SIX WIDE-AWAKEsS.

IX wide-awake babies, bless them !
That means six baths, six breakfasts this morning ; at
least as many kisses as there are toes and fingers apiece.
O, you dear little troublesome tots !
What a small place in the house you seem to fill; the
smallest chair, the tiniest bed. But if you slip away, there
is a hollow which ‘all the king’s horses, and all the king’s

men” cannot fill.
Each one, as it comes along, its grandma has called the

d

dearest and sweetest she ever saw.

Babies are like parrots and monkeys in doing and saying
what people about them do and say.

No cross nurse has ever slapped one baby in this picture ;
no naughty brother has struck one. Only gentle hands
and voices have been around them—at least we hope so.
Only pleasant thoughts and fancies are dropped into their
mind gardens; so, only lovely actions spring up and blos-
som there; peep through their eyes and see.

Of course they are not all the time so dreadfully clean as
when they were having their picture taken. A little fresh
dirt does not hurt any baby.

The boy who is pulling-his playmate’s hair seems to be
doing it politely! Behind him is another fellow, a whole-
sale dealer in flowers. He has given the girl on each side
of him a handful, and the patient one in the corner knows
she will have some, soon.

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