we will have something so very nice.
I am baking it in a pie-dish--a pie-
dish with a pink rim. You never
tasted anything so good! And YOU
shall eat it all! _I_ will eat muffins,
my dear Duchess!" wrote Ribby.

Duchess read the letter and wrote
an answer:--"I will come with
much pleasure at a quarter past four.
But it is very strange. _I_ was just
going to invite you to come here,
to supper, my dear Ribby, to eat
something MOST DELICIOUS."

"I will come very punctually, my
dear Ribby," wrote Duchess; and
then at the end she added--"I hope
it isn't mouse?"


And then she thought that did
not look quite polite; so she scratched
out "isn't mouse" and changed
it to "I hope it will be fine," and
she gave her letter to the postman.

But she thought a great deal
about Ribby's pie, and she read
Ribby's letter over and over again.