"No, Buff, you are not to tell yourself a story. You must sup your porridge."
Buff slapped his porridge vindictively with his spoon and said, "I wish all the millers were dead."
"Foolish fellow," said his father, as he took a bit of toast.
"Come away," said Elizabeth persuasively, scooping a hole in the despised porridge, "we'll make a quarry in the middle." She filled it up with milk. "There! We've made a great deep hole, big enough to drown an army. Now—one sup for the King, and one for the boys in India, and one for—for the partridge in the pear-tree, and one for the poor little starved pussy downstairs."
Buff twisted himself round to look at his sister's face.
"Yes, there is. Ellen found it last night at the kitchen door. If you finish your breakfast quickly, you may run down and see it before prayers."
"What's it like?" gurgled Buff, as the porridge slid in swift spoonfuls down his throat.
"Grey, with a black smudge on its nose and such a little tail."
"Set me down," said Buff, with the air of one who would behold a cherished vision.
Elizabeth untied his napkin, and in a moment they heard him clatter down the kitchen stairs.