. No one, not even Daddy, should hit his little
brother. Such was Laddie, the gentle and the fearless.

Then there is Dimples. Dimples is nearly seven, and you never saw a
rounder, softer, dimplier face, with two great roguish, mischievous eyes
of wood-pigeon grey, which are sparkling with fun for the most part,
though they can look sad and solemn enough at times. Dimples has the
making of a big man in him. He has depth and reserves in his tiny soul.
But on the surface he is a boy of boys, always in innocent mischief. "I
will now do mischuff," he occasionally announces, and is usually as good
as his word. He has a love and understanding of all living creatures,
the uglier and more slimy the better, treating them all in a tender,
fairylike fashion which seems to come from some inner knowledge. He has
been found holding a buttercup under the mouth of a slug "to see if he
likes butter." He finds creatures in an astonishing way. Put him in the
fairest garden, and presently he will approach you with a newt, a toad,
or a huge snail in his custody. Nothing would ever induce him to hurt
them, but he gives them what he imagines to be a little treat and then
restores them to their homes. He has been known to speak bitterly to the
Lady when she has given orders that caterpillars be killed if found upon
the cabbages, and even the explanation that the caterpillars were doing
the work of what he calls "the Jarmans" did not reconcile him to their
fate.

He has an advantage over Laddie, in that he suffers from no trace of
shyness and is perfectly friendly in an instant with any one of every
class of life, plunging straight into conversation with some such remark
as "Can your Daddy give a war-whoop?" or "Were you ever chased by a
bear?" He is a sunny creature but combative sometimes, when he draws
down his brows, sets his eyes, his chubby cheeks flush, and his lips go
back from his almond-white teeth. "I am Swankie the Berserker," says he,
quoting out of his favourite "Erling the Bold," which Daddy reads aloud
at bed-time. When he is in this fighting mood he can even drive back
Laddie, chiefly because the elder is far too chivalrous to hurt him. If
you want to see what Laddie can really do, put the small gloves on him
and let him go for Daddy. Some of those hurricane rallies of his would
stop Daddy grinning if they could get home, and he has to fall back off
his stool in order to get away from them.

If that latent po