CHAPTER V.
CELLAR—WALK TO THE SEA-SHORE—RAINBOW, ETC.
THE next morning it rained again, and the little girls could not go out; but they were not unhappy, because they knew that grandmamma would tell them some stories, or give them something to amuse them.
After their lessons, grandmamma said, ‘Alice and Beatrice, I am going down into the cellar, will you come with me?’
‘Yes, please, please,’ cried both the little girls; ‘we shall like to come with you so much; we have never seen the cellar.’
‘Is it quite dark, grandmamma?’ asked Beatrice.
‘Yes, to be sure,’ said Alice; ‘but Mary has a candle, and will show us light.’
Mary walked on in front, and went slowly down a long, dark, narrow staircase. Alice ran after her, and Beatrice, holding grandmamma’s hand, followed carefully.
The little girls looked about in wonder; they did not know what a large place the cellar was. There were several rooms, all called cellars, which Mary showed them. First, to the right hand, without a door, was a very large and black-looking place, and when Mary lighted it up, the children saw that it was full of coals.