MR. and Mrs. Stoat lived with their children in a comfortable home. They were very well off—they always had plenty to eat, and their fur coats always fitted beautifully and were never shabby.

Every day, when Mrs. Stoat was busy with the house work, she used to send the children out for a walk, and one day, when the children were walking in the wood, they saw two ladies coming down the path.

The little Stoats hid in a hole in the mossy root of a tree, and as the ladies went by, one of them said: “I wonder what fur will be worn next winter?”

“They say,” answered the other lady, “that nothing will be worn except——”

But the little Stoats could not hear what fur it was that was to be worn next winter. They did not like to think of other people wearing fur, for fear their own fur coats should be taken from them. “Oh! how cold we should be without our coats!” they said, shivering; but then the most sensible Stoat said: “It can’t matter to us what big people wear! Our coats wouldn’t fit them, you know.”

But the smallest Stoat of all felt quite anxious to know what fur would be worn, because she was a vain little person, and felt it would be very sad if Stoat-fur coats were not the fashion.

So when she went home to dinner she asked Mrs. Stoat the question.

“Mother dear, you know everything. Do tell us what fur will be worn next winter.”

“Why, Stoat-fur, of course,” the Mother answered, laughing; “unless——” She stopped short and looked at Mr. Stoat, who nodded and then they both laughed, and everyone sat down to dinner. But that silly smallest Stoat of all couldn’t sleep for thinking of that “unless.” What could it mean but that perhaps some other fur would be worn? And then unfashionable! It was a dreadful thought. Before morning she had made up her mind to go out into the great world and find out what fur was to be worn next winter. So she said nothing to anybody, but she started off alone; and perhaps she would soon have seen how silly she was and have come running back again, but, alas! she was caught in a trap, and the keeper who caught her would have killed her, only his little daughter begged so hard that the keeper agreed to spare the little creature’s life. So the smallest Stoat of all was kept in a hutch.

And there she stayed for weeks and weeks; and when it grew very cold the hutch was put in the stable, so that she was always warm; but she longed to get home again.

“I don’t think I should care about not being in the fashion,” she said sadly to herself, “if only I could go back to my dear Mammy and the old home!”

Now, one day two ladies took refuge from a snowstorm in the keeper’s house, and as they passed the stable the smallest Stoat of all heard one of them say: “You see, I was right. Nothing is being worn but ermine!”

And the little person in the hutch recognised the voices of the two ladies she had seen in the wood. So now she had found out the great secret! And it so happened that the very next day someone left the door of her hutch open, and she slipped out very cautiously, lifting up her little head and turning it from side to side, and sniffing to make sure that there was no danger near.

Then she started to run across the snowy fields to her old home. But as she ran she heard feet behind her—and ran faster and faster—a little brown streak on the snow. And the feet came faster too. They were a dog’s feet—and she heard the dog’s quick breathing close behind her as she rushed into the old home, and knew she was safe. As soon as she had got over her fright enough to look about her, she received another shock; she was in the midst of a number of strangers all dressed in creamy white fur dresses who were only like her as to their neat black tails.

“I’m sure I beg your pardon,” she said; “I thought this was the house where my Father and Mother lived.”

“So it is,” cried the white furry people, laughing. “Don’t you know us?” And then she saw that these were really her own relations, only their dresses were new.

“We are wearing ermine now,” said Mrs. Stoat proudly.

“Oh, Mother, can’t I have an ermine dress too?” cried the youngest Stoat of all. “Nothing is being worn but ermine. I heard them say so.”

“Something else is being worn by you, at any rate,” said Mrs. Stoat sternly. “You’ve been living in some warm nasty place. If you’d stayed here in the cold like a good little Stoat, instead of running away from home, you would have had an ermine dress like everyone else.”

“Don’t you know, silly child,” said Mr. Stoat, “that we always get ermine coats in very cold winters? Then dogs can’t see us so well in the snow. It’s very cold still. If you try hard perhaps you can get an ermine coat like the rest of us.”

But the smallest Stoat of all never got her ermine coat, for the spring came quite soon, and there has not been a really hard winter since.

E. Nesbit.