Adopted children -- Juvenile fiction; Girls -- Juvenile fiction
"She knows as much about farming as I do," the man said with a laugh
as he put the sleepy child on the back seat of the carriage when the
family were ready to go home.
"I've had a lovely time, Mr. Hired Man," Marian roused herself to
remark, "and to-morrow I'm going to play farm."
"Good haying weather," the man suggested with a smile; "better get your
barns up quick's you can."
"I'm going to," was the response; "it's a lovely game."
Whatever Marian saw or heard that pleased her fancy, she played.
Stories that were read to the little Ella were enacted again and again
in Marian's room if the day was rainy, out in the orchard or the locust
grove if the day was fair. Farming promised to be the most interesting
game of all.
Early the next morning Marian visited what she called the yarrow jungle
ever since Uncle George read jungle stories to Ella. More than one
queer looking creature tried to keep out of sight when her footsteps
were heard. The old black beetle scampered away as fast as his six legs
would carry him, though it can't be possible he remembered the time
when Marian captured him for her museum. Crickets gathered up their
fiddles, seeking safety beyond the fence. Perhaps they thought Marian
wanted them to play in the orchestra at another snail wedding. Even the
ants hastened to the hills beyond the jungle, leaving only the old toad
to wink and blink at the happy one of whom he had no fear.
"Well, Mr. Toad," said she, "why don't you hop along? I've come to
make my farm out here where the yarrow grows. Why don't you live in
the garden land? I would if I were you. Don't you know about the cool
tomato groves and the cabbage tents? I've got to clear away this jungle
so the sun may shine upon my farm the way the country man said. You
really must go, so hop along and stop winking and blinking at me." The
old toad wouldn't stir, so for his sake Marian spared the yarrow jungle.
"After all, I'll make my farm here on the border-land," said she, while
the daisies nodded and the buttercups shone brighter than before.
"Only, I'll tell you one thing, Mr. Toad, that maybe you won't like.
If you will stay there, you'll have to be an elephant in the jungle.
There, now, I s'pose you are sorry. I say--be an elephant and now you
are one." The toad didn't mind a bit. He was so used to being changed
into all sorts of animals that he never seemed to notice whether he was
an elephant or a kangaroo.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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