Yet she was continually getting into mischief; and to see her trotting
to and fro, eager to be of use, but always lending a little hindering
hand to everything, one would hardly consider her a help. "How should
I ever get on without the child!" her mother would often exclaim; while
at the same moment Tilderee might be dragging at her gown and
interfering with her work at every step.

How frequently Mrs. Prentiss laughed, though with tears in her eyes, as
she thought of the time when Tilderee, a toddling baby, was nearly
drowned by tumbling head-foremost into a pailful of foaming milk, and
no one would have known and rushed to save her but for the barking of
the little terrier Fudge! Then there was the scar still to be found
beneath the soft ringlets upon her white forehead, a reminder of the
day when she tried to pull the spotted calf's tail. How frightened
"papa" was at the discovery that his mischievous daughter had been at
his ammunition chest, played dolls with the cartridges, and complained
that gunpowder did not make as good mud pies as "common dirt!"

Peter and Joan could add their story, too. Peter might tell, for
instance, how Tilderee and Fudge, the companion of most of her pranks,
frightened off the shy prairie-dogs he was trying to tame; saying they
had no right to come there pretending to be dogs when they were only
big red squirrels, which indeed they greatly resembled. Still he was
very fond of his little sister. He liked to pet and romp with her, to
carry her on his back and caper around like the friskiest of ponies.
When he paused for breath she patted his sun-burned cheek with her
dimpled hand, saying, in her cooing voice, "Good brother Pippin!" which
was her nickname for him. Then he forgot that she delighted to tease
him,--that her favorite pastime was to chase the young chicks and cause
a tremendous flutter in the poultry yard; and how vexed he had been