"Please may I have a book instead of----"

"Leonie, that is very rude."

"Please, Lady Hetth. Go on, darling---what kind of book."

"'Bout tigers an' snakes, oh! an' elephants. Weal animals. Dolls, you
know"--she smiled as she confided the great secret--"aren't weal
_babies_, they're just full of sawdust."

He lifted the child on to his knee, frowning at the weight, and
smoothed the tangled mass of curls away from the low forehead with a
touch which caused her to make a sound 'twixt sob and sigh, and to lie
back against the broad shoulder.

It was a long and disjointed story, told in the inconsequent fashion of
a child of seven unused to converse with her elders; and continually
interrupted by the aunt, who, fretful and dying for her tea, jingled
her distracting bracelets and chains, fidgeted with the Anglo-Indian
odds-and-ends of her raiment, and disconcerted the child by the futile
verbal proddings; which are as bad for the infant mind as the criminal
attempts to force a baby to use its legs are to the infant body.

"So! and you found the dear little kitten lying quite still in the
nursery this morning?"

"Yes! Stwangled!"

"Do pronounce your _r_'s, Leonie."