aired baby in her arms sucking a great
crust of brown bread, and when Mr. and Mrs. Norton had shaken hands with
her--"I'm sure, ma'am, I'm very pleased to see you here," said Mrs.
Backhouse. "John told me you were come (only Mrs. Backhouse said
'coom'), and Becky and Tiza went down with their father when he took the
milk this morning, hoping they would catch a sight of your children.
They have been just wild to see them, but I told them they weren't
likely to be up at that time in the morning."

"Where are they now?" asked Mrs. Norton. "Mine have been looking out for
them as we came along."

"Well, ma'am, I can't say, unless they're in the cherry-tree. Becky!
Tiza!"

A faint "Yis" came from the other end of the garden, but still Milly and
Olly could see nothing but a big cherry-tree growing where the voice
seemed to come from.

"You go along that path, missy, and call again. You'll be sure to find
them," said Mrs. Backhouse, pointing to the tree. "And won't you come
in, ma'am, and rest a bit? You'll be maybe tired with walking this hot
day."

So Mr. and Mrs. Norton went into the farmhouse, and the children went
hand-in-hand down the garden, looking for Becky and Tiza.

Suddenly, as they came close to the cherry-tree, they heard a laugh and
a little scuffling, and looking up, what should they see but two little
girls perched up on one of the cherry-tree branches, one of them sewing,
the other nursing a baby kitten. Both of them had coloured print
bonnets, but the smaller had taken hers off and was rolling the kitten
up in it. The little girl sewing had a sensible, sober face; as for the
other, she could not have looked sober if she had tried for a week of
Sundays. It made you laugh only to look at Tiza. From the top of her
curly head to the soles of her skipping little feet, she was the
sauciest, merriest, noisiest creature. It was she who was always playing
tricks on the cows and the horse, and the big sheep-dogs; who liked
nothing so well as teasing Becky and dressing up the kittens, and who
was always tumbling into the milkpail, or rolling downstairs, or losing
herself in the woods, without somehow ever coming to any harm. If she
and Olly had been left alone in the world together they _must_ have come
to a bad end, but luckily each of them had wiser people to take care of
them.

"Becky," said Milly, shyly, looking up into the tree, "will you come
down and say how do you do to us?"

Becky stuck her needle in