"Which _is_ Hetty?" demanded Ann Dovey; who, with all her neighbourly visits, had not learnt to distinguish the two apart. "The one that you be a-nursing." "Did the mistress of the Manor look at 'em?" "Yes; and she thinks I'd better give 'em both some mild physic. Leastways, I said a dose might bring 'em round," added Hester Reed, correcting herself, "and she said it might." "It's the very thing for 'em, Hester Reed," pronounced Mrs. Dovey, decisively. "There's nothing like a dose of physic for little ones; it often stops a bout of illness. You give it to the two; and don't lose no time. Grey powder's best." "I've not got any grey powder by me," said Mrs. Reed. "It crossed my mind to try 'em with one o' them pills I had from Abel Crew." "What pills be they?" "I had 'em from him for myself the beginning o' the year, when I was getting the headache so much. They're as mild as mild can be; but they did me good. The box is upstairs." "How do you know they'd be the right pills to give to babies?" sensibly questioned Mrs. Dovey. "Oh, they be right enough for that! When little Georgy was poorly two or three weeks back, I ran out to Abel Crew, chancing to see him go by the gate, and asked whether one of his pills would do the child harm. He said no, it would do him good." "And did it get him round?" "I never gave it. Georgy seemed to be so much pearter afore night came, that I thought I'd wait till the morrow. He's a rare bad one to take physic, he is. You may cover a powder in treacle that thick, Ann Dovey, but the boy scents it out somehow, and can't be got to touch it. His father always has to make him; I can't. He got well that time without the pill." "Well, I should try the pills on the little twins," advised Ann Dovey. "I'm sure they want something o' the sort. Look at this one! lying like a lamb in my arms, staring up at me with its poor eyes, and never moving. You may always know when a child's ill by its quietness. Nothing ailing 'em, they worry the life out of you." "Both of them were cross enough this morning," remarked Hester Reed, "and for that reason I know they be worse now. I'll try the pill to-night." Now, whether it was that Ann Dovey had any especial love for presiding at the ceremony of administering pills to children, or whether she only looked in again incidentally in passing, certain it was that in the evening she was for the second time at George Reed's cottage. Mrs. Reed had put the three elder ones to bed; or, as she expressed it, "got 'em out o' the way;" and was undressing the twins by firelight, when Ann Dovey tripped into the kitchen. George Reed was at work in the front garden, digging; though it was getting almost too dark to see where he inserted the spade. "Have ye give 'em their physic yet?" was Mrs. Dovey's salutation. "No; but I'm a-going to," answered Hester Reed. "You be just come in time to hold 'em for me, Ann Dovey, while I go upstairs for the box."