Publisher's Synopsis
The children sat round me in the gloaming. There were several of them; from Madge, dear Madge with her thick fair hair and soft kind grey eyes, down to pretty little Sybil-Gipsy, we called her for fun, -whom you would hardly have guessed, from her brown face and bright dark eyes, to be Madge's "own cousin." They were mostly girls, the big ones at least, which is what one would expect, for it is not often that big boys care much about sitting still, and even less about anything so sentimental as sitting still in the twilight doing nothing. There were two or three little boys however, nice round-faced little fellows, who had not yet begun to look down upon "girls," and were very much honoured at being admitted to a good game of romps with Madge and her troop. It was one of these-the rosiest and nicest of them all, little Ted-who pulled my dress and whispered, but loud enough for every one to hear, with his coaxingest voice-"Tell me a story, aunty." And then it came all round in a regular buzz, in every voice, repeated again and again-"O aunty! do; dear, dear aunty, tell us a story.
