ny long words, so they got on together famously.

It was raining a little, and Fanny said the mud in the streets was very
_stickery_, and she had hard work to keep her boots clean. "I declare,"
she continued, "such very dirty streets are only fit for _esquarians_."

"_Esquarians!_" said Sallie, "what kind of an animal is that? Pigs?"

"My patience!" said Fanny, "did you never hear of _esquarian_ exercise?
I take it every day at Mr. Disbrow's. It is riding on horseback."

"Oh!" said Sallie, rubbing her chin, "of course. I was a perfect goose
not to know that. I wish, when the streets are muddy, we could fly like
birds through the air: how pleasant it must be to be dangling in the
air, with nothing to do but stare at the sun! I would not come down for
a week. Just fancy! what perfect happiness!"

"And no lessons to learn," said Fanny. "Now, there's grammar--I hate it
like pepper, and the hard words in the dictionary nearly _discolates_
my jaw. You ought to be thankful, Sallie, that you don't go to school;
for my part, I am always glad when '_chatterday_' comes, as you call
it."

Sallie knew better than that, but she called Saturday chatterday,
because Fanny almost always spent that day with her, and they chattered
so much you would hardly believe but what they had breakfasted on two or
three dictionaries apiece, and each word was undergoing digestion.

"I think I should like to go to Mr. Abbott's school," said Sallie;
"mamma says that they have an _intermittent_ of five minutes in every
hour. Only think! you can talk to everybody, or walk with anybody, or
put your head in your desk, or eat candy, or drink water all the time,
or never stop laughing, or anything else you please till the five
minutes are over. That's the school for me. I should think he would
have a million of scholars. I am sure if I studied all the time, my head
would be cracked in a week. Why, Fanny, I tried to say the alphabet
backward the other evening, and it _fatwigged_ me so I had to go to
bed."

Here Sallie's mother gave a little laugh, which was instantly changed
into a smothered groan, for the laughing hurt her head, that it seemed
as if a whole regiment of dragoons was galloping through her brain; but
the long words and the wrong words sounded so funny, and the children
acted and talked so much like two old ladies over a cup of tea, it was
not human nature to keep from being amused; and, in fact, their comical
prattle acted like a fairy t