Ransey wore no cap, just a head of towy hair, which was thick enough, however, to protect him against summer's sun or winter's cold. The upper part of his body was arrayed in a blue serge shirt, very much open at the neck; while below his waist, and extending to within nine inches of his bare feet, where they ended in ragged capes and promontories like a map of Norway, he wore a pair of pants. It would have been difficult, indeed, to have guessed at the original colour of these pants, but they were now a kind of tawny brindle, and that is the nearest I can get to it. They were suspended by one brace, a bright red one, so broad that it must have belonged to his father. I think the boy was rather proud than otherwise of this suspender, although it had a disagreeable trick of sliding down over his shoulder and causing some momentary disarrangement of his attire. But Ransey just hooked it back into its place again with his thumb, and all was right, till the next time. A rough little tyke you might have called Ransey Tansey, with his sun-burnt face, neck, and bosom. Yet there was something that was rather pleasing than otherwise in his clear eyes and open countenance; and when his red and rather thin lips parted in a smile, which they very often did, he showed a set of teeth as clean and white as those of a six-months-old Saint Bernard puppy, and you cannot better that. Had this little lad been a town boy, hands and face and feet would have been far from clean; but Ransey lived away down in the cool, green country, in a midland district of Merrie England, and being as often in the water as a duck, he was just as clean as one. Away went Ransey Tansey now, and opened a rough old door in a rock which formed part of the hill by the side of which the humble cottage stood. The door opened into a kind of cave, which was a storehouse for all kinds of things. He was soon back again, and in five minutes' time had lit the fire, swept the hearth as tidily as a girl could have done it, and hung the kettle on a hook and chain. By this time another member of this small family came in, a very large and handsome tabby cat, with a white chest and vandyked face. Murrams, as he was called, was holding his head very high indeed. In fact he had to, else the nice young leveret he carried would have trailed on the ground. Bob jumped up to meet him, with joy in his brown eyes. Had Bob possessed a tail of any consequence, he would have wagged it. Bob's tail, however, was a mere stump, and it was quite buried in the rough, shaggy coat that hung over his rump. But though honest Bob had only the fag-end of a tail, so to speak, he agitated this considerably when pleased. He did so when he saw that leveret. "Oh, you clever old Murrams!" Bob seemed to say. "What a nice drop of soup that'll make, and all the bones for me!" Murrams walked gingerly past him, and throwing the leveret on the hearth, proceeded to wash his face and warm his nose at the blaze.