, but one is sometimes
afraid they may do some mischief on the way--without meaning it, of
course; and, besides, it is not always so easy to pull them up as it was
to start them.

Just as Auntie finished speaking the door opened and their uncle came
in. He was Auntie's elder brother--a good deal older--and very kind and
sensible. At once all thoughts of the dwarfs or what Auntie had been
saying danced out of Rex's curly head. Like a true boy he flew off to
his uncle, besieging him with questions as to what sort of a carriage
they were to go on in--_was_ it an ox-cart; oh, mightn't they _for once_
go in an ox-cart? and might he--oh, might he sit beside the driver in
front?

His uncle laughed and replied to his questions, but Olive stayed beside
the sofa, staring gravely at her aunt.

"Auntie," she said, "you're not _in earnest_, are you, about there being
really a country of dwarfs?"

Olive was twelve. Perhaps you will think her very silly to have imagined
for a moment that her aunt's joke could be anything but a joke,
especially as she had been so sensible about not letting Rex get
anything into his head which could frighten him. But I am not sure that
she was so very silly after all. She had read in her geography about the
Lapps and Finns, the tiny little men of the north, whom one might very
well describe as dwarfs; there might be dwarfs in these strange
Thueringian forests, which were little spoken of in geography books;
Auntie knew more of such things than she did, for she had travelled in
this country before. Then with her own eyes Olive had seen a dwarf, and
though she had said to Rex that he was just an odd dwarf by himself as
it were, not one of a race, how could she tell but what he might be one
of a number of such queer little people? And even the blue dwarfs
themselves--the little figures in the china manufactory--rather went to
prove it than not.

"They may have taken the idea of dwarfs from the real ones, as Rex
said," thought Olive. "Any way I shall look well about me if we go
through any of these forests again. They must live in the forests, for
Auntie said they eat roast fir-cones for dinner."

All these thoughts were crowding through her mind as she stared up into
Auntie's face and asked solemnly--

"Auntie, were you in earnest?"

Auntie's blue eyes sparkled.

"In earnest, Olive?" she said. "Of course! Why shouldn't I be in
earnest? But come, quick, we must get our things together. Your uncl