Now when the Tortoise came to the school it was high noon, and all the children were waiting open-mouthed for their mammas and the lunches which they expected.  Such rows and rows of wide hungry mouths!  Madame Tortoise moved slowly up and down and round and round, eyeing the various children who begged for the nice wiggly worms.  “H’m!” she said to herself, “hungry children seem to look considerably alike, and none of them are so wondrously beautiful when their mouths are wide open greedily.  I wonder which are Mrs. Partridge’s children.  She told me to give this lunch to the handsomest babies here.  Well, I will, and if I make a mistake it will not be my fault.  Hello!  Here are my dear little Turtlets!  Bless the babies, how pretty they are!  Why, I declare, I never realized that they were so handsome.  Certainly, they are the best-looking children in the school.  Then I must give them Mrs. Partridge’s luncheon, for so I promised.  Yes, my little ones, here is your lunch which I brought for you.  And when you have finished that, here is another, some nice, fat, wiggly worms which mother collected on the way,—­a prize for the handsomest children in the school.”

So the little Turtlets fared wonderfully well that day; but the poor little Partridges went hungry, and had dreadful headaches, and went home peeping sadly to their silly mother.  And Mrs. Partridge had no more sense than to be angry with Madame Tortoise, which I think was very unfair, don’t you?  For the latter had only done as she was bidden by her silly and conceited neighbor.

But after that the Tortoise and the Partridge never spoke to each other, and their children would not play together at school.

THE EARLY GIRL

There were once two girls who were very dear friends, Zaica and Tourtourelle.  One morning Zaica woke up and said, “O Tourtourelle!  Last night I had such a strange dream!”

“And so did I!” cried Tourtourelle.  “Let us tell each other the dreams.  But you first, Zaica.”

Zaica began to laugh.  “I dreamed I was a pretty bird with a tuft of feathers on my head.  I could fly, and, O Tourtourelle! it was great fun!  But the most amusing thing of all was that I could sing so finely, and mock all the birds of the forest.  Nay, I could even imitate the sounds of animals.  I cannot help laughing when I think what a jolly time I had.”

“Why, Zaica!” cried Tourtourelle, wondering, “I dreamed the very same thing.  I too was a pretty little bird, and I too could imitate all kinds of sounds as I fluttered in the tree-tops.  Surely, the dream will come true for one of us.  How fine that would be!”

“Yes, let it be for the one of us who first rises to-morrow morning,” said Zaica.  And so the two friends agreed.

Now when it came night-time Zaica went to bed very early, like a wise little girl who wants to rise with the sun.  But Tourtourelle said to herself, “I know what I will do, I will not go to sleep.  I will sit up all night, and then I am sure to be the first to rise.”