er, 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 mass of yellow legs, like a great
centiped.

"How happy the old hen is," said the children's mother, looking on, and
then looking compassionately 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