THE MINNOWS WITH SILVER TAILS.
THERE was a cuckoo-clock hanging in Tom Turner's cottage. When it struck One, Tom's wife laid the baby in the cradle, and took a saucepan off the fire, from which came a very savory smell.
Her two little children, who had been playing in the open doorway, ran to the table, and began softly to drum upon it with their pewter spoons, looking eagerly at their mother as she turned a nice little piece of pork into a dish, and set greens and potatoes round it. They fetched the salt; then they set a chair for their father; brought their own stools; and pulled their mother's rocking-chair close to the table.
'Run to the door, Billy,' said the mother, 'and see if father's coming.' Billy ran to the door; and, after the fashion of little children, looked first the right way, and then the wrong way, but no father was to be seen.
Presently the mother followed him, and shaded her eyes with her hand, for the sun was hot. 'If father doesn't come soon,' she observed, 'the apple-dumpling will be too much done, by a deal.'
'There he is!' cried the little boy, 'he is coming
