ves and blossoms of
the sweet herbs, and sews them up in little bags of fine muslin, and
lays them among the clothes and the nice towels and pillow-cases. And
it makes them all smell just delicious."

The air was full of fragrance now. They played tag around the
grass-plot. Daisy sat on the stoop and said she didn't mind, though she
gave a little sigh, and wondered how it would feel to run about. The
little lame girl in Houston Street could get over the ground pretty
rapidly. She had interested Doctor Joe in her, and he had hunted up the
child's mother, who wouldn't listen to anything being done for her.

"Sure," said she, "if it's the Lord's will to send this affliction to
her, I'll not be flying in the face of Providence. She can manage, and
she's impident enough now. There'd be no livin' with her if she had two
good legs. And I'll not have any doctor cuttin' her up into mince-meat."

Pussy Gray came and sat beside Daisy with a flick of the ear and turn of
the tail, as if he said: "We'll let those foolish girls fly about and
squeal and laugh and get half roasted, while we sit here at leisure and
enjoy ourselves."

Afterward they swung, and then went up to Nora's play-house. Aunt Patty
had given her a rag doll that she had when she was a little girl, and it
was over fifty years old. It was undeniably sweet, because it had been
steeped in lavender, but it was not very pretty. There was a curious
little wooden cradle Aunt Patty's brother had made. All the children's
story-books were up here in a case Dele had made out of a packing box.

They thought after a little they would rather go over in the Park. Nora
took the key. It was very pleasant; and they watched the carts and
waggons going by, and the pedestrians. Presently a young woman unlocked
the gate at the lower end, and came in with two little children rather
queerly dressed. She had a white muslin cap on her head, very high in
front. We often see them now, but then they were a rarity. The little
children had very black eyes and curly black hair, and stared curiously
at the group of girls.

"They're French," explained Nora. "They live a few doors down below. And
they can't speak a word of English, nor the maid either, though we do
sometimes talk a little. There are two quite big boys, then the mother
and father, and the grandmother and grandfather. The old people come out
and sit on the stoop, now that it is warm. He reads French books to her,
and she makes lac