“No indeed, Aunt Fanny,” they all cried together, “and we are so glad we have found you at last. We are glad you are little, that’s the best of it! and don’t look so very brown. Come, please sit down, and tell us what has become of the Night-cap children, won’t you? Oh, do!”
There was no resisting that “Oh, do!” with six pair of loving bright eyes looking into mine; so I answered—
“Well, let us all get in a corner together, and have a nice long talk.”
At this one of the boys threw up his hands, made a dry dive down on the carpet, and bumped the top of his head, in his joy; another, hopped on one foot till he lost his balance, and had to make a one-sided somerset, to bring himself up on his feet again; the third and smallest laid his curly head lovingly against my dress; while the little girls danced and skipped so lightly around me, that I caught myself wishing for the hundred and fiftieth time that I were a child too.
But never mind. I love children with my whole heart, and that helps to comfort me, when I think what an old “Aunt Fanny” I am getting to be.
So we all sat down in the corner, just as close together as we could get, and I told them how, as they knew already from the “Mitten” books, that George was a captain in the army, and as he had always been a good boy, he was now a noble and good young man; and how Harry had gone to the naval school at Newport, and could run about the rigging of a ship, like any monkey; and Anna was engaged to be married; at which they were greatly surprised.
“Why, Aunt Fanny!” they exclaimed, “is she as old as that?”
“Yes,” I answered, “she would grow up into a lovely young lady, all I could do—and the rest are growing older too, for Clara has left school; little Minnie knows how to make cake; the ‘Tremendous Dog’ has died of old age; and even little Johnny, who packed up his mother’s false hair in an old tin tomato-can, and gave it to the express-man to carry off, is taller than I am.”
“Oh, Aunt Fanny! How old they all are!” cried Sophie, the eldest girl, “they are too old to have any more stories told to them. Oh! Oh!” she exclaimed, clapping her hands, “please tell the next stories to us. Won’t you? Will you?”
Such a shout as the rest of the children gave at this! “Yes! yes! yes!” they all cried. “We’ll be the Night-cap children! we want the next stories! Oh my! How delightful it would be!”