibly could. It was the middle of the afternoon; but as she rightly conjectured, the sound, without startling Mildred, gave her to understand that she was wanted. The minister watched her making her way to the shore, leaping the dark spaces of rushing water between the cakes, apparently as unconcerned as if she were walking along the highway; and when he saw her safe on shore, he was very glad to sit down and drink a glass of the wine that Martha had brought to revive me. 'My dear madam,' he said,—I was lying on the sofa in dreadful suspense, and could not trust myself to look,—'the young lady is safe on the bank, and will be here in a moment. I fear she is not so sedate as you fancied; and as she is too old to be spanked and put to bed, I should recommend your sending her home by the coach to-morrow morning. That girl, madam, needs the curb, and you have been guiding her with the snaffle.' He was very fond of horses, good man, and always drove a good one himself."

"And did you send her home?" asked Hildegarde, anxiously, thinking what a dreadful thing it would be to be sent back in disgrace.

"Oh, no!" said Miss Wealthy, "I could not do that, of course. Mildred was my god-child, and I loved her dearly. But she was not allowed to see me for twenty-four hours, and I fancy those were very sad hours for her. Dear Mildred! that was her last prank; for the next time she came here she was a woman grown, and all the hoyden ways had been put off like a garment. And now, dears," added Miss Wealthy, rising, "we must let Martha take these dishes, or she will be late with her work, and that always distresses her extremely."

They went into the parlor, and Hildegarde, as she patted and "plumped" the cushions of the old lady's chair, reminded her that she had promised them some work for the morning, but had not told them what it was.

"True!" said Miss Wealthy. "You are right, dear. This is my Flower-day. I send flowers once a week to the sick children in the hospital at Fairtown, and I thought you might like to pick them and make up the nosegays."

"Oh, how delightful that will be!" cried Hildegarde. "And is that what you call work, Cousin Wealthy? I call it play, and the best kind. We must go at once, so as to have them all picked before the sun is hot. Come, Rosebud!"

The girls put on their broad-brimmed hats and went out into the garden, which was still cool and dewy. Jeremiah was there, of course, with his wheelbarrow; and as they stood looking about them, Martha appeared with a tray in one hand and a large shallow tin box in the other. Waving the tray as a signal to the girls to follow, she led the way to a shady corner, where, under a drooping laburnum-tree, was a table and a rustic seat. She set the tray and box on the table, and then, diving into her capacious pocket, produced a ball of string, two pairs of flower-scissors, and a roll of tissue paper.

"There!" she said, in a tone of satisfaction, "I think that's all. Pretty work you'll find it, Miss Hilda, and it's right glad I am to have you do it; for it is too much for Miss Bond, stooping over the beds, so it is. But do it she will; and I almost think she hardly liked to give it up, even to you."

"Indeed, I don't wonder!" said Hildegarde. "There cannot be anything else so pleasant to do. And thank you, Martha, for making everything so comfortable for us. You are a dear, as I may have said before."

Martha chuckled and withdrew, after telling the girls that the flowers must be ready in an hour.

"Now, Rose," said Hildegarde, "you will sit there and arrange the pretty dears as I bring them to you. The question is now, where to begin. I never, in all my life, saw so many flowers!"

"Begin with those that will not crush easily," said Rose, "and I will lay them at the bottom. Some of those splendid sweet-williams over there, and mignonette, and calendula, and sweet alyssum, and—"

"Oh, certainly!" cried Hildegarde. "All at once, of course, picking with all my hundred hands at the same moment. Couldn't you name a few more, Miss?"

"I beg pardon!" said Rose, laughing. "I will confine my attention to the laburnum here. 'Allee same,' I don't believe you see that beautiful mourning-bride behind you."

"Why mourning, and why bride?" asked Hildegarde, plucking some of the dark, rich blossoms. "It doesn't strike me as a melancholy flower."

"I don't know!" said Rose. "I used to play that she was a princess, and so wore crimson instead of black for mourning. She is so beautiful, it is a pity she has no fragrance. She is of the teasel family, you know."

"Lady Teazle?" asked Hildegarde, laughing.

"A different branch!" replied Rose, "but just as prickly. The fuller's teasel,—do you know about it, dear?"

"No, Miss Encyclopædia, I do not!" replied Hildegarde, with some asperity. "You know I never know anything of that kind; tell me about it!"

"Well, it is very curious," said Rose, taking the great bunch of mourning-bride that her friend handed her, and separating the flowers daintily. "The flower-heads of this teasel, when they are dried, are covered with sharp curved hooks, and are used to raise the nap on woollen cloth. No machine or instrument that can be invented does it half so well as this dead and withered blossom. Isn't that interesting?"

"Very!" said Hildegarde. "Oh, dear! oh, dear!"

"What is the matter?" cried Rose, in alarm. "Has something stung you? Let me—"

"Oh, no!" said Hildegarde, quickly. "I was only thinking of the appalling number of things there are to know. They overwhelm me! They bury me! A mountain weighs me down, and on its top grows a—a teasel. Why, I never heard of the thing! I am not sure that I am clear what a fuller is, except that his earth is advertised in the Pears' soap-boxes."

They both laughed at this, and then Hildegarde bent with renewed energy over a bed of feathered pinks of all shades of crimson and rose-color.

"A mountain!" said Rose, slowly and thoughtfully, as she laid the blossoms together and tied them up in small posies. "Yes, Hilda, so it is! but a mountain to climb, not to be buried under. To think that we can go on climbing, learning, all our lives, and always with higher and higher peaks above us, soaring up and up,—oh, it is glorious! What might be the matter with you to-day, my lamb?" she added; for Hildegarde groaned, and plunged her face into a great white lily, withdrawing it to show a nose powdered with virgin gold. "Does your head ache?"

"I think the sturgeon is at the bottom of it," was the reply. "I have not yet recovered fully from the humiliation of having been so frightened by a sturgeon, when I had been brought up, so to speak, on the 'Culprit Fay.' I have eaten caviare too," she added gloomily,—"odious stuff!"

"But, my dear Hilda!" cried Rose, in amused perplexity, "this is too absurd. Why shouldn't one be frightened at a monstrous creature leaping out of the water just before one's nose, and how should you know he was a sturgeon? You couldn't expect him to say 'I am a sturgeon!' or to carry a placard hung round his neck, with 'Fresh Caviare!' on it." Hildegarde laughed. "You remind me," added Rose, "that my own ignorance list is getting pretty long. Get me some sweet-peas, that's a dear; and I can ask you the things while you are picking them." Hildegarde moved to the long rows of sweet-peas, which grew near the laburnum bower; and Rose drew a little brown note-book from her pocket, and laid it open on the table beside her. "What is 'Marlowe's mighty line'?" she demanded bravely. "I keep coming across the quotation in different things, and I don't know who Marlowe was. Yet you see I am cheerful."

"Kit Marlowe!" said Hildegarde. "Poor Kit! he was a great dramatist; the next greatest after Shakspeare, I think,—at least, well, leaving out the Greeks, you know. He was a year younger than Shakspeare, and died when he was only twenty-eight, killed in a tavern brawl."

"Oh, how dreadful!" cried gentle Rose. "Then he had only begun to write."

"Oh, no!" said Hildegarde. "He had written a great deal,—'Faustus' and 'Edward II.,' and 'Tamburlaine,' and—oh! I don't know all. But one thing of his you know, 'The Passionate Shepherd,'—'Come live with me and be my love;' you remember?"

"Oh!" cried Rose. "Did he write that? I love him, then."

"And so many, many lovely things!" continued Hildegarde, warming to her subject, and snipping sweet-peas vigorously. "Mamma has read me a good deal here and there,—all of 'Edward II.,' and bits from 'Faustus.' There is one place, where he sees Helen—oh, I must remember it!—

"'Was this the face that launched a thousand ships,
And burnt the topless towers of Ilium?'

Isn't that full of pictures? I see them! I see the ships, and the white, royal city, and the beautiful, beautiful face looking down from a tower window."

Both girls were silent a moment; then Rose asked timidly, "And who spoke of the 'mighty line,' dear? It must have been another great poet. Only three words, and such a roll and ring and brightness in them."

"Oh! Ben Jonson!" said Hildegarde. "He was another great dramatist, you know; a little younger, but of the same time with Shakspeare and Marlowe. He lived to be quite old, and he wrote a very famous poem on Shakspeare, 'all full of quotations,' as somebody said about 'Hamlet.' It is in that that he says 'Marlowe's mighty line,' and 'Sweet Swan of Avon,' and 'Soul of the Age,' and all sorts of pleasant things. So nice of him!"

"And—and was he an ancestor of Dr. Samuel's?" asked Rose, humbly.

"Why, darling, you are really quite ignorant!" cried Hildegarde, laughing. "How delightful to find things that you don't know! No, he had no h in his name,—at least, it had been left out; but he came originally from the Johnstones of Annandale. Think of it! he may have been a cousin of Jock Johnstone the Tinkler, without knowing it. Well, his father died when he was little, and his mother married a brick-layer; and Ben used to carry hods of mortar up ladders,—oh me! what a strange world it is! By-and-by he was made Laureate,—the first Laureate,—and he was very great and glorious, and wrote masques and plays and poems, and quarrelled with Inigo Jones—no! I can't stop to tell you who he was," seeing the question in Rose's eyes,—"and grew very fat. But when he was old they neglected him, poor dear! and when he died he was buried standing up straight, in Westminster Abbey; and his friend Jack Young paid a workman eighteenpence to carve on a stone 'O Rare Ben Jonson!' and there it is to this day."

She paused for breath; but Rose said nothing, seeing that more was coming. "But the best of all," continued Hildegarde, "was his visit to Drummond of Hawthornden. Oh, Rose, that was so delightful!"

"Tell me about it!" said Rose, softly. "Not that I know who he was; but his name is a poem in itself."

"Isn't it?" cried Hildegarde. "He was a poet too, a Scottish poet, living in a wonderful old house—"

"Not 'caverned Hawthornden,' in 'Lovely Rosabelle'?" cried Rose, her eyes lighting up with new interest.

"Yes!" replied Hildegarde, "just that. Do you know why it is 'caverned'? That must be another story. Remind me to tell you when we are doing our hair to-night. But now you must hear about Ben. Well, he went on a walking tour to Scotland, and one of his first visits was to William Drummond, with whom he had corresponded a good deal. Drummond was sitting under his great sycamore-tree, waiting for him, and at last he saw a great ponderous figure coming down the avenue, flourishing a huge walking-stick. Of course he knew who it was; so he went forward to meet him, and called out, 'Welcome, welcome, royal Ben!' 'Thank ye, thank ye, Hawthornden!' answered Jonson; and then they both laughed and were friends at once."

"Hildegarde, where do you find all these wonderful things?" cried Rose, in amazement. "That is delightful, enchanting. And for you to call yourself ignorant! Oh!"

"There is a life of Drummond at home," said Hildegarde, simply. "Of course one reads lovely things,—there is no merit in that; and the teasel still flaunts. But I do feel better. That is just my baseness, to be glad when you don't know things, you dearest! But do just look at these sweet-peas! I have picked all these,—pecks! bushels!—and there are as many as ever. Don't you think we have enough flowers, Rosy?"

"I do indeed!" answered Rose. "Enough for a hundred children at least. Besides, it must be time for them to go. The lovely things! Think of all the pleasure they will give! A sick child, and a bunch of flowers like these!" She took up a posy of velvet pansies and sweet-peas, set round with mignonette, and put it lovingly to her lips. "I remember—" She paused, and sighed, and then smiled.

"Yes, dear!" said Hildegarde, interrogatively. "The house where you were born?"

"One day I was in dreadful pain," said Rose,—"pain that seemed as if it would never end,—and a little child from a neighbor's house brought a bunch of Ragged Robin, and laid it on my pillow, and said, 'Poor Pinky! make she better!' I think I have never loved any other flower quite so much as Ragged Robin, since then. It is the only one I miss here. Do you want to hear the little rhyme I made about it, when I was old enough?"

Hildegarde answered by sitting down on the arm of the rustic seat, and throwing her arm round her friend's shoulder in her favorite fashion. "Such a pleasant Rosebud!" she murmured. "Tell now!"

And Rose told about—

CHAPTER IX.

BROKEN FLOWERS.

Miss Wealthy was sitting on the back piazza, crocheting a tidy. The stitch was a new one, and quite complicated, and her whole mind was bent upon it. "One, two, purl, chain, slip; one, two, purl"—when suddenly descended upon her a whirlwind, a vision of sparkling eyes and "tempestuous petticoat," crying, "Please, Cousin Wealthy, may I go with Jeremiah? The wagon is all ready. Mayn't I go? Oh, please say 'yes'!"

Miss Wealthy started so violently that the crochet-hook fell from her hands. "My dear Hilda!" she said plaintively, "you quite take my breath away. I—really, my dear, I don't know what to say. Where do you want to go?"

"With Jeremiah, to Fairtown, with the flowers—to see the children!" cried Hildegarde, still too much out of breath to speak connectedly, but dropping on one knee beside the old lady, and stroking her soft hand apologetically. "He says he will take care of me; and Rose has a long letter to write, and I shall be back in time for dinner. Dear, nice, pretty, sweet, bewitching Cousin Wealthy, may I go?"

Miss Wealthy was still bewildered. "Why, my dear," she said hesitatingly. "Yes—you may go, certainly—if you are quite sure—"

But Hildegarde waited for no "ifs." She whirled upstairs, flew out of her pink gingham and into a sober dark blue one, exchanged her garden hat for a blue "sailor," whirled downstairs again, kissed Rose on both cheeks, dropped another kiss on Miss Wealthy's cap, and was in the wagon and out of sight round the corner before any one with moderately deliberate enunciation could have said "Jack Robinson."

Miss Wealthy dropped back in her chair, and drew a long, fluttering breath. She looked flushed and worried, and put her hand nervously up to the pansy brooch. Seeing this, Rose came quietly, picked up the crochet-hook, and sat down to admire the work, and wonder if she could learn the stitch. "Perhaps some time you would show it to me, dear Miss Bond," she said; "and now may I read you that article on window-gardening that you said you would like to hear?"

So Rose read, in her low, even tones, smooth and pleasant as the rippling of water; and Miss Wealthy's brow grew calm again, and the flush passed away, and her thoughts passed pleasantly from "one, two, purl, slip," to gloxinias and cyclamen, and back again; till at length, the day being warm, she fell asleep, which was exactly what the wily Rose meant her to do.

Meantime Hildegarde was speeding along toward the station, seated beside Jeremiah in the green wagon, with the box of flowers stowed safely under the seat. She was in high spirits, and determined to enjoy every moment of her "escapade," as she called it. Jeremiah surveyed her bright face with chastened melancholy.

"Reckon you're in for a junket," he said kindly. "Quite a head o' steam you carry. 'T'll do ye good to work it off some."

"Yes!" cried Hildegarde. "It is a regular frolic, isn't it, Jeremiah? How beautiful everything looks! What a perfection of a day it is!"

"Fine hayin' weather!" Jeremiah assented. "We sh'll begin to-morrow, I calc'late. Pleasant, hayin' time is. Now, thar's a field!" He pointed with his whip to a broad meadow all blue-green with waving timothy, and sighed, and shook his head.

"Isn't it a good field?" asked Hildegarde, innocently.

"Best lot on the place!" replied the prophet, with melancholy enthusiasm. "Not many lots like that in this neighborhood! There's a power o' grass there. Well, sirs! grass must be cut, and hay must be eat,—there's no gainsayin' that,—'in the sweat o' thy brow,' ye understand; but still there's some enj'yment in it."

Hildegarde could not quite follow this sentence, which seemed to be only half addressed to her; so she only nodded sagely, and turned her attention to the ferns by the roadside.

It was less than an hour's trip to Fairtown, nor was the walk long through the pleasant, elm-shaded streets. The hospital was a brick building, painted white, and looking very neat and trim, with its striped awnings, and its flagged pathway between rows of box. One saw that it had been a fine dwelling-house in its day, for the wood of the doorway was cunningly carved, and the brass knocker was quite a work of art.

Jeremiah knocked; and when the door was opened by a neat maidservant, he brought the box of flowers, and laid it on a table in the hall. "Miss Bond's niece!" he said, with a nod of explanation and introduction. "Thought she'd come herself; like to see the young ones. I'll be back for ye in an hour," he added to Hildegarde, and with another nod departed.

After waiting a few minutes in a cool, shady parlor, where she sat feeling strange and shy, and wishing she had not come, Hildegarde was greeted by a sweet-faced woman in spotless cap and apron, who bade her welcome, and asked for Miss Bond. "It is some time since she has been here!" she added. "We are always so glad to see her, dear lady. But her kindness comes every week in the lovely flowers, and the children do think so much of them. Would you like to distribute them yourself to-day? A new face is always a pleasure, if it is a kind one; and yours will bring sunshine, I am sure."

"Oh, thank you!" said Hildegarde, shyly. "It is just what I wanted, if you really think they would like it."

Mrs. Murray, as the matron was called, seemed to have no doubt upon this point, and led the way upstairs, the servant following with the flowers. She opened a door, and led Hildegarde into a large, sunny room, with little white beds all along the wall. On every pillow lay a little head; and many faces turned toward the opening door, with a look of pleasure at meeting the matron's cheery smile. Hildegarde opened her great box, and taking up three or four bouquets, moved forward hesitatingly. This was something new to her. She had visited girls of her own age or more, in the New York hospitals, but she was not used to little children, being herself an only child. In the first cot lay a little girl, a mite of five years, with a pale patient face. She could not move her hands, but she turned her face toward the bunch of sweet-peas that Hildegarde laid on the pillow, and murmured, "Pitty! pitty!"

"Aren't they sweet?" said Hildegarde. "Do you see that they have little wings, almost like butterflies? When the wind blows, they flutter about, and seem to be alive, almost."

The child smiled, and put her lips to the cool fragrant blossoms. "Kiss butterf'ies!" she said; and at this Hildegarde kissed her, and went on to the next crib.

Here lay a child of seven, her sweet blue eyes heavy with fever, her cheeks flushed and burning. She stretched out her hands toward the flowers, and said, "White ones! give me white ones, Lady! Red ones is hot! Minnie is too hot. White ones is cold."

A nurse stood beside the crib, and Hildegarde looked to her for permission, then filled the little hands with sweet alyssum and white roses.

"The roses were all covered with dew when I picked them," she said softly. "See, dear, they are still cool and fresh." And she laid them against the burning cheek. "There was a great bed of roses in a lovely garden, and while I was at one end of it, a little humming-bird came to the other, and hovered about, and put his bill into the flowers. His head was bright green, like the leaves, and his throat was ruby-red, and—"

"Guess that's a lie, ain't it?" asked the child, wearily.

"Oh, no!" said Hildegarde, smiling. "It is all true, every word. When you are better, I will send you a picture of a humming-bird."

She nodded kindly, and moved on, to give red roses to a bright little tot in a red flannel dressing-gown, who was sitting up in bed, nursing a rubber elephant. He took the roses and said, "Sanks!" very politely, then held them to his pet's gray proboscis. "I's better," he explained, with some condescension. "I don't need 'em, but Nelephant doos. He's a severe case. Doctor said so vis mornin'."

"Indeed!" said Hildegarde, sympathetically. "I am very sorry. What is the matter with him?"

"Mumps 'n' ague 'n' brown kitties 'n' ammonia 'n' fits!" was the prompt reply; "and a hole in his leg too! Feel his pult!"

He held up a gray leg, which Hildegarde examined gravely. "It seems to be hollow," she said. "Did the doctor think that was a bad sign?"

"It's fits," said the child, "or a brown kitty,—I don't know which. Is you a nurse?"

"No, dear," said Hildegarde; "I only came to bring the flowers. I must go away soon, but I shall think of you and the elephant, and I hope he will be better soon."

"Sing!" was the unexpected reply, in a tone of positive command.

"Benny!" said Mrs. Murray, who came up at this moment; "you mustn't tease the young lady, dear. See! the other children are waiting for their flowers, and you have these lovely roses."

"She looks singy!" persisted Benny. "I wants her to sing. Doctor said I could have what I wanted, and I wants vat."

"May I sing to him?" asked Hildegarde, in a low tone. "I can sing a little, if it would not disturb the others."

But Mrs. Murray thought the others would like it very much. So Hildegarde first gave posies to all the other children in the room, and then came back and sat down on Benny's bed, and sang, "Up the airy mountain," in a very sweet, clear voice. Several little ones had been tossing about in feverish restlessness, but now they lay still and listened; and when the song was over, a hoarse voice from a corner of the room cried, "More! more sing!"

"She's my more! she isn't your more!" cried Benny, sitting erect, with flashing eyes that glared across the room at the offender. But a soft hand held a cup of milk to his lips, and laid him back on the pillow; and the nurse motioned to Hildegarde to go on.

Then she sang, "Ring, ting! I wish I were a primrose;" and then another of dear William Allingham's, which had been her own pet song when she was Benny's age.

By the time the song was finished, Benny was sleeping quietly, and the nurse thanked Hildegarde for "getting him off so cleverly. He needed a nap," she said; "and if he thinks we want him to go to sleep, he sets all his little strength against it. He's getting better, the lamb!"

"What has been the matter?" asked Hildegarde.

"Pneumonia," was the reply. "He has come out of it very well, but I dread the day when he must go home to a busy, careless mother and a draughty cottage. He ought to have a couple of weeks in the country."

At this moment the head nurse—a tall, slender woman with a beautiful face—came from an inner room, the door of which had been standing ajar. She held out her hand to Hildegarde, and the girl saw that her eyes were full of tears. "Thank you," she said, "for the song. Another little bird has just flown away from earth, and he went smiling, when he heard you sing. Have you any sweet little flowers, pink and white?"

The quick tears sprang to Hilda's eyes. She could not speak for a moment, but she lifted some lovely sprays of blush rosebuds, which the nurse took with a smile and a look of thanks. The girl's eyes followed her; and before the door closed she caught a glimpse of a little still form, and a cloud of fair curls, and a tiny waxen hand. Hildegarde buried her face in her hands and sobbed; while Benny's gentle nurse smoothed her hair, and spoke softly and soothingly. This was what she had called a "frolic,"—this! She had laughed, and come away as if to some gay party, and now a little child had died almost close beside her. Hildegarde had never been so near death before. The world seemed very dark to her, as she turned away, and followed Mrs. Murray into another room, where the convalescent children were at play. Here, as she took the remaining flowers from the box, little boys and girls came crowding about her, some on crutches, some with slings and bandages, some only pale and hollow-eyed; but all had a look of "getting well," and all were eager for the flowers. The easiest thing seemed to be to sit down on the floor; so down plumped Hildegarde, and down plumped the children beside her. Looking into the little pallid faces, her heart grew lighter, though even this was sad enough. But she smiled, and pelted the children with bouquets; and then followed much feeble laughter, and clutching, and tumbling about, while the good matron looked on well pleased.

"What's them?" asked one tiny boy, holding up his bunch.

"Those are pansies!" answered Hildegarde. "There are little faces in them, do you see? They smile when the sun shines, and when children are good."

"Nein," said a small voice from the outside of the circle, "dat iss Stiefmütterlein!"

"Du Blümlein fein!" cried Hildegarde. "Yes, to be sure. Come here, little German boy, and we will tell the others about the pretty German name."

A roly-poly lad of six, with flaxen hair and bright blue eyes, came forward shyly, and after some persuasion was induced to sit down in Hildegarde's lap. "See now!" she said to the others; "this pansy has a different name in Germany, where this boy—"

"Namens Fritzerl!" murmured the urchin, nestling closer to the wonderful Fräulein who knew German.

"Where Fritzerl came from. There they call it 'Stiefmütterlein,' which means 'little stepmother.' Shall I tell you why? See! In front here are three petals just alike, with the same colors and the same marking. These are the stepmother and her own two daughters; and here, behind, are the two step-daughters, standing in the background, but keeping close together like loving sisters. I hope the little stepmother is kind to them, don't you?"

"I've got one!" piped up a little girl with a crutch. "She's real good, she is. Only she washes my face 'most all day long, 'cause she's 'feared she won't do her duty by me. She brought me red jelly yesterday, and a noil-cloth bib, so's I wouldn't spill it on my dress. My dress 's new!" she added, edging up to Hildegarde, and holding up a red merino skirt with orange spots.

"I see it is," said Hilda, admiringly; "and so bright and warm, isn't it?"

"I've got a grandma to home!" cried another shrill voice. "She makes splendid mittens! She makes cookies too."

"My Uncle Jim's got a wooden leg!" chimed in another. "He got it falling off a mast. He kin drive tacks with it, he kin. When I'm big I'm going to fall off a mast and git a wooden leg. You kin make lots o' noise with it."

"My grandma's got a wig!" said the former speaker, in triumph. "I pulled it off one day. She was just like an aig on top. Are you like an aig on top?"

Here followed a gentle pull at one of Hildegarde's smooth braids, and she sprang up, feeling quite sure that her hair would stay on, but not caring to have it tumbling on her shoulders. "I think it is nearly time for me to go now," she was beginning, when she heard a tiny sob, and looking down, saw a very small creature looking up at her with round blue eyes full of tears. "Why, darling, what is the matter?" she asked, stooping, and lifting the baby in her strong young arms.

"I—wanted—" Here came another sob.

"What did you want? Come, we'll sit here by the window, and you shall tell me all about it."

"Ze uzzers told you sings, and—I—wanted—to tell you sings—too!"

"Well, pet!" said Hildegarde, drying the tears, and kissing the round velvet cheek, "tell me then!"

"Ain't got no—sings—to tell!" And another outburst threatened; but Hilda intervened hastily.

"Oh, yes, I am sure you have things to tell, lots of things; only you couldn't think of them for a minute. What did you have for breakfast this morning?"

Baby looked doubtful. "Dat ain't a sing!"

"Yes, it is," said Hildegarde, boldly. "Come, now! I had a mutton chop. What did you have?"

"Beef tea," was the reply, with a brightening look of retrospective cheer, "and toasty strips!"

"Oh, how good!" cried Hilda. "I wish I had some. And what are you going to have for dinner?"

"Woast tsicken!" and here at last came a smile, which broadened into a laugh and ended in a chuckle, as Hilda performed a pantomime expressing rapture.

"I never heard of anything so good!" she cried. "And what are you going to eat it with,—two little sticks?"

"No-o!" cried Baby, with a disdainful laugh. "Wiz a worky, a weal worky."

"A walk!" said Hildegarde, puzzled.

"Es!" said Baby, proudly. "A atta worky, dess like people's!"

"Please, he means fork!" said a little girl, sidling up with a finger in her mouth. "Please, he's my brother, and we've both had tripod fever; and we're going home to-morrow."

"And the young lady must go home now," said Mrs. Murray, laying a kind hand on the little one's shoulder. "The man has come for you, Miss Grahame, and I don't know how to thank you enough for all the pleasure you have given these dear children."

"Oh, no!" cried Hildegarde. "Please don't! It is I who must thank you and the children and all. I wish Rose—I wish my friend had come. She would have known; she would have said just the right thing to each one. Next time I shall bring her."

But "Nein! Müssen selbst kommen!" cried Fritzerl; and "You come, Lady!" shouted all the others. And as Hildegarde passed back through the long room where the sick children lay, Benny woke from his nap, and shouted, "Sing-girl! my sing-girl! come back soon!"

So, half laughing and half crying, Hildegarde passed out, her heart very full of painful pleasure.

CHAPTER X.

THE HOUSE IN THE WOOD.

Rose was wonderfully better. Every day in the clear, bracing air of Bywood seemed to bring fresh vigor to her frame, fresh color to her cheeks. She began to take regular walks, instead of strolling a little way, leaning on her friend's stronger arm. Together the girls explored all the pleasant places of the neighborhood, which were many; hunted for rare ferns, with tin plant-boxes hanging from their belts, or stalked the lonely cardinal-flower, as it nodded over some woodland brook. Often they took the little boat, and made long expeditions down the pleasant river,—Hildegarde rowing, Rose couched at her ease in the stern. Once they came to the mouth of a stream which they pleased themselves by imagining to be unknown to mankind. Dipping the oars gently, Hildegarde drew the boat on and on, between high, dark banks of hemlock and pine and white birch. Here were cardinal-flowers, more than they had ever seen before, rank behind rank, all crowding down to the water's edge to see their beauty mirrored in the clear, dark stream. They were too beautiful to pick. But Hildegarde took just one, as a memento, and even for that one the spirit of the enchanted place seemed to be angered; for there was a flash of white barred wings, a loud shrill cry, and they caught the gleam of two fierce black eyes, as something whirred past them across the stream, and vanished in the woods beyond.

"Oh! what was it?" cried Hildegarde. "Have we done a dreadful thing?"

"Only a kingfisher!" said Rose, laughing. "But I don't believe we ought to have picked his flower. This is certainly a fairy place! Move on, or he may cast a spell over us, and we shall turn into two black stones."

One day, however, they had a stranger adventure than that of the Halcyon Stream, as they named the mysterious brook. They had been walking in the woods; and Rose, being tired, had stopped to rest, while Hildegarde pursued a "yellow swallow-tail" among the trees. Rose established herself on the trunk of a fallen tree, whose upturned roots made a most comfortable armchair, all tapestried with emerald moss. She looked about her with great content; counted the different kinds of moss growing within immediate reach, and found six; tried to decide which was the prettiest, and finding this impossible, gave it up, and fell to watching the play of the sunshine as it came twinkling through the branches of oak and pine. Green and gold!—those were the colors the fairy princes always wore, she thought. It was the most perfect combination in the world; and she hummed a verse of one of Hildegarde's ballads:—