Cousins’ Badges.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXVIII, Issue VIII, 22 February 1902, Page 382

Cousins’ Badges.

Cousins requiring' badges are requested to send an addressed envelope, when the badge will be forwarded by return mail. •fr + + COUSINS’ CORRESPONDENCE. Dear Cousin Kate, —A little girl (.ailed Dorothy Nolan is going to write to you. 1 stayed with her a lew days. Have you ever read a book called lire Lamplighter”? I think it is so pretty. Did you get many Christmas presents? I received three brooches —a greenstone one, a silver one, ana a gold one. Our holidays will soon be over now, as we begin school on Tuesday. Do you like playing croquet? Now, dear Cousin Kate, 1 must end with much love. — From Cousin Airini. [Dear Cousin Airini, —I think you are going to be a most excellent cousin, for you are writing very regularly. Yes, 1 have read "The Lamplighter,” and think it a most excellent book. I am much afraid my time for Xmas presents is over. 1 have to give them nowadays. I like croquet, but am rather a "duffer” at it, I fear; the new game is so hard, 1 think.—Cousin Kate.] + + + Dear Cousin Kate, —Cousin Airini persuaded me to write to you and ask if 1 may become a cousin. Please will you send me a badge. 1 enclose an addressed envelope. lam going away soon, but when 1 come back I intend to write regularly. Have you ever read i book called “Little Lord Fauntleroy’ ' it is so nice. Cousin Airini and I tried to make some Turkish Delight. but it was not quite right, but nearly. Now, dear Cousin Kate, I must end. With love from Cousin I ton t hy. | Dear Cousin Dorothy. I am verypleased to welcome you to our band, and very obliged to Cousin Airini for introducing you to us. "Lord Fauntleroy” is a lovely book one of the prettiest stories ever written. I think. Turkish Delight must be rather hard to make. I should think. When I was your age I never was clever enough to attempt anything but toffee, and usually burned that. Cousin Kate.) Dear Cousin Kate, Thank you very much for sending me the badge; it is very |. petty, and I like it very much. The weather is very hot just now; I put the thermometer out in the sun to-dt. y and at half-past twelve it had

i iseu to 106, but that is not half as hot as it has been. The gardens are getting like iron, they are so dry. A 1 ttle while ago there was too much lain, and now it is too hot and dry. We would be very glad if it would rain a little. There is a good deal ot .■ rmt in the orchard this year—more I turns than last year, I think. Ig > our. t very morning before breakfast and get some. 1 am reading a storyout ox a “Girls’ Own Annual” just now The “Girls’ Own Annual” is a very nice book, isn’t it? There is something about nearly everything tn n, and some very nice stories, too. 1 think it is the best book I ever ha 1. Now, Cousin Kate, I am going to give you and all the cousins some riddles. ' (1) What is the centre of gravity? (2) What plant clothes half the world? (3) Is there any reason to doubt the Giants’ Causeway?” I will fell you the answers next week, or the week after. Cousin Jenny is going to write then, too; she did nil iiave time to write to-night. I must stop now, with love to you and all the cousins.—l am, your loving c-:u--s-'n, Nellie Willis.

[Dear Cousin Nellie, —As the weather is so hot, as you say, I hope you will not mind if my answer is rather short and stupid. I hope some of the cousins will try and answer your riddles. I think the "Girls’ Own Annual” lovely. I gave four copies away as prizes for the Doll Competition. Please remind Cousin Jenny to write. I am so very busy I must now stop.— Cousin Kate.]

Dear Cousin Kate, —I wrote to you about a fortnight before Christmas, and have never seen it in print yet. 1 expect you were so busy with the uolls just then that it got overlooked, ihe “Graphic” arrived last night by the overland mail, and I was so amuseu by what you said (in your reply to Cousin Zaidie) about your schoc I days. I was very interested, lor 1 think I am something the same myself. As my teacher always tells me, I am the very worst girl in the icliool; but then he is so provoking I always feel inclined to throw a book a' his head. Dear Cousin Kate, you asked us some time ago to tell you v hat we thought was the best way to make the Children’s Page more interesting. 1 think if you were to tell us little bits like, that occasionally p bout your school days it would be intensely interesting. To see you r ow no one would think you had ever been the least bit naughty. But now I suj pose I must talk about something else. The holidays are over, and, worse luck, school commences to-m-irow. I enjoyed the holidays very much. We had plenty of boating and bathing. The weather this iast f< w weeks has been very fine, but rery warm: you feel as if one garment is enough to wear. Igo out black I errying a great deal, there are such lots, and they are so large and nic". I wish I could send you some. I here are heaps of fruit about now; I nearly live on them. We have had peaches, plums and pears. J had intended writing every week during the holidays, but. like a great many other good resolutions, it has been broken. Now. dear Cousin Kate, I must conclude with love.—-Your ever-loving Cousin Ila.—‘P.S. —Did you get a ( hristmas card I sent vou.? —T.F.

| Dear Cousin Ila, - Many thanks for your long and most interesting

letter, which I greatly enjoyed. 1 am glad you liked the little reminiscence of my very very naughty school days, but fear I cannot spare time this week for a tale, at least not a very long one. One naughty thing I did, I remember, was to catch all the White Leghorn hens of our neighbour, one dark night, and dip them into blue, red and yellow die, which we had prepared beforehand. After they were done we let them go again. You never saw a more astonished old lady than she was when she came out to feed them next morning. Of course we looked as innocent as angels, but I sadly fear that old lady guessed, for she had been used to give us sponge cakes sometimes, and the supply ceased for several months.—Cousin Kate.]

Dear Cousin Kate.—l hope my last letter was not too late, because I will have written two for the same week. Will you tell me the author of “The White Company?” I might be able to borrow it or else buy it, when I have finished all the books I have to read. I tried the puzzle in the “Graphic,” it was not very hard to do, but I couldn't write a good description. We will be hack at school before this is printed, and I am glad, as the holidays have been rather long, and I like school. Somehow the days seem shorter at school than at home, and I look forward to Saturday almost as much as the term holidays, which are rather dull. I never seem to have anything to write about except w-hat I have read, and I can’t fill up much space with that. Have you been to Orewa? It is such a pretty place. The back of the lodg-ing-house faces a pretty bush, which is divided from the garden by a freshwater creek; it is not a very wide one, but it is too deep to wade across, so there are some punts to go over in. It is very pretty to go from one end of the creek to the other, and at one end there are some weeping willows. It is quite worth wmle going into the bush; there are beautiful ferns and trees. The nikau grows well there! it is something like a palm, no leaves or branches for a long way up the trunk, as eacn one drops off as it gets bigger, and leaves some large leaves at the top. We cut some off and found a curious flat white thing underneath; it is two thin white leaves, and when we took them off we found a pink kind

of flower which bursts through the stem of the leaf as it grows larger.