It was hard to
tell, by sight, whether he had or not, for his back was to me, as
he flattened his nose against the window, but I could see that my
poultice was gone.
"Where is what uncle put on your arm, Toddie?" I asked.
"I ate it up," said the truthful youth.
"Did you eat the handkerchief, too?"
"No; I froed nashty old handkerchief out the window--don't want
dirty old handkerchiefs in my nice 'ittle room."
I was so glad that his burn had been slight that I forgave the
insult to my handkerchief and called up Budge, so that I might at
once get both boys into bed, and emerge from the bondage in which
I had lived all day long. But the task was no easy one. Of course
my brother-in-law, Tom Lawrence, knows better than any other man
the necessities of his own children, but no children of mine shall
ever be taught so many methods of imposing upon parental good
nature. Their program called for stories, songs, moral
conversations, frolics, the presentation of pennies, the dropping
of the same, at long intervals, into tin savings banks, followed
by a deafening shaking-up of both banks; then a prayer must be
offered, and no conventional one would be tolerated; then the boys
performed their own devotions, after which I was allowed to depart
with an interchange of "God bless you's.
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