"I'm getting ready my new top to give to Harry. _Dos first and feels afterwards._" "Well," I said, "Christopher, you _are_ a good boy." "I should like to punch his head," said Chris--and he said it in just the same sing-song tone--"but I'm getting the top ready. _Dos first and feels afterwards_." And he went on winding and muttering. Afterwards he told me that the "feels" came sooner than he expected. Harry wouldn't take his top, and they made up their quarrel. Christopher is very simple, but sometimes we think he is also a little sly. He can make very wily excuses about things he does not like. He does not like Nurse to hold back his head and wash his face; and at last one day she let him go down-stairs with a dirty face, and then complained to Mother. So Mother asked Chris why he was so naughty about having his face washed, and he said, quite gravely, "I do think it would be _such pity_ if the water got into my head again by accident." Mother did not know he had ever heard about it, but she said, "Oh, Chris! Chris! that's one of your excuses." And he said, "It's not my _'scusis_. She lets a good deal get in--at my ears--and lather too." But, with all his whimsical ways, Lady Catherine is devoted to Christopher. She likes him far better than any one of us, and he is very fond of her; and they say quite rude things to each other all along. And Father says it is very lucky, for if she had not been so fond of Chris, and so ready to take him too, Mother would never have been persuaded to leave us when Aunt Catherine took them to the South of France. Mother had been very unwell for a long time. She has so many worries, and Dr. Solomon said she ought to avoid worry, and Aunt Catherine said worries were killing her, and Father said "Pshaw!" and Aunt Catherine said "Care killed the cat," and that a cat has nine lives, and a woman has only one; and then Mother got worse, and Aunt Catherine wanted to take her abroad, and she wouldn't go; and then Christopher was ill, and Aunt Catherine said she would take him too, if only Mother would go with her; and Dr. Solomon said it might be the turning-point of his health, and Father said "the turning-point which way?" but he thanked Lady Catherine, and they didn't quarrel; and so Mother yielded, and it was settled that they should go. Before they went, Mother spoke to me, and told me I must be a Little Mother to the others whilst she was away. She hoped we should all try to please Father, and to be unselfish with each other; but she expected me to try far harder than the others, and never to think of myself at all, so that I might fill her place whilst she was away. So I promised to try, and I did.