Dotty Dimple Out West

THE MAJOR'S JOKE.

While Dotty was dressing next morning, she fell to thinking again of her own importance as a young lady travelling almost all alone by herself; and then it occurred to her that Jennie Vance, the judge's daughter, had never been any farther than Boston.

"When she comes to Portland next winter to see her aunties that live there, then I'll talk to her all about my travelling out West. But I needn't tell her how that baby choked, nor how that naughty Dollyphus made fun of me. No, indeed!"

As she spoke she was pouring water into the wash-bowl; but her indignation towards Mrs. Lovejoy and "Dollyphus" made her hand unsteady; the pitcher came suddenly against the edge of the bowl, whereupon its nose and part of its body flew off into space. Dotty held the handle, and looked at the ruins in astonishment.

"Did I do that?"

She had no time to spend in lamentation.

"I don't want to let my papa know what I've done," thought she, giving the last hasty touches to her toilet: "he'll have to go and pay the man that keeps house; and then I'm afraid he'll think, if his little girl keeps choking folks and breaking things, I ought to stay at home."

But Dotty was too well grounded in the "white truth" to hesitate long. She could not hide the accident and be happy. When she mentioned it to her father, he did not say, as some fathers might have done,—

"You careless child! Your sister Prudy didn't break a pitcher or lose a pair of gloves all the way to Indiana."

He and Mrs. Parlin were both afraid that, if they spoke in this manner, their children might infer that carelessness is just as sinful as falsehood and ill temper; they wished them to know there is a vast difference. So Mr. Parlin only said,—

"Broken the pitcher? I'm sorry; but you did right to tell me. Give me your hand, and let us go to breakfast."

Major Lazelle was at table. He patted Dotty's head, and said she looked like "a sweet-pea on tiptoe for a flight." He seemed very fond of quoting poetry; and nothing could have been more pleasing to Dotty, who loved to hear high-sounding words, even if they did soar above her head.

The party of three started in due time on their journey. It was very much the same thing it had been yesterday; boys with tea-kettles of ice-water, boys with baskets of fruit and lozenges, and boys with newspapers. There was a long train of cars, and every car was crowded.

"O, papa," sighed Dotty, after she had tried to count the passengers, and had been obliged to give it up because there were so many stepping off at every station, and so many more stepping in. "O, papa, where are all these people going to?"

And in the afternoon she repeated the question, adding,—

"I shouldn't think there'd be anybody left in any of the houses."

By the time they reached Albany, she had seen so much of the world that she felt fairly worn out, and her head hummed like a hive of bees.

"I didn't know, papa,—I never knew,—there were so many folks!"

The next letter Dotty had to read was from Prudy. It was merely a poem copied very carefully. You may skip it if you like; but the major said it was exquisite, and I think the major must have been a good judge, for I have the same opinion myself!

This night was spent at Albany; and, as the evening closed with a little adventure I will tell you about it; and that will be all that it is necessary to relate of Dotty's journey.

Mr. Parlin, Major Lazelle, and our heroine were sitting, after their late tea, in a private parlor. It was time Dotty was asleep but, while she was waiting for her papa, Major Lazelle held her on his knee. Mr. Parlin was writing letters, and did not listen to the conversation going on between his little daughter and her friend. They commenced by talking about Zip. Dotty said he knew as much as a boy.

"I did think once he was my brother. And now I'm glad I didn't have a real brother; for if he had been, p'rhaps he'd have burned up our house with a cracker."

"So you think little girls are nicer than little boys?"

"O, yes, sir; don't you?"

Dotty spoke as if there could be no doubt about it.

"I like good little girls," said Major Lazelle, "such as can ride a whole day in the cars without growing cross."

This compliment gratified Dotty. She felt that she deserved it, for she had kept her temper admirably ever since she left home.

"I am sure you will grow up, one of these days, to be a very good woman," continued Major Lazelle, looking with an admiring smile at the graceful little girl seated on his knee. "You tell me you have never been at school. I hope you do not mean to frolic all your life? What were little girls made for, do you think?"

Dotty reflected a moment.

"What are little girls made for, sir? Why, they are made to play, 'cause they can't play when they grow to be ladies."

The major laughed.

"Pretty well said! You're rather too shrewd for such an 'old mustache' as I. So little girls are made to play? Then suppose we two have a game. Let us play chip-chop."

Dotty was becoming sleepy, but aroused herself, and patted her little soft hands as hard as she could, tossing them hither and thither, sometimes hitting her companion's thumb, sometimes his little finger. Major Lazelle laughed, and then she laughed too; for when he tried to strike her hands, he said it was like aiming at a pair of rose-leaves fluttering in the air.

The chip-chop was a complete failure; but it had set them both in great glee. If truth be told, they became excessively rude.

"Now, sir," said Dotty, as they ran across the room, playing a game of romps, "if you do catch me again, I'll—O, dear, I don't know what I'll do!"

Mr. Parlin looked up from his letter a little annoyed, for the floor was shaking so that he could scarcely write.

"Do not be rude, my daughter," said he, though he knew very well the major was really the one to be chided.

But his warning came a minute too late. Major Lazelle had caught Dotty, and she had thrown up both hands to clutch at his hair. She meant to give it one desperate pulling; she did not care if she hurt him a little; she even hoped he might cry out and beg her to stop.

But the oddest thing happened. If she had gone to bed at the usual time, and fallen asleep, then this would have been her dream. But no, she supposed she was awake; and what now?

As she seizes two locks of Major Lazelle's hair, one in each hand, and pulled them both as if she meant to draw them out by the roots, out they came! Yes, entirely out! And more than that, all the rest of the man's hair came too! His head was left as smooth as an apple.

You see at once how it was. He wore a wig, and just for play had slyly unfastened it, and allowed Miss Dotty to pull it off.

The perfect despair on her little face amused him vastly; but he did not smile; he looked very severe.

"See what you have done!" said he, rubbing his bald head as if it were just ready to bleed. "See what you have done to me, you cruel girl!"

Major Lazelle's entire head of hair lay at her feet as brown and wavy as ever it was. Dotty looked at it with horror. The idea of scalping a man!

For a whole minute she lost the power of speech. Then she gasped out,—

"O, dear! dear! dear! I didn't know your hair was so tender!"

The major had been crowding his handkerchief into his mouth; but at this he could no longer restrain himself, nor could Mr. Parlin help joining in the laugh.

The little girl was more bewildered than ever. She put her hand to her own head, to make sure it was safe, for it felt as airy as a dandelion top.

Then Major Lazelle explained to her in a few words what a wig is, and how it is fastened to the head. Dotty understood it all in a moment, but was too much chagrined to make any reply.

"I am several years younger than your papa, my dear; so you think it strange to see me bald; but I have had two dreadful fevers, and they have run away with every bit of my hair."

Dotty would not even look up to see Major Lazelle replace his wig. Her dignity had been wounded.

"Come, sit on my knee, Pussy, and let me tell you some more about it."

"No, I thank you, sir," replied she, walking the floor with the air of an injured princess. "No, I thank you, sir."

"How, now, little one? You don't mean to be angry with me for a little joke?"

"No, I thank you."

And that was all Dotty would say. She was wise enough to know she was too angry to speak.

"Ah, ha! temper, I see!" thought Major Lazelle; "I did not suspect it from that quarter."

If the young gentleman had only known how hard the little girl was struggling just then to control herself, he would have liked her better than ever.

Her father chided her next morning for taking a joke so seriously. Dotty replied with a deep sigh,—

"Papa, that major 'sposes I'm only five years old! That's what Dollyphus s'posed! I don't like it, papa, when I can travel so well; and how'd I know what a wig was, well; you and mamma never had any?"

But Dotty smiled as benevolently as she could when she met the major again. He was a little afraid of her, however. He did not enjoy playing with her as he had enjoyed it before. He now felt obliged to be on his guard, lest she should take offence.

The rest of her journey—though Dotty did not know it—was not quite so delightful as it might have been if she had only laughed with good humor when the lively major let her pull his hair out by the roots.

But the cars went "singing through the forest, and rattling over ridges," till it was time to part from the pleasant man with a wig. Then they went on, "shooting under arches, rambling over bridges," till Dotty and her papa had come to their journey's end. We will say it was the town of Quinn.

NEW FACES.

The Cliffords lived a little way out of town. Mr. Parlin took a carriage at the depot, and he and Dotty had a very pleasant drive to "Aunt 'Ria's."

The little girl was rather travel-stained. Her gloves were somewhat ragged at the tips, from her habit of twitching them so much; and they were also badly soiled with fruit and candy. Her hair was as smooth as hands could make it; but alas for the "style" hat which had left Portland in triumph! It had reached Indiana in disgrace. Its tipsy appearance was due to getting stepped on, and being caught in showers. Dotty's neat travelling dress was defaced by six large grease spots. Where they had come from Dotty could not conjecture, unless "that sick lady with a bottle had spilled some of her cod-oil on it out of a spoon."

The child had intended to astonish her relatives by her tidy array; but, after all her pains, she had arrived out West in a very sorry plight.

"Now, which side must I look for the house, papa?"

"At your right hand, my dear. The first thing you will see is the conservatory, and then a stone house."

"My right hand," thought Dotty; "that's east; but which is my right hand?"

She always knew after she had thought a moment. It was the one which did not have the "shapest thumb;" that is, the misshapen one she had pounded once by mistake, instead of an oilnut.

"O, yes, papa! See the flowers! the flowers! And only to think they don't know who's coming! P'rhaps they're drinking tea, or gone visiting, or something."

The Cliffords were not at tea. Grace and Cassy were reading "Our Boys and Girls" in the summer-house, with their heads close together; Horace was in the woods fishing; Mr. Clifford at his office; his wife in her chamber, ruffling a pink cambric frock for wee Katie, rocking as she sewed.

As for Katie, she was marching about the grounds under an old umbrella. It was only the skeleton of an umbrella—dry bones, wires, and a crooked handle. Through the open sides the little one was plainly to be seen; and Mr. Parlin thought she looked like that flower we have in our gardens, which peeps out from a host of little tendrils, and is called the "lady in the bower."

Hearing a carriage coming, the "lady in the bower" rushed to the gate, flourishing the black bones of the umbrella directly in the horse's face.

"Dotty has camed! She has camed!" shouted the little creature, dropping the umbrella, falling over it, springing up again, and running with flying feet to spread the news.

Nobody believed Dotty had "camed;" it seemed an improbable story; but Grace and Cassy had heard the wheels, and they ran through the avenue into the house to make sure it was nobody but one of the neighbors.

"Why, indeed, and indeed, it is Dotty; and if here isn't Uncle Edward too!" cried Grace, tossing back her curls, and dancing down the front steps. "Ma, ma, here is Uncle Edward Parlin!"

"I sawed um first! I sawed um first!" screamed little Flyaway, thrusting the point of the umbrella between Dotty's feet, and throwing her over.

"Can I believe my eyes!" said Mrs. Clifford's voice from the head of the stairs; and down she rushed, with open arms, to greet her guests.

Then there was so much kissing, and so much talking, that nobody exactly knew what anybody else said; and Katie added to the confusion by fluttering in and out, and every now and then breaking into a musical laugh, which the mocking-bird, not to be outdone, caught up and echoed. It was a merry, merry meeting.

"You dee papa bringed you—didn't him, Dotty?" said Katie, flying at her cousin with the feather duster, as soon as Grace had taken away the umbrella, and pointing her remarks with the end of the handle.

"You's Uncle Eddard's baby—that's what is it."

"O, you darling Flyaway!" said Dotty, "if you wouldn't stick that handle right into my eyes!"

"I's going to give you sumpin!" returned Katie, putting her hand in her pocket, and producing a very soft orange, which had been used for a football. "It's a ollinge. You can eat um, 'cause I gived um to you."

"Thank you, O, thank you. Flyaway: how glad I am to see you! You look just the same, and no different."

"O, no, I'm is growin' homely," replied the baby, cheerfully, "velly homely; Hollis said so."

By the time Dotty's crushed hat was off, and she had made herself ready for tea, trying to hide three of the six grease-spots with her hands, Horace appeared with a little birch switch across his shoulder, strung with fish. The fish were few and small; but Horace was just as tired, he said, as if he had caught a whale. He did not say he was glad to see his young cousin; but joy shone all over his face.

"We'll have times—won't we, little Topknot?" said he, taking Katie up between his fingers, as if she had been a pinch of snuff.

"Is you found of ollinges, Dotty?" asked Flyaway, with an anxious glance at the yellow fruit in Dotty's hand, still untasted.

After tea the orange lay on the lounge.

"I's goin' to give you a ollinge," said Katie, presenting it again, as if it were a new one. But after she had given it away three times, she thought her duty was done.

"If you please um," said she, coaxingly, "I dess I'll eat a slice o' that ollinge."

So she had the whole.

"Dotty, have you seen Phebe?" asked Horace.

"No; where does she live?"

"O, out in the kitchen. Prudy saw her when she was here, ever so long ago. She hasn't faded any since."

"O, now I remember, she's a niggro, as black as a sip."

"Yes; come out and see her. She's famous for making candy. She learned that of Barby."

"Who is Barby?"

"The Dutch girl we had before Katinka came."

Dotty went into the kitchen with Horace to watch the candy-making. This was a favorite method with him of entertaining visitors.

Phebe Dolan was a young colored girl, who had a very desirable home at Mrs. Clifford's, but who always persisted in going about the house in a dejected manner, as if some one had treated her unkindly. For all that, she was very happy; and under her solemn face was a deal of quiet fun.

Katinka Dinkelspiel was a good-natured German girl, with a face as round as a full moon, and eyes as expressive as two blots of blue paint. She wore her fair hair rolled in front on each side into a puff like a capital O. Dotty looked at her in surprise. She was very unlike Norah, who wore bright ribbons on her head. And Katinka talked broken English, stirring up her words in such a way that the sentences were like Chinese puzzles; they needed to be taken apart and put together differently.

"Please to make the door too," she said to Horace; and it was half a minute before Dotty understood that she was asking him to shut it.

"This is my cousin Dotty Dimple, girls; the handsomest of the family; but not the best one—are you, though?" at the same time giving Miss Dimple a chair.

"How d'ye, miss?" said Phebe, mournfully.

Katinka said nothing, but patted the letter O on the right side of her head.

"O, Phib, my mother says if you are not too tired, you may make some candy; she said so, candidly."

Horace was just old enough to delight in puns.

Now, this was a pleasant message to Phebe; she would have been glad to keep her fingers in molasses half the time. Still it seemed to Dotty, as she saw the rolling of the black eyes, that Phebe was quite discouraged.

"I s'pose she doesn't like candy," thought she; "I heard of a girl once that didn't."

Rolling her sad eyes again and again, Phebe went to draw the molasses, and soon had it boiling on the stove.

"There," said Horace, rubbing his hands, "I told Dotty if anybody knew how to make candy 'twas Phebe Dolan. Give us the nut-cracker, and I'll have the pecans ready in no time."

This time Phebe's eyes twinkled. As soon as the molasses would pour from the spoon in just the right way, with little films like spiders' webs floating from it, then Phebe said it was done, and Horace called Grace and Cassy. Phebe stirred in some soda with an air of solemnity, then poured half the contents of the kettle into a buttered platter, and the other half into a second platter lined with pecan-meats. Then she took the whole out of doors to cool.

"I'll tell you what I'm thinking about," said Dotty, as the girl left the room;—"what has she got on her head?"

"Why, hair, to be sure," replied Grace.

"Wool, I should call it," corrected Horace.

"Because I didn't know," faltered Dotty,—"I didn't know but 'twas a wig."

"What made you think 'twas a wig, Dotty?"

"O, there was a man wore one in the cars; it looked just like anybody's hair, only he tied it on with a button. He knew you and Horace."

"Me and Horace? Who could it have been?"

"He's the major; his name is Lazelle."

"O, I remember him," said Grace and Horace together. "Does he wear a wig? He isn't old at all."

"He calls himself 'an old mustache,'" returned Dotty, "for he said so to me. He wears one of those hair-lips, and a wig."

"And he's as blind as a post?"

"O, no, he can see things now. I liked him, for he gave me all the apples and peaches I could eat."

"I reckon it did him good to go to the war," exclaimed Horace, "for I remember, when I was a little fellow, how he boxed my ears!"

"He has suffered a great deal since then," said the gentle Cassy, thoughtfully. "You know people generally grow better by suffering."

"Dotty dear, you can't keep your eyes open," said Grace, after the candy had been pulled. "I don't believe it will make you any better to suffer. I'm going to put you to bed."

"And here I am," thought Dotty, as she laid her tired head on the pillow, "out West, under a sketo bar. Got here safe. I ought to have thanked God a little harder in my prayer."

WAKING UP OUT WEST.

Dotty was wakened next morning by a variety of sounds. The mocking-bird, the canary, the hens, and Horace's guinea pig were astir, and wished their little world to be aware of it. Flyaway was dressed and running about, making herself generally useful.

Before the tired young traveller knew where she was, a little hand was busy at the door knob, and a baby voice called out,—

"Dottee, Dottee, is you waked up?"

"O, now I know where I am! This is Aunt 'Ria's house, and that little snip of a Flyaway is trying to get in. O, dear, dear, how far off I am! Prudy Parlin, I wonder if you're thinking about me?"

"Dottee! Dottee!" called the small voice again.

"O, I s'pose that baby'll stand at the door all day."

But just then the knob turned, and in rushed Flyaway out of breath.

"Good-morning, Miss Topknot," said Dotty, addressing her by one of the dove-names Horace was so fond of using.

"O, I's pitty well," replied Flyaway, dancing across the room. "I didn't sleep any till las' night. I d'eamed awtul d'eams; so I kep' awake, and wouldn't go to sleep."

And into bed climbed the little one, laying her head, with its tangled floss, right across Dotty's face.

"Dear me!" sighed Dotty, rubbing the floss out of her eyes. "Such hair! I should think you wore a wig! I'm sleepy; can't you let me be?"

"You mus' wake up, Dottee! I love to wake up; I can do it velly easy."

Dotty, losing her patience, moved forward, pushing Katie towards the edge of the bed.

"O, ho! what a little bedstick! I'll yole out!"

"I wish you would, Flyaway Clifford!"

No sooner said than done. Off rolled Flyaway, but alighted on her feet.

"O, my shole," cried she, scrambling in again; "I fell down backboards. O, ho!"

Such good nature was not to be resisted. Sleepy Dotty waked up and smiled in spite of herself; and next minute her persecutor was skipping down stairs.

"Glad she's gone. Now I'll put on my pretty morning dress; Aunt 'Ria hung it up in the closet. I'm going to be a little lady all the time I'm out West, and not jump off of things and tear my clothes."

Then Dotty's mind strayed to a very different subject.

"It is so queer God is in this country just the same as He is in the State of Maine! I said my prayers to Him before I started, and there He was and heard; and now He's here and hears too; I don't see how. You can't think without He sees your thoughts."

Dotty, brushing her hair, looked in the glass so intently that she did not observe her Aunt Maria, who had quietly entered the room. Mrs. Clifford was a wise woman, but she could not look into her niece's heart. She thought Dotty was admiring her own beauty in the mirror, whereas the child was not thinking of it at all.

What Mr. Beecher once said of little folks is very true:—

"Ah, well, there is a world of things in children's minds that grown-up people do not understand, though they too once were young."

Mrs. Clifford went up to Dotty and kissed her. Then the little girl was startled from her musings, and passing down stairs with her hand in Mrs. Clifford's, thought she should be perfectly happy if dear Prudy were only on the other side of her.

Everything she saw that was new or strange she had to stop and admire, thinking it was an article that could only belong out West.

"O, auntie, what is this queer little thing with doors?"

"Grace's cabinet, dear."

"Her cabijen," exclaimed Flyaway, darting in from the next room.

"Good morning, Dotty Dimple," said Horace: "did my Guinea pig wake you? I lost him out. What a noise he made! I wish he was in Guinea, where he came from."

Dotty had never seen a Guinea pig. It was another curiosity, which promised to be more remarkable than Phebe or Katinka. She began to think coming West was like having one long play-day. Even the dining-room was a novelty, with the swinging fan suspended over the table to keep off flies.

"I have been wondering," said Mrs. Clifford, as she urned the coffee, "how we shall amuse our little Dotty while she is here."

"Fishing," suggested Horace.

"Nutting," said Grace.

"Prudy went to a wedding when she was in Indiana," remarked Dotty, in a low voice.

"We will try to get up a wedding then," said Horace; "but they are a little out of fashion now."

"We have been thinking," observed Mrs. Clifford, "of a nutting excursion for to-day. How would you like it, Edward?"

"Very much," replied Mr. Parlin. "I can spend but one day with you, and I would as lief spend it nutting as in any other way."

"Only one day, Uncle Edward!" cried Grace and Horace.

"Only one day, papa!" stammered Dotty, feeling like a little kitten who did have her paw on a mouse, but sees the mouse disappear down a hole.

"O, I shall leave you, my daughter. You will stay here a week or two, and meet me in Indianapolis."

Dotty was able to eat once more.

"Father, what are we to do for horses to go nutting with?" spoke up Horace. "Robin raked this part of town yesterday with a fine-tooth comb, and couldn't find anything but an old clothes' horse, and that was past travelling."

"My son!"

Mr. Clifford's face said very plainly,—

"Not so flippant, my child!"

But the only remark he made was to the effect that there were doubtless horses to be found in the city at the stables.

"What about the infant, mamma?" said Grace. "Is she to be one of the party?"

When Katie was present she was sometimes mysteriously mentioned as "the infant." It was quite an undertaking to allow her to go; but Mrs. Clifford had yielded the point an hour or two before, out of regard to Horace's feelings. She knew the nutting party would be spoiled for him if his beloved little Topknot were left out.

"Is I goin'?" asked she, when she heard the joyful news. "Yes, I'm are goin' to get some horse."

"No, some pecans, you little Brown-brimmer."

Katie had a dim suspicion that she owed this pleasure to her brother's influence.

"Hollis," said she, eagerly,—"Hollis, you may have the red part o' my apple."

This sounded like the very fulness of generosity, but was a hollow mockery; for by the "red part" she only meant the skin.

Mr. Clifford had one horse, and while Robin Sherwood was going to the city for another, Mrs. Clifford made ready the lunch.

Happy Dotty walked about, twirling a lock of her front hair, and watched Katinka cleaning the already nice paint, spilling here and there "little drops of water, little grains of sand." She also observed the solemn yet dextrous manner in which Phebe washed the breakfast dishes, and looked on with peculiar interest as Aunt Maria filled the basket.

First there were custards to be baked in little cups and freckled with nutmeg, to please Uncle Edward. Then there was a quantity of eggs to be boiled hard. As Mrs. Clifford dropped these one by one into a kettle of water, Katie ran to the back door, and cried out to the noisy hens,—

"Stop cacklerin', chickie; we've got 'em."

Then, fearing she had not made herself understood, she added,—

"We've found your aigs, chickie; they was ror, but we's goin' to bake 'em."

Dotty was impressed with the beauty of the picnic basket and the delicacy of the food. Everything she saw was rose-colored to-day.

"O, Aunt 'Ria, I should think you'd like to live out West! Such splendid fruit cake!"

"I saw Fibby and my mamma make that," said Flyaway, "out o' cindamon and little clovers."

"Clovers in cake?"

"Not red and white clovers; them little bitter kinds you know," added the child, with a wry face.

There were four for each carriage. Dotty rode with her father, Mrs. Clifford, and Katie. Little Flyaway looked at the hired phaeton with contempt.

"It hasn't any cap on, like my papa's," said she; but she was prevailed upon to ride in it because her mamma did.

Horace went with his father and the "cup and saucer," as he called Grace and Cassy. He was in a state of irritation because his idolized Topknot was in the other carriage.

"You can't separate that cup and saucer," growled he to himself. "They'll sit and talk privacy, I suppose; and I might have had Brown-brimmer if it hadn't been for Cassy."

GOING NUTTING.

As they drove along "the plank road," farther and farther away from the city, Dotty saw more clearly than ever the wide difference between Indiana and Maine.

"Why, papa," said she, "did you ever breathe such a dust? It seems like snuff."

"It makes us almost as invisible as the 'tarn cap' we read of in German fairy tales," said Mrs. Clifford, tucking her brown veil under her chin.

She and Mr. Parlin both encouraged Dotty to talk; for they liked to hear her exclamations of wonder at things which to them seemed common-place enough.

"What did you call this road, Aunt 'Ria? Didn't you say it was made of boards? I don't see any boards."

"The planks were put down so long ago, Dotty, that they are overlaid with earth."

"But what did they put them down for?"

"You musser ask so many kestions, Dotty," said Flyaway, severely; "you say 'what' too many times."

"The planks were laid down, Dotty, on account of the depth of the mud."

"Mud, Aunt 'Ria?"

"Yes, dear, dusty as it is now, at some seasons of the year the roads are so muddy that you might lose off your overshoes if it were not for the large beams which bridge over the crossings."

"That reminds me," said Mr. Parlin, "of the man who was seen sinking in the mud, and, when some one offered to help him out, he replied, cheerfully, 'O, I shall get through; I have a horse under me.'"

"Why, was the horse 'way down out of sight, papa?"

"Where was the hossy, Uncle Eddard?"

"It was only a story, children. If the man said there was a horse under him, it was a figure of speech, which we call hyperbole; he only meant to state in a funny way that the mud was excessively deep."

"Is it right to tell hyperblees, papa? Because Jennie Vance tells them a great deal. I didn't know the name of them before."

"No, Alice, it is not right to tell untrue things expecting to be believed—of course not."

"Well, she isn't believed. Nobody s'poses her mamma made a bushel of currant wine last summer, unless it's a baby, that doesn't know any better."

"I knows better. I'se a goorl, and can walk," said little Katie, bridling.

"I didn't say you were a baby, you precious Flyaway! Who's cunning?"

"I'm is," replied the child, settling back upon the seat with a sigh of relief. She was very sensitive on the point of age, and, like Dotty, could not abide the idea of being thought young.

"How far are we going?" asked Mr. Parlin.

"I do not know exactly," replied Mrs. Clifford; "but I will tell you how far Mr. Skeels, one of our oldest natives, calls it. He says 'he reckons it is three screeches.'"

"How far is a 'screech,' pray?"

"The distance a human voice can be heard, I presume."

"Let us try it," said Dotty Dimple; and she instantly set up a scream so loud that the birds in the trees took to their wings in alarm. Katie chimed in with a succession of little shrieks about as powerful as the peep of a little chicken.

"I have heard that they once measured distances by 'shoots,'" said Mrs. Clifford, laughing; "but I hope it will not be necessary to illustrate them by firing a gun."

They next passed on old and weatherworn graveyard.

"This," said Mrs. Clifford, "was once known, in the choice language of the backwoodsmen, as a 'briar-patch;' and when people died, it was said they 'winked out.'"

"'Winked out,' Aunt 'Ria? how dreadful!"

"Wing tout," echoed Katie; "how defful!"

"O, what beautiful, beautiful grass we're riding by, auntie! When the wind blows it, it winks so softly! Why, it looks like a green river running ever so fast."

"That is a sort of prairie land, dear, and very rich. Look on the other side of the road, and tell me what you think of those trees."

"O, Aunt 'Ria, I couldn't climb up there, nor a boy either! It would take a pretty spry squirrel—wouldn't it, though?"

"A pitty sp'y squirrel, I fink," remarked Katie, who did not consider any of Dotty's sentences complete until she herself had added a finishing touch.

"They are larger than our trees, Alice."

"O, yes, papa. They look as if they grew, and grew, and forgot to stop."

"Velly long trees, tenny rate," said Katie, throwing up her arms in imitation of branches, and jumping so high that her mother was obliged to take her in her lap in order to keep her in the carriage.

"And, O, papa, it is so smooth between the trees, we can peep like a spy-glass, right through! Why, it seems like a church."

"I don't see um," said Katie, stretching her neck and looking in vain for a church.

"'The groves were God's first temples,'" repeated Mr. Parlin, reverently. "These trees have no undergrowth of shrubs, like our New England trees."

"But, O, look! look, papa! What is that long green dangle, dripping down from up high? No, swinging up from down low?'

"Yes, what is um, Uncle Eddard?"

"That is a mistletoe-vine embracing a hickory tree. It is called a 'tree-thief,' because it steals its food from the tree it grows upon."

"Why, papa, I shouldn't think 'twas a thief, for the tree knows it. A thief comes in the night, when there doesn't anybody know it. I should think 'twas a beggar."

"I fink so too," said Flyaway, straining her eyes to look at she knew not what. "I fink um ought to ask pease."

"All this tract of country where we are riding now," said Mrs. Clifford, "was overflowed last spring by the river. It is called 'bottom land,' and is extremely rich."

"I never thought the Hoojers had a very clean, blue, pretty river," said Dotty, thoughtfully; "it looks some like a mud-puddle. Perhaps it carried off too much of this dirt."

"Muddy-puddil," replied Katie, "full of dirt."

As they rode they passed houses whose chimneys were inhospitably left out of doors.

"Why, look, auntie," said Dotty; "theres a house turned wrong side out!"

These buildings had no cellars, but were propped upon logs, leaving room for the air to pass under the floor, and for other things to pass under, such as cats, dogs, and chickens.

"Why, where do the people go to when they want to go down cellar?" asked Dotty, in a maze.

Near one of these houses she was seized with an irresistible thirst. Mr. Parlin gave the reins to Mrs. Clifford, and stepped out of the carriage, then helped Dotty and Katie to alight.

They found a sharp-nosed woman cooking corn-dodgers for a family of nine children. Whether it was their breakfast or dinner hour, it was hard to tell. When Mr. Parlin asked for water, the woman wiped her forehead with her apron, and replied, "O, yes, stranger," and one of the little girls, whose face was stained with something besides the kisses of the sun, brought some water from the spring in a gourd.

"Well, Dotty Dimple," said Mrs. Clifford, when they were all on their way again, "what did you see in the house?"

"O, I saw a woman with a whittled nose, and a box of flowers in the window."

"And children," said Katie; "four, five hunnerd chillen."

"The box was labelled 'Assorted Lozenges,'" said Mr. Parlin; "but I observed that it contained a black imperial rose; so the occupants have an eye for beauty, after all. I presume they cannot trust their flowers out of doors on account of the pigs."

"They brought me water in a squash-shell," cried Dotty; "it is so funny out West!"

"I dinked in a skosh-shell, too; and I fink it's velly funny out West!" said little Echo.

They were riding behind the other carriage, and at some distance, in order to avoid the dust from its wheels.

"Henry has stopped," said Mrs. Clifford. "We have reached 'Small's Enlargement,' and cannot comfortably ride any farther. The lot next to this is ours, and it is there we are going for the pecans."

Dotty could hardly wait to be lifted out, so eager was she to walk on the "Small Enlargement." She spoke of it afterwards as an "ensmallment;" and the confusion of ideas was very natural. It was the place where Grace and the "Princess of the Ruby Seal" had gone, some years before, to have their fortunes told. It was a wild picturesque region, overgrown with tulip trees, Judas trees, and scrub oaks.

IN THE WOODS.

The party walked leisurely along till they came to a log church, which Mr. Parlin paused to admire. It was in harmony, he said, with the roughness of the landscape.

"I should like to attend service here by moonlight; I think it would be very sweet and solemn in such a lonely place. There would be no sound outside; and as you looked through the open door, you would only see a few quiet trees listening to the words of praise."

"The evenings here must seem like something holy," said Mrs. Clifford, "'the nun-like evenings, telling dew-beads as they go.'"

"O, my shole!" cried Katie, dancing before the church door, and clapping her hands; "that's the bear's house, the bear's house! Little boy went in there, drank some of the old bear's podge, so sour he couldn't drink it." Here she looked disgusted, but added with a honeyed smile, "Then bimeby drank some o' little bear's podge, and 'twas so sweet he drank it aw—all up!"

Everybody laughed, it was so absurd to think of looking for bears and porridge in a building where people met to worship. Dotty had just been saying to herself, "How strange that God is in this mizzable house out West, just as if it was in Portland!" But Katie had rudely broken in upon her meditations.

"O, what a Flyaway!" said she; "you don't do any good."

"Yes, I does."

"Well, what?"

"O, I tell 'tories."

"Is that all?"

"I p'ay with little goorls; and then I p'ay some more; and I wash de dishes. I'll tell you a 'tory," added she, balancing herself on a stump, and making wild gestures with her arms, somewhat as she had seen Horace do.