urn
their heads every day . . . and we all know the sun can be "contrary"
enough!

JACK AND JILL

"_When the well is dry, they know the worth of water_"

Jack and Jill
Went up the hill,
To fetch a pail of water;
Jack fell down
And broke his crown,
And Jill came tumbling after.

"Oh dear, how I hate the rain," said Jack to Jill, as they stood at the
window watching the drops trickling down the window-pane. "We can't do
anything really nice when it is raining. I wish someone would take all
the rain away so that we could have nothing but fine days."

I _have_ heard Jacks and Jills say much the same things nowadays! But
this particular Jack and Jill do not live nowadays at all. They lived
a very long time ago, in a far-off country. So long ago, and so far
off, that witches were still alive, and one of them actually lived in
their own village!

The village straggled up the side of a hill, and the Witch's cottage
was at the top of it.

It was a queer-looking, tumble-down place, but people said that from it
there were trap doors and passages leading to all sorts of caves and
cellars dug out of the ground underneath. It was surrounded by very
high branching palings with skull-shaped knobs on the top of them.

The people in the village hardly ever saw the old Witch, except during
thunderstorms and after late winter parties; but everyone who had seen
her, declared that she was very ugly, and beyond a doubt very wicked.
She had an uncomfortable way, too, of sometimes appearing suddenly when
she was not wanted, and granting people's wishes. This sounds very
nice, but it may be horribly inconvenient. The villagers realised
this, and it had become the fashion never to wish for anything; and so,
despite the presence of the Witch, the village was a happy and
contended place enough.

Jack was certainly not thinking about the old Witch when he said, "Oh
dear, how I hate the rain," on that particular afternoon.

And Jill was certainly not thinking about the old Witch, when, a few
minutes later, she heard a "tap-tap" on the door, louder and more
insistent than the pattering of the raindrops on the window-pane.

So they were both of them distinctly frightened when they went to the
door and saw--who but the old Witch herself, on the doorstep!

"Oh dear," said Jack.

"Won't you come in?" said Jill.

And in she came.

She was certainly very ugly. She had a hooked nose and pointed chin.
Grey