OUR GIRLS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19720, 20 August 1927, Page 4 (Supplement)

OUR GIRLS.

MARY AND HER LAMB. Every school child m New Zealand is familiar with tho old nursery rhyme, "Mary had a little lamb," but perhaps riot one child in a hundred knows that "Mary" is a real person, who is still alive. An English writer who recently called ori Mary has given a most interesting account of his visit. Mary, who is now Mrs. Mary Hughes, is a white-haired, invalid lady, still interested in everything that goes on in the world and especially in children and animals. She seemed to like talking about the pets of her faraway childhood, and I think her story is best told in her own words. "I was born," she said, "eighty-six years ago in the Valley of the Dee, two miles from Llangollen, where I went to school. My father, John Thomas, was an experienced farmer and a rearer of Welsh mountain sheep. As a child I was fond of lambs. Welsh sheep are smaller than those iu most countries, and tho lambs make great pets. Whenever there was an orphan among tho flock, which often occurred in severe weather, my father would entrust tho little one to me to bring up. I used to take off the finger of an old glove and tie it over tho spout of a teapot filled with warm milk to feed tho orphans. Sometimes three or four of the lambs would bo waiting for mo on my return from school. I became greatly attached to the little creatures, and they would prance about and follow mo round tho farm. "When 1 was about seven I had two pet lambs, 'Nell' and 'Billy.' 'Nell' was spotlessly white, and very tiny, but 'Billy' was strong, and if a dog or goat approached 'Nell,' 'Billy' was immediately on the offensive and often there was a fight. He would come with mo everywhere, and was „ahvays

waiting for me in tho> morning when we went together a quarter of a mile to tho farm gate on the Holyhead road to fetch the letters from the postman. "One day 'Billy' followed me to tho village school. But ho frisked and gambolled about the room, causing such a commotion among tho other pupils that the schoolmistress, a Miss Coward, made 1110 take the lamb away, "Llangollen was a favourito resort of visitors becauso of its sylvan beauty and many charms. Three sisters from London, tho Misses Burl, were staying with my mother at the farm. Miss Jane Bur], eldest sister, wrote children's stories and nursery rhymes, and I used to act as guide, taking her from place to place about tho valley. 'Billy' used to follow us, and this greatly interested Miss Burl. When sho heard of his escapade at school she was so amused that sho wrote the little poern which appears in her book of 'Nursery Rhymes'." "I left Mrs. Hughes sitting in her invalid chair and smiling over tho past," concludes the writer of the article. "The unpretentious nursery rhyme had brought her childhood of eighty years ago to life, and the memories of old age seemed more vivid than tho happenings of to-day."