e had feared the worst, she extended the same greeting to Mary and
Jupp; for, she was an affectionate little thing, and highly emotional in
spite of her usually staid demeanour and retiring nature.

The vicar, too, could hardly contain himself for joy, and broke down
utterly when he tried to thank Jupp for rescuing his little son; while
Joe the gardener, not to be behindhand in this general expression of
good-will and gratitude, squeezed his quondam rival's fist in his,
ejaculating over and over again, with a broad grin on his bucolic face,
"You be's a proper sort, you be, hey, Meaister?" thereby calling upon
the vicar, as it were, to testify to the truth of the encomium.

He was a very funny man, Joe!

When the general excitement had subsided, and Teddy, who had in the
meantime been stalking about, a comical little figure, attired in Mary's
flannel petticoat, was re-dressed in the fresh suit of clothes Joe had
brought for him amidst the blankets, the whole party adjourned up the
hill to their old rendezvous under the elm-tree.

Here they found, greatly to their surprise and gratification, that
Jupp's well-built fire had not gone out, as all expected, during the
unforeseen digression that had occurred to break the even tenor of their
afternoon's entertainment, although left so long unattended to.

On the contrary, it was blazing away at a fine rate, with the kettle
slung on the forked sticks above it singing and sputtering, emitting
clouds of steam the while, "like an engine blowing off," as the porter
observed; so, all their preparations having been already completed, the
children carried out their original intention of having a festal tea in
honour of "Pa's birthday," he being set in their midst and told to do
nothing, being the guest of the occasion.

Never did bread and butter taste more appetisingly to the little ones
than when thus eaten out in the woods, away from all such stuck-up
surroundings as tables and chairs, and plates, and cups and saucers, and
the other absurd conventionalities of everyday life. They only had
three little tin pannikins for their tea, which they passed round in
turn, and a basket for their dish, using a leaf when the luxury of a
plate was desired by any sybarite of the party--those nice broad ones of
the dock making splendid platters.

Now, besides bread and butter, Molly the cook had compounded a delicious
dough-cake for them, having plums set in it at signal distances apart,
so