Miss Grace laughed.  “Well, we are going to do our lessons here, and perhaps when twelve o’clock comes you won’t be the least little bit sorry to go away from it.  But first of all I want you to help me arrange these flowers a little, and then go with me to carry them to a poor lady who is ill.  Do you know the different kinds of roses by name, Jessie?”

Jessie did not.  “Well, I will tell you some of them, and then you will be able to surprise grandfather.  A gardener’s granddaughter should know all these things.  That lovely spray of little pink roses you are holding is called ‘Dorothy Perkins.’  You will remember that, won’t you?  And this deep orange-tinted bud is ’William Allen Richardson.’”

“‘William Allen Richardson,’” repeated Jessie.  “I think Miss Perkins is much prettier than Mr. Richardson.”

Miss Grace laughed.  “You are a very polite little girl, Jessie.  Look at this one; this is called ‘Homer,’ but you need not call it Mr. or Mrs., but just plain ‘Homer.’”

“I think it ought to be called ‘pretty Homer,’” said Jessie, smiling.

By the time they had arranged all the flowers in the basket, she knew quite a lot about the different kinds and their names.  Miss Grace made everything so attractive, and it was wonderful what a lot of interesting things she saw as she went about, even when she walked only across the green to Mrs. Parker’s to leave the flowers.

Jessie did not see the poor dirty grey toad lying panting and frightened on the pathway, but Miss Grace did, and stooped and picked the poor thing up, and carrying it into her garden, placed it in a nice cool shady corner, underneath some bushes.

“Won’t it bite you, or sting?” asked Jessie, her eyes wide with alarm, but Miss Grace reassured her.  “That poor gentle little frightened thing hurt me!” she cried; “it could not if it wanted to, and I am sure it does not want to.  It will help to take care of my flowers for me.  You are not afraid to stroke it, Jessie, are you?  Just look how fast its poor little heart is beating with fright!  Isn’t it cruel that any living creature should be as terrified as that!”

Jessie was ashamed for Miss Grace to know that she was almost as terrified of the toad as the toad was of her, so she stroked it, though very reluctantly, and the coldness of it made her jump so at first, that she thought she could never, never touch it again; but she tried not to be foolish, and she stroked its little head, and after that she did not mind it a bit, though she was glad Miss Grace did not ask her to carry it.

When they got back to the house they found two glasses of milk and a plate of biscuits in Miss Grace’s room awaiting them, and after they had taken them, Miss Grace took down a book and read to Jessie, and Jessie, who already knew her letters and some of the easiest words, read a little to Miss Grace, and before she thought that half of the morning was gone, twelve o’clock had struck, and it was time to dress and run off to meet her grandfather at the four cross-roads.