reputable looking little objects you
ever saw. We could hardly believe our eyes.

"'We has tum home aden,' Margaret called, cheerfully, as she saw us.

"Well you can imagine how quickly we got both those children into the
house, and into the bath-tub, where we satisfied ourselves that they
were not bleeding to death.

"We had to get the first coating of dirt off before we could undertake
to disentangle those dreadful burs. My heart sank at the sight, I must
say. I was so proud of their beautiful golden hair. They each had so
much of it, and it was as fine as floss; but this only made it the more
difficult to get those sticky burs out. My sister and I each took a
child, and began at the burs. We worked at them a long time, but they
were so hopelessly twisted in, and the fine silky hair was so wound up
in them, that at last I had to get the scissors, very sorrowfully. Way
underneath, close to their necks, we found these little locks, that by
some work and careful snipping we managed to get quite free of burs, so
I cut them off to preserve. I simply cut the rest off, in any way, as
best I could, to do for the night, as it was too late to take them to
the barber's that afternoon.

"What dreadful looking little things they were then! Did you ever see a
sheared sheep? Well, they looked just like that, for I had snipped their
hair here and there, as best I could, and it stood up in little, rough,
jagged, irregular tufts all over their heads. I almost cried as I looked
at them. 'I had thought I had two pretty children,' I said, mournfully.
Their heads looked so comically small, and their necks like little
pipe-stems.

"Of course the barber clipped their hair smooth the next day, but I felt
for a long time as if I could not let people see them. Their heads were
simply lost in every hat and bonnet they had."

"To think of my mother having been such a little _scallawag_," murmured
Cricket, in an awestruck tone.

"Poor little things! They had a sad time the next day, for their feet
were so swollen and cut that they couldn't get on a shoe. I can't
imagine how they managed to walk so far on the hot pavements with their
tender little feet."

"I know. The palms of your feet get dreadfully hot and sting-y when you
go barefoot. I've tried it. Did they ever run away again?"

"No, never, I believe. That one experience was enough. And now, my small
maid, will you go and ask Luke to harness Mopsie for you? I would like
to send a n