"Look," cried the eldest of the party, a girl about twelve years of age, lifting up her doll, triumphantly, "I have quite finished; does it not fit well?"
"Oh, how pretty!" cried the other three children in a breath.
"I should like just such a frock as that," said a very little girl. "Do make me one, Marian; you said you would."
"Yes, to be sure I did, Lucy, and so I will. Let us begin it directly." And so they set about selecting the materials. All the stores of silk and muslin were displayed, and now this and now that pattern proposed and admired, and in its turn rejected for a newly-unfolded rival. At last, Lucy's eye fell upon one which struck her as just the thing. "This is the prettiest," cried she; "I should like this, Marian, if you please, better than any of the others."
As ill-luck would have it, Marian at that very moment drew forth another, in her opinion, much more suitable for the purpose than the one selected by her little sister. "This will do much better, Lucy," she said, decidedly; "it will look much prettier made up, and as I am going to make it, I ought to know."
"But I don't like it so well," objected Lucy.
"You will like it when it is made," replied Marian, drawing out the pattern she had chosen, and pushing away the remainder.
"Let her have the one she likes best," said Caroline, "it is for her doll."
"Oh, very well, if she likes her doll to be a fright, she can have it," said Marian, and she snatched the objectionable piece from the pile with a jerk which threw the rest upon the lawn to gambol with the breeze, and a merry dance they had before they could be again collected into a bundle.