"Poor little baby, to think that we were actually disappointed when he came. We had wanted another girl so much, and a fourth boy seemed rather unnecessary. Of course that was only at the very beginning. He was the plainest looking baby I ever saw, and we would not have had him in the very least different." "I thought he was lovely," said Ann. "When Mark saw him for the first time, he said, 'Hullo, Peter,' and Peter he was called for years. When I came home from school he was about three years, and he became my special charge. You were so very busy at that time with the house and church work, as well as a great scheme that the Member of Parliament for the district started to teach working women how to make savoury dinners out of nothing. You were so keen about it that you tried all the new dishes on your family, and we nearly perished as a family. I can remember some of the dishes. _Stuffed cod's head_--one glance at its gruesome countenance was enough. _Mock kidney soup_, made with grated liver, which, instead of being the rich brown proper to kidney soup, was a sort of olive green. Sea-pie--so-called, Mark said, because the sea was a handy place when you had eaten it. I once went with you to see a demonstration by the principal cooking teacher, a buxom lady with quantities of glossy black hair coiled round her head. She showed us first what she called 'a pretty puddin'.' Instead of sugar she had grated carrots in it, or something surprisingly like that. Then she made shortbread, and when the cakes were finished and ready to go into the oven she wanted something to prick them with, and nothing was at hand. She wasn't easily beaten, for I saw her withdraw a hairpin from the coils on her head and prick them with that. When they were taken from the oven, and I saw that they were to be handed round and tasted, I unobtrusively withdrew. You had noticed nothing, and ate your bit quite happily." "Oh, Ann, you always saw far too much. That's all nonsense about the things we made. Everything was excellent and very cheap, and the women in the district enjoyed the lectures amazingly, and constantly asked to have them repeated. I enjoyed them myself. Anything to do with cooking interests me, and I read every recipe I see."