They certainly looked very fresh and tempting, with their glossy white tops and soft pink gills. "Thank you, my darling," said his mother, stroking the brown hair back from his bright face, "I shall like them very much." At this moment Willie caught sight of a little black head and a pair of bright eyes between the fir-branches. "Mother," he whispered, pointing to the branch, "that's our Blackbird. He's fond of blackberries; he was eating some in the hedge the other day--I saw him. I have a few in the corner of the basket here. I'll throw them to him." A few blackberries were scattered on the grass on the other side of the fir-tree, and Willie moved a little further off, for fear the Blackbird should be shy. "These nuts are for your dessert, mother," he continued, holding out the hazel branch in triumph. "It is very good of my little boy to think of mamma," said his mother. "Isn't it, Barlow?" she said, turning to that rather exhausted person, who now came slowly up. Nurse Barlow had not had a happy afternoon. She had been toiling through the lanes after Willie and his papa. The lanes were muddy, they had gone a long way, and she was very tired. She had made up her mind that the mushrooms were toadstools. It is true that they had come from a meadow in the neighbourhood where excellent mushrooms were wont to grow, but all the same, she was fully persuaded that these particular ones were toadstools, "just such as my poor sister's little boy nearly died of eating." Then again Master Willie had eaten "pounds of blackberries, let alone those nasty nuts." It turned out that Nurse Barlow's fears were happily unfounded, for Willie's papa had forbidden the consumption of nuts and limited the quantity of blackberries. Notwithstanding these assurances, "Nanny" refused to be comforted, and as she tucked Willie in his little bed, she soothingly remarked, "A nice lot of physic I shall have to give you. Then you'll have to stay indoors, and you'll both be very cross and very tiresome; I know what it will be."