ister as theirs.

Our story begins on the evening before the first of May. Now one
hundred years ago, Mayday was looked forward to with glee by all
English children living in the country. Early that morning the lads
and lasses of the village, gaily decked with flowers, would go merrily
singing from house to house. In their midst would walk the Queen of
the May, or sometimes, seated in a chair twined round with blossom,
she would be carried from door to door by her little companions. With
a wreath of their gayest flowers they would crown her their Queen, and
for her would be woven the fairest garlands. After the May carols were
sung, cake, coppers, or small coins would be given to the boys and
girls.

To choose their Queen and to arrange their flowers the children would
meet on the last day of April. This they did in the village where
Susan lived, and their meeting-place was in a corner of a field close
by a large pink hawthorn. A shady lane ran past one side of the bush.
On another side a sweetbrier hedge separated it from the garden
belonging to an attorney.

This attorney was a very cross man, so cross that the village people
were always in fear of him. Although he had hedged and fenced his
garden, it sometimes happened that there would stray into it a pig, or
a dog, or a goat, or a goose belonging to a poor neighbor. Then the
attorney would go to the owner of the stray animal and in a harsh
voice demand money to pay for the damage it had done.

Nor did this cruel man let people walk along the paths through his
meadows, although they did no harm. He blocked up the stiles with
stones and prickly shrubs, so that not even a gosling could squeeze
under them nor a giant climb over. Even the village children were
afraid to fly their kites near his fields, lest they should get
entangled in his trees or fall on his ground.

Mr. Case was the name of this attorney, and he had one son and a
daughter called Barbara.

For long the father paid no attention to the education of his
children, for all his time and thought were given to money-making.
Meanwhile Barbara and her brother ran wild with the village children.
But suddenly Mr. Case decided to send his son to a tutor to learn
Latin, and to employ a maid to wait upon Barbara. At the same time he
gave strict orders that his children should no longer play with their
old companions.

The village children were not at all sorry when they heard this.
Barbara had not been a fa