they were too polite to say how nasty it was. But, of course, when I
was helped I called out. And what do you think the boy in buttons
said?"

Nobody could guess, so No. 7 had to tell them.

"He said he had put it in on purpose, because he thought it would
correct the acid of the pie. So I said he had best be apprenticed to
a doctor; so he went--I dare say, ma'am, it was the same doctor who
took your cook--but I never heard of him any more, and I've never
dared to have a boy in buttons again."

"A very wise decision, ma'am, I'm sure!" cried Aunt Judy, who came up
to the wonderful tea-table in the midst of the last mound of
applause. "And now may I ask what game this is that you are playing
at?"

"Oh, we're telling Cook Stories, Aunt Judy," cried No. 6, seizing her
by the arm; "they're such capital fun! I wish you had heard mine;
they were laughing at it when you first came in!"

"It must have been delicious, to judge by the delight it gave,"
replied Aunt Judy, smiling, and kissing No. 6's oddly bedizened up-
turned face. "But what I want to know is, what put Cook Stories, as
you call them, into your head?"

"Oh! don't you remember--" and here followed a long account from No.
6 of how, about a week before, the little ones had gone somewhere to
spend the day, and how it had turned out a very rainy day, so that
they could not have games out of doors with their young friends, as