d Dot, "she found out what she
had done."

"If she'd given it to Sammy Pinkney," Tess said morosely, "I guess he'd
have eaten it right down and never said a word. I saw him drop his bread
and butter and 'lasses on the ground once, and he picked it right up and
ate it. He said the ground was clean!"

"No wonder Sammy's such a gritty little chap," chuckled Neale.

"Well," Mrs. MacCall said cheerfully, and with her usual optimism, "it's
an old saying that everybody has to eat a peck of dirt before he dies."

"So 'tis, Mrs. MacCall," Aunt Sarah rejoined from her end of the table,
and with a scornful sniff. "But I want to know whose dirt I'm eating.
That Sammy Pinkney is nothing but a little animal."

This puzzled Dot somewhat, and she whispered to Ruth: "Ruthie, are
_good_ little boys, then, vegetables!"

"No, dear," the elder sister said, smiling while the others laughed.
"Both bad little boys and good little boys, as well as girls, are human
beings."

"And," said Tess soberly, trying to recall something she had learned in
the past, "there isn't any difference between bad girls and bad boys,
only the boys are of the male sex and the girls are of the feline sex."

At that statement there was a burst of laughter.

"You certainly said something that time, Tess," declared Neale. "For if
there is anything more feline than a girl that's mad--"

"Nothing like that, Neale O'Neil," interrupted Agnes quickly. "You would
better sing pretty small, young man. Remember you are outnumbered."

"Yes," said Tess sedately, "you haven't even Sammy here now to take your
part, you know, Neale."

"True for you, Tessie," agreed Neale. "I am in an infinitesimal
minority."

Dot's eyes opened wide as these long words sounded from the boy's lips,
and she gulped just as though she were swallowing them down for
digestion. Agnes' eyes twinkled as she asked the smallest girl:

"Did you get those two, honey?"

"Don't make fun of her," admonished Ruth, aside.

"Well," sighed Dot, soberly, "I do hope I'll get into big words in the
reading book this next term. I love 'em. Why! Tess is awfully far ahead
of me; she can spell words in four cylinders!"

And that closed the evening meal with a round of laughter that Dot did
not understand.

CHAPTER V

THE SHEPARDS

"Just think!" Agnes said to Ruth. "For the first time since we came to
live at the old Corner House and call it our owniest own, we are going
to have real visitors. Oh