cats.

"That--that's my Alice-doll's next-to-best dress, Bungle!" she managed
to say. "You're tearing it! you're tearing it!"

Just then the door opened. Uncle Rufus came tottering in with the
feather duster. The old man's rheumatism still troubled him and he was
not steady on his feet.

Tootsie saw a way of escape. She darted between Uncle Rufus' legs, still
yelping as loudly as she could.

"Wha' fo' dat? wha' fo' dat?" ejaculated Uncle Rufus, and he fell back
against the door which closed with a slam. If Tootsie had possessed a
long tail it certainly would have been caught.

"Git erway f'om yere, you pesky cats!" shouted Uncle Rufus as Bungle and
Popocatepetl charged the door on the trail of the terrified dog.

"Oh, dear me! Don't let them out," begged Dot, "till I can get my doll's
clothes off."

"My poor Tootsie!" cried Mrs. Forsyth again.

"Hush yo'! hush yo'!" said Uncle Rufus, kindly. "Dar's a do' shet 'twixt
dat leetle fice an' dem crazy cats. Dar's sho' nuff wot de papahs calls
er armerstice 'twixt de berlig'rant pahties--ya-as'm! De berry wust has
happen' already, so yo' folkses might's well git ca'm--git ca'm."

The old colored man's philosophy delighted the doctor's wife so much
that she had to laugh. Yet she was not wholly assured that Tootsie was
not hurt until the older girls had trailed the Pomeranian under the bed
in one of the chambers. She had only been hurt in her feelings.

The cats could not seem to calm down either, and Uncle Rufus had to hold
one after the other while Dot removed what remained of the doll's
clothes, in which she had decked out her favorites.

"I guess I don't want cats for doll-babies any more," Dot said, with
gravity, examining a scratch on her plump wrist, after supper that
evening. "They don't seem able to learn the business--not _good_."

Agnes laughed, and sing-songed:

"Cats delight
To scratch and bite,
For 'tis their nature to;
But pretty dolls
With curly polls,
Have something else to do."

"I think our Aggie is going to be a poetess," said Tess, to Ruth,
secretly. "She rhymes so easy!"

"I'd rather have her learn to pick up her things and put them properly
away," said Ruth, who was trying to find her own out-door clothing on
the back hall rack. "My goodness! everything I put my hand on belongs to
Agnes."

"That's because I'm rich," returned Agnes cheerfully. "For once in my
life I have a multitude of clothes," and she