ng their turn
for the same attention. Then she took up the little comb which had
dropped to her lap, and set herself busily to her task again.

Alexia looked in at the door of the "baby-house," as Phronsie's little
room devoted to her family of dolls, was called. "Oh my goodness me!"
she exclaimed, "don't you ever get tired of everlastingly dressing those
dolls, Phronsie?"

Phronsie gave a sigh, and went patiently on with her work. "Yes, Alexia,
I'm tired sometimes; but I'm their mother, you see."

"And to comb their hair!" went on Alexia, "Oh dear me! I never could do
it in all this world, Phronsie. I should want to run and throw them all
out of the window."

"Oh Alexia!" exclaimed Phronsie in horror, "throw them all out of the
window! You couldn't do that, Alexia." She tightened her grasp on the
doll in her arms.

"Yes, I should want to throw every one of those dreadful dolls out of
the window, Phronsie Pepper!" declared Alexia recklessly.

"But they are my children," said Phronsie very soberly, trying to get
all the others waiting for their hair to be fixed, into her arms too,
"and dear Grandpapa gave them to me, and I love them, every single one."

"Well, now, you see, Phronsie," said Alexia, getting down on the floor
in front of the doll's bureau, by Phronsie's side, "you could come out
with me on the piazza and walk around a bit if it were not for these
dreadfully tiresome dolls; and Polly is at school, and you are through
with your lessons in Mr. King's room. Now how nice that would be, oh
dear me!" Alexia gave a restful stretch to her long figure. "My!" at a
twinge of pain.

"Does your arm hurt you, Alexia?" asked Phronsie, looking over her dolls
up to Alexia's face.

"Um--maybe," said Alexia, nursing her arm hanging in the sling; "it's a
bad, horrid old thing, and I'd like to thump it."

"Oh, don't, Alexia," begged Phronsie, "that will make it worse. Please
don't, Alexia, do anything to it." Then she got up, and went over with
her armful of dolls to the sofa, and laid them down carefully in a row.
"I'll fix your hair to-morrow, children," she said; "now I'm going away
for a little bit of a minute," and came back. "Let's go down to the
piazza," she said, holding out her hand.

"You blessed child, you!" exclaimed Alexia, seizing her with the well
hand, "did you suppose I'd be such a selfish old pig as to drag you off
from those children of yours?"

"You are not a selfish old pig, Alexia, and I like