"I shall try again too," said Grizzel. "There's plenty more cherries, and a new barrel of sugar came yesterday. After all, everybody has ups and downs when they are making fortunes. I'll take good care never to burn my jam again." "I'm not really sure if attar of roses is worth while," Hugh said thoughtfully, his eyes on the tiny milk-jug in his hand; "only rich people could afford to buy it. If you want to make a fortune it is better to make something that everyone wants, rich and poor. Soap might do." "Jam," said Grizzel. "_I'm_ not sure if it is right to make fortunes at all," said Mollie slowly. "Why not?" asked the other three all at once. "Because it doesn't seem fair, somehow. Some people are so frightfully rich, and some people haven't even enough to eat. My mother goes to the children's hospital every week, and sometimes she takes me. You can't _think_ what some of the poor babies are like--and then you go outside and see rich, _rich_ women in splendid motor-cars--I mean carriages," she corrected herself, "and it does make you feel things aren't fair, and I do like fairness." The Australian children were silent for a minute or two. "But if no one was rich no one could give," Grizzel said at last. "We know very rich people here, and they do lovely kind things. Mrs. Basil Hill sends us a packing-case of _exquisite_ oranges every summer, and when she comes to see Mamma she almost always brings us a surprise packet--last time it was five pounds of the most beautiful sweets in Rundle Street, and the time before it was all Miss Alcott's books." "But if everybody was the same, people wouldn't have to give you things," said Mollie. "You'd have them yourself." "Then we would never get a surprise," said Grizzel, "and that would be horribly dull. Don't you think it would be dull if everybody was exactly the same?" "I suppose it would," Mollie admitted, with a sigh, feeling that she had not presented her case attractively; "but I think they might be samer than they are." "There's no use talking," Hugh said decisively. "Australia is full of fortunes waiting to be made. I heard Papa say so. And the early bird gets the worm, and the better the bird the better it is for everyone all round." "Except the worm," said Grizzel. They all laughed. "I wish I had a brother instead of three sisters," Hugh remarked, emptying the contents of the tiny milk-jug over a handkerchief which had once been clean. "A brother would be some use. Where's yours?" he asked Mollie. "Did he get our message?" This reminded Mollie of Dick's letter, which impressed the Australians as much as it had impressed Mollie. "So the next thing--the next thing----" she repeated, looking round at the other three children. "What _is_ the next thing to do?" "We can't tell you," Prudence said, with a funny little smile, "you'll have to fix it yourself in the end." "Cooo-eeeee!" sounded from the cottage. * * * * *