Dan speaking for the first time, rather sheepishly volunteered the information that Peter had also been intending to come over but had to go home to take some flour to his mother instead.

“Peter?” I questioned.  I had never heard of any Peter.

“He is your Uncle Roger’s handy boy,” said Uncle Alec.  “His name is Peter Craig, and he is a real smart little chap.  But he’s got his share of mischief, that same lad.”

“He wants to be Felicity’s beau,” said Dan slyly.

“Don’t talk silly nonsense, Dan,” said Aunt Janet severely.

Felicity tossed her golden head and shot an unsisterly glance at Dan.

“I wouldn’t be very likely to have a hired boy for a beau,” she observed.

We saw that her anger was real, not affected.  Evidently Peter was not an admirer of whom Felicity was proud.

We were very hungry boys; and when we had eaten all we could—­and oh, what suppers Aunt Janet always spread!—­we discovered that we were very tired also—­too tired to go out and explore our ancestral domains, as we would have liked to do, despite the dark.

We were quite willing to go to bed; and presently we found ourselves tucked away upstairs in the very room, looking out eastward into the spruce grove, which father had once occupied.  Dan shared it with us, sleeping in a bed of his own in the opposite corner.  The sheets and pillow-slips were fragrant with lavender, and one of Grandmother King’s noted patchwork quilts was over us.  The window was open and we heard the frogs singing down in the swamp of the brook meadow.  We had heard frogs sing in Ontario, of course; but certainly Prince Edward Island frogs were more tuneful and mellow.  Or was it simply the glamour of old family traditions and tales which was over us, lending its magic to all sights and sounds around us?  This was home—­ father’s home—­our home!  We had never lived long enough in any one house to develop a feeling of affection for it; but here, under the roof-tree built by Great-Grandfather King ninety years ago, that feeling swept into our boyish hearts and souls like a flood of living sweetness and tenderness.

“Just think, those are the very frogs father listened to when he was a little boy,” whispered Felix.

“They can hardly be the same frogs,” I objected doubtfully, not feeling very certain about the possible longevity of frogs.  “It’s twenty years since father left home.”

“Well, they’re the descendants of the frogs he heard,” said Felix, “and they’re singing in the same swamp.  That’s near enough.”

Our door was open and in their room across the narrow hall the girls were preparing for bed, and talking rather more loudly than they might have done had they realized how far their sweet, shrill voices carried.

“What do you think of the boys?” asked Cecily.

“Beverley is handsome, but Felix is too fat,” answered Felicity promptly.