"Oh, what will father say?" she cried delightedly, as she surveyed
herself in the little mirror.

This sobered Marie at once. What would "father" say, indeed? Would he
not have a right to be very angry with her, that she had allowed the
child to get into such danger?

* * *

"Where is Katharine?" asked the colonel, as he stood, tall and
commanding, on the threshold, later that evening, surveying eight small
Hollanders, looking so much alike, except for the difference in their
sizes, that they might have passed for eight Dutch dolls propped up in a
row against the wall.

A sudden shriek of laughter, and one of the dolls was in his arms,
smothering him with kisses. Then every one began to talk at once, as
usual, and it was not until late the next evening, when he and Katharine
were steaming out of Amsterdam, that the colonel was told the whole
story and for the first time fully understood all that had happened to
his little girl on that eventful day.

Meanwhile the new light in his daughter's eyes and the laughter on her
lips kept him from any desire to inquire too deeply into the reason for
a certain embarrassed frightened look on the faces of the women.

Before leaving Amsterdam the colonel was obliged to purchase a complete
suit of Dutch garments for Katharine as a memento of this visit, and
"because they are so pretty, father," she said, and "oh, father, I just
love Holland! As for those Dutch children, I think they are simply the
dearest, sweetest things I ever saw, and I have promised to write to
Gretel as soon as ever I get to Paris."

THE JINGLE OF THE LITTLE JAP

BY ISABEL ECCLESTON MACKAY

There lives in a town that is called Chu-Bo
A little Jap girl named Nami-Ko.
She learns to spell and she learns to write,
But her A B C's are the _oddest_ sight!

For _this_ is the way that the letters look
In her neat little, queer little copy-book:

This little Jap girl has shoes most neat
To put on her tiny Japanese feet,
But O! They are _queer_--such heels, such toes!
You'd think she would fall on her little Jap nose!

And _these_ are the shoes--beware of mishap
If you wear what belongs to a queer little Jap!

When this little Jap girl goes out to call
She wears no hat--but a parasol!
And her little Jap mother wears one too--
In fact it's the way that the Japs all do.

And _this_ is the curious