either she or
they devote much time to nursing and tending a little new-born child?

The baby, however, arrived. It was sent up at once to the nursery which
was hastily prepared for it. Flossy, aged six, and Peter, who was
between eight and nine, followed it up-stairs, and watched it with
profound and breathless interest, while Martha, the most trustworthy of
the servants, undressed it, and fed it, and put it to sleep.

'It's a perfect duck,' said Flossy. 'Look at its wee little face, and
isn't its skin soft! Might we kiss it, Martha? Would it break it, or
anything, if we was to kiss it very soft and tender like?'

'It ain't a doll, child,' said Martha. 'It won't break with you loving
of it. Kiss it, Flossy--babes is meant for kissing of.'

The children bent down, and printed a tender salute on the wee baby's
face, and that night they scarcely slept themselves for fear of
disturbing it.

'I hope we'll be allowed to take care of the wee baby,' whispered Flossy
to her brother. 'I think we could do it werry nice; don't you, Peter?'

'Yes,' replied Peter. 'It would be something to amuse us; it's rather
dull, you know, always having to keep quiet on account of the lodgers.'

Peter and Flossy soon found they were to have their wish. Martha could
only spare a very short time to attending to the baby's wants, and the
poor little mite would have had a very unhappy and neglected life but for
the children.

As it happened, however, the wee white baby had not a dull life of it at
all; when its teeth were not troubling it, and when it was not very
hungry, it had quite a merry time. It was devoted to the children, and
even when it was sending forth its wail for more food and some real
mother's love, it would stop crying and give a clear hearty little laugh
if Flossy shook her head of tangled red-brown hair in front of it, or if
Snip-snap, the mongrel terrier, stood on his hind-legs and begged to it.

Peter and Flossy had been rather troublesome children before the arrival
of the baby. Mrs Franklin's lodgers were fond of calling them 'little
termagants,' and liked exceedingly to hint to the mother that if the
termagants did not make themselves scarce they would be obliged to seek
other quarters. Poor Mrs Franklin was always extremely frightened when
these things were said, for she knew the rent, and to a certain extent
the daily bread of the children, depended on the lodgers. When she
learned that the baby must