his letter better, for he
always was a quiet chap who listened to others, but said little
himself," explained Aunt Selina.

The following day while the Blue Birds were at the Publishing House
watching the wonderful process of stitching and trimming completed
magazines, a very alert young man rang the bell at the Talmage house.

Mrs. Talmage and Aunt Selina welcomed the visitor.

Shouts of excitement reached the house where the ladies were talking
with Mr. Sphere's representative, and soon a crowd of boys and girls
swarmed up the steps and ran pell-mell for Mrs. Talmage, nothing daunted
by seeing the stranger.

"Mother, mother, see, see!" cried Ruth, dragging Jinks by the sleeve.

"Oh," gasped little Betty, "see our magazine!"

"It's perfectly lovely, Mrs. Talmage!" cried Dot.

The older boys were more subdued when they saw the stranger.

Mrs. Talmage introduced the gentleman, Mr. Richards, one of the New York
advertising solicitors for the Philadelphia agency. He smiled in a
condescending way when Don asked, "Want to see our magazine?"

"Yes, indeed! It is such an unusual thing to find such dear little
children interested in such a way," replied Mr. Richards, looking about
at the boys and girls.

Don looked at Dot with a glance that said as plain as day, "Pooh! he's
trying to pat us on the back!"

And Dot said to the visitor: "Don't think that we like to be fussed over
just because we are working!"

The rest of the publishing company looked uncomfortable at the very
evident tendency to humor them on account of their work.

The fact was, that the man couldn't understand why his firm (such a
sensible lot of business men) should send him away from his important
work in New York to call upon some wealthy ladies and a number of
children, to talk about advertising pages in a toy magazine.

The two copies of the completed magazine had been given to Aunt Selina
and Mrs. Talmage and they expressed such satisfaction at the appearance
of the work that the man turned his attention to Mrs. Talmage. She
handed him her copy.

When Mr. Richards saw the magazine, he was surprised out of his usual
self-possession and exclaimed,

"Why, who did this?"

"Blue Birds and Bobolinks," replied Ned, with head tilted on one side
the better to see the precious book the man held.

"But this is first-class work!" exclaimed the visitor.

"Sure! did you think we were going to turn out anything else?" asked
Jinks, insulted.

"O