special favor one very low roof, which you might climb
upon by a mere plank, and you think the boys whose father lives in that
house are very fortunate boys.

Your old aunt, whom you visit, you think, wears a very queer cap, being
altogether different from that of the old nurse, or of Mrs.
Boyne,--Madge's mother. As for the house she lives in, it is quite
wonderful. There are such an immense number of closets, and closets
within closets, reminding you of the mysteries of "Rinaldo Rinaldini."
Beside which there are immensely curious bits of old furniture--so black
and heavy, and with such curious carving!--and you think of the old
wainscot in the "Children of the Abbey". You think you will never tire
of rambling about in its odd corners, and of what glorious stories you
will have to tell of it when you go back to Nelly and Charlie.

As for acquaintances, you fall in the very first day with a tall boy
next door, called Nat, which seems an extraordinary name. Besides, he
has travelled; and as he sits with you on the summer nights under the
linden-trees, he tells you gorgeous stories of the things he has seen.
He has made the voyage to London; and he talks about the ship (a real
ship) and starboard and larboard, and the spanker, in a way quite
surprising; and he takes the stern-oar in the little skiff, when you row
off in the cove abreast of the town, in a most seaman-like way.

He bewilders you, too, with his talk about the great bridges of
London,--London Bridge specially, where they sell kids for a penny;
which story your new acquaintance unfortunately does not confirm. You
have read of these bridges, and seen pictures of them in the "Wonders of
the World"; but then Nat has seen them with his own eyes: he has
literally walked over London Bridge, on his own feet! You look at his
very shoes in wonderment, and are surprised you do not find some
startling difference between those shoes and your shoes. But there is
none,--only yours are a trifle stouter in the welt. You think Nat one of
the fortunate boys of this world,--born, as your old nurse used to say,
with a gold spoon in his mouth.

Beside Nat there is a girl lives over the opposite side of the way,
named Jenny,--with an eye as black as a coal, and a half a year older
than you, but about your height,--whom you fancy amazingly.

She has any quantity of toys, that she lets you play with as if they
were your own. And she has an odd old uncle, who sometimes makes you