years.

Mr. Dunlee was in rather poor health, and had been "ordered" to the
mountains. The others were perfectly well and had not been "ordered"
anywhere: they were going merely because they wanted to have a good
time.

"Papa would be so lonesome without us children," said Edith, "he needs
us all for company."

He was to have still more company. Mr. and Mrs. Hale were coming
to-morrow to join the party, bringing their little daughter Barbara,
Lucy's dearest friend. They could not come to-day; there would have been
hardly room for them in the tallyho. With all "the bonnie Dunlees,"--as
Uncle James called the children,--and all the boxes, baskets, and
bundles, the carriage was about as full as it could hold.

It was seldom that the driver used this tallyho. He was quite choice of
it, and generally drove an old stage, unless, as happened just now, he
was taking a large party. It was a very gay tallyho, as yellow as the
famous pumpkin coach of Cinderella, only that the spokes of the wheels
were striped off with scarlet. There were four white horses, and every
horse sported two tiny American flags, one in each ear.

"All aboard!" called out the driver, a brown-faced, broad-shouldered
man, with a twinkle in his eye.

"All aboard!" responded Mr. Sanford, echoed by Jimmy-boy.

Whereupon crack went the driver's long whip, round went the red and
yellow wheels, and off sped the white horses as freely as if they were
thinking of Lucy's gold mine and longing to show it to her, and didn't
care how many miles they had to travel to reach it. But this was all
Lucy's fancy. They were thinking of oats, not gold mines. These bright
horses knew they were not going very far up the mountain. They would
soon stop to rest in a good stable, and other horses not so handsome
would take their places. It was a very hard road, and grew harder and
harder, and the driver always changed horses twice before he got to the
end of the journey.

As the tallyho rattled along, the older people in it fell to talking;
and the children looked at the country they were passing, sang snatches
of songs, and gave little exclamations of delight. Edith threw one arm
around her older sister Katharine, saying:--

"O Kyzie, aren't you glad you live in California? How sweet the air is,
and how high the mountains look all around! When we were East last
summer didn't you pity the people? Only think, they never saw any lemons
and oranges growing! They don't know muc