rounded the house; and beyond were beautiful gardens filled
with a superabundance of the gayest and sweetest common flowers. Roses,
carnations, wall flowers, holly-hocks, dahlias, lilies, and violets,
were assembled there in such crowds, that Laura might have plucked
nosegays all day, without making any visible difference; and she was
also made free of the gooseberry bushes and cherry-trees, with leave to
gather, if she pleased, more than she could eat.

Every morning, Laura entered the breakfast-room with cheeks like the
roses she carried, bringing little bouquets for all the ladies, which
she had started out of bed early, in order to gather; and her great
delight was to see them worn and admired all the forenoon, while she was
complimented on the taste with which they had been selected and
arranged. She filled every ornamental jar, basin, and tea-cup in the
drawing-room, with groups of roses, and would have been the terror of
any gardener but the one at Holiday House, who liked to see his flowers
so much admired, and was not keeping up any for a horticultural show.

Laura's chief delight, however, was in the dairy, which seemed the most
beautiful thing she had ever beheld, being built of rough transparent
spar, which looked exactly like crystal, and reminded her of the ice
palace built by the Empress of Russia. The windows were of painted
glass; the walls and shelves were of Dutch tiles, and in the centre rose
a beautiful jet d'eau of clear bright water.

Laura thought it looked like something built for the fairies; but within
she saw a most substantial room, the floor and tables in which were so
completely covered with cheeses, that they looked like some old Mosaic
pavement. Here the good-natured dairy-maid showed Laura how to make
cheese, and afterwards manufactured a very small one about the size of a
soup plate, entirely for the young lady herself, which she promised to
take home after her visit was over; and a little churn was also filled
full of cream, which Laura one morning churned into butter, and
breakfasted upon, after having first practised printing it into a
variety of shapes. It was altered about twenty times from a swan into a
cow, and from a cow into a rose, and from a rose back to a swan again,
before she could be persuaded to leave off her amusement.

Laura continued to become more and more delighted with Holiday House;
and she one day skipped about Lady Harriet's room, saying, "Oh! I am too
happy