o for a walk with you; oh,
do buy me, and buy my poor brothers too! Do! do! do!' They almost said,
'Do! do! do!' plain to the ear, as they whined; all but one big Irish
terrier, and he growled when Jane patted him.

'Grrrrr,' he seemed to say, as he looked at them from the back corner
of his eye--'YOU won't buy me. Nobody will--ever--I shall die chained
up--and I don't know that I care how soon it is, either!'

I don't know that the children would have understood all this, only once
they had been in a besieged castle, so they knew how hateful it is to be
kept in when you want to get out.

Of course they could not buy any of the dogs. They did, indeed, ask the
price of the very, very smallest, and it was sixty-five pounds--but that
was because it was a Japanese toy spaniel like the Queen once had her
portrait painted with, when she was only Princess of Wales. But the
children thought, if the smallest was all that money, the biggest would
run into thousands--so they went on.

And they did not stop at any more cat or dog or bird shops, but passed
them by, and at last they came to a shop that seemed as though it only
sold creatures that did not much mind where they were--such as goldfish
and white mice, and sea-anemones and other aquarium beasts, and
lizards and toads, and hedgehogs and tortoises, and tame rabbits
and guinea-pigs. And there they stopped for a long time, and fed the
guinea-pigs with bits of bread through the cage-bars, and wondered
whether it would be possible to keep a sandy-coloured double-lop in the
basement of the house in Fitzroy Street.

'I don't suppose old Nurse would mind VERY much,' said Jane. 'Rabbits
are most awfully tame sometimes. I expect it would know her voice and
follow her all about.'

'She'd tumble over it twenty times a day,' said Cyril; 'now a snake--'

'There aren't any snakes, said Robert hastily, 'and besides, I never
could cotton to snakes somehow--I wonder why.'

'Worms are as bad,' said Anthea, 'and eels and slugs--I think it's
because we don't like things that haven't got legs.'

'Father says snakes have got legs hidden away inside of them,' said
Robert.

'Yes--and he says WE'VE got tails hidden away inside us--but it doesn't
either of it come to anything REALLY,' said Anthea. 'I hate things that
haven't any legs.'

'It's worse when they have too many,' said Jane with a shudder, 'think
of centipedes!'

They stood there on the pavement, a cause of some inconvenience