y guide and looked at some names?' said mother.

'Is there a railway station there?' I asked.

'Oh yes, I know there is one near, for Homer wrote all that when she
asked us to go down for a day. Stay, there's something about English
history mixed up with it in my mind. I do believe it's coming. Ring the
bell, Jack, dear, and we'll look through an A B C. It's something about
putting the fires out at night, you know--the old law.'

'Curfew?' said mother.

'Ye-es, but it's not quite that. But----'

Just then the servant came, and we got the railway guide.

'Look at "f's," Jack,' said Dorothea.

I read some 'f's,' but she shook her head. Then I said to mother--

'Here's one of the places Dr. Marshall was speaking about. "Fewforest,"
it----'

Cousin Dorothea clapped her hands.

'_That's_ it,' she said joyfully.

'What a coincidence!' said mother.

'I remember about it now,' said Dorothea. 'They were so afraid of fire
there, because the village stands close to a thick wood--at least it did
then--that the Curfew bell was rung there long after it had been given
up in many places. And so it got from Curfew Forest to Fewforest.'

'It must be a jolly old place, mums,' I said. 'Do let's find out about
it.'

CHAPTER VIII

MOSSMOOR FARM

And so we did. Dorothea wrote to her home, and got Mrs. Parsley's proper
address. Mrs. Parsley was the farmer's wife who used to be
'Homer'--rather a come-down from 'Homer' to 'Parsley,' wasn't it? and it
_was_ near Fewforest. Then she wrote to Mrs. Parsley, 'sounding' her a
little, and the day she got the answer she brought it straight off to
us.

Mums and I were in the little drawing-room by ourselves, for the girls
were still kept rather out of the way, as they coughed a good deal now
and then. Hebe by this time was able to get up a little and lie on a
sofa in her room, and the others used to go in and sit with her in
turns,--Anne the most, of course, for she reads aloud nicely, and she's
not at all stupid, and Hebe's very fond of her. I used to sit with her
too a good deal, but really that spring I was very busy. I had some of
my lessons. I went to Miss Stirling's house when the girls began to get
better, instead of her coming to us, just for _fear_ of infection, as
she'd never had the whooping-cough. And I had heaps to do for mother,
besides helping to amuse the two little ones.

My greatest rest was to be alone with mums sometimes for a bit in the
afternoon. Now