Johnson's Dictionary and the Dignotions, and Brown's Vulgar Errors,
and I was afraid Margery would say I had been very silly, and let a
cat out of a bag.

I hope he was not vexed about his vulgar errors. He only laughed till
he nearly tumbled off his chair.

I never did have a spot on my journey-to-go nail, but we went away all
the same; so I suppose Dignotions do not always tell true.

When Grandmamma forgave me, and told me she would spare the Sunflowers
this time, as Dr. Brown had begged them off, she said--"And Dr. Brown
assures me, Grace, that when you are stronger you will have more
sense. I am sure I hope he is right."

I hope so, too!

DANDELION CLOCKS.

Every child knows how to tell the time by a dandelion clock. You blow
till the seed is all blown away, and you count each of the puffs--an
hour to a puff. Every child knows this, and very few children want to
know any more on the subject. It was Peter Paul's peculiarity that he
always did want to know more about everything; a habit whose first and
foremost inconvenience is that one can so seldom get people to answer
one's questions.

Peter Paul and his two sisters were playing in the pastures. Rich,
green, Dutch pastures, unbroken by hedge or wall, which
stretched--like an emerald ocean--to the horizon and met the sky. The
cows stood ankle-deep in it and chewed the cud, the clouds sailed
slowly over it to the sea, and on a dry hillock sat Mother, in her
broad sun-hat, with one eye to the cows and one to the linen she was
bleaching, thinking of her farm.

Peter Paul and his sisters had found another little hillock where,
among some tufts of meadow-flowers which the cows had not yet eaten,
were dandelion clocks. They divided them quite fairly, and began to
tell each other the time of day.

Little Anna blew very hard for her size, and as the wind blew too, her
clock was finished in a couple of puffs. "One, two. It's only two
o'clock," she said, with a sigh.

Her elder sister was more careful, but still the wind was against
them. "One, two, three. It's three o'clock by me," she said.

Peter Paul turned his back to the wind, and held his clock low. "One,
two, three, four, five. It's five o'clock by my dandelion--I wonder
why the fairy clocks all go differently."

"We blow differently," said his sister.

"Then they don't really tell the time," said Peter Paul.

"Oh yes, they do--the fairy time." And the little girls got more
clocks, and tur