first half of the first day was got through pretty well. But after
lunch the day darkened and rain began to fall in heavy slate-
coloured streaks, pouring down the window-panes and streaming across
the greenhouse roof, changing the bright daylight into a dismal
twilight, and blotting out all view of the garden. It was depressing
weather even for people who were quite well, and poor Mollie might
be forgiven for finding it hard to keep up her spirits. She was
tired of knitting, tired of being read aloud to, and tired of
writing letters to her family.

"How would you like to see some photographs of your father when he
was little?" suggested Grannie at last. "He was the most beautiful
infant I ever saw." She opened a cupboard door as she spoke, and
presently came back to Mollie's side with an arm-load of photograph-
albums, the kind of albums to be found in country houses, filled
with carte-de-visite photographs of old-fashioned people, all
standing, apparently, in the same studio, and each resting one hand
on the same marble pillar. The ladies wore spreading crinoline
skirts, and had hair brushed in smooth bands on either side of their
high foreheads; the men wore baggy trousers and beards; family
groups were large, and those boys and girls taken separately looked
altogether too good for this world.

Mollie smiled at the picture of her father, a fat, solemn baby in
his mother's arms. She thought, but did not say, that he was a
remarkably plain child, and congratulated herself that she took
after her mother in appearance; though, of course, Father, as she
knew him, was not in the least like that infant. At the rest of the
photographs she looked politely, but it was hard work to keep from
yawning, and at last her mouth suddenly opened of itself and gave a