d gauze apron and bib.

"By the time Master and Miss Bennet had made their bow and curtsey,
and were seated, Betty came in with the dinner, and Mrs. Howard called
the children to table. Master and Miss Bennet, seeing the beautiful
toys before them through the glass doors of the cupboard, did not
forget to behave themselves well at table; they said grace and ate such
things as were offered them; and Mrs. Howard, who noticed their good
behaviour, began to hope that Farmer Bennet's children were becoming
better.

"After the children had got their dinner, it being a very pleasant
afternoon, Mrs. Howard gave them leave to play in the garden, and in
the little croft, where she kept her old horse Crop.

"'But take care, my dears,' she said to the little girls, 'not to soil
your slips or tear your aprons.'

"The children were much pleased with this permission to play; and after
they were gone out, Mrs. Howard put on her hood and cloak, and said to
Betty:

"'I shall drink tea, Betty, in my bower at the end of the grass walk;
do you bring my little tea-table there, and the strawberries and cream,
and the cake which you made yesterday; and when we have finished our
tea, bring those toys which are in the glass cupboard to divide amongst
the children.'

"'And I think, madam,' said Betty, 'that Master and Miss Bennet will
gain some of them to-day, for I thought they behaved very well at
dinner.'

"'Indeed, Betty,' said Mrs. Howard, 'I must say I never saw them behave
so mannerly as they did at dinner, and if they do but keep it up till
night, I shall not send them home without some pretty present, I assure
you.'

"When Mrs. Howard had given her orders to Betty, she took her
gold-headed stick in her hand, and went down the grass walk to her
bower. It was a pretty bower, as I have heard my mother say, formed of
honeysuckles and other creeping shrubs nailed over a framework of lath
in the old-fashioned way. It stood just at the end of that long green
walk, and at the corner of the field; so that anyone sitting in the
bower might see through the lattice-work and foliage of the
honeysuckles into the field, and hear all that was said. There good
Mrs. Howard sat knitting (for she prepared stockings for most of the
poor children in the neighbourhood), whilst her little visitors played
in the garden and in the field, and Betty came to and fro with the
tea-table and tea-things.

"Whilst the children were all engaged with their spo