Every fire that warmed us, every tree that shaded us, every path that we took, all these “answered back” and were familiars. Everything spoke to us, save only one. And this one thing was Work. Our playthings in the cupboard would talk to us all day long _until_ the moment that we were told to put them in order, and then instantly they all fell into silence. Pulling weeds in the four o’clock bed, straightening books, tidying the outdoor play-house--it was always the same. Whatever we worked at kept silent. It was on a June morning, when the outdoors was so busy and beautiful that it was like a golden bee buried in a golden rose, that I finally refused outright to pick up a brown sunhat and some other things in the middle of the floor. Everything outdoors and in was smiling and calling, and to do a task was like going to bed, so far as the joy of the day was concerned. This I could not explain, but I said that I would not do the task, and this was high treason. Sitting in a straight-backed chair all alone for half an hour thereafter--the usual capital punishment--was like cutting off the head of the beautiful Hour that I had meant to have. And I tried to think it out. Why, in an otherwise wonderful world, did Work have to come and spoil everything? I do not recall that I came to any conclusion. How could I, at a time that was still teaching the Hebraic doctrine that work is a curse, instead of the new gospel--always dimly divined by children before our teaching has corrupted them,--that being busy is being alive, and that all work may be play if only we are shown how to pick out the kind that is play to us, and that doing nothing is a kind of death. And while I sat there alone on that straight-backed chair, I wish that I, as I am now, might have called in Mary Elizabeth, whom I could see drearily polishing the New Family’s lamp-chimneys, and that I might have told the story of Bit-bit. * * * * * Bit-bit, the smallest thing in the world, sat on the slipperiest edge of the highest mountain in the farthest land, weaving a little garment of sweet-grass. Then out of the valley a great Deev arose and leaned his elbows on the highest mountain and said what he thought--which is always a dangerous business. [Illustration: “THEN OUT OF THE VALLEY A GREAT DEEV AROSE.”] “Bit-bit,” said the Deev, “how dare you make up my sweet-grass so disgustin’ extravagant?” (It is almost impossible for a Deev to say his _ing’s_.) “Deevy dear,” said Bit-bit, without looking up from his work, “I have to make a garment to help clothe the world. Don’t wrinkle up my plan. And _don’t_ put your elbows on the table.” “About my elbows,” said the Deev, “you are perfectly right, though Deevs always do that with their elbows. But as to that garment,” he added, “I’d like to know why you have to help clothe the world?”