ther yours are
brown or dark grey, but I'm sure a necklace of topaz would suit you
beautifully, and you'll have to wear one when you're grown up. By the
by, on which day of the week were you born?"

"On a Friday," said Sylvia; "but why do you want to know?"

"Then you're loving and giving."

"What do you mean?"

"Oh, don't you know the old rhyme?

'Monday's child is fair of face,
Tuesday's child is full of grace,
Wednesday's child is a child of woe,
Thursday's child has far to go,
Friday's child is loving and giving,
Saturday's child must work for its living,
But the child that is born on the Sabbath day
Is good and truthful and happy and gay.'"

"Where do you learn all these things?" asked Sylvia.

"From our old cook. She's a daleswoman, and she can tell what it means
when the candle gutters or the clock stops, or a swarm of bees comes,
or you see magpies, or your ear burns, or you sneeze, and what's lucky
to do and what's unlucky."

"You are the greatest goose!" said Marian scornfully. "You don't mean
to say you believe that silly rubbish? We shouldn't be allowed to talk
to our cook at home if she told us such nonsense. You'd better not let
Miss Kaye see you throwing salt over your shoulder, or crossing the
water when you wash with anybody."

"You always make fun of everything I do," exclaimed Nina plaintively.

"Then you should have more sense," snapped Marian, who prided herself
upon being strong-minded.

"Sylvia has a pretty name at any rate," continued Nina, "and so have
I. I shouldn't like to be called Marian; it's just like Mary Ann."

But as Marian wisely took no notice, and walked away, the shot fell
rather flat.

The parcel post came in at half-past ten, and brought several
bulky-looking packages addressed to "Miss S. Lindsay". Sylvia bore
them off to the playroom and untied the strings before an audience of
sympathetic girls, each of whom was almost as interested as if the
birthday had been her own.

"Which shall I open first?" she said. "This one feels nice, and it's
in Mother's writing, too. Lend me your scissors, Marian, that's a
dear. I can't unfasten this knot. Oh, look! Exactly what I wanted."

And she drew from a cardboard box a charming little Brownie camera
with several rolls of films quite ready to use.

"How delightful!" she cried. "Now I can take snapshots of you all, and
the house, and Miss Kaye, and everything. I'll send them home to