He milked away--each child got a drink, and then the cups were filled again. And all the while Dolly stood as quiet as possible--looking benignly round, as if she would be happy to supply milk to the whole parish, if the Brownie desired it.

"Soh, Dolly! Thank you, Dolly!" said he, again, mimicking the Gardener's voice, half growling, half coaxing. And while he spoke, the real voice was heard behind the hedge. There was a sound as of a great wasp flying away, which made Dolly p.r.i.c.k up her ears, and look as if the old savageness was coming back upon her. The children s.n.a.t.c.hed up their mugs, but there was no need, they had all turned into b.u.t.tercups again.

Gardener jumped over the stile, as cross as two sticks, with an old rope in his hand.

"Oh, what a bother I've had! Breakfast ready, and no milk yet--and such a row as they are making over those lost ducklings. Stand back, you children, and don't hinder me a minute. No use begging--not a drop of milk shall you get. Hillo, Dolly? Quiet old girl!"

Quiet enough she was this time--but you might as well have milked a plaster cow in a London milking-shop. Not one ringing drop resounded against the empty pail; for, when they peeped in, the children saw, to their amazement, that it was empty.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Each child got a drink, and then the cups were filled again.--Page 32]

"The creature's bewitched!" cried the Gardener, in a great fury. "Or else somebody has milked her dry already. Have you done it? or you?" he asked each of the children.

They might have said No--which was the literal truth--but then it would not have been the whole truth, for they knew quite well that Dolly had been milked, and also who had done it. And their mother had always taught them that to make a person believe a lie is nearly as bad as telling him one. Yet still they did not like to betray the kind little Brownie. Greatly puzzled, they hung their heads and said nothing.

"Look in your pail again," cried a voice from the other side of Dolly.

And there at the bottom was just the usual quant.i.ty of milk--no more and no less.

The Gardener was very much astonished. "It must be the Brownie!"

muttered he, in a frightened tone; and, taking off his hat, "Thank you, sir," said he to Mr. n.o.body--at which the children all burst out laughing. But they kept their own counsel, and he was afraid to ask them any more questions.

By-and-by his fright wore off a little. "I only hope the milk is good milk, and will poison n.o.body," said he, sulkily. "However, that's not my affair. You children had better tell your mother all about it. I left her in the farmyard in a pretty state of mind about her ducklings."

Perhaps Brownie heard this, and was sorry, for he liked the children's mother, who had always been kind to him. Besides, he never did any body harm who did not deserve it; and though, being a Brownie, he could hardly be said to have a conscience, he had something which stood in the place of one--a liking to see people happy rather than miserable.

So, instead of going to bed under his big coal for the day, when, after breakfast, the children and their mother came out to look at a new brood of chickens, he crept after them and hid behind the hencoop where the old mother-hen was put, with her young ones round her.

There had been great difficulty in getting her in there, for she was a hen who hatched her brood on independent principles. Instead of sitting upon the nice nest that the Gardener made for her, she had twice gone into a little wood close by and made a nest for herself, which n.o.body could ever find; and where she hatched in secret, coming every second day to be fed, and then vanishing again, till at last she re-appeared in triumph, with her chickens running after her. The first brood there had been twelve, but of this there were fourteen--all from her own eggs, of course, and she was uncommonly proud of them. So was the Gardener, so was the mistress--who liked all young things. Such a picture as they were! fourteen soft, yellow, fluffy things, running about after their mother. It had been a most troublesome business to catch--first her, and then them, to put them under the coop. The old hen resisted, and pecked furiously at Gardener's legs, and the chickens ran about in frantic terror, chirping wildly in answer to her clucking.

At last, however, the little family was safe in shelter, and the chickens counted over, to see that none had been lost in the scuffle.

How funny they were! looking so innocent and yet so wise, as chickens do--peering out at the world from under their mother's wing, or hopping over her back, or snuggled all together under her breast, so that nothing was seen of them but a ma.s.s of yellow legs, like a great centiped.

"How happy the old hen is," said the children's mother, looking on, and then looking compa.s.sionately at that other forlorn old hen, who had hatched the ducklings, and kept wandering about the farmyard, clucking miserably, "Those poor ducklings, what can have become of them? If rats had killed them, we should have found feathers or something; and weasels would have sucked their brains and left them. They must have been stolen, or wandered away, and died of cold and hunger--my poor ducklings!"

The mistress sighed, for she could not bear any living thing to suffer.

And the children nearly cried at the thought of what might be happening to their pretty ducklings. That very minute a little wee brown face peered through a hole in the hencoop, making the old mother-hen fly furiously at it--as she did at the slightest shadow of an enemy to her little ones. However, no harm happened--only a guinea-fowl suddenly ran across the farmyard, screaming in its usual harsh voice. But it was not the usual sort of guinea-fowl, being larger and handsomer than any of theirs.

"Oh, what a beauty of a creature! how did it ever come into our farmyard," cried the delighted children; and started off after it, to catch it if possible.

But they ran, and they ran--through the gate and out into the lane; and the guinea-fowl still ran on before them, until, turning round a corner, they lost sight of it, and immediately saw something else, equally curious. Sitting on the top of a big thistle--so big that he must have had to climb it just like a tree--was the Brownie. His legs were crossed, and his arms too, his little brown cap was stuck knowingly on one side, and he was laughing heartily.

"How do you do? Here I am again. I thought I wouldn't go to bed after all. Shall I help you to find the ducklings? Very well! come along."

They crossed the field, Brownie running beside them, and as fast as they could, though he looked such an old man; and sometimes turning over on legs and arms like a Catherine wheel--which they tried to imitate, but generally failed, and only bruised their fingers and noses.

He lured them on and on till they came to the wood, and to a green path in it, which well as they knew the neighborhood, none of the children had ever seen before. It led to a most beautiful pond, as clear as crystal and as blue as the sky. Large trees grew round it, dipping their branches in the water, as if they were looking at themselves in a gla.s.s.

And all about their roots were quant.i.ties of primroses--the biggest primroses the little girls had ever seen. Down they dropped on their fat knees, squashing more primroses than they gathered, though they tried to gather them all; and the smallest child even began to cry because her hands were so full that the flowers dropped through her fingers. But the boys, older and more practical, rather despised primroses.

"I thought we had come to look for ducklings," said the eldest. "Mother is fretting dreadfully about her ducklings. Where can they be?"

"Shut your eyes, and you'll see," said the Brownie, at which they all laughed, but did it; and when they opened their eyes again, what should they behold but a whole fleet of ducklings sailing out from the roots of an old willow-tree, one after the other, looking as fat and content as possible, and swimming as naturally as if they had lived on a pond--and this particularly pond, all their days.

"Count them," said the Brownie, "the whole eight--quite correct. And then try and catch them--if you can."

Easier said than done. The boys set to work with great satisfaction--boys do so enjoy hunting something. They coaxed them--they shouted at them--they threw little sticks at them; but as soon as they wanted them to go one way the fleet of ducklings immediately turned round and sailed another way, doing it so deliberately and majestically, that the children could not help laughing. As for little Brownie, he sat on a branch of the willow-tree, with his legs dangling down to the surface of the pond, kicking at the water-spiders, and grinning with all his might. At length, quite tired out, in spite of their fun, the children begged for his help, and he took compa.s.sion on them.

"Turn round three times and see what you can find," shouted he.

Immediately each little boy found in his arms, and each little girl in her pinafore, a fine fat duckling. And there being eight of them, the two elder children had each a couple. They were rather cold and damp, and slightly uncomfortable to cuddle, ducks not being used to cuddling.

Poor things! they struggled hard to get away. But the children hugged them tight, and ran as fast as their legs could carry them through the wood, forgetting, in their joy, even to say "Thank you" to the little Brownie.

When they reached their mother she was as glad as they, for she never thought to see her ducklings again; and to have them back alive and uninjured, and watch them running to the old hen, who received them with an ecstasy of delight, was so exciting, that n.o.body thought of asking a single question as to where they had been found.

When the mother did ask, the children told her about Brownie's taking them to the beautiful pond--and what a wonderful pond it was; how green the trees were round it; and how large the primroses grew. They never tired of talking about it and seeking for it. But the odd thing was that, seek as they might, they never could find it again. Many a day did the little people roam about one by one, or all together, round the wood, often getting themselves sadly draggled with mud and torn with brambles--but the beautiful pond they never found again.

Nor did the ducklings, I suppose; for they wandered no more from the farmyard, to the old mother-hen's great content. They grew up into fat and respectable ducks--five white ones and three gray ones--waddling about, very content, though they never saw water, except the tank which was placed for them to paddle in. They lived a lazy, peaceful, pleasant life for a long time, and were at last killed and eaten with green peas, one after the other, to the family's great satisfaction, if not to their own.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

[Ill.u.s.tration]

ADVENTURE THE FOURTH

BROWNIE'S RIDE

FOR the little Brownie, though not given to horsemanship, did once take a ride, and a very remarkable one it was. Shall I tell you all about it?

The six little children got a present of something they had longed for all their lives--a pony. Not a rocking-horse, but a real live pony--a Shetland pony, too, which had traveled all the way from the Shetland Isles to Devonshire--where every body wondered at it, for such a creature had not been seen in the neighborhood for years and years. She was no bigger than a donkey, and her coat, instead of being smooth like a horse's, was s.h.a.ggy like a young bear's. She had a long tail, which had never been cut, and such a deal of hair in her mane and over her eyes that it gave her quite a fierce countenance. In fact, among the mild and tame Devonshire beasts, the little Shetland pony looked almost like a wild animal. But in reality she was the gentlest creature in the world. Before she had been many days with them, she began to know the children quite well; followed them about, ate corn out of the bowl they held out to her; nay, one day, when the eldest little girl offered her bread-and-b.u.t.ter, she stooped her head and took it from the child's hand, just like a young lady. Indeed, Jess--that was her name--was altogether so lady-like in her behavior, that more than once Cook allowed her to walk in at the back-door, when she stood politely warming her nose at the kitchen-fire for a minute or two, then turned round and as politely walked out again. But she never did any mischief; and was so quiet and gentle a creature that she bade fair soon to become as great a pet in the household as the dog, the cat, the kittens, the puppies, the fowls, the ducks, the cow, the pig, and all the other members of the family.

The only one who disliked her, and grumbled at her, was the Gardener.

This was odd; because, though cross to children, the old man was kind to dumb beasts. Even his pig knew his voice and grunted, and held out his nose to be scratched; and he always gave each successive pig a name, Jack or d.i.c.k, and called them by it, and was quite affectionate to them, one after the other, until the very day that they were killed. But they were English pigs--and the pony was Scotch--and the Devonshire Gardener hated every thing Scotch, he said; besides, he was not used to groom's work, and the pony required such a deal of grooming on account of her long hair. More than once Gardener threatened to clip it short, and turn her into a regular English pony, but the children were in such distress and mother forbade any such spoiling of Jessie's personal appearance.

At length, to keep things smooth, and to avoid the rough words and even blows which poor Jess sometimes got, they sought in the village for a boy to look after her, and found a great rough, shock-headed lad named Bill, who, for a few shillings a week, consented to come up every morning and learn the beginning of a groom's business; hoping to end, as his mother said he should, in sitting, like the squire's fat coachman, as broad as he was long, on the top of the hammer-cloth of a grand carriage, and do nothing all day but drive a pair of horses as stout as himself a few miles along the road and back again.

Bill would have liked this very much, he thought, if he could have been a coachman all at once, for if there was one thing he disliked, it was work. He much preferred to lie in the sun all day and do nothing; and he only agreed to come and take care of Jess because she was such a very little pony, that looking after her seemed next door to doing nothing.

But when he tried it, he found his mistake. True, Jess was a very gentle beast, so quiet that the old mother-hen with fourteen chicks used, instead of roosting with the rest of the fowls, to come regularly into the portion of the cow-shed which was part.i.tioned off for a stable, and settle under a corner of Jess's manger for the night; and in the morning the chicks would be seen running about fearlessly among her feet and under her very nose.

But, for all that, she required a little management, for she did not like her long hair to be roughly handled; it took a long time to clean her; and, though she did not scream out like some silly little children when her hair was combed, I am afraid she sometimes kicked and bounced about, giving Bill a deal of trouble--all the more trouble, the more impatient Bill was.

And then he had to keep within call, for the children wanted their pony at all hours. She was their own especial property, and they insisted upon learning to ride--even before they got a saddle. Hard work it was to stick on Jess's bare back, but by degrees the boys did it, turn and turn about, and even gave their sisters a turn too--a very little one--just once round the field and back again, which was quite enough, they considered, for girls. But they were very kind to their little sisters, held them on so that they could not fall, and led Jess carefully and quietly: and altogether behaved as elder brothers should.

Nor did they squabble very much among themselves, though sometimes it was rather difficult to keep their turns all fair, and remember accurately which was which. But they did their best, being, on the whole, extremely good children. And they were so happy to have their pony, that they would have been ashamed to quarrel over her.

Also, one very curious thing kept them on their good behavior. Whenever they did begin to misconduct themselves--to want to ride out of their turns, or to domineer over one another, or the boys, joining together, tried to domineer over the girls, as I grieve to say boys not seldom do--they used to hear in the air, right over their heads, the crack of an unseen whip. It was none of theirs, for they had not got a whip; that was a felicity which their father had promised when they could all ride like a young gentleman and ladies; but there was no mistaking the sound--indeed, it always startled Jess so that she set off galloping, and could not be caught again for many minutes.