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"And do you know the dingle-bells that grow near the edge of the wood?" he asked again. "I know them well, papa," replied Mary, "for often I gather their blue blossoms and put them in a vase upon the table." "And how about the cockle-shells?"

And now I feel as if the flowers were really my dear ones, and I must be very careful that they come to no harm!" She was filled with joy when one morning she ran out to her flower-garden after breakfast and found the dingle-bells and cowslips were actually blossoming, while even the cockle-shells were showing their white buds.

"Because the cockle-shells and cowslips are both fading away and dying, just as the dingle-bells did, and papa said when they faded and withered he and the boys would come back to us." Mary's mother knew that the harsh winds had killed the flowers before their time, but she did not like to disappoint her darling, so she only said, with a sigh,

"Oh, Squire!" sobbed Mary, "I am in great trouble "Each dingle-bell I loved so well Before my eyes is dying, And much I fear my brother dear In sickness now is lying!" "Nonsense!" said the Squire; "because you named the flowers after your brother Hobart is no reason he should be affected by the fading of the dingle-bells.

"The dingle-bells are dying," said her mother, after looking carefully at the flowers; "but the reason is that the cold winds from the sea swept right over your garden last night, and dingle-bells are delicate flowers and grow best where they are sheltered by the woods. If you had planted them at the side of the house, as I wished you to, the wind would not have killed them."

"When they have grown up big and strong," said Mary one morning, as she weeded the bed, "and when they have budded and blossomed and faded away again, then papa and my brothers will come home. And I shall call the cockle-shells papa, for they are the biggest and strongest; and the dingle-bells shall be brother Hobart, and the cowslips brother Robart.

"Why, just this, sweetheart," returned the sailor gravely; "all the time that it takes the cowslips and dingle-bells and cockle-shells to sprout from the ground, and grow big and strong, and blossom into flower, and, yes to wither and die away again all that time shall your brothers and I sail the seas.

"Mistress Mary, so contrary, How does your garden grow? With dingle-bells and cockle-shells And cowslips all in a row!" And Mary, being a sharp little girl, and knowing the Squire's queer ways, replied to him likewise in rhyme, saying, "I thank you, Squire, that you enquire How well the flowers are growing; The dingle-bells and cockle-shells And cowslips all are blowing!"

The very next day, to Mary's great surprise and grief; she found the leaves of the dingle-bells curling and beginning to wither. "Oh, mamma," she called, "come quick! Something is surely the matter with brother Hobart!"

I very much suspect the real reason they are dying is because the cold sea wind caught them last night. Dingle-bells are delicate. If you had scattered the cockle-shells and cowslips all about them, the stronger plants would have protected the weaker; but you see, my girl, you planted the dingle-bells all in a row, and so the wind caught them nicely."