'We won't do any mischief, sir,' said Peggy earnestly, as she tried to make the bundle she carried sit upright, and look something like a baby, instead of cuddling up like a shapeless lump on her shoulder.
'Very well, then, in you go.'
The farmer held the gate open till the five children and two babies had filed sedately through; then he dropped the bar into the socket, and tramped away down the dusty lane.
The sheep were away at the far side, and did not take the trouble to glance up at the intruders. The hens were clucking busily on a piece of bare ground beyond the barn. Down in the lowest corner of the field was a shallow pond, where a plump mother duck and half a dozen downy ducklings were sailing placidly about. They were new-comers comparatively, and the children greeted them with shouts of approval.
'Why can't babies swim about and do things, instead of always crying and going to sleep?' asked Tommy, eyeing his small twin brothers with great dissatisfaction, as they sat in a row on a fallen tree-trunk. 'I'd rather have young ducks any day; they've twice as much sense.'
'See that one eating up my bread and butter!' cried Jack; 'he's something like a duck. I wish Farmer Jones would give him to me.'
'I'm quite sure he wouldn't,' said Peggy sharply; 'ducks are dreadfully dear things: mother's said so lots of times.'
Jack didn't answer; he was leaning over the tree trunk, throwing tiny bits of crusts to the duckling, who was doing his best to choke himself with them. Soon after, the duckling came round in front of the trunk where they were sitting; and it was the funniest little object, with its stumpy wings, and a big yellow bill that opened and shut like a pair of scissors.
'IT WAS THE FUNNIEST LITTLE OBJECT.'