One day, not long after this, Bee and George, without being seen, climbed up the stairs of the Keep which rises in the middle of the castle. On reaching the platform they shouted loudly and clapped their hands. The view stretched over rolling downs, cultivated and cut up into small green and brown squares. On the horizon they could see hills and woods--blue in the distance.

"Little sister," cried George, "little sister, look at the whole earth."

"It is very big," said Bee.

"My professor," said George, "had taught me that it was big, but as Gertrude our governess says, seeing is believing."

They walked round the platform.

"Here is a marvellous thing, little brother," said Bee. "The castle is in the middle of the whole earth, and we, who are on the Keep, which is in the middle of the castle, are now in the middle of the whole world. Ha! ha! ha!"

And really the skyline was around the children like a circle of which the Keep was the centre.

"We are in the middle of the world. Ha! ha! ha!" George repeated.

Then both began to think.

"What a pity it is that the world is so big!" said Bee. "You can lose yourself in it and be separated from your friends."

George shrugged his shoulders.

"How nice it is that the world is so big! You can look for adventures in it. Bee, when I am grown up I mean to conquer those mountains which are right at the end of the earth. It is there that the moon rises. I will catch it as I go along and give it to you, my Bee."