at would wear better than the Scotch. It did! I had four frocks of it,
and the boys each had three kilt suits, and even the baby wore brown
slips. You cannot remember it, Toots?"

Gertrude shook her head.

"I remember the effect on the family mind," she said, laughing.

"Yes," said Bell. "I don't know whether you have ever noticed,
Hildegarde, that none of us ever wear brown? Well, we never do! Pater
will never see it. He did not realise for some time what had been done.
But one day,--oh, you ought to hear the Mammy tell about this! I can't
begin to make it as funny as she does. One day he came home, and the
twinnies were playing in the front yard. He stood and looked at them for
a while.

"'Are you making mud pies, boys?'

"'No, Papa!'

"'Then why have you on these clothes?'

"The boys didn't know much about their clothes; he looked at them a
little more, and then he came into the house. There was I, in my brown
gingham, playing with my doll.

"'Great Caesar!' says Papa. 'Here's another! Been making mud pies,
Pussy?'

"'No, Papa! I am playing with my dolly.'

"'Do you get dirty, playing with your dolly?'

"'Why, no, Papa!'

"'Then why do you wear such things as this?'

"I was just going to tell him that 'this' was the dress I was wearing
every day and all day, when dear Mammy came out of the sitting-room with
the baby. And, Hilda, the baby wore a brown gingham slip, and Mammy had
on a long, brown gingham apron.

"'Napoleon Bonaparte!' said Papa. 'Here's two more of 'em.' Then he sat
down on the stairs, and looked from one to the other. Then he went to
the door and called the boys; and he took us all into the sitting-room,
and stood us in a row, and sat and looked at us.

"'Miranda,' he said, 'What have you been doing here?'

"'Doing, my dear Miles?' said Mamma. 'What should I have been doing?
Dressing baby after her afternoon nap, to be sure.'

"'Dressing her!' says Pater. '_Dressing_ her!' Then he broke off, Mammy
says, and put his hand to his forehead, as if he were in a kind of
dream.

"'Miranda,' he said, 'I have been greatly occupied for the last few
weeks, and have not fully realised what was going on. I have been dimly
aware that, when I came home, the whole world seemed to turn brown and
dingy. At first I thought it was the weather; then I thought it was the
condition of business; at last I began to think that my sight must be
failing, and cataracts forming, or something of the kind, so