A shabby old flat-bottomed boat was moored beneath the bank, and when they were tired of their play, some one suggested that they should go and sit in it. “But may we?” asked Laura, rather nervously, for it was the first boat she had seen outside a picture-book, and the water looked deep and wide to her, after the brook at home. But Edmund was more enterprising; he slid down the bank into the boat at once, crying: “Come on! Hurry up! Our ship’s just starting to Australia!” So, with the little boys holding an oar each and pretending to row, and the girls packed into the stern, well out of the way of chance knocks with the oars, and the willow leaves silvery against the blue sky, and the air flavoured with mint and the raw dankness of water weeds, they set out on their imaginary voyage. And, all the time, there was that stout, strong rope holding the boat safely to shore. All the joys of adventure without its perils.

When discussing the family afterwards, Laura’s mother said Molly was a little woman, “a regular second mother to the younger ones,” and her own mother must have trusted her, for the children were left to themselves the whole of that afternoon. Or it may have been that the father and uncle had so much to settle about Ireland and the mother and aunt were so busy indoors inspecting wardrobes and discussing family affairs.

The children, too, had plenty to discuss. “Can you read?” “When are you going to school?” “What’s Lark Rise like?” “Only a few houses—all fields?” “Where do you buy things if there are no shops?” “Do you like Molly’s hair? Most people hate red and they call her ‘ginger’ at school; but Mr. Collier, that’s our Vicar, says it’s lovely, and a customer told Mother that if she liked to have it cut off she could sell it for pounds and pounds. Some ladies would pay anything to have it to put on their own heads. Yes, didn’t you know that some people wear false hair? Aunt Edith has a switch? I’ve seen it, hanging on her dressing table in the morning; that’s what makes her hair bunch out so at the back.” “And your hair’s nice, too, Laura,” said Molly generously, picking out Laura’s best feature. “I like the way it runs like water all down your back.”

“My mother can sit on her hair when it’s down,” boasted Laura, and the cousins were impressed, for a great deal was thought of quantity in those days, of hair as of other things.