Lily handing Bertha her Doll, after lending the Shoes.
Jessie, a sweet little blue-eyed fairy, with quiet, gentle manners, brought two beautiful dolls, dressed in white, trimmed with black velvet. The children all kissed the dolls, they thought them "so sweet;" but Lily's mother kissed Jessie, and I think she had the best of it.
Ellie had a dolly that ought to have married the Kentucky giant, for she was so big she had to have a whole chair to herself. The dear little girl was so anxious to have her appear to advantage that, before she came to the party, she went with her brother into the garden, and, after a grand consultation, they picked two immense dahlias, which she insisted should be pinned on dolly's shoulders, and her mother had great difficulty in persuading her that dolly looked much handsomer without them.
Hugh, a dear little boy with very bright eyes, brought a boy-doll, which he called Mr. Brown.
There was one live doll at the party. She was not quite as high as Ellie's doll, and such a sweet little blue-eyed creature, with such soft, curling hair that, if she had not been jumping and laughing nearly all the time, you would really have taken her for a beautiful wax doll. Her name was little "Mary," and she was about two years old.
I wish you could have heard little Mary sing "Where is my little Kitty gone," sitting in a tiny chair with her little doll in her arms, bobbing it up and down in her lap to keep time. Her sweet little baby voice was like a robin's note; and I, for one, would not have lost that dear little song for all the Italian operas from here to China.
There were a great many other pretty children, and splendid dolls that I have no time to describe; and the bride and groom sat on the sofa and stared at them all, as if they never meant to look at any thing else.
And now that all had congratulated the happy couple, you would have thought that the queen of fun and frolic had joined the party, and all the cross children had gone up to the moon, and never meant to come down again; for the children—putting the dolls on the chairs, to play grown people—all tumbled down on the carpet, and had a grand game of "hunt the slipper," and did not leave off till supper was announced.
Supper was set out in—hem!—in the garret; but, let me tell you, it is quite as fine to go up so high to supper, as to dive down in the basement; at all events the children thought so, for they scuffled and scrambled up the stairs, all laughing and talking, and nobody listening, so that they might as well have given their ears to their dolls, for any use they were, and arrived at the festive banquet quite breathless.