The afternoon was spent in the garden, the little girls betaking
themselves to a pretty moss-covered arbour, where there was a grand
doll's feast. Ida had no less than twenty-three dolls, ranging from
the magnificent Rosalind, who had real hair that could be brushed,
and was as large as little Sally at home, down to poor little china
Mildred, whose proper dwelling-place was a bath, and who had with
great difficulty been put into petticoats enough to make her fit to
be seen out of it. Now nobody at home could have saved the life of a
doll for a single day, and Susan and Elizabeth were both thought far
above them; but these beautifully arrayed young ladies had always
been the admiration of the heart of Bessie as well as of Annie, and
they were not too old for extreme satisfaction in handling their
elegant ladyships, and still more their beautiful dinner and tea-
service of pink and white ware.
Susan, though she could not write a note, or do lessons like Ida, was
older in the ways of life, and played rather as she did with the
little ones at home than for her own amusement.
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