take them to school for Fräulein's table. So you see Milly was made up
of loving. And she was a thoughtful little girl too, tidy with her
dress, quick and quiet at her lessons, and always ready to sit still
with her fairy-book or her doll, when mother was busy or tired. But
there were two things in which Milly was not at all sensible in spite of
her sensible face. She was much too ready to cry when any little thing
went wrong, and she was dreadfully afraid of creatures of all sorts. She
was afraid of her father's big dog, she was afraid of the dear brown cow
that lived in the field beyond the garden, she was afraid of earwigs. I
am even ashamed to say she was afraid of spiders. Once she ran away as
if a lion were behind her from a white kitten that pulled her dress with
its frolicsome paws to make her play with it; but that, Milly would tell
you, was "when I was little," and she was quite sure she was a good deal
braver now.

Now what am I to tell you about Olly?

Olly was just a round ball of fun and mischief. He had brown hair, brown
eyes, a brown face, and brown hands. He was always touching and meddling
with everything, indoors and out, to see what was inside it, or what it
was made of. He liked teasing Milly, he liked his walks, he liked his
sleep in the morning, he liked his dinner, he liked his tea, he liked
everything in the world, except learning to read, and that he hated. He
could only do one thing besides mischief. He could sing all kinds of
tunes--quick tunes, slow tunes, and merry tunes. He had been able to
sing tunes ever since he was quite a tiny baby, and his father and
mother often talked together of how, in about a year, he should be
taught to play on the piano, or perhaps on the violin, if he liked it
better. You might hear his sharp, shrill little voice, singing about the
house and the garden all day long. John the gardener called it