ssible to keep
still,

"I'm going to stay here always, papa says I may, and my box is coming
tomorrow, all my things had to be washed and mended, and your aunt came
and carried me off. Isn't it great fun?"

"Why, yes. Did you bring your big doll?" asked Daisy, hoping she had,
for on the last visit Nan had ravaged the baby house, and insisted on
washing Blanche Matilda's plaster face, which spoilt the poor dear's
complexion for ever.

"Yes, she's somewhere round," returned Nan, with most unmaternal
carelessness. "I made you a ring coming along, and pulled the hairs out
of Dobbin's tail. Don't you want it?" and Nan presented a horse-hair
ring in token of friendship, as they had both vowed they would never
speak to one another again when they last parted.

Won by the beauty of the offering, Daisy grew more cordial, and proposed
retiring to the nursery, but Nan said, "No, I want to see the boys, and
the barn," and ran off, swinging her hat by one string till it broke,
when she left it to its fate on the grass.

"Hullo! Nan!" cried the boys as she bounced in among them with the
announcement,

"I'm going to stay."

"Hooray!" bawled Tommy from the wall on which he was perched, for Nan
was a kindred spirit, and he foresaw "larks" in the future.

"I can bat; let me play," said Nan, who could turn her hand to any
thing, and did not mind hard knocks.

"We ain't playing now, and our side beat without you."

"I can beat you in running, any way," returned Nan, falling back on her
strong point.

"Can she?" asked Nat of Jack.

"She runs very well for a girl," answered Jack, who looked down upon Nan
with condescending approval.

"Will you try?" said Nan, longing to display her powers.

"It's too hot," and Tommy languished against the wall as if quite
exhausted.

"What's the matter with Stuffy?" asked Nan, whose quick eyes were roving
from face to face.

"Ball hurt his hand; he howls at every thing," answered Jack scornfully.

"I don't, I never cry, no matter how I'm hurt; it's babyish," said Nan,
loftily.

"Pooh! I could make you cry in two minutes," returned Stuffy, rousing
up.

"See if you can."

"Go and pick that bunch of nettles, then," and Stuffy pointed to a
sturdy specimen of that prickly plant growing by the wall.

Nan instantly "grasped the nettle," pulled it up, and held it with a
defiant gesture, in spite of the almost unbearable sting.

"Good for you," cried the boys, quick to acknowledge coura