"The Lower Wooders and we together; they too had to have a song, but the
shortest, as it ought to be. It runs so:

"'And they of Middle Lot
They all together plot
That they are striving zealously for peace,
But with quarrelling they never cease.'

"And how do you like that, Papa?"

"They are, all three of them, kind of fighting songs, Edi," answered the
father, "and I should prefer that you keep busy with your history
studies, instead of taking sides in these party-fights. One never knows
where one comes out, and such poetry usually ends with lumps on the
heads."

Edi seemed much disappointed as he attacked his noodles with a visibly
spoiled appetite.

"And what has been your experience, Sally? Why are you so pensive?" the
father continued.

"Kaetheli was not at school," reported Sally, "and I had so much to talk
over with her. Perhaps she is sick; may I go to see her this afternoon?
We have no school, you know."

"Aha, Sally wants to see the strange boy," the sharp-witted Edi
remarked.

"You may go, Sally," the mother said, answering a questioning look from