in' to go just now."

"Pearlie, dear," her mother said, "you're raisin' too many hopes in
them."

"Hopes!" Pearl cried. "Did you say hopes, Ma? They look like a bunch
with too many hopes, settin' there blubberin' their eyes out and
spoiling their looks."

By eleven o'clock everything was ready but the weather, and then, as
if it suddenly dawned on the elements that this was hardly a square
deal on Pioneers' Picnic day, the clouds parted right over John
Watson's house, and a patch of blue sky, ever widening, smiled down
encouragingly. Sorrow was changed to joy. Bugsey dried his eyes when
he saw the sun shining on the Brandon Hills.

A little breeze frolicked over the trees and flung down the raindrops
in glittering showers, and at exactly a quarter past eleven the
Watson family, seated on three seats in the high-boxed waggon, drove
gaily out of the yard.

"Sure, we enjoy it all the better for getting the scare," said Mary
the philosopher.

The Perkinses, in their two-seated buggy, were just ahead on the
road. Even Martha, encouraged by Pearl, was coming to the picnic.

Behind the Watsons came the Caverses and the Motherwells.

"Let's ask Libby Anne to ride with us," said Tommy, but Mary, with
fine tact, pointed out that she would see the bottles, and it might
hurt her feelings, "for, mind you," said Mary, "she knows, young and
all as she is."

Mary was one year younger herself.

Along every trail that led into the little town came buggies and
waggons, their occupants in the highest good humour. There was a
laughing ripple in the meadowlark's song, as if he were declaring
that he knew all the time that the rain was only a joke.

Across the river lay the Horsehoe slough, a crescent of glistening
silver, over which wild ducks circled and skimmed and then sank into
its clear waters, splashing riotously, as if they, too, were holding
an "Old Boys' Reunion." It was the close season for wild fowl, and
nobody knew it better than they.

Coming down into the valley, innumerable horses, unhitched and tied
to the wagons, were to be seen. The rain had driven away the
mosquitoes, and a cool breeze, perfumed with wild roses and cowslips,
came gently from the West. The Watsons drove to a clump of poplar
trees which seemed to offer shade for the horses. Bugsey and Tommy
carried the box of bottles to the drug-store, admonished by Pearl to
drive a close bargain.

Pearl went with Jimmy and Patsey, who took the green vegeta