aw, caw!" screamed a rook just over her head, as if in answer to her
thought.

Griselda looked up at him.

"Your voice isn't half so pretty as the cuckoo's, Mr. Rook," she said.
"All the same, I dare say I should make friends with you, if I
understood what you meant. How funny it would be to know all the
languages of the birds and the beasts, like the prince in the fairy
tale! I wonder if I should wish for that, if a fairy gave me a wish? No,
I don't think I would. I'd _far_ rather have the fairy carpet that would
take you anywhere you liked in a minute. I'd go to China to see if all
the people there look like Aunt Grizzel's mandarins; and I'd first of
all, of course, go to fairyland."

"You must come in now, little missie," said Dorcas's voice. "Miss
Grizzel says you have had play enough, and there's a nice fire in the
ante-room for you to do your lessons by."

"Play!" repeated Griselda indignantly, as she turned to follow the old
servant. "Do you call walking up and down the terrace 'play,' Dorcas? I
mustn't loiter even to pick a flower, if there were any, for fear of
catching cold, and I mustn't run for fear of overheating myself. I
declare, Dorcas, if I don't have some play soon, or something to amuse
me, I think I'll run away."

"Nay, nay, missie, don't talk like that. You'd never do anything so
naughty, and you so like Miss Sybilla, who was so good."

"Dorcas, I'm tired of being told I'm like Miss Sybilla," said Griselda,
impatiently. "She was my grandmother; no one would like to be told they
were like their grandmother. It makes me feel as if my face must be all
screwy up and wrinkly, and as if I should have spectacles on and a wig."

"_That_ is not like what Miss Sybilla was when I first saw her," said
Dorcas. "She was younger than you, missie, and as pretty as a fairy."

"_Was_ she?" exclaimed Griselda, stopping short.

"Yes, indeed she was. She might have been a fairy, so sweet she was and
gentle--and yet so merry. Every creature loved her; even the animals
about seemed to know her, as if she was one of themselves. She brought
good luck to the house, and it was a sad day when she left it."

"I thought you said it was the cuckoo that brought good luck?" said
Griselda.

"Well, so it was. The cuckoo and Miss Sybilla came here the same day. It
was left to her by her mother's father, with whom she had lived since
she was a baby, and when he died she came here to her sisters. She
wasn't _own_ sister to