Diddie and Dumps scrambled down from the gate-posts and ran along by
the side of Prince to the house, where their mamma was waiting on the
porch. And oh! such a joyful meeting! such hugging and kissing all
around!

Then the wagons came up, and the strong negro men began taking out the
boxes and bundles and carrying them to the storeroom.

"Hand me out that covered basket, Nelson," said Major Waldron to one
of the men; and taking it carefully to the house, he untied the cover,
and there lay two little white woolly puppies-- one for Diddie, and
one for Dumps.

The little girls clapped their hands and danced with delight.

"Ain't they lovely?" said Dumps, squeezing hers in her arms.

"Lubly," echoed Tot, burying her chubby little hands in the puppy's
wool, while Diddie cuddled hers in her arms as tenderly as if it had
been a baby.

Mammy made a bed for the doggies in a box in one corner of the
nursery, and the children were so excited and so happy that she could
hardly get them to bed at all; but after a while Tot's blue eyes began
to droop, and she fell asleep in Mammy's arms, murmuring, "De booful
itty doggie."

"De booful itty doggies," however, did not behave very well; they
cried and howled, and Dumps insisted on taking hers up and rocking him
to sleep.