E-text prepared by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, Emmy, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net/ Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 17412-h.htm or 17412-h.zip: (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/7/4/1/17412/17412-h/17412-h.htm) or (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/7/4/1/17412/17412-h.zip) THE BOBBSEY TWINS OR Merry Days Indoors and Out by LAURA LEE HOPE Author of "The Bobbsey Twins in the Country," "The Bobbsey Twins at the Seashore," Etc. [Illustration: DOWN THE LONG HILL SWEPT THE TWO SLEDS.--P. 45.] [Illustration] New York Grosset & Dunlap Publishers Copyright, 1904, by The Mershon Company All rights reserved CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. THE BOBBSEY TWINS AT HOME 1 II. ROPE JUMPING, AND WHAT FOLLOWED 9 III. THE FIRST SNOW STORM 18 IV. THE BROKEN WINDOW 27 V. BERT'S GHOST 36 VI. COASTING, AND WHAT CAME OF IT 44 VII. FREDDIE AND FLOSSIE'S SNOW HOUSE 52 VIII. FUN ON THE ICE 61 IX. FREDDIE LOSES HIMSELF 70 X. LOST AND FOUND 79 XI. THE CRUISE OF THE "ICE BIRD" 88 XII. TIGE--PLAYING THEATER 97 XIII. NAN'S FIRST CAKE-BAKING 106 XIV. CHRISTMAS 115 XV. THE CHILDREN'S PARTY 124 XVI. A GRAND SLEIGH RIDE 133 XVII. THE RACE AND THE RUNAWAY 142 XVIII. A QUARREL IN THE SCHOOLYARD 151 XIX. NAN'S PLEA 160 XX. ST. VALENTINE'S DAY 169 XXI. THE RESCUE OF SNOOP, THE KITTEN 178 XXII. THE LAST OF THE GHOST--GOOD-NIGHT 187 THE BOBBSEY TWINS CHAPTER I THE BOBBSEY TWINS AT HOME The Bobbsey twins were very busy that morning. They were all seated around the dining-room table, making houses and furnishing them. The houses were being made out of pasteboard shoe boxes, and had square holes cut in them for doors, and other long holes for windows, and had pasteboard chairs and tables, and bits of dress goods for carpets and rugs, and bits of tissue paper stuck up to the windows for lace curtains. Three of the houses were long and low, but Bert had placed his box on one end and divided it into five stories, and Flossie said it looked exactly like a "department" house in New York. There were four of the twins. Now that sounds funny, doesn't it? But, you see, there were two sets. Bert and Nan, age eight, and Freddie and Flossie, age four. Nan was a tall and slender girl, with a dark face and red cheeks. Her eyes were a deep brown and so were the curls that clustered around her head.