“You have no particular wish to ride, Melea, have you?” inquired her sister.
“Not at all. I had much rather see these children home. They look so frightened, I hardly know how Rhoda can manage to take care of them all.”
“The horses can be left at the farm for half an hour while George goes with us all to Mr. Cavendish’s,” observed Fanny: and so it was arranged.
As the party chose a circuitous way, in order to avoid the bustle of the town, the young ladies had an opportunity of improving their acquaintance with five little Miss Cavendishes, including the baby in arms. At first, the girls would walk only two and two, hand in hand, bolt upright, and answering only “Yes, ma’am,” “No, ma’am,” to whatever was said to them. By dint of perseverance, however, Melea separated them when fairly in the fields, and made them jump from the stiles, and come to her to have flowers stuck in their bonnets. This latter device first loosened their tongues.
“Mamma says it stains our bonnets to have flowers put into them,” observed Marianna, hesitating. “She says we shall have artificial flowers when we grow bigger.”
Melea was going to take out the garland, when Emma insisted that mamma did not mean these bonnets, but their best bonnets.
“O, Miss Berkeley!” they all cried at once, “have you seen our best bonnets?”
“With lilac linings,” added one.
“With muslin rosettes,” said another.
“And Emma’s is trimmed round the edge, because she is the oldest,” observed little Julia, repiningly.