st as usual, and do her lessons and run
about in the garden, and play like _well_ children. She didn't much mind
being ill, not as much as you would, I don't think. For, you see, except
just for the few days that she felt weak and giddy and really ill,
staying in bed didn't seem to make very much difference to her, indeed
in some ways it was rather nicer. She had lots of storybooks to
read--several of her friends sent her presents of new ones--and
certainly more dainty things to eat than when she was well--"

"Delly?" said Hec. "Duke and me had delly when we was ill."

"Yes," said Maudie, "last winter Hec and Duke had the _independent_
fever, and they had to have jelly and beef-tea and things like that to
make them strong again."

"Yes," said Magdalen, "that was why Lena--I forgot to tell you that that
was the little girl's name--that was why they gave all those nice things
to little Lena. But the worst of it was she didn't like them nearly as
much as when she was well, and she often wished they would give her just
common things, bread and butter and rice-pudding, you know, when she was
ill, and keep all the very nice things for a treat when she was well and
could enjoy them. She was getting well, of course; by the time it comes
to thinking about what you have to eat, children generally are getting
well; but she was rather slow about it, and even when she was up and
about again as usual, she didn't _feel_ or look a bit like usual. She
was thin and white, and whatever she did tired her. Something queer
seemed to have come over all her dolls and toys; they had all grown
stupid in some tiresome way, and when she tried to sew, which she was
generally rather clever at, all her fingers seemed to have turned into
thumbs."

"How dedful," said Hoodie, stretching out her two chubby hands and
gravely gazing at them. "All zumbs wouldn't look pretty at all. I hope
mine won't never be like that if I get ill."

"My dear Hoodie," said Magdalen, as soon as she could speak for
laughing. "I didn't mean it that way. Not _really_. I just meant that
her fingers had got clumsy, you know, with her being weak and ill. It is
just a way of speaking."

"Oh!" said Hoodie, rather mystified still, "I'm glad them wasn't
_zeally_ all zumbs."

"Only, Hoodie, I _do_ wish"--began Maudie, but Magdalen went on before
she had time to finish her sentence.

"And as the days went on and she didn't seem to be getting back to be
like herself, her mother