greatest interest by the Three. I hope he will be more successful than I
was in teaching them Bible stories. I never got farther than Noah, at
which stage their questions became so searching as to completely
confound me; and as no one likes being confounded, and it is especially
regrettable when a parent is placed in such a position, I brought the
course to an abrupt end by assuming that owl-like air of wisdom peculiar
to infallibility in a corner, and telling them that they were too young
to understand these things for the present; and they, having a touching
faith in the truth of every word I say, gave three contented little
purrs of assent, and proposed that we should play instead at rolling
down the grass bank under the south windows--which I did not do, I am
glad to remember.

But the schoolmaster, after four weeks' teaching, has got them as far as
Moses, and safely past the Noah's ark on which I came to grief, and if
glibness is a sign of knowledge then they have learned the story very
thoroughly. Yesterday, after he had gone, they emerged into the verandah
fresh from Moses and bursting with eagerness to tell me all about it.

"Herr Schenk told us to-day about Moses," began the April baby, making a
rush at me.

"Oh?"

"Yes, and a _boser_, _boser Konig_ who said every boy must be deaded,
and Moses was the _allerliebster_."

"Talk English, my _dear_ baby, and not such a dreadful mixture," I
besought.