"When I was your age, child, I could cook 'most everything and piece patch-work for quilts,"--and she kept Mary Frances on the porch ten minutes, telling her that little girls weren't brought up any more to be useful the way they were when she was a little girl. * * * * * "Oh, my lid!" sang Tea Kettle, as Mary Frances stepped back into the kitchen. "Oh, my aunt!--has the old lady went?" "Gone!" said Big Iron Pot from the back of the stove. [Illustration: "Oh, my aunt!"] "Who dares correct me?" simmered Tea Kettle. "I dare," sputtered Iron Pot. "I dare,--and I dare tell you other things, too!" [Illustration: "Who dares correct me?" "I dare!"] "You do, do you?" bubbled Tea Kettle. "You do! Well, what do you dare tell me?" "I dare tell you, Mister," said Iron Pot, "that you've got a dirty face--yes, a black face." Tea Kettle, it was plain to be seen, was boiling mad. Steam blew out of his nose in every direction. Now, everybody who knows anything about a tea kettle can imagine how very angry Tea Kettle was. As soon as he could get his breath, he blew steam all over Iron Pot. "My face is black, is it? Well, yours is black,--and it will soon be black and blue!" "You swallow them words!" and Iron Pot raised his queer little fists. "Sput!" mocked Tea Kettle, getting ready to spout again. "Take that!" Wang! came down the little fist,--but not on the lid of Tea Kettle. Oh, no; for just as that was going to happen, Mary Frances lifted him high in the air. "Let go of me! Let me at Iron Pot!" He was at white heat. "Be quiet!" said Mary Frances, shaking him quite hard. "What's all this about?" "Iron Pot commenced it!" sullenly simmered Tea Kettle. "Iron Pot called me names!" "Why," said Mary Frances, "this is disgraceful! Now, you sit there!" She put Tea Kettle on the front of the stove. "And you, there!" She pulled Big Iron Pot as far back as she could. "Now, behave yourselves!" Then she sat down to rest. "What makes them quarrel so, I wonder," Mary Frances said half to herself. "All the Kitchen People seem so kind and helpful." "Why, don't you know, child?" asked Aunty Rolling Pin. "I thought everybody knew that story." [Illustration: "Don't you know, child?" "Let me at him!"] A story! Mary Frances was always ready to listen to a story. "Won't you tell me, please?" Aunty Rolling Pin cleared her voice, and rolled back an inch or two to a more comfortable place on the table. "You see, it's this way, child," she began. "In the days of your great-grandmother there were no stoves, only open fireplaces were used for cooking,--and kettles were just as black then as that old black Pot there. [Illustration: In the days of your great grandmother] "So, when the Pot called the Kettle black, the Kettle said: "'Black yourself!' and no harm was done. "But when your mother got that fine new cook stove, she bought that bright, shiny Kettle, too.