pulled
at his wool and a small brown burr came off in her hand.

"Look! Girls!" she cried suddenly. "If he got this, there must be
more in the lot!"

"Of course!" said Frances, looking scornfully at the burr Alice held up
for her to see; "there's a million over there--see? They're an awful
nuisance, burrs are, even this early in the season."

"They may be a nuisance," laughed Alice, "but I'll venture to say
they'll make good doll houses for all that. Here! I'll show you what
I think we can do." She ran over to where Frances had pointed out a
lot of burrs, pulled off a handful and began sticking them together.
"Yes, it works," she said in a satisfied tone, "but let's not stop to
make the houses here. Let's gather a lot of burrs and take them over
to Grandmother's front yard. Then we can make a whole village!"

Frances and Mary Jane didn't quite see how a village was to come out of
a lot of burrs, but Alice was so sure of what she was going to do that
they thought she must be right. So they gathered up their skirts and
filled them with burrs and then helped each other back over the fence.

Under the big pine tree, where the ground was the levelest of any place
in the yard, Alice had them spread out all their burrs.

"Now," she said when the burrs were ready, "you make them stick
together--so. Make eight rows of six burrs each. That will be the
floor of the house. Then start up the sides for walls."

Frances and Mary Jane got the idea in a minute and they set to work in
a jiffy. Such fun as it was! The houses and barns and churches grew
so rapidly that none of the girls gave a minute's thought to pricked
fingers--there wasn't time! When the stock of burrs was entirely used
up, Alice set the houses along in a straight line as though they were
on a street. Frances put the barns back of the houses where they
belonged and Mary Jane ran to her garden for nasturtiums to lay by the
houses for gardens.

"But we haven't any dolls to live in the houses!" exclaimed Frances
suddenly.

"That's easy," said Alice; "I've made dolls before. Grandmother showed
me how years ago. Come on and we'll get some."

She led the girls back to the orchard, where by now tiny green apples
were lying on the ground, scattered there by the summer winds.

"You girls get all the apples you can while I get the toothpicks." And
she ran to the house.

"What does she mean?" asked Frances, who wasn't used to this sort of
play.