Part 6 (2/2)
”Because there are snakes about, and she is terrified of them,”
Prudence explained
”Oh dear--so ahtened!” Mollie exclaimed ”I never saw a snake in htened of them?” Grizzel asked ”You only have to be a little firm with them and they won't do you any harm I have lived in Australia for years and years and have never once been bitten”
”I hope I will neveran unconvinced head
While the other children counted their balls, dried their hands, and tied on their sunbonnets, Mollie stood still and gazed about her
The country she saw looked strange and unfamiliar to her eyes So far as she could see there seeurey trunks, so different frolish woods Here and there one had fallen, and lay like a giant skeleton on the ground On all sides were hills, not very high, but rolling one behind the other like waves, sorass and rough boulders Over everything was the saht that had impressed Mollie so much on her first visit, and the air arht of the dull street at hoether and dingy little back-yards, and she wished that her family could come and live in this wide and sunny country
As she stood, a cry came across the valley
”Coo-eee! Cooo-eeeee!”
”There's Bridget calling for tea,” said Prudence ”Cory as a hunter, and Biddy said she would make some damper, because we are rather short of bread”
”What is damper?” asked Mollie, as she followed the other tn the hill ”Is it wet bread?”
”Don't you knohat _damper_ is?” Grizzel asked, with round eyes
”It is unleavened bread--you know, like the Children of Israel ate
So underneath the trees, but I don't like it lad I am not a Child of Israel,” she added; ”I don't like that old Moses Do you?”
”I haven't thought about hiht in his oay”
”He was so fond of Thou shalt not,” Grizzel objected, ”and I can't _bear_ thou shalt nots If _I_ had htest not to co' Don't you think that would be ?”
”No, I don't,” Mollie answered decidedly, ”I like things to be short and plain like Thou shalt not steal Then you knohere you are”
Prudence looked disapprovingly at her sister ”You should not talk like that, Grizzel; it is flippant, and you knohat Papa says about flippancy”
Grizzel made a face but did not answer, and they went on in silence till they reached the foot of the hill They crossed the little creek by stepping-stones, and walked slowly up the winding path, the vines with their ripening grapes on the one side, and on the other great cherry trees, laden with the largest and reddest cherries that Mollie had ever seen in her life They hung down te their little bunches in the inable, some scarlet, some black, and some almost white, but all ripe and luscious The children stretched up their hands and pulled so toher stones on the ground and carefully pushi+ng the to s ofher stones away in the careless fashi+on of people who are accusto their fruit in shops
”My jam fortune,” Grizzel answered ”Every year Mamma sends a case of ja to put in twelve tins of my very own jam, and Grandmamma will sell it and put the ood girl, and I've been as good as it is possible for a hu to be”
”But can _you_ make really-truly jam?” Mollie asked incredulously-- Grizzel looked so s to be a maker of real jam in shoppy tins
”Grizzel is a _beautiful_ cook,” said Prudence, with an air of great pride ”You wait till you taste her herring-shape, and her parsnip sauce Mamma says that cooks are born, not made, and that Grizzel is born and I'm not made”
Mollie felt an i point, as her Guide captain had infore more than once, and in any case food at home was too precious for children to experi about with fruit and sugar for instance
She began to think that if there were soo children, there were also soht which would have given her hter's mind at that moment