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82 |
LILITH |
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rouse the sleeping giant at whose door I lay. She carried a boy-baby in her arms : hitherto a girl-baby, apparently about a year old, had been the youngest. Three of the bigger girls were her nurses, but they shared their treasure with all the rest. Among the Little Ones, dolls were unknown; the bigger had the smaller, and the smaller the still less, to tend and play with.
Lona came to me and laid the infant in my arms. The baby opened his eyes and looked at me, closed them again, and fell asleep.
' He loves you already !' said the girl.
Where did you find him ? ' I asked.
' In the wood, of course,' she answered, her eyes beaming with delight, —where we always find them. Isn't he a beauty ? We've been out all night looking for him. Sometimes it is not easy to find!'
How do you know when there is one to find ? ' I asked.
'I cannot tell,' she replied. 'Every one makes haste to tell the other, but we never find out who told first. Sometimes I think one must have said it asleep, and another heard it half-awake. When there is a baby in the wood, no one can stop to ask questions; and when we have found it, then it is too late.'
' Do more boy or girl babies come to the wood ?
' They don't come to the wood; we go to the wood and find them.'
' Are there more boys or girls of you now ? '
I had found that to ask precisely the same question twice, made them knit their brows.
' I do not know,' she answered.
' You can count them, surely !' |
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