V 
 
THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
DONALD AND DOROTHY. 
 HANS DRINKER. 
 THEOPHILUS AND OTHERS. 
 ALONG THE WAY. 
 RHYMES AND JINGLES. 
 WHEN LIFE IS YOUNG, 
 ETC., ETC., ETC. 
 
TWO BOYS OF HOLLAND. 
 [From au old Dutcli painting. J 
 
THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 STORIES AND SKETCHES 
 FOR YOUNG FOLK 
 
 BY 
 
 MARY MAPES DODGE 
 
 AUTHOR OF u HANS BRINKER " 
 
 "DONALD AND DOROTHY" 
 
 "RHYMES AND JINGLES" 
 
 ETC., ETC. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 THE CENTURY CO. 
 1894 
 
 M230423 
 
Copyright, 1894, by 
 THE CENTURY Co. 
 
 THE DEVINNE PRESS. 
 
AUTHOR S NOTE 
 
 The paper on Holland which constitutes Part I 
 of this book has now been expanded to more than 
 double the proportions of "The Land of Pluck" as 
 printed a few years ago in " St. Nicholas." 
 
 The stories and sketches composing Part II are 
 here for the first time collected in book form. 
 
 TJie frontispiece "Two Boys of Holland" has been 
 engraved from a fine Dutch painting, attributed to 
 Cuyp, and owned by Mr. Charles T. Barney of New 
 York, who courteously allowed it to be copied for 
 use in this volume. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK. 
 
 CHAPTER I. ON BOTH SIDES OF THE DIKE 1 
 
 CHAPTER II. BIRD S-EYE VIEWS 11 
 
 CHAPTER III. WINTER AND SUMMER 17 
 
 CHAPTER IV. STREETS AND BYWAYS 29 
 
 CHAPTER V. DUTCH ODDITIES 43 
 
 CHAPTER VI. THE BATAVIANS AND THEIR GOOD 
 
 MEADOW 57 
 
 CHAPTER VII. THE DUTCH HAVE TAKEN HOLLAND . 64 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. THE DUTCH AT HOME AND ABROAD . 76 
 
 CHAPTER IX. HOLLAND TO-DAY 85 
 
 DAY-DREAMS ON THE DIKE 103 
 
 PART II. STORIES AND SKETCHES 
 
 WONDERING TOM 115 
 
 LITTLE VEMBA BROWN 137 
 
 THE CROW-CHILD 145 
 
 TRAPPER JOE 161 
 
 THE BRIGHTON CATS 175 
 
 WORTH YOUR WEIGHT IN GOLD 185 
 
 BIANCA AND BEPPO 195 
 
 A LAW THAT COULD NOT BE BROKEN 203 
 
 A GARRET ADVENTURE 211 
 
 BORROWING TROUBLE 225 
 
 HEAVIER THAN AIR 231 
 
 WHAT THE SNOW-MAN DID 241 
 
 KITTY S CANARY 253 
 
 GRANDMOTHER 261 
 
 Two MAY-QUEENS 269 
 
 LITTLE HAL S RICHES 279 
 
 ONLY A ROSE 287 
 
 LIMPETTY JACK 299 
 
 BUBBLES . . 307 
 

 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 

 CHAPTEE I 
 
 ON BOTH SIDES OF THE DIKE 
 
 * AR over the sea is a famous little country 
 generally known as Holland ; but that 
 name, even if it should mean Hollow land, 
 or How land ? does not describe it half so 
 well as this The Little Land of Pluck. 
 
 Verily, a queerer bit of earth was never shone upon by 
 the sun nor washed by the tide. It is the oddest, funniest 
 country that ever raised its head from the waves (and, 
 between ourselves, it does not quite do that), the most 
 topsyturvy landscape, the most amphibious spot in the 
 universe, as the Man in the Moon cannot deny, the 
 chosen butt of the elements, and good-naturedly the 
 laughing-stock of mankind. Its people are the queerest 
 and drollest of all the nations ; and yet so plucky, so wise 
 
 and resolute and strong, that " beating the Dutch " has 
 i i 
 
THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 .beco irid a familiar byword for expressing the limits of 
 mortal performance. 
 
 As for the country, for centuries it was not exactly 
 anywhere ; at least it objected to remaining just the 
 same for any length of time, in any one place. It may 
 be said to have lain around loose on the waters of a 
 certain portion of Europe, playing peek-a-boo with its 
 inhabitants ; now coming to the surface here and there 
 to attend to matters, then taking a dive for change of 
 scene, and a most disastrous dive it often proved. 
 
 Eip Van Winkle himself changed less between his 
 great sleeping and waking than Holland has altered 
 many a time, between sunset and dawn. All its firm 
 ness and permanence seems to have been soaked out of 
 it, or rather to have filtered from the land into the people. 
 Every field hesitates whether to turn into a pond or not, 
 and the ponds always are trying to leave the country by 
 the shortest cut. One would suppose that under this con 
 dition of things the only untroubled creatures would be 
 turtles and ducks ; but no, strangest and most mysterious 
 of all, every living thing in Holland appears to be thor 
 oughly placid and content! The Dutch mind, so to speak, 
 is at once anti-dry and waterproof. Little children run 
 about in fields where once their grandfathers sailed over 
 the billows ; and youths and maidens row their pleasure- 
 boats where their ancestors played " tag " among the hay 
 stacks. When the tide sweeps unceremoniously over 
 Mynheer s garden, he lights his pipe, takes his fishing-rod, 
 and sits down on his back porch to try his luck. If his 
 pet pond breaks loose and slips away, he whistles, puts up 
 
ON BOTH SIDES OF THE DIKE 3 
 
 a dam so that it cannot come back, and decides upon the 
 crop to be raised in its place. None but the Dutch could 
 live so tranquilly in Holland ; though, for that matter, if 
 
 MYNHEER SITS DOWN ON HIS BACK PORCH TO TRY HIS LUCK." 
 
 it had not been for the Dutch, we may be sure that by 
 this time there would be no Holland at all. 
 
 And yet this very Holland, besides holding its own 
 place, has managed to gain a foothold on almost every 
 
THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 quarter of the globe. An account of its colonies is a 
 history in itself. In the East Indies alone it has under 
 its authority more than thirty million people. 
 
 It is said that the Greenlanders, in spite of the discom 
 forts of their country, become so very fond of it that even 
 the extreme cold is considered a luxury. 
 In some such way, I suppose, the Hol 
 lander becomes infatuated with water. 
 He deems no landscape, no pleasure- 
 spot complete without it. It is 
 funny to see the artificial pond 
 that a Dutchman will have be 
 neath his very window; and 
 funny, also, to see how soon the 
 pond will try to look like land, 
 by filming itself over with a coat 
 of green. Many of the city peo 
 ple have little summer-houses, 
 or pavilions, near the outskirts 
 of the town. They are built 
 just large enough for the 
 family to sit in. Each 
 zomerhuis, as it is called, 
 s= is sure to be surrounded 
 by a ditch, if indeed it is not built out over the water. 
 Its chief ornaments are its little bridges, its fanciful roof, 
 and its Dutch motto painted over the entrance. Hither 
 the family repair on summer afternoons. Mynheer sips 
 his coffee, smokes his pipe, and gazes at the water. His 
 vrouw knits or sews ; and the children fish from the win- 
 
 
ON BOTH SIDES OF THE DIKE 5 
 
 dows, or climb the little bridges, or paddle about in .skiffs, 
 gathering yellow water-lilies. Near by, perhaps, they can 
 hear some bargeman s wife singing her cheery song while 
 busy at her housekeeping, or rather homekeeping, for she 
 lives on the canal-boat. That is her flower-garden grow 
 ing on a corner of the deck, quite unconscious that it is 
 doing anything remarkable in blooming over the water. 
 In fact, it is in much less danger of sinking there than 
 
 O O 
 
 it would be on shore. 
 
 Now, these oddities arise mainly from the fact that 
 though mankind cannot help admiring this Land of Pluck, 
 the ocean has always looked down upon it. A large por 
 tion of Holland lies below the level of the sea, in some 
 places as much as twenty or thirty feet. Besides, the 
 country abounds with lakes and rivers that persist in 
 swelling and choking and overflowing to such a degree 
 that, as I said before, none but the Dutch could do 
 anything with them. All this disturbs an unpleasant 
 phantom named Fog, who has a cousin in London. He 
 sometimes rises like a great smoke over the land, shutting 
 out the sunlight, and wrapping everything and everybody 
 in a veil of mist, so that it is almost as much as a person s 
 life is worth to venture out of doors, for fear of tumbling 
 into a canal. Again, the greater part of Holland is so flat 
 that the wind sweeps across it in every direction, putting 
 the waters up to no little mischief, and blowing about 
 all the dry sand it can find, heaping it, scattering it, in 
 the wildest possible way. 
 
 What wonder the Dutch have always been wise, plucky, 
 and strong ? They have had to struggle for a foothold 
 
6 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 upon the very land of their birth. They have had to push 
 back the ocean to prevent it from rolling in upon them. 
 They have had to wall in the rivers and lakes to keep 
 them within bounds. They have been forced to decide 
 which should be land and which should be water, 
 forever digging, building, embanking, and pumping for 
 dear existence. They had no stones, no timber, that 
 they had not themselves procured from elsewhere. 
 Added to this, they have had the loose, blowing sand 
 in their mind s eye for ages ; never forgetting it, gov 
 erning its drifts, and where its vast, silent heapings (as 
 in the great dunes along the coast) have proved use 
 ful as a protection, they have planted sea-bent and 
 other vegetation to fasten it in its place. Even the riotous 
 wind has been made their slave. Caught by thousands of 
 long-armed windmills, it does their grinding, pumping, 
 draining, sawing. When it ceases to blow, those great 
 white sleeve-like sails all over the country hang limp and 
 listless in the misty air, or are tucked trimly out of sight ; 
 but let the first breath of a gale be felt, and straightway, 
 with one flutter of preparation, every arm is turning slowly, 
 steadily, with a peculiar plenty-of-time air, or is whirling 
 as if the spirit of seventy Dutchmen had taken posses 
 sion of it. 
 
 You scarcely can stand anywhere in Holland without 
 seeing from one to twenty windmills. Many of them are 
 built in the form of a two-story tower, the second story 
 being smaller than the first, with a balcony at its base 
 from which it tapers upward until the cap-like top is 
 reached. High up, near the roof, the great axis juts from 
 
ON BOTH SIDES OF THE DIKE 
 
 ONE OF THE WINDMILLS. 
 
 the wall; and to this are fastened two prodigious arms, 
 formed somewhat like ladders, bearing great sheets of can 
 vas, whose business it is to catch the mischief-maker and 
 set him at work. These mills stand like huge giants 
 guarding the country. Their bodies are generally of a 
 dark red ; and their heads, or roofs, are made to turn this 
 way and that, according to the direction of the wind. 
 Their round eye-window is always staring. Altogether, 
 they seem to be, keeping a vigilant watch in every direc- 
 
8 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 tion. Sometimes they stand clustered together; some 
 times alone, like silent sentinels ; sometimes in long rows, 
 like ranks of soldiers. You see them rising from the 
 midst of factory buildings, by the cottages, on the polders 
 (the polders are lakes pumped dry and turned into farms) ; 
 on the wharves ; by the rivers ; along the canals ; on the 
 dikes ; in the cities everywhere ! Holland would n t 
 
 7 
 
 " ALONG THE CANAL. 
 
 be Holland without its windmills, any more than it would 
 be Holland without its dikes and its Dutchmen. 
 
 A certain zealous dame is said to have once attempted 
 to sweep the ocean away with a broom. The Dutch have 
 been wiser than she. They are a slow and deliberate people. 
 Desperation may use brooms, but deliberation prefers clay 
 and solid masonry. So, slowly and deliberately, the dikes, 
 those great walls of cement and stone, have risen to 
 breast the buffeting waves. And the queer part of it is, 
 
ON BOTH SIDES OF THE DIKE 
 
 A DUTCH DIKE AS SEEN FROM THE LAND SIDE. 
 
 they are so skilfully slanted and paved on the outside 
 with flat stones that the efforts of the thumping waves 
 to beat them down only make them all the firmer ! 
 
 These Holland dikes are among the wonders of the 
 \voiid. I cannot say for how many miles they stretch 
 along the coast, and throughout the interior ; but you may 
 be sure that wherever a dike is necessary to keep back 
 the encroaching waters, there it is. Otherwise, nothing 
 would be there at least, nothing in the form of land; 
 nothing but a fearful illustration of the principal law of 
 hydrostatics : Water always seeks its level. 
 
 Sometimes the dikes, however carefully builded, will 
 spring a leak, and if this be not promptly attended to, terri 
 ble results are sure to follow. In threatened places guards 
 are stationed at intervals, and a steady watch is kept up 
 night and day. At the first signal of danger, every Dutchman 
 within hearing of the startling bell is ready to rush to the 
 rescue. When the weak spot is discovered, what do you 
 think is used to meet the emergency ? What, but straw 
 everywhere else considered the most helpless of all things 
 
10 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 in water ! Yet straw, in the hands of the Dutch, has a 
 will of its own. Woven into huge mats and securely 
 pressed against the embankment, it defies even a rush 
 ing tide, eager to sweep over the country. 
 
 These dikes form almost the only perfectly dry land to 
 be seen from the ocean-side. They are high and wide, 
 with fine carriage-roads on top, sometimes lined with 
 buildings, windmills, and trees. On one side of them, and 
 nearly on a level with the edge, is the sea, lake, canal, or 
 river, as the case may be; on the other, the flat fields 
 stretching damply along at their base. Cottage roofs, 
 therefore, may be lower than the shining line of the 
 water; frogs squatting on the shore can take quite a 
 bird s-eye view of the landscape; and little fish wriggle 
 their tails higher than the tops of the willows near by. 
 Horses look complacently down upon the bell-towers ; 
 and men in skiffs and canal-boats cannot know when 
 they are passing Dirk s cottage close by, except by seeing 
 the smoke from its chimney, or perhaps the cart-wheel 
 that he has perched upon the peak of its overhanging 
 thatched roof, in the hope that some stork will build her 
 nest there, and so bring him good luck. 
 
 A butterfly may take quite an upward flight in Holland, 
 leaving flowers and shrubs and trees beneath her, and, 
 after all, mount only to where a snail is sunning himself 
 on the water s edge ; or a toad may take a reckless leap 
 from the land side of the dike, and, alighting on a tree- 
 top, be obliged to reach earth in monkey-fashion, by leaping 
 from branch to branch ! 
 
CHAPTEE II 
 
 BIRD S-EYE VIEWS 
 
 k O the birds, skimming high over the 
 country, it must be a fanciful sight this 
 Holland. There are the fertile farms or 
 polders, studded with cattle and bright red 
 cottages ; shortwaisted men, women, and children, 
 moving about in wide jackets and big wooden shoes; 
 trees everywhere clipped into fantastical shapes, with their 
 trunks colored white, yellow, or brick red ; country man 
 sions too, and farm-houses gaudy with roofs of brightly 
 tinted tiles. These tiles are made of a kind of glazed earthen 
 ware, and make one feel as if all the pie-dishes in the country 
 were lapped in rows on top of the buildings. Then the 
 great slanting dikes, with their waters held up as if to catch 
 the blue of the sky ; the ditches, canals, and rivers trailing 
 their shining lengths in every direction ; shining lines of 
 railway, too, that now connect most of the principal points 
 of the Netherlands ; then, the thousands of bridges, little 
 and big ; the sluice-gates, canal-locks, and windmills ; the 
 silver and golden weathercocks perched on one foot, and 
 twitching right and left to show their contempt for the 
 
12 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 wind. All this, as you must know, makes the sun jeweler- 
 in-chief to the landscape, which shines and glitters and 
 trembles with motion and light. Yet that is only one 
 way of looking at it. A low-spirited bird might still see 
 
 CAPSIZING 
 
 only marshes and puddles, though he might learn a good 
 lesson or two in seeing jolly Dutch folk, young and old, 
 making merry over every-day affairs. Or one of the prac 
 tical every-day sort might notice only commonplace things 
 such as the country roads paved with yellow bricks ; 
 cabbage-plots scarcely greener than the ponds nestling 
 everywhere among the reeds ; cottages, with roofs ever so 
 
BIRD S-EYE FIEWti 13 
 
 much too big for them, perched upon wooden legs to keep 
 them from sinking in the marsh; and horses wearing 
 wide, stool-like shoes for the same reason. Or they might 
 watch the wagons bumping along with drivers sitting out 
 side, kicking the funny little crooked pole; or horses 
 yoked three abreast, dragging obstinate loads ; or women 
 and boys harnessed to long towing-ropes, meekly drawing 
 their loads of market-stuff up and down the canal. 
 
 Then there are the boats, large and small, of every pos 
 sible Dutch style ; wonderful ships made to breast the 
 rough seas of the coast ; fishing-smacks (smaksckepen), 
 heavy with fresh catches ; the round-steriied craft by the 
 cities, with their gilded prows and gaily painted sides ; 
 trekschuiten, or water-omnibuses, plying up and down the 
 canals for the conveyance of passengers; brown-sailed 
 pakschuiten, or water-carts, for carrying coal and mer 
 chandise upon these same water-roads ; barges loaded 
 
 A WATER OMNIBUS. 
 
14 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 with peat ; pleasure-boats with their showy sails ; the 
 little skiffs, the rafts, the chip boats launched by white- 
 haired urchins kneeling in the mud. 
 
 OVER THE CHIMNEYS AND HOUSE-TOPS (AMSTERDAM). 
 
 Then, mingling confusedly with masts, and windmills, 
 and sails are the long rows of willows, firs, beeches, or 
 elms, planted on the highways wherever root-hold can be 
 found or manufactured ; the stiff, symmetrical gardens, 
 with their nodding tulips and brilliant shrubs ; the great 
 white storks flying to and fro with outstretched necks 
 and legs, busily attending to family needs, or settling upon 
 the quaint gabled roofs, perhaps, of Amsterdam ; water-fowl 
 
BIRD S-EYE VIEWS 
 
 15 
 
 dipping with soft splashings into the tide ; rabbits scudding 
 here and there ; water-rats slyly slipping into their cran 
 nies, and bright water-insects rocking at the surface on 
 reed and tangleweed. Seeing all this, our birds have not 
 seen half ; but they have ample time to look, for bird-life 
 is not the uncertain thing in Holland that it is here. They 
 are citizens loved and respected, and protected by rigorous 
 laws. Stones are not thrown at their heads, nor is " salt 
 sprinkled upon their tails." They are not afraid of guns, 
 for the law has its eye on the gunners ; and, strangest of 
 all, they see nothing terrible in small boys ! Young eyes, 
 to be sure, often peep into their nests; but the owners 
 have been taught not to rob nor molest. Human mothers 
 and bird mothers are in secret league. Indeed, the softest, 
 warmest nest is not softer nor warmer than the Dutch 
 heart has proved itself to the birds. 
 
MYNHEER ON HIS WAY TO BUSINESS. 
 
CHAPTEE III 
 
 WINTER AND SUMMER 
 
 tlie coldest days of winter come, and 
 the little songsters and their greedy cou 
 sins, the storks have flown away in search 
 of warmer climes, the country still is in a glitter, for its 
 waters are frozen. Then all Holland puts 011 its skates, 
 and gets atop of its beloved water, in which before it has 
 only dabbled. Everybody, young and old, little and big, 
 goes skimming and sliding along the canals, over the lakes, 
 and on the rivers. 
 
 The entire country seems one vast skating-rink. No 
 need of red balls to tell the people that everything is 
 ready for the sport. They know that, in their land, a 
 cold winter means ice, and good solid ice, too, some 
 times for weeks together. Then come out the skaters ; 
 and the sleighs; and the happy, sliding-chair folk who 
 are pushed swiftly over the ice by friends, or by livened 
 lackeys, gliding close behind. Then appear, swiftest, 
 most dazzling of all, the ice-boats, perhaps with merry 
 loads of laughing boys and singing school-children. Lis 
 tening to these sweet choruses, as they suddenly burst 
 
18 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 upon you and then as suddenly die away with the vanish 
 ing boat, you feel that not the wind but the joyous music 
 fills the sails skimming so swiftly over the ice. 
 
 As you may well believe, these flying, whizzing ice 
 boats always get the right of way, for nobody w r ould 
 willingly come into collision with them. They seem to 
 
 
 THB ICE-BOATS ARE OUT ! 
 
 know that their season is brief, at the best, and they make 
 speed while the ice shines. 
 
 Now, there is a new sensation among the pleasure-seek 
 ers. Distant shouts of men are heard, and faint crashing 
 sounds slowly growing louder. The ijsbrekers are out ! 
 These, as you may guess by trying to pronounce the word, 
 are provided with pikes for clearing a way through the ice, 
 so that barges and other vessels may pass. Sometimes 
 they are rather small affairs, worked by hand, and some 
 times are large and heavy, and drawn by as many as 
 
WINTER AND SUMMER 19 
 
 twenty or even thirty horses. There is no little excite 
 ment among the boys and girls when a big ice-breaker 
 comes out for the first time in the season. The great 
 crashing thing inspires them with wonder and admiration; 
 yet with all its power it cuts only a narrow pathway for 
 the boats. The main face of the country belongs to the 
 skaters. 
 
 For miles and miles the glassy ice spreads its mirror 
 under the blinking and dazzled sun. Everywhere is one 
 shining network of slippery highway. Who would walk 
 or ride then ? Not one. Doctors skate to their patients; 
 clergymen to their parishioners ; marketwomen to town 
 with baskets upon their heads. Laborers go skimming by, 
 with tools on their shoulders ; and tradespeople, busily 
 planning the day s affairs ; fat old burgomasters, too, with 
 gold-headed canes cautiously nourished to keep them in 
 balance ; laughing girls with arms entwined ; long files of 
 young men, shouting as they pass ; children with school- 
 satchels slung over their shoulders, all whizzing by, this 
 way and that, until you can see nothing but the flashing 
 of skates, and a rushing confusion of color. 
 
 And while all this is happening in the open air, the 
 simple indoor life -is steadily going on, in the homes, the 
 shops, the churches, the schools, the workshops, the 
 picture-galleries. 
 
 Ah, the picture-galleries ! All Hollanders, from the very 
 richest and most cultivated to almost the very humblest, 
 visit and enjoy the rare collections of paintings that en 
 noble their principal towns and cities. And what pictures 
 those old Dutchmen have painted ! The Dutchmen of to- 
 
20 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 day well may be proud of them. There was Rembrandt 
 Van Eyn (of the 111 line), perhaps the greatest portrait- 
 painter this world has ever known ; and Franz Hals and 
 Van der Heist and Van Ostade, and the careful Gerard 
 Don, and Mieris and the two Cuyps, father and son, and 
 Teniers and Adriaen Hanneman, and other great paint 
 ers by the score. You must read about them, and some 
 day see their pictures, if indeed you have not already come 
 upon them either in your books or on your travels. 
 
 But if you visit no other, you surely must plan some 
 day to go to the Eyks Museum at Amsterdam, and see its 
 collection of priceless Eembrandts and other treasures of 
 Dutch art. 
 
 If you go to Holland in summer and look at the people, 
 you will wonder when all the work was done, and who did 
 it. The country folk move so slowly and serenely, looking 
 as if to smoke their pipes were quite as much as they 
 care to do, they have so little to say, and seem to see 
 you only because their eyes happen to be open. You feel 
 sure if by any accident the lids dropped they would not 
 be lifted again in a hurry. Yet there are the dikes, the 
 water-roads, the great ship-canals, the fine old towns, the 
 magnificent cities, the colleges, the galleries, the charit 
 able institutions, the churches. There are the public 
 parks, the beautiful country-seats, the immense factories, 
 the herring-packeries, the docks, the shipping-yards, the 
 railways, and the telegraphs. Surely these Hollanders 
 must work in their sleep ! 
 
 But though the men outside of Amsterdam and the 
 large cities may screen themselves with a mask of dull- 
 
KEMBKANDT S PORTRAIT OF HIMSELF. 
 
WINTER AND SUMMER 
 
 23 
 
 ness, it is not so with the women. They are as lively 
 as one could wish, taller in proportion than the men, 
 with fresh, rosy faces, and hair that matches the sun 
 shine. Many of them are elegant and graceful. As for 
 work, well, if there could be such a thing as a Dutch 
 Barnum, he would make 
 his fortune by exhibiting 
 a lazy Dutchwoman if 
 he could find one ! Ah ! 
 how they work! brush 
 ing, mopping, scrubbing, 
 and polishing. Judging 
 from some houses that I 
 have seen in Holland, I do 
 believe the tiniest Lillipu 
 tian that Gulliver ever 
 saw could not fill his 
 pockets with dust if he 
 searched through dozens 
 of Dutch homes. 
 
 Broek, a little village 
 near beautiful Amster 
 dam, that city of ninety 
 islands, is said to be the 
 cleanest place in the world. 
 It used to be quite famous 
 for its North-Holland pe 
 culiarities and even to-day it has strong characteristics 
 of its own. It is inhabited mainly by retired Dutch mer 
 chants and their families, who seem determined to enjoy 
 
 A PRETTY HOLLANDER. 
 
24 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 the world as it appears when scrubbed to a polish. Every 
 morning the village shines forth as fresh as if it had just 
 taken a bath. The wooden houses are as bright and gay 
 as paint can make them. Their shining tiled roofs and 
 polished facings flash up a defiance to the sun to find a 
 speck of dust upon them. Certain dooryards, curiously 
 paved with shells and stones, look like enormous mosaic 
 brooches pinned to the earth ; the little canals and ditches, 
 instead of crawling sluggishly as many of their kindred do, 
 flow with a limpid cleanliness ; the streets of fine yellow 
 brick are carefully sanded. Even the children walk as if 
 they were trying to make their wooden shoes express a 
 due respect for sand and pebbles. Horses and wheeled 
 vehicles of any kind are not allowed within the borders 
 of the town. The pea-green window-shutters usually are 
 closed ; and the main entrances of cottages never are 
 opened except on the occasion of a christening, a wedding, 
 or a funeral, or when the dazzling brass knobs and knock 
 ers are to be rendered more dazzling still. 
 
 The gardens are as trim and complete as the houses ; but 
 in summer the flower-beds, all laid out in little patches, 
 are bright with audacious blossoms nodding saucily to the 
 prim box-border that incloses them. Most of you have 
 seen the stocky, thick-stemmed box-plant, with its dense 
 growth of dark, glossy little leaves. Every old-fashioned 
 country-place in our own Middle States has had its box- 
 bordered flower-beds, with occasional taller clumps of the 
 shrub, looking like dumpy little trees. Well, the box- 
 plants in Broek -grow in a similar way, but they are very 
 old, and the work of trimming and shaping their hedges 
 
PORTRAIT OF A BOY, BY ADRIAEN HANNEMAN (BORN l6lO, DIED 1666). 
 
WINTER AND SUMMER 27 
 
 may have been handed down from father to son for gener 
 ations. Nearly every garden in Broek has its zomerkuis 
 and its pond. Some of these ponds have queer automata 
 or self-moving figures upon them : sometimes a duck 
 that paddles about and flaps its wooden wings ; some 
 times a wooden sportsman standing upon the shore, jerkily 
 taking aim at the duck, but never quite succeeding in 
 getting his range accurate enough to warrant firing ; and 
 sometimes a dog stands among the shrubbery and snaps 
 his jaws quite fiercely when he is not too damp to work. 
 Queer things, too, are seen in the growing box, which is 
 trimmed so as to fail in resembling peacocks and wolves. 
 Altogether, Broek is a very remarkable place. The 
 dairy-ly inclined inhabitants regard their kine as friends 
 and fellow-lodgers, and so the very cattle there live in 
 fine style. Pet cows, it is said, sometimes rejoice in 
 pretty blue ribbons tied to their tails, and in winter 
 they not uncommonly find themselves daintily housed 
 beneath the family roof. 
 
 In some Dutch houses the rooms are covered with two 
 or three carpets, laid one over the other, and others have 
 no carpets at all, but the floors are polished, or perhaps 
 made of tiles laid in regular patterns. Sometimes doors 
 are curtained like the windows, and the beds are nearly 
 concealed by heavy draperies. Many among the poorer 
 classes sleep in rough boxes, or on shelves fixed in recesses 
 against the wall ; so that sometimes the best bed in the 
 cottage looks more like a cupboard than anything else. 
 
 Whether having so much water about suggested the 
 idea or not, T cannot say, but certain it is that big Mocks 
 
28 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 of imported cork are quite in fashion for footstools. They 
 stand one on each side of the great open fireplace, as 
 though the household intended to have at least a couple 
 of life-preservers on hand, in case of a general flood. The 
 large earthen cup, or fire-pot, that you may see standing 
 near, filled with burning peat, and casting a bright glow 
 over the Dutch sentence inscribed on the tiles arching the 
 fireplace, is very useful for warming the room on chilly 
 days, when it is not quite cold enough for a fire. For that 
 matter, it is a general custom in Holland to use little tin 
 fire-boxes (with a handle, and with holes in the top lid) 
 for warming the feet. Our Dutch ancestors brought some 
 of them over to America long ago, and many grown-up 
 New-Yorkers can remember seeing similar ones in use. 
 In Holland every lady has her voet stoof, or foot-stove. 
 Churches are provided with a large number ; and on Sun 
 day, boys and sometimes old women, bearing high piles of 
 them, move softly about, distributing them among the 
 congregation. 
 
 A DUTCH FOOT-STOVE. 
 
CHAPTEE IV 
 
 STREETS AND BYWAYS 
 
 X NLY an hour s ride on the railroad 
 from Broek to Amsterdam and yet 
 how different are the two ! Here, 
 as in the other large Dutch cities, 
 you see a brisk business look on 
 the men s faces. They are slighter 
 in build than the rustic folk ; and, 
 __,_ _ not having such broad backs and short 
 legs, not wearing leather breeches and wide jackets and 
 big waist-buckles as the countrymen do, they quite make 
 you forget that they are Dutch. In fact they look like 
 New-Yorkers. Nowadays, the fashions and the stiff mas 
 culine costume of Paris and London tend to make nearly 
 all city folk of the Christian world look alike. 
 
 Still, often in Dutch cities you see something distinctive 
 in costume, huge coal-scuttle bonnets on the women; 
 and wooden shoes, that clatter-clatter at every step. 
 Some of the women and girls have their hair cropped short 
 and wear close-fitting caps; and these caps and head- 
 
30 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 dresses are seen in great variety. Some have plain gold 
 bands over the forehead, others have gold or silver plates 
 at the back, and some have deep folds of rich lace hanging 
 from them. The writer once saw two young women walk 
 ing together in Eotterdam, one of whom wore a fashion 
 able French bonnet, and the other a queer head-gear with 
 rosettes and golden " blinders " projecting on each side of 
 her forehead. Little girls often are very charming with 
 their sweet, bright faces, their clean, trig, simple attire, and 
 their queer white caps decked with a gold band over the 
 forehead and small gold twirls dangling at each side. The 
 little visitor in the picture on page 31 is one of these, and 
 you see how carefully she has slipped off her wooden shoes 
 so as not to soil her hostess s spotless floors. Then there 
 are the boys, cheerful, clean, and sturdy ; some dressed in 
 modern-looking hats and suits ; but others wearing such 
 short jackets and loose knee-breeches, you would declare 
 they had borrowed the former from their little brothers 
 and the latter from their grandfathers. 
 
 Now and then, in our own country, we hear vague ru 
 mors of a person having been born with a silver spoon in 
 his mouth. As a rule, we scorn to credit such stories, but 
 if we were told that all Dutchmen were born with pipes in 
 their mouths, we probably should not consider it worth 
 while to doubt. In making an inventory of a Dutch rus 
 tic s face, you would need to mention two eyes, two ears, 
 one nose, one mouth, and one pipe. To be sure, there 
 might be but one eye, or one ear, or no nose ; but there 
 certainly would be a pipe. The pipe-rack on the wall, and 
 a large box of tobacco attached beneath, so that any guest 
 

 "" ;i; 
 
 A LITTLE VISITOR. 
 
STREETS AND BYWAYS 
 
 33 
 
 A MAIDEN FROM MONNIKENDAM. 
 
 or stranger may help himself, may frequently be seen in 
 Dutch farm-houses. The men, and too often the boys, 
 smoke, smoke, smoke, as if some malicious fairy had given 
 them a perpetual season- 
 ticket for enjoying the priv 
 ilege. Perhaps that is why 
 they seem so sleepy ; and yet, 
 with what a sudden glow 
 both pipe and Dutchman 
 can brighten at a whiff ! 
 
 Instead of seeming to 
 shrivel up, inside and out, 
 as constant smokers in 
 other lands are apt to do, 
 a Dutchman grows sleeker 
 and fatter behind his pipe ; as if the same fairy who gave 
 him the season-ticket had perched herself invisibly on the 
 bowl and was continually blowing him out like a rubber 
 balloon. 
 
 All things are reversed in Holland. The main entrance 
 to the finest public building in the country, The Palace, 1 
 or late town-hall, of Amsterdam, is its back door. Bash 
 ful maidens hire beaus to escort them to the Kermis, or 
 fair, on festival-days. Timid citizens are scared in the 
 dead of the night by their own watchmen, who at every 
 quarter of the hour make such a noise with their wooden 
 clappers, one would suppose the town to be on fire. You 
 
 1 A noble town-hall it is, too ; but the building, to be safe and dry, has 
 to stand on more than thirteen thousand piles driven deep into the 
 
 spongy soil. 
 3 
 
STREETS AND BYWAYS 35 
 
 will see sleds used in summer there. They go bumping 
 over the bare cobblestones, while the driver holds a drip 
 ping oil-rag in advance of the runners to lessen the fric 
 tion. You will see streets of water ; and the country 
 roads paved as carefully as Broadway. You will see 
 vessels hitched, like horses, to their owners door-posts ; 
 and whole rows of square-peaked houses with overlapping 
 stories and roofs seeming to lean over the street, just 
 as if they were getting ready to tumble. Instead of sol 
 emn, striking clocks, you will hear church chimes playing 
 snatches of operatic airs every quarter of an hour, by 
 way of marking the time. 
 
 You will see looking-glasses hanging outside of the 
 dwellings ; and, occasionally, mysterious pincushions dis 
 played on the street-doors. The first are called spionnen 
 (or spi&nnetjen), and are so arranged outside of the win 
 dows, that persons sitting inside can, without being seen, 
 enjoy a reflection of all that is going on in the street. 
 They can learn, too, what visitor may be coming, and 
 watch him rubbing his soles to a polish before entering. 
 The pincushion means that a new baby has appeared in 
 the household. If white or blue, the new-comer is a girl ; 
 if red, it is a little Dutchman. Some of these signals 
 are very showy affairs ; some are not cushions at all, but 
 merely shingles trimmed with ribbon or lace ; and, among 
 the poorest class, it is not uncommon to see merely a 
 white or red string tied to the door-latch fit token of 
 the meager life the poor little stranger is destined to lead. 
 
 Sometimes, instead of either pincushion or shingle, 
 you will see a large placard hung outside of the front 
 
36 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 BI.V 
 
 11 
 
 SOME ONE AT THE WINDOW IS WATCHING! 
 
 door. Then you may know that somebody in the house 
 is ill, and his or her present condition is described on 
 the placard for the benefit of inquiring friends ; and 
 sometimes, when such a placard has been taken down, 
 you may meet a grim-looking man on the street, dressed 
 in black tights, a short cloak, and a high hat, from which 
 a long black streamer is flying. This is the Aanspreker, 
 going from house to house to tell certain persons that 
 their friend is dead. He attends to funerals, and bears 
 invitations to all friends whose presence may be desired. 
 A strange weird-looking figure he is ; and lie wears a 
 peculiar, professional cast of countenance that is any 
 thing but refreshing. 
 
 Ah ! here is something more cheerful ! For now a 
 little cart rattles past, drawn by a span of orderly dogs, 
 
38 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 and filled with shining 
 brass kettles that were 
 brimming with milk when 
 it started on its round. 
 How nimbly the little ani 
 mals trot over the stones ! 
 How promptly they heed 
 the voice of their young 
 master stalking leisurely 
 along the sidew - no, 
 not on the sidewalk, 
 but on the narrow foot 
 path of yellow brick that 
 stretches along near the 
 houses ! Excepting this, 
 the cobble pavement, if 
 there be no canal, reaches 
 entirely across the street from door to door. Occasionally 
 one may see clogs dragging tiny fish-carts. They jog 
 
 A YOUNG WATER-CARRIER. 
 
 KKADV FOR CUSTOMERS. 
 
STREETS AND BYWAYS 
 
 39 
 
 along in such practised style, we may be sure they were 
 taught at the dog-school in Amsterdam. But oftener, in 
 Holland, the small milk-cart or water-cart is drawn by 
 a robust boy, or a pretty rosy-cheeked girl with eyes 
 brighter than the shining brass water-jar she may 
 
 CARRYING MILK AND CHEESE TO MARKET. 
 
 carry. Those canal-boats around the corner, wending 
 their way among the houses, are loaded with peat for 
 the people to burn ; coal is a luxury used only by the 
 rich. That barge by the market-place, drawn up to 
 the street s edge (for many of the principal thoroughfares 
 
40 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 A WATER-BARGE. 
 
 are half water and half street), is laden with what do 
 you think ? What should you suppose these people would, 
 least of all, need to buy ? You see these canals, following 
 and crossing the streets in every direction ; you see the 
 mastheads and sails rising everywhere, in among the 
 trees and steeples, showing that river or sea always is 
 close at hand; you know that all Holland is a kind of 
 wet sponge ; and the guide-Looks will tell you that every 
 house is built upon long wooden piles driven deep into the 
 marsh, or it could not stand there at all. Now, what do 
 you think these barges contain ? What but water ! 
 water for the people to drink. It is brought for the 
 purpose from Utrecht, or the river Yecht, or from some 
 favored inland spot. All along the coast, just where Hol 
 land is wettest, our poor Dutchmen must go without any 
 drinking-water, for there is none fit to swallow, unless 
 they buy from the barges, or catch the rain almost as 
 soon as it falls. 
 
NEAR SUPPER-TIME. 
 
5 
 
~^ v 
 
 ON THE BEACH AT SCHEVENINGEN. 
 
 CHAPTEE V 
 
 DUTCH ODDITIES 
 
 Now, is not Holland a funny land? Where else do the 
 people pray for fish and never pray for rain ? Where 
 else do they build enormous factories for the cutting and 
 polishing of such little things as diamonds ? Where 
 else do peasant women wear solid gold and costly old 
 lace on their heads? Where else do persons carry foot- 
 stoves about in their hands ? Where else do crowds 
 of folk sit on the sea-shore as at Scheveningen, every one 
 in a great high hut-like wicker chair with a window on 
 each side ? In what other country are over eighteen hun- 
 
 43 
 
44 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 dred varieties of tulips cultivated ? tulips ranging from 
 the palest tints to the most brilliant hues and gorgeous 
 combinations of colors. Where else do funny wooden 
 heads or gapers at the apothecaries windows " make 
 faces " for all who have to take physic ? Where else is 
 fire in the form of red-hot peat sold in summer by 
 the pailful ? 
 
 Is not water often as fertile as land, in Holland ? 
 Cannot the frogs there look down upon chimney-swal 
 lows? Did not the learned Erasmus, who knew how 
 the piles were driven in, say that their city people lived 
 like crows, on the tops of trees? And does not every 
 body know that "Dutch pink" is as yellow as gold? 
 
 In what other land do men cut down willow-trees to 
 make shoes of ? and where else are shoes not only worn 
 on the feet but made to serve on occasion as improvised 
 flower-pots, hammers, toy boats, boxes and baskets, and 
 Christinas stockings ? 
 
 These wooden shoes, or Uompen, well named from the 
 noise they make upon hard roads and cobbled streets, 
 are of all degrees, from the huge affairs worn by heavy 
 working-men to the dainty bits of clumsiness in which lit 
 tle children trudge about. The well-to-do peasant of Hol 
 land, on winter evenings, loves to carve pretty patterns 
 upon these small klompen for the delight of his darling 
 Jantje and Kassy. Dainty or not, the shoes must be 
 slipped off by their wearer upon entering any tidy cottage. 
 A row of klompen standing outside some prim doorway is 
 no uncommon sight ; and if, in addition, a pretty juffrouw 1 
 
 1 Pronounced yuffrow. 
 
46 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 - ! 
 
 DRYING SHOES BEFORE THE FIRE. 
 
 or maiden on the threshold peers expectantly up the 
 street, one may well suspect that still another guest will 
 soon arrive, and add his klompen to the row. 
 
 French shoe-polish is not for klompen. What they like 
 is plenty of soap and water and a good scraping and scrub 
 bing, inside and out, on Saturday, and a thorough drying 
 by the fire or a bleaching in the sunshine. All Dutch 
 folk love to be spick and span for Sunday. So, if ever you 
 visit Holland and see a klompen-bush in full bloom, you 
 
DUTCH ODDITIES 
 
 47 
 
 will know that it is only the family shoes hung out to dry 
 after their Saturday " shine," and, of course, a Dutch 
 " shine " must be snowy white ! 
 
 Even in their formal courtesies, the Dutch have queer 
 ways of their own. For instance, it is said that in certain 
 towns when, in walking along 
 the street, they come upon the 
 home of a friend, or a house at 
 which they have been socially 
 entertained, they bow in passing 
 it yes, bow to the house, bow to 
 the windows, even if not a person 
 can be seen there. And a very 
 pretty custom it is, for it shows 
 good feeling and kindly remem 
 brance of hospitality enjoyed. 
 
 We are told, too, that at Kit- 
 wyk, during the morning hours 
 indeed, from the first break 
 fast of early morning to the 
 second breakfast a noon serv 
 ing of biscuit and koffij (coffee) 
 ladies and maids do not make 
 any attempt at fine dressing. 
 And, strange to say, if in this 
 
 A KLOMPEN-BUSH IN BLOOM. 
 
 magic space of time, they choose to go out of doors, either 
 about their own homes, or to the market-place, or to the 
 great town-pump, they are supposed to be invisible! In 
 other words, one must not recognize them nor even ap 
 pear to see them, so long as they are in their clogs, crimps, 
 
48 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 nightcaps, and jackets, or wrappers, which, it seems, 
 constitute the forenoon undress uniform of many a 
 Dutch lady who may shine resplendent later in the day. 
 And now conies the greatest oddity of all, the Tulip 
 Craze, or Tulipomania, as it is called, which raged over 
 
 Holland early 
 in the seven- 
 teenthcentury. 
 Have you not 
 read of it ? 
 how the cul 
 tivating and 
 owning of tu 
 lips seemed for 
 a while to be 
 the only thing 
 men cared for ? 
 The first speci 
 men seen in 
 Holland came 
 from Constan 
 tinople in 1599. 
 Therarebeauty 
 of the flower- 
 called tulip on 
 account of its 
 
 resemblance to a turban (tidipa) at once attracted great 
 attention. Eich Hollanders sent to Constantinople direct 
 for the bulbs. They vied with one another in obtaining the 
 most beautiful varieties, and in having the finest tulip- 
 
 THE TOWN 1 UMP AT KITWYK. 
 
DUTCH ODDITIES 
 
 49 
 
 beds. At last this taste, growing to a fancy, then to 
 an ambition, became a mania. The same thing would 
 now be called " tulip on the brain." Everybody had 
 
 "HO! HO! I THOUGHT HER LITTLE TULIP-BULB WAS AN ONION, 
 AND I SWALLOWED IT ! " 
 
 it old, young, rich, and poor. One rich man at Haarlem 
 gave half of his fortune for a single root. By the year 
 1635, persons were known to invest 100,000 florins 1 for 
 thirty or forty roots. A tulip of the species Admiral Lief- 
 ken sold for 4400 florins. The Semper Augustus easily 
 brought 2000 florins. And one superb specimen of the 
 Semper Augustus actually sold for 13,000 florins, or 
 5200 dollars. At one time there were but two roots of 
 this variety in Holland ; one belonged to a gentleman 
 of Haarlem, the other to a trader in Amsterdam. Both 
 of these were eagerly sought for by infatuated tulip-men. 
 
 1 A Dutch florin is equal to about forty cents in United States currency. 
 
THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 h 
 
 The owner of the first refused an offer for it of the fee simple 
 of twelve acres of building lots. The second, that of Am 
 sterdam, was finally sold for 4600 florins (1840 dollars), a 
 new carriage, two gray horses, and a complete suit of har 
 ness! This statement is well attested, and is printed in the 
 records of the day. 
 
 One Munsing, who wrote a large volume on the tulipo- 
 mania, gives this list of articles which were delivered for 
 a single root of the variety called The Viceroy : 
 
 " Two lasts [loads] of wheat ; four lasts of rye ; four fat 
 oxen; eight fat swine; twelve fat sheep; two hogsheads of 
 wine ; four tuns of beer ; one thousand pounds of cheese ; 
 a suit of clothes ; a silver cup ; a bed, complete, and two 
 tuns of butter, the whole valued at twenty-five hundred 
 florins [or one thousand dollars]." And all for one root ! 
 
 Still the mania grew. Men parted not only with their 
 money, but with their lands, household goods, apparel, 
 watches anything, for the purchase of tulips. 
 
DUTCH ODDITIES 
 
 51 
 
 People of all grades, from the rich burgomaster to the 
 chimney-sweep, speculated in the flower. Ladies bought 
 bulbs in the hope of making large profits upon them. The 
 rise and fall in tulip stocks were the excitement of the 
 day. At last, the government, becoming alarmed for the 
 state of society, checked the traffic, and so burst the bubble. 
 Then things were worse than ever. Disappointed and en 
 raged speculators went to law ; but the law turned its back 
 upon them. It was decided that debts contracted under 
 tulip-speculation were not legal. Then there was trouble ! 
 
 But time, the great consoler quieted matters before very 
 
 A TULIP FANTASY. 
 
 lon<? and Holland settled down to its tobacco and meer- 
 
 O 
 
 schaum again. There had also been great tulip excitements 
 in England and Paris, but these, too, died out in time. 
 
 O 
 
 To this day, however, the Hollanders are fond of their 
 
52 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 turban-flower, as well they may be. A great tulip-bed, 
 with its stately rows of gay flowers in their setting of soft, 
 waving green, is a beautiful sight. But, to enjoy it to the 
 utmost, one must love the flowers with true Dutch fond 
 ness and pride. Not only this, but he must dwell upon 
 the special traits and charms of each specimen, as though 
 it were a personal friend. 
 
 Verily, as I said at first, Holland is the queerest 
 country that ever the sun shone upon ! But the queerest 
 thing of all is, when you really know much about it 
 you feel more like crying than laughing; for this land 
 that lies so loosely upon the sea has many a time been 
 forced to be as a rock against a legion of foes. Its stanch- 
 hearted people have suffered as never nation suffered be 
 fore. Dutch country-folk look sleepy, I know, and have 
 some very odd ways ; but Motley s history of the Eise 
 of the Dutch Republic is not a funny book. 
 
 There is no more heartrending, terrible story in all his 
 tory than that of the siege of Haarlem by the Spaniards in 
 the sixteenth century. It cannot be told here; but one 
 of its opening incidents shows the Spanish forces, unused 
 to ice, tramping and tumbling toward Haarlem upon the 
 frozen, slippery sea. Their object was to capture the 
 Dutch ships that lay near the city, tightly held in by the 
 ice. Suddenly they were overpowered. How ? By a body 
 of armed men on skates, who, springing from ice-trenches, 
 flew swiftly upon the astonished Spaniards, shooting 
 them down by hundreds. It was a day of victory for the 
 Dutch patriots. But what months of terrible suffering, of 
 almost superhuman endurance, came to them afterward! 
 
DUTCH ODDITIES 55 
 
 The ocean, too, could tell tales of Dutch sea-fights and 
 Dutch ships bound on great enterprises ; though it has 
 a funny story of the brave admiral Van Tromp, which 
 you may already have heard. He was born a little Dutch 
 man, two hundred and ninety-seven years ago, just two 
 summers before the first tulip bowed upon Dutch soil. 
 His father, who was an admiral, in due time took his lit 
 tle boy to sea. One day in a naval fight with the British, 
 the father was killed, and little Marten Harpertzoon Van 
 Tromp was taken prisoner. He was made to work as 
 cabin-boy for many a weary month, but he did not des 
 pair. He was a Dutch boy. 
 
 In two years he was free again. Soon better fortunes 
 came to him. In early manhood he entered the Dutch 
 navy, and finally became Admiral of Holland, sometimes 
 fighting against the Spaniards, sometimes beaten on the 
 high seas, but oftener victorious. In fact, in the course of 
 his career, he was winner of more than thirty battles. 
 He had many a fierce sea-fight with Admiral Blake of 
 England, and, though conquered by this enemy at last, 
 he had the satisfaction of one victory over Blake so bril 
 liant and thorough that he celebrated the event by sail 
 ing the British Channel with a broom fastened to his 
 masthead. This was his way of proclaiming that he had 
 swept his enemy from the seas. 
 
CHAPTEE VI 
 
 THE BATAVIANS AND THEIR GOOD MEADOW 
 
 [ND now let us see how Holland, from its 
 earliest history, has proved itself to be truly 
 a Land of Pluck: 
 
 In the old, old time, when many who now 
 are called the heroes of antiquity were cutting their 
 baby-teeth, men began to quarrel for the possession of the 
 country which is now known as Holland ; and in one form 
 or another, the contest has been going on nearly ever since. 
 Why any should have coveted it, is a mystery to me. It 
 was then only a low tract of spongy marsh, a network of 
 queer rivers that seemed never to know where they be 
 longed, but insisted every spring upon paying unwelcome 
 visits to the inland hiding here, running into each other 
 there, and falling asleep in pleasant places. It was a great 
 land-and-water kaleidoscope, girt about with a rim of 
 gloomy forest ; or a sort of dissected puzzle, with half of 
 the pieces in soak ; and its owners were a scanty, savage, 
 
58 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 fish-eating tribe, living like beavers on mounds of their 
 own raising. 
 
 What could have tempted outsiders to disturb them ? 
 What, indeed, unless it were the same feeling that often 
 makes a small boy holding either a kaleidoscope, or a puzzle, 
 an object of persecution to all the big boys around him. 
 
 " Let me take a look ! " they cry ; " I want my turn " ; 
 or, " Give me the puzzle ! Let s see what I can make out 
 of it!" 
 
 You know how it is too apt to be. First, their attention 
 is arrested by seeing the small boy peculiarly happy and 
 absorbed. They begin to nudge, then to bully him. Small 
 Boy shakes his head and tries to enjoy himself in peace 
 and quietness. Bullying increases the nudges become 
 dangerous. In despair he soon gives in, or, rather, gives 
 up, and the big boys slide into easy possession. 
 
 But suppose the small boy is plucky, and will not give 
 up ? Suppose he would see the puzzle crushed to atoms 
 first ? Suppose only positive big-boy power can overcome 
 his as positive resistance ? What then ? 
 
 So began the history of Holland. 
 
 The first who held possession of Dutch soil not the 
 first who ever had lived upon it, but the first who had per 
 sistently enjoyed the kaleidoscope, and busied themselves 
 with the puzzle were a branch of the great German race. 
 Driven by circumstances from their old home, they had 
 settled upon an empty island in the river Ehine, which, 
 you know, after leaving its pleasant southern country, 
 straggles through Holland in a bewildered search for the 
 sea. This island they called Betauw, or " Good Meadow," 
 
THE BATAVIANS AND THEIR GOOD MEADOW 59 
 
 and so, in time, themselves came to be called Batavii, or 
 Batavians. 
 
 Other portions of the country were held by various 
 tribes living upon and beyond a great tract of land which 
 afterward, in true Holland style, was turned into a sea, 1 
 called the Zuyder Zee. Most of these tribes were sturdy 
 and brave, but the Batavii were braver than any. Fierce, 
 stanch and defiant, they taught even their little children 
 only the law of might ; and their children grew up to be 
 mightier than they. The blessed Teacher had not yet 
 brought the world his lesson of mercy and love. " Con 
 quer one another " had stronger claims to their considera 
 tion than " Love one another." 
 
 Their votes in council were given by the clashing of 
 arms ; and often their wives and mothers stood by with 
 shouts and cries of encouragement wherever the fight was 
 thickest. " Others go to battle," said the historian Taci 
 tus ; " these go to war." 
 
 Soon the all-conquering Eornans, who, with Julius 
 Caesar at their head, had trampled surrounding nations 
 into subjection, discovered that the sturdy Batavii were 
 not to be vanquished that their friendship was worth 
 far more than the spongy country they inhabited. An al 
 liance was formed, and the Batavii were declared to be ex 
 empt from the annual tax or tribute which all others were 
 forced to pay to the Romans. Ctesar himself was not 
 ashamed to extol their skill in arms, nor to send their 
 
 !The Zuyder Zee was formed by successive inundations during the thir 
 teenth century. In the last of these inundations in 1287 nearly 
 eighty thousand persons were drowned. 
 
60 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 already famous warriors to fight his battles and strike 
 terror to the hearts of his foes. 
 
 The Batavian cavalry could swim across wide and deep 
 rivers without breaking their ranks, and their infantry 
 were excelled by none in drill, in archery, and in wonderful 
 powers cf endurance. They had fought too long with the 
 elements in holding their "Good Meadow" to be dismayed 
 in battle by any amount of danger and fatigue. 
 
 The Romans called them " friends," but the Batavians 
 soon discovered that they were being used merely as a 
 cat s-paw. After a while, as cat s-paw r s will, they turned 
 and scratched. A contest, stubborn and tedious, between 
 the Romans and Batavians followed. At length both par 
 ties were glad to make terms of peace, which prevailed, 
 with few interruptions, until the decline of the Roman 
 Empire. 
 
 After that, hordes of barbarians overran Europe ; and 
 Holland, with the rest, had a hard time of it. Man to 
 man, the Batavian could hold his own against any mortal 
 foe, but he could not always be proof against numbers. 
 The " Good Meadow," grown larger arid more valuable, 
 was conquered and held by several of the " big-boy " sav 
 age tribes, in turn, but not until Batavian pluck stood 
 recorded in many a fearful tale passed from generation 
 to generation. 
 
 Later, each of the surrounding nations, as it grew more 
 powerful, tried to wrest Holland from the holders of her 
 soil. Some succeeded for a time, some failed ; but always, 
 and every time, the Dutch gathered their strength for 
 the contest and went not to battle, but to war. As, in later 
 
THE BAT AVIANS AND THEIR GOOD MEADOW 63 
 
 history, the Russians burned Moscow to prevent it from 
 falling into the hands of Napoleon, so this stanch people 
 always stood ready, at the worst, to drown Holland rather 
 than yield her to the foe. Often they let in the waters 
 they had laboriously shut out, laying waste hundreds of 
 fertile acres, that an avenging sea might suddenly con 
 found the invaders. Often they faced famine and pesti 
 lence, men, women, and little wonder-stricken children 
 perishing in the streets of their beleaguered cities all 
 who had breath to say it, still fiercely refusing to surrender. 
 Wherever the strong arm of the enemy succeeded in mow 
 ing these people down, a stronger, sturdier growth was sure 
 to spring from the stubble. Sometimes defeated, never 
 subdued, they were patient under subjection only until 
 they were again ready to rise as one man and throw off the 
 yoke. Now and then, it is true, under promise of peace 
 and increased prosperity, they formed a friendly union 
 with a one-time enemy. But woe to the other side if it 
 carried aggression and a trust in might too far. Treach 
 ery, oppression, breach of faith were sure, sooner or later, 
 to arouse Dutch pluck ; and Dutch pluck, in the end, has 
 always beaten. 
 
CHAPTEE VII 
 
 THE DUTCH HAVE TAKEN HOLLAND 
 
 AND so, though Eomaii, Saxon, 
 Austrian, Spaniard, Belgian, Eng 
 lishman, and Frenchman in turn 
 llourished a scepter over them, it 
 conies, after all, to be true, that only 
 "the Dutch have taken Holland." 
 It is theirs by every right of in 
 heritance and strife theirs to hold, 
 to drain, and to pump, for ever and 
 ever. They wrested it from the sea, 
 not in a day, but through long years 
 of patient toil, through dreary years 
 of suffering and sorrow. They have counted their dead, in 
 their war with the ocean alone, by hundreds of thousands. 
 Industry, hardihood, and thrift have been better allies to 
 them than were Cnesar s Roman legions to the old Batavian 
 forefathers. 
 
 For ages, it seems, Holland could not have known a 
 leisure moment. Frugal, hardy, painstaking, and perse 
 vering, her spirit was ever equal to great enterprises. 
 With her every difficulty was a challenge. Obstacles 
 
 64 
 
THE DUTCH HAVE TAKEN HOLLAND 65 
 
 that would have discouraged others, inspired the Dutch 
 with increased energy. Their land was only a marsh 
 threatened by the sea. What of that ? So much the 
 more need of labor and skill to make it a hailing-place 
 among nations. It was barren and bleak. " Why, then," 
 said they, "so much the more need for us to become 
 masters in tilling the soil." It was a very little place, 
 scarcely worth a name on the maps. " So much the more 
 need," said plucky Holland, " that we extend our posses 
 sions, gain lands in every corner of the earth, and send 
 our ships far and near, until every nation shall uncon 
 sciously pay us tribute." 
 
 " Such is the industry of the people and the trade 
 they drive," said a writer of the sixteenth century, " that, 
 having little or no corn of their own growth, they do 
 provide themselves elsewhere, not only sufficient for their 
 own spending, but wherewith to supply their neighbors. 
 Having no timber of their own, they spend more timber 
 in building ships and fencing their water-courses than 
 any country in the world. . . . And finally, having 
 neither flax nor wool, they make more cloth of both sorts 
 than is made in all the countries of the world, except 
 France and England." 
 
 Of some things they soon began to have a surplus. 
 There were not half nor a quarter enough persons in frugal 
 Holland to drink all the milk of their herds. Forthwith 
 Dutch butter and cheese came to be sent all over Chris 
 tendom. The herring-fisheries were enormous. More fish 
 came to their nets than would satisfy every man, woman, 
 and child in Holland. England had enough herring of 
 
THE DUTCH HAVE TAKEN HOLLAND 67 
 
 her own. Ships were far too slow in those steamless 
 days to make fresh fish a desirable article of export. Here 
 was trouble ! Not so. Up rose a Dutchman named William 
 Beukles, to invent the curing and pickling of herring. 
 The fish trade made Holland richer, more prosperous than 
 ever. In time, a monument was raised to the memory 
 of Beukles, for was he not a national benefactor ? 
 
 The Dutch delight in honoring their heroes, their states 
 men, and inventors. You cannot be long among them 
 without hearing of one Laureiis Janzoon Koster, to whom, 
 they insist, the world owes the art of printing with mov 
 able types the most important of human inventions. 
 Their cities are rich in memorials and monuments of 
 those whose wisdom and skill have proved a boon to 
 mankind. All along the paths of human progress we 
 can find Dutch footprints. In education, science, and 
 political economy, they have, many a time, led the way. 
 
 The boys and girls of Holland are citizens in a high 
 sense of the word. They soon learn to love their country, 
 and to recognize the fatherly care of its government. The 
 sense of common danger, and the necessity of all acting 
 together in common defense, has served to knit the affec 
 tions of the people. In truth it may be said, for history 
 has proved it, that in every Dutch arm you can feel the 
 pulse of Holland. Throughout her early struggles, in the 
 palmy, glorious days of the republic, as well as now in 
 her cautious constitutional monarchy, the Dutch have 
 been patriots mistaken and short-sighted at times, even 
 goaded to cruel deeds by the brutal wickedness of their 
 enemies, but always true to their beloved " Good Meadow." 
 
68 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 Hollow-land, Low-land, or Netherland, whatever men may 
 call it, their country stands high in their hearts. They 
 love it with more than the love of a mountaineer for his 
 native hills. 
 
 To be sure there have been riots and outbreaks there, as 
 in all other thickly settled parts of the world perhaps 
 more than elsewhere, for Dutch indignation, though slow 
 in kindling, makes a prodigious blaze when once fairly 
 afire. Some of these disturbances have arisen only after 
 a long endurance of serious wrongs ; and some seem to 
 have been started at once by that queer friction-match in 
 human nature, which, if left unguarded, is sure to be 
 nibbled at, and so ignited, by the first little mouse of 
 discontent that finds it. 
 
 There was a curious origin to one of these domestic 
 quarrels. On a certain occasion a banquet was given, 
 at which were present two noted Dutch noblemen, rivals 
 in power, who had several old grudges to settle. The 
 conversation turning on the codfishery, one of the two 
 remarked upon the manner in which the hook (Jwek) 
 took the codfish, or kabbeljaauw, as the Dutch call it. 
 
 " The hook take the codfish ! " exclaimed the other in no 
 very civil tone ; " it would be better sense to say that the 
 codfish takes the hook." 
 
 The grim jest was taken up in bitter earnest. High 
 words passed, and the chieftains rose from the table en 
 emies for life. 
 
 They proceeded to organize war against each other; 
 a bitter war it proved to Holland, for it lasted one 
 hundred and fifty years, and was fought out with all 
 
THE DUTCH HAVE TAKEN HOLLAND 71 
 
 the stubbornness of family feuds. The opposing parties 
 took the names of " hoeks " and " kabbeljaauws," and men 
 of all classes enlisted in their respective ranks. In many 
 instances fathers, brothers, sons, and old-time friends forgot 
 
 *D 
 
 their ties, and knew each other only as foes. The feud 
 (being Dutch !) raged hotter and stronger in proportion 
 as men had time coolly to consider the question. A 
 thicket of mutual wrongs, real or imaginary, sprang up 
 to further entangle the opposing parties; families were 
 divided, miles of smiling country laid in ruin, and tens 
 of thousands of men slain for what ? 
 
 Those who fought, and those who looked on, longing for 
 peace, are alike silent now. Historical records do not 
 quite clear up the mystery. We know how hard it must 
 have been to settle the knotty question whether hooks or 
 codfish can more properly be said to be " taken," and how 
 dangerous the smallest thorns of anger and jealousy be 
 come if not plucked out promptly. It is certain, too, that 
 the hoeks and kabbeljaauws were terribly in earnest, 
 though what they killed each other for we " cannot well 
 make out." 
 
 The kabbeljaauws had one advantage. When a public 
 dinner was given by their party, the first dish brought in 
 by the seneschal (or steward) was a huge plate of codfish 
 elaborately decorated with flowers; something not orna 
 mental only, but substantial and satisfactory ; while the 
 corresponding dish at a hoek festival contained nothing 
 but a gigantic hook encircled by a flowery wreath. 
 
 All through Dutch history you will find quaint words 
 and phrases that have a terrible record folded within their 
 
72 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 quaintness. The Casenbrotspel, or Bread and Cheese war, 
 was not funny when it came to blight the last ten years of 
 the fifteenth century, though its name sounds trivial now. 
 And the Gueux, or " Beggars," who, nearly a century later, 
 come forth on the bloodstained page, were something 
 more than beggars, as King Philip and the wicked Duke 
 of Alva found to their cost. 
 
 Ah, those Gueux ! "Watch for them when you read 
 Dutch history. They will soon appear, with their wallets 
 and wooden bowls, their doublets of ashen gray, brave, 
 reckless, desperate men, whose deeds struck terror over 
 land and sea. When once they come in sight, turn as you 
 may, you will meet them ; you will hear their wild cry, 
 " Long live the Beggars ! " ringing amid the blaze and 
 carnage of many a terrible day. There are princes and 
 nobles among them. They will grow bolder and fiercer, 
 more reckless and desperate, until their country s perse 
 cutor, Philip of Spain, has withdrawn the last man of all 
 his butchering hosts from their soil ; until the Duke of 
 Alva, one of the blackest characters in all history, has 
 cowered before the wrath of Holland ! 
 
 Ah ! my light-hearted boys and girls, if there were not 
 lessons to be learned from these things, it would be well 
 to blot them from human memory. But would it be well 
 to forget the heroism, the majestic patience, the trust in 
 God, that shine forth resplendent from these darkest pages 
 of Dutch history ? Can we afford to lose such examples 
 of human grandeur under suffering as come to us from the 
 beleaguered cities of Naarden, Haarlem, and Leyden ? 
 When you learn their stories, if you do not know them 
 
THE DUTCH HAVE TAKEN HOLLAND 75 
 
 already, you will understand Dutch pluck in all its full 
 ness, and be glad that, in the end, it proved victorious 
 over every foe. 
 
 But, as you have been told before, it is not only amid 
 the din of war that Holland has shown her pluck ; nor is 
 hers the bragging, boisterous quality that offends at every 
 turn. A simpler, firmer, more peacefully inclined people 
 it would be hard to find ; but somehow they have an odd 
 way of being actively concerned in the history of other 
 nations. Possibly this is due to the fact that their pecu 
 liar simplicity and love of quiet have proved a sort of 
 standing invitation to those who would make war with 
 them; possibly it is because of their great commercial 
 enterprise, and their tempting stores ; but, to my mind, 
 their remarkably far-seeing, though seemingly sleepy, way 
 of looking at things, has had much to do with their 
 progress. They seem never to threaten, yet always to 
 perform ; never to prepare, but always to be ready. 
 
CHAPTEE VIII 
 
 THE DUTCH AT HOME AND ABROAD 
 
 HE story of Dutch patriotism could be written 
 out in symbols, or pictures, more eloquently 
 than that of any other nation. There would 
 Iv^?^. ^6 shields, arrows and spears, and battleships 
 
 v^ ^^ 
 
 V and fortresses, and all the paraphernalia of 
 war, ancient and modern. But beside these, and having 
 a sterner significance, would be the tools and implements 
 of artisans ; the windmills, the dikes, the canals ; the sluice 
 gates, the locks ; the piles that hold up their cities. How 
 much could be told by the great, white-sailed merchantmen 
 bound for every sea ; by the mammoth docks, and by the 
 wonderful cargoes coming and going ! How the great 
 buildings would loom up, each telling its story the fac 
 tories, warehouses, schools, colleges, museums, legislative 
 
 halls, the hospitals, asylums, and churches ! 
 
 7 6 
 
THE DUTCH AT HOME AND ABROAD 77 
 
 There would be more than these : there would be libra 
 ries, art-galleries, and holy places battered and broken. 
 There would be monuments and relics, and church organs 
 chief among them that of the Haarlem Cathedral, to 
 
 THE HAARLEM CATHEDRAL. 
 
 this day ranking among the grandest in the world. There 
 would be boats manned by rough heroes trying to save 
 thousands of drowning fellow-creatures whose homes had 
 been swept away by the waves. We should see some of 
 the most beautiful public parks of their time ; gardens, too, 
 
78 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 wonderful in their blooming ; and, over all, trie bells the 
 faithful carillons that for ages have sent down messages, 
 more or less musical, upon the people. 
 
 DUTCH pluck has accomplished, and will yet accomplish, 
 wonders. Even now, while the waves of the great Zuyder 
 Zee are beating against its dikes, Holland is deciding 
 whether a vast portion of this sea shall be changed back 
 to what it was in the thirteenth century dry land ! 
 A tremendous piece of work, indeed ; but it will be done if 
 the Dutchmen say so. Here is the small bit of very big 
 news as it came to the " London Times " from the capital 
 of Holland, in this year of grace, 1894: 
 
 " The Hague, May 5. The Royal Commission, presided 
 over by M. Lely, Minister of the Waterstaat, which has 
 long been studying the scheme for the draining and reclaim 
 ing of the Zuyder Zee, has concluded its labors. Twenty- 
 one members out of the twenty-six composing the Com 
 mission recommend that the projected work be carried out 
 by the State. 
 
 " It is proposed to reclaim from the sea about 450,000 
 acres, the value of which is estimated at 326,000,000 guil 
 ders. 1 The cost of this important work is computed at 
 189,000,000 guilders, or with the accumulated expenditure, 
 including measures of defense and the payment of com 
 pensation to the fishermen of the Zee, at 315,000,000 guil 
 ders. The draining is to be carried out by means of a sea 
 dike from northern Holland into Friesland." 
 
 1 $130,400,000, as the guilder like the silver florin is equal to 
 forty cents of United States money. 
 
THE DUTCH AT HOME AND ABROAD 79 
 
 Dutch pluck has sailed all over the world. It has put 
 its stamp on commerce, science, and manufactures. It has 
 set its seal on every quarter of the earth. Dutchmen were 
 at home in Japan before either the Americans or English 
 had dared to intrude upon those inhospitable shores. 
 There were great obstacles to encounter in any attempt at 
 trading or becoming acquainted with that strange hermit 
 of an empire in the east. She had enough of her own, she 
 said, and asked no favors of the outside barbarians. 
 Would they be kind enough to stay away ? Most of the 
 world gave an unwilling assent ; but Holland undertook to 
 show Japan the folly of rejecting the benefits of commerce ; 
 and in time, and after many a hard struggle, succeeded in 
 establishing a Japanese trade. 
 
 Talking of ships, whence did the ship sail that brought 
 the good Fathers of New England safely across the sea ? 
 And, for months before, what country had sheltered them 
 from the persecution that threatened them in their native 
 land ? Ask the books these questions, if need be, and ask 
 yourselves whether to shelter the oppressed, to offer an 
 asylum to innocent but hunted fugitives from every clime, 
 is not a noble work for pluck to do. 
 
 Whence, too, did some of our New York oddities come ? 
 Why are you, little New Yorkers, so fond of waffles, crul 
 lers, doughnuts, and New Year s cake ? Dutch inventions 
 every one of them. Why do you expectantly honor the 
 good St. Nicholas, the patron saint of New York ? Why 
 is this city turned topsyturvy in a general " moving " 
 whenever the first of May comes round ? Why, until very 
 recently, did your fathers and uncles on the first day of 
 
80 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 January, from morning till night, pay visits from house to 
 house, wishing the ladies a " Happy New Year " ? Simply 
 because these were Holland customs. The Americans of 
 the day only were following the example long ago set them 
 by the Dutch. 
 
 Hendrik Hudson, the first white man who explored 
 our noble North Eiver, was an adopted Dutchman. He 
 modestly called it De Groote (or the Great) Eiver, little 
 thinking that for all time after it would be known as the 
 Hudson. Staten (or States) Island was so named by him 
 in honor of his home government, the States-General. 
 
 At that time he was in the service of the Dutch East 
 India Company. Three years later he made another voy 
 age and discovered the famous bay, far to our northward, 
 which now bears his name. Intrepid as he was, the bitter 
 cold of that region, and threatened starvation, prevented 
 him from carrying out his resolve to spend the winter on 
 the shores of his bay, and he set sail for home, only to 
 meet the tragic fate which to this day is veiled in mystery. 
 The sailors mutinied, and set him afloat, with eight other 
 men, in an open boat. They were never seen nor heard of 
 again. 
 
 It is said that Hudson gave the name Helle Gat, or 
 Beautiful Pass, to the dangerous waterway between Long 
 Island and Manhattan Island which in 1885, only nine 
 years ago, yielded its most dangerous reef, Flood Eock, 
 to the persuasions of science and dynamite. 
 
 The site of the present capital of the State of New 
 York at first was called New Orange, in honor of William, 
 Prince of Orange and Stadtholder of Holland; but in 1664, 
 
THE DUTCH AT HOME AND ABROAD 83 
 
 when the English were in power, they changed the name 
 to Albany, after the Duke of York and Albany, better 
 known to you, perhaps, by his later title, King James 
 II. of England. 
 
 Look at the names of many down-town streets of New 
 York city, once called New Amsterdam, Cortlandt, Van- 
 darn, Eoosevelt, Stuyvesant, and scores of others all named 
 after good Dutchmen. Not only New York, but Brooklyn, 
 Albany, and other cities have streets that lead one directly 
 into the Netherlands, so to speak. Indeed, Dutch names 
 lie sprinkled very thickly within a hundred miles of Fifth 
 Avenue in every direction. You readily may suspect the 
 origin of Harlem, named when it was a little hamlet quite 
 far from New Amsterdam, but connected with it by a 
 country road known as the Bouerie. This Bouerie, or 
 Bowerie, now spelled Bowery, no longer has the rural, 
 bower-like aspect it enjoyed in those old days ; for then 
 it was a road through the farm or louerie of Peter Stuy 
 vesant, the last Dutch colonial governor of these New 
 Netherlands. 
 
 Few New-Yorkers nowadays stop to ask why Eleventh 
 street, which extends across the city from the East to the 
 North River, should break off at Fourth Avenue and begin 
 again on the west side of Broadway. But they know that 
 a long solid block its southwestern corner beautified by 
 Grace Church and its parsonage reaches from Tenth 
 street to Twelfth street. The fact is, Eleventh street was 
 stopped just there by a Dutchman, or an honored citizen 
 of Dutch descent, named Brevoort. Mrs. Lamb, in her 
 " History of New York," tells us that the mansion of Henry 
 
84 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 Brevoort fronted the Bowery road, and, according to the 
 plans of the street commissioners, Eleventh street would 
 cut across the site occupied by his house. He resisted 
 the opening of the street with such determination and 
 effect " that the block remained undisturbed. To this day, 
 Eleventh street has no passageway between Broadway 
 and Fourth Avenue." 
 
 And in Grace Church, near the south entrance, may 
 be seen a memorial tablet of white marble, the leading 
 inscription of which reads : 
 
 IN MEMORY OF 
 
 HENEY BEEVOOET 
 
 WHO DIED AUG. 21. 1841 IN THE 94. YEAR OF HIS AGE 
 
 IN POSSESSION OF THE GROUND ON WHICH THIS 
 
 CHURCH NOW STANDS ; DERIVED IN UNBROKEN DESCENT 
 
 FROM THE FIRST COLONISTS OF NEW NETHERLANDS. 
 
CHAPTEE IX 
 
 HOLLAND TO-DAY 
 
 OLLAND is stanch, true, and plucky, 
 but it is Holland ; and, lest you for 
 get that it still is the oddest country 
 in Christendom, I must tell you that 
 within a few years a new king has 
 succeeded to its throne and this 
 new king is a bright little girl not 
 yet fifteen years of age ! Yes, the High Council of Hol 
 land solemnly decreed that officials and other public ser 
 vants should take the oath of allegiance, not to Queen but 
 to King Wilhelmina ! The Dutch newspapers protested 
 vehemently against this form, as being contrary to common 
 sense. But the High Court of Holland does not yield to 
 dictation, and the press, it seems, at last adopted a dignified 
 silence in the matter. Possibly the expression "King Wil 
 helmina " may recall to some readers that historic incident 
 of 1740, when the heroic young Empress of Austria, beset 
 with foes, heard her impassioned Hungarian nobles shout 
 ing, as their swords leaped from their scabbards: "Let us 
 die for our King, Maria Theresa ! " 
 
 6* 85 
 
86 THE LAND OF PLUGK 
 
 But, king or queen, this royal little Wilhelmina of Hol 
 land already rules in the hearts of her people. Well may 
 the boys and girls of our republic follow her career 
 with interest; so bright, winning, and unaffected is she 
 in her pretty dignity and her earnest patriotic spirit. 
 Despite her high station, she is a real child, ready for 
 play and, as a recent writer tells us, " devotedly fond of 
 dolls." 
 
 On one occasion, it is said, her youthful majesty was 
 heard addressing a refractory doll as follows : " Now be 
 good and quiet, because if you don t I will turn you into 
 a queen, and then you will not have any one to play 
 with at all." 
 
 Poor little doll-mother ! In the confidence of that 
 family circle she may say things that she hardly could 
 utter at court receptions ! To some of her dolls, however, 
 she undoubtedly shows a dignified reserve ; for instance, 
 to the fifty lately given to her on her fourteenth birthday 
 by her mother, the queen regent. They are stiff and im 
 posing, we may be sure, for they are dressed to represent 
 soldiers of rank, in order that the little queen may be 
 come familiar with, and easily recognize, the different 
 uniforms of the officers in her Dutch army. 
 
 IN concluding these simple chapters about the Land 
 of Pluck, I yield to an impulse to quote for the benefit 
 of readers who would like a further familiar word about 
 the Holland of to-day some extracts from two personal 
 letters recently received. The first is from an American 
 
QUEEN WILHELMINA OF HOLLAND, AT THE AGE OF ELEVEN. 
 
 (FROM A PHOTOGRAPH BY KAMEKE, THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS.) 
 
HOLLAND TO-DAY 89 
 
 friend traveling through the Netherlands. The other was 
 written by a young girl born and bred in Holland. 
 
 "THE HAGUE, March 28, 189-. 
 
 " . . . Heaven bless the Dutchmen ! They are the 
 most delightful and sterling folk that we have found 
 in all Europe ! And no more charming days have we 
 had anywhere than at Amsterdam, at Haarlem, and at The 
 Hague and Scheveningen. ... At Amsterdam we saw the 
 Great Dike and the lesser dikes (worthy monuments to 
 the sturdy force of this brave race), and at Zaandam, near 
 by, we went through a perfect forest of windmills, of which 
 there are nearly four hundred within the town limits. A 
 more picturesque sight cannot be imagined. As the little 
 steamboat got into the thick of them, with those huge 
 arms whirling close by on every side, the whole land 
 scape began to take on the motion, and I half expected 
 the boat would turn a somersault any moment. But 
 it was a fascinating spectacle. 
 
 "... And the little cottages alongside the stream 
 how quaint and cozy ! And every street in Amsterdam, 
 and every woman and child how clean and fair and 
 tidy they look ! And the delightful head-gear that the 
 country women wear ! And the happy, healthy smiles of 
 the boys and girls ! The virtues of these honest Dutch folk 
 shine out to eyes that have just seen the Italian paupers. 
 Small as it is, Holland can take care of itself. For a 
 thousand years the Dutch have fought the sea, and for 
 eighty years they fought the greatest military power of 
 Europe, and always held their own. 
 
90 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 11 In all our travels we have found no race so sturdy 
 and independent as this, so healthy and seemingly so 
 happy. Not a beggar have we seen in Holland, but we 
 have seen the origin of many of the best characteristics 
 of New York life. I never realized till now how much 
 our big city owes to the Dutchmen. . . . And these people 
 are not only the tidiest folk in the world, and among the 
 bravest, cheeriest, and most upright, but they also have 
 an inborn, genuine love of art. It is a significant fact that 
 the only place in Europe in which we have seen the peo 
 ple of the country actually enjoying their great pictures, 
 was in the Eyks Museum at Amsterdam. The great 
 building was crowded with Dutch folk of all classes, and 
 of a hundred different types all really interested in the 
 pictures. It was a study to watch them. 
 
 " And the pictures themselves ! The Dutchmen of to 
 day may well appreciate them. You remember Rem 
 brandt s famous Night Watch and his portrait of an old 
 woman, at Amsterdam, and his celebrated Anatomist, 
 here at The Hague. I have seen now many of the most 
 famous paintings in the world, but for perfection of tech 
 nical skill these of Rembrandt s surely are equal to the 
 best. True, he did not paint ideal subjects, nor enter 
 the spiritual realm in which the Italian masters were 
 so great. But as a portrait-painter he seems to me the 
 greatest of all the masters. 
 
 "... But I must restrain my enthusiasm, and tell you 
 briefly that we have done also the Amsterdam Zoo (one 
 of the finest zoological gardens in the world), have heard 
 the great organ of Haarlem, have seen two rich private gal- 
 
HOLLAND TO-DAY 91 
 
 leries, have heard the Mikado sung in Dutch (fairly well 
 sung, too, but with some nightmare words fitted to the 
 music), have seen Peter the Great s hut at Zaandam, 
 and to-day an auction of fish on the beach at Schevenin- 
 gen, with the fishermen and white-capped fisherwomen 
 thronging about in their odd costumes and big wooden 
 shoes. . . . To-morrow we return to Amsterdam." 
 
 Holland speaks for itself, and every traveler is its inter 
 preter. But here is an inside, home letter straight from 
 the land of dikes. Its writer, a bright and patriotic Dutch 
 girl, is in herself the best evidence one can have of the 
 advantages of education her country offers to all. 
 
 It cannot but be encouraging to young Americans try 
 ing to master a foreign language to note how admirably 
 this young Hollander expresses herself in English. Not 
 a word of her clearly written letter has been changed : 
 
 " SCHEVENINGEN, Feb. 28, 189-. 
 
 "... The winter has been, as probably everywhere 
 else, exceptionally cold ; an old-fashioned winter, and one 
 that will be recorded in the annals of history and not soon 
 forgotten. Of course, it has been the cause of much pov 
 erty and misery, and every one was thankful when, after 
 weeks of severe frost, the thaw fell in ; but much has been 
 done to soften the sufferings of the poor, and those who 
 went round to ask for help did not ask in vain. On the 
 other hand, the whole country was alive with wholesome 
 merriment, caused by the skating that was practised over 
 the whole length and width of our watery little land. 
 
92 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 Holland is very characteristic and very much at its ad 
 vantage during such a time, and I am really thankful to 
 have been able to join in the universal movement. 
 
 " As you know, a great many of the people, especially 
 the peasants, skate very well. The country is cut up by 
 canals running from one town to the other, and from one 
 village to the other ; along these waters slow barges travel 
 peacefully the whole summer through, laden with coals, 
 wood, vegetables, pottery, and numberless other things ; a 
 great deal of traffic is done in this slow but sure way, as it 
 is a very cheap mode of transport. But these same waters 
 now bore a much livelier aspect. People of all classes 
 skated along their smooth surfaces, and many have been 
 the expeditions planned and executed to skate from one 
 town to the other, halting at several small villages on the 
 way, and thus seeing the country in an original and very 
 pleasant manner. . . . 
 
 " My sister and I, and several ladies and gentlemen, 
 made a charming excursion on one of the finest and mild 
 est days of the winter. The sun shone brightly, the sky 
 was blue, and although the thermometer pointed below 
 zero, it was quite warm and delicious to skate. We were 
 quite a large party, and went from the Hague to Amster 
 dam, and thence across the Y and farther over the inland 
 waters to Monnickendam, on skates of course. 
 
 " Monnickendam lies at the Zuider Zee, which is a kind 
 of bay formed by the North Sea and surrounded by sev 
 eral provinces of our country. In comparison with your 
 grand lakes, it is small, but we consider it quite a large 
 water, and it is very rarely frozen over. This year, how- 
 
HOLLAND TO-DAY 95 
 
 ever, it was one immense surface of ice, stretching itself 
 out as far as the eye could reach. It was quite the thing 
 this winter to go out and see it ; so, of course, we went 
 there and visited the small island of Marken, which is 
 situated near the coast. 
 
 " . . . A small steamer goes daily from Monnickendam 
 to the island, or three times a week I m not sure about 
 that ; now all the communication was done by sledge and 
 on skates over the ice. Thousands of people have seen 
 Marken this winter in that way, and the place is quite a 
 curiosity, especially for strangers. (If you happen to have 
 a map of the Netherlands you 11 be sure to find where it 
 lies in the Zuider Zee.) 
 
 "The quaint costumes worn by the peasant men and 
 women are alone well worth the voyage to the place, being 
 quite different from those worn in Scheveningen, and be 
 sides the pokey little wooden houses are charming in their 
 way, and exceedingly clean and neat, with rows of colored 
 earthenware dishes along the walls, and carved chests and 
 painted wooden boxes piled one on the top of the other 
 containing their clothes. Although so near the civilized 
 world these good people live quite apart, hardly ever 
 marry some one not from the island, and seem quite con 
 tented. They earn their living by fishing, and occasion 
 ally get as far as a harbor of Scotland. 
 
 "When we arrived at Marken across the ice we were 
 very hungry, and on asking a peasant if he could procure 
 us something to eat, were very hospitably received in his 
 little house by his wife, who regaled us on bread, cheese, 
 and milk. Enormous hunches of bread ! but what will a 
 
96 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 A WOMAN OF ZEELAND. 
 
 hungry skater not eat ? And we sat very snugly in their 
 little room, admiring all their funny little contrivances. 
 "... The Zuider Zee was very curious and interesting 
 to see. Fancy an enormous field of ice crowded with thou 
 sands of people all on skates, and, moving swiftly between 
 them, brightly painted sledges with strong horses and jing- 
 
HOLLAND TO-DAY 97 
 
 ling bells, looking very picturesque. Also little ice-boats 
 with large sails that come flying across the frozen waters, 
 looking like great birds, but keeping at a little distance 
 from the crowd for fear of accidents. A fair was held on 
 the ice, where were going on all kinds of harmless amuse 
 ments ; and there were tents where they sold cakes and 
 steaming hot milk and chocolate. The whole scene, the 
 bright, moving, joyous crowd, made me think of the pictures 
 by the old masters, like Teniers and Ostade, it was so thor 
 oughly Dutch. But to think that this immense solid sur 
 face, whereon you moved so confidently, would melt again 
 before the year was much older and change itself into lap 
 ping waves ! It was hardly conceivable ! 
 
 " At the Hague we have a very prettily situated skating- 
 club, where our little circle of friends saw each other daily 
 and where we spent many a pleasant hour. So the winter 
 has flown by. It is not quite over, but it seems so to me, 
 as the last weeks have been very fine, and the place where 
 we live, being half country, directly takes a spring-like air. 
 Tennis begins to reign supreme, and I am going to practise 
 this game very seriously. 
 
 "... I have not heard much music this winter. Our 
 German opera, which grew poorer and poorer every year, is 
 now gone altogether, and that was the only way in which we 
 heard some Wagnerian operas, which I like above all others; 
 indeed, the more you hear them the less you care about the 
 others. Once a fortnight I regularly go to the concert, but 
 there are times when I can t listen to the music. My 
 mind strays, and try as much as I will, the sounds pass 
 over me and don t leave any impression ; I think the reason 
 
98 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 of this is that I have heard too much music in the last few 
 years, and that I don t appreciate it. So when it is not 
 something I like very much I had rather not hear it, as 
 I think it only needlessly fatigues my brain, and so I do 
 not profit by it at all. . . . 
 
 " Your letter was very pleasant and so fluently Avritten ! 
 I wish I could do as well. My only consolation is that it is 
 not my language; but then I cannot produce such a good 
 style in Dutch either, and you will hardly believe it, but I 
 need a dictionary more when I write a Dutch letter than 
 when I write an English one. Of course I make a great 
 many mistakes in English, but Dutch is a far more difficult 
 language, and you never know when a word is masculine 
 or feminine (unless you are exceedingly clever!), as it 
 makes no difference when you speak, but a great difference 
 when you write; so if you want to write correctly you have 
 to look in the dictionary or else to guess. Then you say, 
 Oh! that word is probably feminine, and you change the 
 sentence accordingly, and afterward you discover that you 
 were quite wrong. Is not that a troublesome language ? 
 The Erench can hear when to put le or la before the 
 word (at least they rarely make mistakes), but we can t. It 
 sounds all the same when speaking. 
 
 "... The year that has gone has been very much like 
 the foregoing ones except for some political events which 
 have created a change in our country. Our old king died, 
 as you remember, and at his death there was a sincere 
 mourning over the whole country. Personally he was not 
 so very much liked ; still his subjects were attached to 
 him because he was (his two sons having died) the last 
 
HOLLAND TO-DAY^ 
 
 male descendant of a glorious and highly respected race : 
 the House of Orange. The Oranges are loved by the 
 Dutch because they can boast of many a valorous and 
 wise ancestor, but principally because the head of the 
 house, Prince William, who was murdered in 1584, freed 
 the people from the Spanish tyrant whose despotic reign 
 had become unbearable. 
 
 "The sole descendant of this long list of princes and 
 kings is our little Queen Wilhelmina, much beloved by 
 the people, who cherish her as something very precious. 
 The government is now in the hands of her mother, who 
 is queen regent until the little one is eighteen years old. 
 Queen Emma is a very superior woman, kind and wise, 
 giving her little daughter a sensible education, and quite 
 capable of filling her difficult position and of executing 
 her duties exceedingly well. 
 
 "Of course you, like a true American, do not feel any 
 enthusiasm for kings and queens, but our government is 
 constitutional and liberal, and I don t think the people have 
 in reality much more freedom in any of the new republics 
 than in our kingdom. The two queens live in the Hague. 
 As yet, of course, everything is very quiet at the court, but 
 the mother and daughter can be seen daily when driving 
 out, looking very happy together. They pass our house 
 nearly every day. I would not be a queen for anything 
 would you ? Fancy not a bit of freedom, not being able 
 to move a step without the whole land, so to say, knowing 
 of it ; their sorrows and rejoicings public sorrows and 
 rejoicings ! Seemingly rulers of the land, but in reality 
 dictated to in their slightest acts ! 
 
102 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " As yet all goes well in our little country, and I don t 
 think we need have any fear of being swallowed up by the 
 great states that surround us. 
 
 "... And now, my dear L., it is really time to finish 
 I think I never wrote such a Ions one 
 
 this long letter, 
 before. . 
 
 ELSIE M ." 
 
 oes well in our little country." Cheery words, 
 these, from a daughter of the race. 
 
 Long may all go well with sturdy, steadfast Holland, 
 girt with grim dikes higher than the tallest of its foes ; 
 the land of whirling sails and leaning seas ; the great 
 little land of oddity, thrift, patriotism and pluck! 
 
DAY-DREAMS ON THE DIKE 
 
DAY-DEEAMS ON THE DIKE 
 
 THERE were five of them, Dirk van Dorf, Katrina 
 van Dorf, Greitje Kuyp, Kassy Eiker, and Lndoff Kleef, 
 five stout little Hollanders, all well and happy, and all 
 sitting in the broad, bright sunlight dreaming ! 
 
 It was not so at first, you must know. They had been 
 trudging along the great dike, their loose wooden shoes 
 beating the hard clay laughing a little, talking less, yet 
 with an air of goodfellowship about them these chubby 
 little neighbor children, who knew one another so well that 
 by a nod or a gesture, or by throwing a quick glance or a 
 smile, they could take one another s meaning and make 
 two words do the work of twenty. Their fathers and 
 mothers were thrifty, hard-working folk living in Volen- 
 dam, a little fishing-village hard by, built under one of 
 the dikes of the Zuyder Zee. 
 
 The children, being Hollanders, knew quite well that 
 the dike they were treading was a massive, wide bank or 
 
 105 
 
106 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 wall built to keep back the sea that was forever trying to 
 spread itself over Holland, though Holland by no means 
 intended to allow it to do any such thing. And they 
 knew also, as did all Volendani, that Jan van lliper had 
 been out over long in his little fishing-boat, and that therehad 
 been heavy winds 
 after he started ; 
 also that his wife, 
 who was continually 
 scolding him, was 
 now going about, 
 her eyes red witli 
 weeping, telling the 
 neighbors how good 
 and easy he was, 
 and how he would 
 n t harm a kitten 
 Jan would n t ! 
 They knew, more 
 over, that Adrian 
 Eimckel s tulip-bed 
 was a show; hardly 
 another man in the 
 village had a flower worth looking at, if you went in for 
 size, color, and stiffness. They knew, besides, that ever 
 so many queer flapping and squirming things had been 
 hauled in that very morning by Peter Loop s big net 
 only he was dreadfully cross, and would n t let a body 
 come near it that is, a little body. Above all, they 
 knew that the mother of Ludoff Kleef was coming to join 
 
 ; HE WOULD N T HARM A KITTEN JAN WOULD N* 
 
DAY-DREAMS ON THE DIKE 1Q7 
 
 them as soon as she could finish up her dairy-work, and 
 make herself and the children tidy. All the party need do 
 was to keep along the dike and be good, and take care of 
 little Ludoff, and sit down and rest whenever they felt 
 like resting, and of all things they were not to soil or 
 tear their clothes. So you see they were neither empty- 
 headed nor careworn, nor were they in any danger of 
 falling asleep ; yet there they sat, on the dike, side by 
 side, dreaming ! 
 
 Kassy Hiker was the first to glide into a dream, though 
 sitting close beside little Ludoff, who wriggled, and won 
 dered why his mother and sister and baby brother did n t 
 come. He wanted to cry, but he felt in the depth of his 
 baby soul that Kassy would laugh at him if he did; and as 
 for the others, Greitje Kuyp was gazing a hundred "miles 
 out to sea already ; Katrina van Dorf was so busy with her 
 knitting that she had forgotten there was such a thing as 
 a small boy in the world ; and big boy Dirk van Dorf why, 
 he was altogether too grand a person to be moved by any 
 amount of howling. So poor little Ludoff amused himself 
 by watching a long straw that in the still air hitched itself 
 along till it wavered feebly on the edge of the dike, uncer 
 tain whether to stay on shore or start on a seafaring 
 career. If the straw had settled upon any definite course 
 of action, Ludoff would have done the same ; but, as it 
 was, Ludoff kept on watching and watching it until, in 
 the stillness, he forgot all about being a little boy who 
 wanted his mother; for was not the straw whisking one 
 end feebly, and turning round to begin again ? 
 
 Meantime Greitje Kuyp gazed out to sea ? the great 
 
108 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 Zuyder Zee, wondering why any one should think it was 
 trying to come ashore and do mischief. It was so quiet, 
 so grand, and it bore the big fishing-smacks so patiently, 
 when it could so easily topple them over ! Mother was 
 patient and peaceful, too. Greitje herself (so went her 
 day-dream) would be just like Mother, one of these days : 
 she would sew and mend and churn and bake, only she 
 would make more cakes and less bread. Yes, she would 
 bake great chests full of cinnamon-cakes, Jcaneel kockjes, 
 such as they sold at the Kermis ; and she would be, oh, 
 just as good and kind to her little girl as Mother was to 
 
 her, and 
 
 * * # 
 
 "I m not going to stay at home all my life," Kassy 
 Eiker was thinking or dreaming. " Some day I shall 
 keep a beautiful shop in Amsterdam, and sell laces and 
 caps and head-gear and lovely things ; and I 11 courtesy 
 and say ja, mynheer, like a grand lady; and I 11 learn 
 to sing and dance better than any girl at the Kermis ; 
 and I shall wear gold on my temples, and have a lovely 
 jacket for skating- days ; and every month I 11 come back 
 for a while, and bring pretty things to Father, Mother, and 
 
 the minister ; and 
 
 * * * 
 
 " I ve done full a finger-length of it to-day," mused 
 Katrina, as she pressed her red lips together and worked 
 steadily at the chain she was weaving on a pin-rack 
 for her father. " It shall be done by his birthday, and 
 I 11 hang his big silver watch on it while he s asleep, 
 and then kiss and hug him till he opens his eyes. Ah, 
 
DAY-DREAMS ON THE DIKE 109 
 
 how we all will wish him a happy clay and the Lord s 
 blessing ! And if he gives me a little cart some time for 
 my dog Shag to draw, I think 1 11 fill it full of wet, 
 shining fish and sell them at the market-town. No ; I 11 
 help Mother very hard at making the cheeses ; and I 11 
 fill the cart with them ; and soon Mother can have a fine 
 new lace cap with the money, and a silk apron ; and maybe 
 I 11 be so useful to the family that they 11 decide to take 
 me out of school ; and then and then I 11 w T ork and I 11 
 save, and save, till perhaps 
 
 * * * 
 
 " Can that be Jan van Riper s boat ? " mused big boy 
 Dirk, as he eyed a fishing-smack just coming into view. 
 " No, it s my uncle Ryk s. Like enough, Jan has landed 
 somewhere and put off to foreign parts, as he often says 
 he will when Vrouw van Riper s tongue gets too lively. 
 / should. I d like to go to foreign parts, anyway. Lots 
 of room for a fellow in Java; lots of rich Hollanders there 
 we Hollanders own it, they say ; and there s no reason 
 a fellow like me should n t grow to be a merchant and 
 own warehouses, and 
 
 * * * 
 
 So the dreams ran on, Greitje s, Kassy Eiker s, 
 Katrina s, and Dirk van Dorf s, all different, and all very 
 absorbing. Meantime the straw had shown itself so weak- 
 minded and tedious that little Ludoff had nodded himself 
 into a dose as he leaned against Greitje s plump little 
 shoulder. The dreaming time, pleasant as it was, had 
 really not been very long ; for even a smooth sea, a soft 
 summer breeze, and five serene little Dutch natures could 
 
HO THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 not have kept ten young legs and ten young arms quiet 
 any longer. 
 
 A .great shout from the village came faintly to the chil 
 dren s ears. Jan s boat was in sight ! The little folk 
 were up and alert in an instant. They turned about, 
 to look back toward the village, and if there was not 
 Ludoff s mother, Mevrouw l Kleef, erect and smiling, com 
 ing briskly along the dike toward them ! How handsome 
 she looked, with her bright eyes and rosy cheeks, and 
 the big lace cap, the blue-and-black short skirt, and 
 the low jacket over the gaily-colored under waist ! Her 
 little Troide toddled beside her, taking two steps to 
 the mother s one, with deep blue eyes fixed upon the 
 line of familiar forms just risen from the dike. The 
 baby it was a boy ; one could tell tlmt by the woolen 
 slaapmuts, or nightcap, on his head, for the girl-babies in 
 Volendam never wear that kind the baby, trig and smart, 
 Grazed from the mother s arms at the same five familiar 
 
 O 
 
 little forms, and in a moment the children all were crowd 
 ing around the mevrouw. 
 
 " Jan is back, is n t he ? " asked Dirk. 
 
 " Yes, I suppose so," she answered carelessly. The good 
 woman was rather tired of her neighbor Jan van Kiper s 
 frequent misbehaviiigs and false alarms. 
 
 " My, how warm the day ! " she added, gently setting the 
 baby down upon the turf beside her ; " and the dear child 
 is as weighty as a keg of herring ! " 
 
 " Oh, oh, the beauty ! " exclaimed the girls, quite en 
 raptured with the little one; while Dirk and Ludoff 
 
 1 Mevrouw, Madam (pronounced Meffrouw). 
 
LUUOFF S MOTHER, MEVROUW KLEEF, WAS CQM1NQ 13RISKLY A 
 
DAY-DREAMS ON THE DIKE H3 
 
 doubled their lists, and pretended (to his great delight) 
 they were going to pummel him soundly. 
 
 " Yes," said the mother. " He s a bouncing little man, 
 and with a good head of his own. I was saying to myself 
 as I came along that I should n t wonder if he should get 
 to be a grand burgomeister some day, and rule a city, and 
 lift us all to greatness and so you shall, my little one ! 
 There, there, don t pull my skirt off, my Ludoff ! " Then, 
 looking brightly from one to another of the group, Mev- 
 rouw Kleef asked : 
 
 "And what have you been doing you. Dirk, Katrina, 
 and the rest of you ? " 
 
 " Nothing," answered the children ; but they all looked 
 very happy. Day-dreams linger about us, you know, and 
 light our way even when they are half forgotten. 
 
 "And now, my children," she continued, " we are to have 
 a great pleasure, for I shall take you all to see the men 
 start Eaff Ootcalt s new windmill this very afternoon. 
 Baff is to make a short speech, and there will be music 
 and dancing and a little feast." 
 
 " Good, good ! " cried the happy little crowd, eager to 
 set off at once. 
 
 So the mother took up her little burgomeister, and, rosy 
 and smiling, started on her way back to the village, the 
 children trudging after. 
 
PAET II 
 STOEIES AND SKETCHES 
 
WOKDEBING TOM 
 
OH, TOM! THE KING WISHES TO SPEAK WITH VOU ! " 
 
WONDEEING TOM 
 
 LONG, long ago, in a great city whose name is forgotten, 
 situated on a river that ran dry in the days of Cinderella, 
 there lived a certain boy, the only son of a poor widow. 
 He had such a fine form and pleasant face that one day, as 
 lie loitered on his mother s door-step, the King stopped on 
 the street to look at him. 
 
 "Who is that boy?" asked his Majesty of his Prime 
 Minister. 
 
 This question brought the entire royal procession to a 
 standstill. 
 
 The Prime Minister did not know, so he asked the Lord 
 of the Exchequer. The Lord of the Exchequer asked the 
 High Chamberlain ; the High Chamberlain asked the 
 Master of the Horse ; the Master of the Horse asked the 
 Court Physician; the Court Physician asked the Royal 
 Bat-Catcher; the Ptoyal Eat-Catcher asked the Chief- 
 Cook-and-Bottle- Washer ; and the Chief- Cook-and-Bottle- 
 Washer asked a little girl named Wisk. 
 
 Little Wisk, with a pretty courtesy, informed him that 
 the boy s name was Wondering Tom. 
 
 A <3 
 
 S* 117 
 
118 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " So, ho ! " said the Chief -Cook-and-Bottle- Washer, tell 
 ing the Eoyal Eat-Catcher. "So, ho! " said the Eoyal Eat- 
 Catcher, passing on the news ; and it traveled in that way 
 until, finally, the Prime Minister, bowing low to the King, 
 said : 
 
 " May it please your most tremendous Majesty, it s 
 Wondering Tom." 
 
 " Tell him to come here ! " said the King to the Prime 
 Minister. " His Majesty commands him to come here ! " 
 was repeated to the next in rank ; and again his words 
 traveled through the Lord of the Exchequer, the High 
 Chamberlain, the Master of the Horse, the Court Physician, 
 the Eoyal Eat-Catcher, and the Chief-Cook-and-Bottle- 
 Washer, until they reached little Wisk, who called out : 
 
 " Oh, Tom ! the King wishes to speak with you." 
 
 "With me!" exclaimed Tom, never budging. "Why?" 
 
 " I don t know," returned little Wisk, " but you must go 
 at once." 
 
 " Why ? " cried Tom. 
 
 " Oh, Tom ! Tom ! they re going to kill you," she cried, 
 in an agony. 
 
 "WHY? What for?" shouted Tom, staring in the wild 
 est astonishment. 
 
 Surely enough, the Master of Ceremonies had ordered 
 forth an executioner with a bowstring. In that city, any 
 man, woman, or child who disregarded the King s slightest 
 wish was instantly put to death. 
 
 The man approached Tom. Another second, and the 
 bowstring would have done its work ; but the King held 
 up his royal hand in token of pardon, and beckoned Tom 
 to draw near. 
 
WONDERING TOM 119 
 
 "Whatever in all this world can his Majesty want with 
 me ? " pondered the bewildered boy, moving very slowly 
 toward the monarch. 
 
 " Well, sir ! " said his Majesty, scowling. " So you are 
 here at last ! Why do they call yon Wondering Tom ? " 
 
 "ME, your Majesty?" faltered Tom. "I I don t 
 know." 
 
 " You don t know ? (Most remarkable boy, this !) And 
 what were you doing, sir, when we sent for you ? " 
 
 " Nothing, your Majesty. I was only wondering 
 whether 
 
 "Ah, I see. You take your life out in wondering. A 
 fine, strong fellow like you has no right to be idling in his 
 mother s doorway. A pretty kingdom we should have if 
 all our subjects were like this ! You may go. 
 
 " He has a good face," continued the King, turning to the 
 Prime Minister, " but he 11 never amount to anything." 
 
 "Ah, exactly so," said the Prime Minister. " Exactly so," 
 echoed the Lord of the Exchequer, and " Exactly so," 
 sighed the Chief-Cook-and-Bottle-Washer at last, as the 
 royal procession passed on. 
 
 Tom heard it all. 
 
 " Now, how do they know that ? " he muttered, scratch 
 ing his head as he lounged back to the door-step. " Why in 
 the world do they think I 11 never amount to anything ? " 
 
 In the doorway he fell to thinking of little Wisk. 
 
 " What a very nice girl she is ! I wonder if she d play 
 with me if I asked her, but I can t ask her. I do 
 wonder what makes me so afraid to talk to Wisk ! " 
 
 Meantime, little Wisk, who lived in the next house, 
 watched him shyly. 
 
120 T1I.E LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " Tom ! " she called out at last, swaying herself lithely 
 round and round her wooden door-post, " the blackberries 
 are ripe." 
 
 " You don t say so ! " exclaimed Tom, in surprise. 
 
 " Yes, I do. And, Tom, there are bushels of them in the 
 woods just outside of the city gates." 
 
 " Oh ! " answered Torn, " I wonder if there are ! " 
 
 " I know it," said little Wisk, decidedly, " and I in going 
 to get some." 
 
 " Dear me ! " thought Tom, " T wonder if she d like to 
 have me go with her. Wisk ! " 
 
 " What, Tom ? " 
 
 " Oh, nothing," said the frightened fellow, suddenly 
 changing his mind, " I was only wondering whether it is 
 going to rain or not." 
 
 " Eain ? Of course not," laughed little Wisk, as she 
 ran off to join a group of children going toward the north 
 city -gate ; " but even if it should rain, what matter ? " 
 
 "Oh," thought Tom, "she s really gone for blackberries ! 
 I wondered what she had that little kettle on her arm for. 
 Pshaw ! Why did n t I tell her that I d like to go too ? " 
 
 Just then his mother came to the door, clapping a wet 
 ruffle between her hands. She was a clear-starcher. 
 
 " Tom, Tom ! why don t you set about something ! 
 There s plenty to do, in doors and out, if you d only 
 think so." 
 
 " Yes, ma am," said Tom, wondering whether or not he 
 was going to have a scolding. 
 
 " But you look pale, my pet ; go and play. Do. One 
 does n t often have such a perfect day as this (and such 
 
WONDERING TOM 121 
 
 splendid drying, too ! ). If I were you, I d make the 
 most of it " ; and the mother went back into the bare 
 entry, still clapping the ruffle. 
 
 " I do wonder how I can make the most of it," asked 
 Tom of himself, over and over again, as he sauntered off. 
 
 He did n t dare to go toward the north gate of the city, 
 because he could n t decide what he should say if he 
 should meet little Wisk ; so he turned toward the south. 
 
 " Shall I go back, I wonder, or keep on ? " thought Tom, 
 as he found himself going farther from the door-step and 
 nearer to the great city-wall, until at last the southern 
 gate was reached. Following the dusty highway leading 
 from the city, he came to pleasant fields. Then, after 
 wading awhile through the sunlit grain, he followed a 
 shady brook and entered the wood. 
 
 " It s pleasant here," he thought. " I wonder why 
 mother did n t get a cottage out here in the country in 
 stead of living in the noisy city." 
 
 " Could n t," croaked a voice close by. 
 
 Tom started. There was nobody near but frogs and 
 crickets. Besides, as lie had not spoken aloud, of course 
 it could not be in answer to him. Still, he wondered 
 what in the world the voice could be, and why it sounded 
 like " could n t." 
 
 " It certainly did sound so. Maybe she could n t, after 
 all," thought Tom ; " but why could n t she, I wonder ? " 
 
 " No-one-to-help," said something, as it jumped with a 
 splash into the water. 
 
 " I do wonder what that was ! " exclaimed Tom, aloud ; 
 " there s nobody here, that s certain. Oh, it must have 
 
122 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 been a toad ! Queer, though, how very much it sounded 
 like no-one-to-help ! Poor mother ! I don t help her 
 much, I know. Pshaw ! what if I do love her, I in not 
 the least bit of use, for I never know what to start about 
 doing. What in all botheration makes me so lazy ! 
 Heigh-ho ! " and Tom threw himself upon the grass, an 
 image of despair. He 11 never amount to anything, the 
 King said. Now, what did he mean by that ? " 
 
 " Uilly, dally ! " said another mysterious voice, speaking 
 far up among the branches overhead. 
 
 Tom was getting used to it. He just lifted his eyebrows 
 a little and wondered what bird that was. In a moment 
 he found himself puzzling over the strange words. 
 
 " Uilly, dally, it said, I declare. Oh dear ! It s too 
 bad to have to hear such things all the time. And then, 
 there s the King s ugly speech ; a fellow is n t agoing to 
 stand everything ! " 
 
 He rested his elbows upon his knees, holding his face 
 between his hands ; and, although he felt very wretched, he 
 could n t help wondering whether the daisies crowding in 
 his shadow did n t think it was growing late. They cer 
 tainly nodded as if they felt sleepy. 
 
 Suddenly his hat, which had tumbled from his head and 
 now lay near him, began to twitch strangely. 
 
 "Pshaw!" almost sobbed Tom, "what s coming now, I 
 wonder ? " 
 
 " I am," said a piping voice. 
 
 " Where are you ? " he asked, trembling. 
 
 " Here. Under your hat. Lift it off." 
 
 While Tom was wondering whether to obey or not, the 
 
WONDERING TOM 123 
 
 hat fell over, and out came a fairy, all shining with green 
 and gold, a funny little creature with a sprightly air. 
 Her eyes sparkled like diamonds. 
 
 " What troubles you, Master Torn ? " asked the fairy. 
 
 " So she knows my name ! " thought the puzzled youth ; 
 " well, that s queerer than anything ! I Ve always heard 
 that these woods were full of fairies ; but I never saw one 
 before. I wonder why I in not more frightened." 
 
 " Did you hear me ? " piped the little visitor. 
 
 " Did you speak? Oh yes ma am certainly, I heard 
 plainly enough." 
 
 " Well, what troubles you ? " 
 
 He looked sharply at the fairy. Yes, her little face was 
 kind. He would tell her all. 
 
 " I wonder what your name is ? " he said, by way of a 
 beginning. 
 
 " It s Setalit," said the fairy. " In mortal language that 
 means come-to-the-point. Now be quick! if you can. 
 I sha n t stay long." 
 
 " Why ? " asked Tom, quite astonished. 
 
 " Because I cannot. That s enough. If you wisli me 
 to help you, you must promptly tell me your trouble." 
 
 " Oh ! " said Tom, wondering where to begin. 
 
 "Are you lame ? Are you sick ? Are you blind, deaf, 
 or dumb ? " she asked, briskly. 
 
 " Oh no," he replied, " nothing like that. Only I don t 
 know what to make of things. Everything in this world 
 puzzles me so, and I can t ever make up my mind what 
 to do." 
 
 " Well," said Setalit, " perhaps I can help you a little." 
 
124 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " Can you ? " lie exclaimed. " Now I wonder how in 
 the world such a little mite as you ever 
 
 "Don t wonder so much," squeaked the fairy, impa 
 tiently, " but ask me frankly what I can do ? " 
 
 " I m going to," said Tom. 
 
 " Going to ! " she echoed. " What miserable creatures 
 you mortals are ! How could we ever get our gossamers 
 spun if we always were going to do a thing, and never 
 doing it ! Now listen. I in a very wise fairy, if I am small ; 
 I can tell you how to accomplish anything you please. 
 Don t you want to be good, famous, and rich ? " 
 
 " Certainly I do," answered Tom, startled into making a 
 prompt reply. 
 
 " Very well," she responded, quite pleased. " If you 
 always knew your own mind as decidedly as that, they 
 would n t call you Wondering Tom. It s an ugly name, 
 Master Mortal. If I were you (may Titania pardon the 
 dreadful supposition ! ) if I were you, I d wonder less 
 and work more." 
 
 " I wonder if I could n t ! " said Tom, half convinced. 
 
 " There you go again ! " screeched the fairy, stamping 
 her tiny foot. " You re not worth talking to. I shall 
 leave you." 
 
 " She s fading away," cried Tom. " fairy, good fairy, 
 please come back ! You promised to tell me how to be 
 come good and famous and rich ! " 
 
 Once more she stood before him, looking brighter and 
 fresher than ever. 
 
 " You re a noisy mortal," she said, nodding pleasantly 
 at Tom. " I thought for an instant that it was thunder- 
 
WONDERING TOM 125 
 
 ing, but it was only you, calling. I Ve a very little while 
 to stay, but you shall have one more chance of obtaining 
 everything you wish. Now, sir, be careful ! I 11 answer 
 you any three questions you may choose to put to me " ; and 
 Setalit sat down on a toadstool, and looked very profound. 
 
 " Only three ? " asked Tom, anxiously. 
 
 " Only three." 
 
 " Why can t you give me a dozen ? There s so much 
 that one wishes to know in this world." 
 
 " Because I cannot," said the fairy, firmly. 
 
 " But it s so hard to put everything into such a few 
 questions ! I don t know what in the world to decide upon. 
 What do you think I ought to ask ? " 
 
 " Consult the dearest wishes of your heart," answered 
 Setalit, " for there is the truest wisdom." 
 
 "Ah, well. Let me think," pursued Tom, with great de 
 liberation. " I want to be wise, of course, and good, and 
 very rich, and I want mother to be the same, and, 
 good fairy, if you would n t mind it, little Wisk to be the 
 same too. And dear me ! it s hard to put everything into 
 such a few questions. Let me see. First, I suppose I ought 
 to learn how to become immensely rich, right off, and then 
 I can give mother and Wisk everything they want; so, good 
 Setalit, here s my first question, How can I grow rich, very 
 rich, in in one week ? " 
 
 The fairy shook her head. 
 
 " I would answer you, Master Tom, with great pleasure," 
 she said, " but this is number FOUK. You have already 
 asked your three questions." And she turned into a green 
 frog and jumped away, chuckling. 
 
126 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 Tom rubbed his eyes and sat up straight. Had he been 
 dreaming ? 
 
 " I m a fool ! " he cried. 
 
 All the trees nodded, and their branches seemed to be 
 having great fun among themselves. 
 
 "A My fool ! " he insisted. 
 
 The leaves fairly tittered. 
 
 " Did n t old Katy, the apple-woman, call me a goose 
 only this morning ? " he continued, growing very angry 
 with himself. 
 
 " Katy did," assented a voice from among the bushes. 
 
 " Katy did n t ! " contradicted another. 
 
 " Katy did ! " 
 
 " Katy did n t ! " 
 
 Tom laughed bitterly. 
 
 " Ha ! ha ! Fight it out among yourselves, old fellows. 
 I may have been asleep ; but, anyhow, I ve been a fool ! " 
 
 " Ooo ! " echoed a solemn voice above him. 
 
 Tom looked up, and in the hollow of an old tree he 
 saw a great blinking owl. 
 
 " Hallo, old Goggle-eyes ! You re having something to 
 say, too, are you ? " 
 
 The owl shifted his position, and stared at Tom an 
 instant. Then, as if the sight of so ridiculous a fellow 
 was too much for him, he shut his eyes with a loud 
 " T whit ! " that made Tom jump. 
 
 All these things set the poor boy to thinking in earnest. 
 The words of Setalit were ringing in his ears, "If I were 
 you, I \l wonder less and work more. Going back through 
 the wood across the brook, and over the lots, he pondered 
 
WONDERING TOM 127 
 
 and pondered over the day s events, but with new resolu 
 tion in his soul. And the result of all his pondering was 
 that, as he entered the eity gate, he snapped his fingers, 
 saying/ The King s words shall never come true ! Wonder 
 ing Tom is <K)in2>; to work at last!" 
 
 o o o 
 
 TIIKEE years passed away. 
 
 " Little Wisk " grew to be quite a big girl ; but nobody 
 thought of calling her by any other name. She was so 
 lithe and quick, so rosy, fresh, and sparkling, and so ten 
 der and true withal, that she was Little Wisk as a matter 
 of course. 
 
 One chilly November afternoon she missed old Katy, 
 the old apple-woman, from her accustomed place at the 
 street corner. 
 
 " She must be ill," thought little Wisk. " Perhaps she 
 has no one to help her." 
 
 With some persons, to think is to act. AVisk stepped 
 into a neighboring cobbler s shop. 
 
 "Mr. Wacksend, do you know where the old apple- 
 woman lives ? " 
 
 " No," said the cobbler, gruffly. " Shut the door when 
 you go out." 
 
 Little Wisk looked at him as he sat upon his bench, 
 pegging away at his work. 
 
 " Poor man ! " she said to herself, " pushing the awl 
 through that thick leather makes him press his lips tight 
 together, and I suppose pressing his lips so tight, day after 
 day, makes him cross. I 11 try the butcher." 
 
 She ran into the next shop. 
 
128 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " Mr. Butcher, do you know where the old apple- woman 
 
 lives ? " 
 
 " Well," said the butcher, pausing to wipe his cleaver 
 on his big apron, " she does n t exactly live anywhere. 
 But, as the poor thing has neither kith nor kin to help 
 her, why, for the past year or so I Ve just let her tumble 
 herself in under a shed in my yard yonder. She s got an 
 old chopping-bench for a table, and a pile of straw for a 
 bed, and that s all her housekeeping." 
 
 "And does n t she have anything to eat but apples ? " 
 asked Wisk, much distressed. 
 
 " Bless your simple heart ! " said the butcher, laugh 
 ing, "she can t afford to eat her apples. No, no. She 
 keeps the breath in her body mostly with black bread 
 and scraps." 
 
 "Scraps?" 
 
 " Yes, meat-scraps. I save em for her out of the trim- 
 min s. But what are you wantin of her so particular ? 
 Did you come to invite her to court ?" 
 
 " I d like to see her for a moment," said Wisk, shrink 
 ing from his coarse laugh. 
 
 " Well," answered the butcher, beginning to chop again, 
 " the surest way of seeing her is to go to the corner and 
 buy an apple." 
 
 " But she is n t there." 
 
 " Not there ? That s uncommon. Well," pointing- 
 back over his shoulder with his cleaver, "go down the 
 alley here, alongside the shop ; steer clear of old Beppo in 
 his kennel, he s ugly sometimes ; then go past the pig 
 sties and the skin-heaps, and cross over by the cattle-stalls ; 
 
WONDERING TOM 
 
 129 
 May- 
 
 and right back of them, a little beyond, is the shed, 
 be she s lying there sick ; like enough, poor thing ! " 
 
 Little Wisk followed the directions, as she picked her 
 way carefully through the great bleak cattle-yard, think 
 ing, as she went, that killing lambs did n t always make a 
 man so very wicked, after all. 
 
 Beaching the shed, she found the poor old apple- woman, 
 moaning and bent nearly double with rheumatism. 
 
 " l M SORRY YOU ARE NOT WELL, GOODY, SAID LITTLE WISK." 
 
 " I m sorry you are not well, Goody," said Little Wisk. 
 " We missed you, you know. What can I do for you ? " 
 
 rt Bless your bright eyes ! Did you come to see poor old 
 Katy ? Ougti ah-Ji ! the pain s killing me, child ! Oh, the 
 Lord save us, ougli ah ! " 
 
 9 
 
130 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " It s too cold and damp for you in here, I m sure." 
 
 " Ah yes, it is, dearie dear, oiujli, ouyli! cold and wet 
 enough ! " 
 
 " This old rusty stove would be nice if you had a fire in 
 it, Goody." 
 
 " Oh, the stove, dearie ! The good gentleman in the 
 shop put it in here for me last winter. He s kept me in 
 meat-scraps, too. Oh, oh, oh ! (it catches me that way 
 often, child). But, alack ! I have n t a chip nor a shaving 
 to make a bit of fire. Oh! oh! (the worst s in this shoul 
 der, dearie, and cross the back and into this ere knee). 
 Yes, cold and wet enough, so it is. Aoucli! No use s arch- 
 ing out there ; you won t find nothing. Not a waste splin 
 ter of wood left, I 11 be bound, after my raking and scrap 
 ing till I was too sick to stand up." 
 
 " I do wish I had money to buy you some, Goody," said 
 Wisk. " I sha n t have another silver-piece till my next 
 birthday, but you shall have that, I promise you." 
 
 " Blessings on you for saying it, dearie ; but old Katy 
 is n t going to last till then. What with cold and hunger 
 (the meat on the nail there s no use, you see, if I can t 
 cook it), and this ere ouyh ah! this ere dreadful 
 rheumatiz, I can t hold out much longer." 
 
 Suddenly a thought came to Wisk. 
 
 " Oh, Katy ! " she exclaimed, and off she ran, past the 
 cattle-sheds, the skin-heaps, the pigsties, the dog-kennel, 
 up the alley, up the street, and round the corner toward the 
 river till she came to the workshop of a ship-carpenter. 
 
 " Tom," she said, hurrying in, quite out of breath, and 
 addressing a great strong boy who was working there, 
 " won t you give me some shavings and chips ? " 
 
WONDERING TOM 131 
 
 " Certainly," said Tom, straightway beginning to scrape 
 together a big pile. " What shall we put them in ? " 
 
 " Into my apron. They re for poor Katy, the apple- 
 woman. She lives in an old shed in Slorter s cattle-yard. 
 She s sick, Tom, and she has n t a thing to make a fire 
 with." 
 
 " Oh, if that s it," said Tom, "we must get her up a 
 cart-load of waste stuff, if the boss is willing." 
 
 The boss spoke up : 
 
 " Help yourself, Tom. You re the steadiest lad in the 
 shop, and you Ve never asked me a favor before. Help 
 yourself. Take along all those odds and ends in the cor 
 ner yonder. Chips and shavings soon burn up." 
 
 " Much obliged to you, sir," said Tom ; and he added in 
 a lower tone to Wisk, " I 11 load up and take em round 
 to her as soon as I Ve done my work. You can carry your 
 apronful now." 
 
 Wisk held up the corners of her apron while Tom filled 
 it, laughing to see how she lifted her pretty chin so that he 
 might pile in a "good lot," as she called it. 
 
 " There ! " he exclaimed at last, " that s as much as you 
 can manage." 
 
 " Thank you, Tom. Oh, how kind you are ! I was as 
 sure as anything that you d know just what to do. Thank 
 you again, Tom," and she started at once. 
 
 " Wisk ! " 
 
 He had followed her to the door. When she turned 
 back, in answer to his call, he tried to speak to her, but 
 coughed instead. 
 
 " Did you want me, Tom ? " she asked, demurely. 
 
 " Yes, Wisk. I I wanted to say that that I" 
 
132 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " Why, what a cough you have, Tom ! It s from work 
 ing so much in this windy shop. Oh, Tom, I Ve just 
 thought ! If Katy had a door to her shed and a bench 
 with a back to it, she d be so comfortable ! " 
 
 " She shall have both," said Tom. " I 11 do it this very 
 evening. It s full moon." 
 
 " Oh, you dear, blessed Tom ! Good-by." 
 
 "Wisk!" 
 
 But she was already running down the street. Tom 
 turned back slowly. I think he was wondering, though 
 he had really conquered that old habit. But it is so dif 
 ficult, sometimes, to say just what we feel to those whom 
 we like very much ! 
 
 " First the shavings, then the chips," sang Wisk s happy 
 heart, as she hurried along ; " first the shavings, and then 
 the chips, and then a spark from old Katy s tinder-box, 
 and sha n t we have a beautiful blaze ! " 
 
 That night, the one-eyed dog in the butcher s yard had 
 a hard time of it. There was the moon to be barked at ; 
 the pigs to be barked at ; the sheep, the oxen, and the 
 lambs to be barked at every time they moved in their 
 stalls. The skin-heap, too, required a constant barking 
 to keep it from stirring while the rats were burrowing 
 beneath. And then there was the strange lad to be 
 barked at, corning in twice, as he did, with a hand-nut 
 heaped high with chips, shavings, and blocks, and again 
 coming back with planks, hammer, and saw. And the 
 sudden smoke from the sick woman s fire ; ah, how it 
 bothered old Beppo ! 
 
 He had lived long in the yard, and remembered well 
 
WONDERING TOM 133 
 
 how the high chimney had stood there for years and 
 years, all that was left of a burned-down factory, 
 and how the shed had been built up around it as if to 
 keep it from tumbling. For months past it had been a 
 quiet, well-behaved chimney ; but now to see smoke rush 
 ing out of it at such a rate, bound straight for that irri 
 tating moon, was really too much to stand. So Beppo 
 barked and barked ; and Tom hammered and hammered ; 
 and old Katy, warm at last, curled herself up in the 
 straw, saying over and over again, " How nice it will be ! 
 How nice it will be ! " 
 
 YEARS passed on. One day, the King and his court 
 carne riding down that same city again. Suddenly his 
 Majesty, grown older now, halted before a boat-builder s 
 shop, and asked: 
 
 " Who is that busy fellow, yonder ? " 
 
 "Where, your most prodigal Majesty?" asked the Prime 
 Minister in return. 
 
 " In the shop. Yesterday this same young fellow and 
 his man were busy out on the docks. He works with 
 a will, that fellow. I must set him at the royal ships." 
 
 " The royal ships ! " echoed the Prime Minister, " your 
 most overwhelming Majesty ; why, that is a fortune for 
 any man ! " 
 
 " I know it. Why not ? " said the King. "What is his 
 name ? " 
 
 The Prime Minister could not say. And again, as on 
 that day long before, the question traveled through the 
 
134 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " THOMAS .REPDY, YOUR MAJESTY." 
 
 grandees of the court, until it readied the Chief-Cook-and- 
 Bottle- Washer, and the Chief-Cook-and-Bottle- Washer 
 asked a pretty young woman named Wisk, who chanced to 
 be coming out of the shop. 
 
 " He s a master-builder," replied Wisk, blushing. 
 
 " But what s his name ?" repeated the Chief-Cook-and- 
 Bottle- Washer. 
 
 "He used to be called Wondering Tom," she answered; 
 " but now we all call him by his real name, Thomas Keddy." 
 
WONDERING TOM 135 
 
 " Thomas Eeddy ! " shouted the Chief-Cook-and-Bottle- 
 Washer. " Thomas Eeddy ! " cried the Eoyal Eat- Catcher. 
 
 And, in fact, " Thomas Eeddy ! " was called so often and 
 so loudly along the line before it reached the only officer 
 who could venture to speak to the King, that the master- 
 builder, with a keen eye to business, threw down his tools 
 and came out of the shop. 
 
 " Oli, Tom ! Again the King wishes to speak with you," 
 said Little Wisk. 
 
 They took each other by the hand, and together walked 
 toward his Majesty. 
 
 " Behold ! " said the King, " we have found the finest 
 young workman in our realms ! Let preparations be 
 made at once for proclaiming him Eoyal Ship-Builder ! 
 What do they call you, young man ? I Ve lost the name." 
 
 " Thomas Eeddy, your Majesty," he answered, his eye 
 sparkling with grateful joy. 
 
 " And who are you, iny pretty one ? " 
 
 " Oh, I in his wife," said the smiling Wisk. 
 
LITTLE VEMBA BKOWN 
 
LITTLE VHMUA BROWN. 
 
LITTLE YEMBA BKOWN 
 
 VEMBA was a new name in the Brown family ; and, 
 very properly, it was given to a brand-new girl, the 
 sweetest, prettiest mite of a girl, in fact, that ever had 
 come to join the Brown household. To be sure, six years 
 before this, they had welcomed a Morris Brown nearly 
 as small and sweet and pretty, and, later on, a Harris 
 Brown, who began life as a baby of the very first quality ; 
 but they, both, were boys. And here was a girl ! She 
 was so new that she did not know Morris and Harris 
 were in the house. Think of that ! And if she had 
 noticed them, she would not have had the slightest idea 
 who they were. Dear me ! How very well acquainted 
 the three became after awhile ! But at first, when the 
 little girl was only a few weeks old, she was still quite 
 a stranger to the boys, and had no other name than Miss 
 Brown ; yet she had the air of owning not only Mr. and 
 Mrs. Brown, but all the family, and the very house they 
 lived in. Why, the King of the Cannibal Islands him 
 self could not have made her change countenance unless 
 she chose to do so. 
 
 Well, there they were, Morris Brown, aged six years, 
 
 139 
 
140 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 Harris Brown, aged three, and Miss Brown of hardly any 
 age at all. These were the Brown children. 
 
 " Dear me ! a bonny little lady ! " said Uncle Tom, who 
 had come all the way from Philadelphia to take a look at 
 the haby. 
 
 At this point of time, as he gazed at her through his 
 spectacles, all the family crowded around ; the boys, proud 
 and happy, stood on either side of him to hear what his 
 opinion might be. 
 
 "A bonny little lady," repeated Uncle Tom ; " and now, 
 Stephania, what are you going to call her ? " 
 
 He turned so suddenly upon Mrs. Brown, in his brisk 
 way, that it made her start. 
 
 " Dear me ! I I don t know," she answered. " Some 
 novel, pretty name, of course ; something fanciful ; but we 
 have n t settled upon one yet." 
 
 "Why not call her Stephania, after you and me?" asked 
 Grandmama, brightly. 
 
 " Oh, dear, no," sighed Mrs. Brown ; " I d like some 
 thing not so liorri , I mean, something more fanciful 
 than that ! " 
 
 " Well, I declare ! " exclaimed Grandmama, and she 
 closed her lips as if resolved never to say another word 
 about it. 
 
 " We have thought of Marjorie," remarked Mr. Brown, 
 with a funny twinkle in his eyes, " and, ahem ! two or 
 three others, Mabel, for instance, and Ida, and Irene, 
 and Clara, and Jean, and Olivia ; Florence, and Francesca, 
 too, and Lily ; Alice, and Elinor, and Anita, and Jessie, 
 and Dora, and Isabel, and Bertha, and Louise, and Can- 
 
LITTLE VEMBA BROWN 141 
 
 dace, and Alma; but Stephania condemns every one of 
 them as too plain or too hackneyed. The fact is, all the 
 pretty names are used up." 
 
 "You might name her Chestnut," said Morris, musingly. 
 " There are three of us, and three is an awful lot." 
 
 Just then the wind howled dismally ; sere and yellow 
 leaves whirled past the windows. 
 
 " Goodness, what weather ! " exclaimed Grandmama. 
 "Bleak even for November is n t it?" 
 
 " Here s sunshine, though," murmured Mrs. Brown, 
 cheerily. " You re a ittle pessus bit of booful sunshine, 
 so you is, even if you is a poor itty Vember baby ! " and 
 she fell to kissing Miss Brown in the most rapturous 
 manner. 
 
 " Ha ! there it is ! " cried Uncle Tom. " Vemba s her 
 name. Her mother has said it. Let us call her Vemba!" 
 
 Every one laughed, but Uncle Tom was in earnest ; be 
 sides, he had to take the afternoon train back to Phila 
 delphia, and you know how they always rush matters 
 through in Philadelphia. 
 
 " It s a good name, and new," he said, nodding his head 
 in a rotary way that somehow took in Mr. Brown, Mrs. 
 Brown, Grandma Brown, Morris Brown, Harris Brown, 
 and Miss Brown. " It s a good name. Think it over. 
 I must be off!" 
 
 " Vemba, from November ? " cried Grandma. " What a 
 bleak name ! Do you want the poor child to be a shadow 
 011 the house ? " and the dear old lady nourished her knit 
 ting as she spoke. 
 
 Whether it was the gleam of the long needles, or Uncle 
 
142 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 Tom s frantic but slow way of putting on his coat, of 
 whether Miss Brown, catching Grandma Brown s words, 
 had suddenly resolved to show them that she had n t the 
 slightest intention in the world of being a shadow on the 
 house, I do not know. But certain it is she smiled, 
 smiled the brightest, sunniest little smile you can imagine. 
 
 All the family were delighted. The boys shouted, Papa 
 laughed, Mama laughed, Uncle Tom laughed, and Grandma 
 exclaimed, " Well, I never ! " 
 
 " She s answered you, Grandma ! " cried Uncle Tom, 
 bending down with only one sleeve of his overcoat on, 
 and actually kissing the baby, "she has answered you. 
 Ha, ha ! No clouds about her ; you see she s a sunshine- 
 girl. Well, good-by, little Vemba ! Good-by, all," and he 
 was out of the room and on his way to the train before 
 the baby had time to blink. 
 
 Well, to make a long story short, the more they thought 
 about the new name, the better they liked it. Besides, 
 Morris and Harris, who adored Uncle Tom, would hear of 
 no other. Papa declared it was not " half bad," and even 
 Mama admitted that at least it was not commonplace. 
 Meanwhile, the baby fell into a pleasant sleep. 
 
 When she awoke her name was Vemba Brown. 
 
 That was five years ago, this November, and now every 
 one says that of all the sweet, sunny, bright little girls in 
 New York, Vemba Brown is the sunniest, brightest, and 
 sweetest. She is now thoroughly acquainted with Morris 
 and Harris ; and as for Uncle Tom well, you should 
 have heard her laugh the other day when that gentleman 
 told the wee maiden that bleak November would soon 
 
LITTLE VEMBA BROWN 
 
 143 
 
 be here, and then everybody would shiver and sneeze 
 go I aiid you should have seen her throw her arms around 
 his neck and kiss him when that same day he gave her a 
 beautiful new walking-suit and a soft white muff to keep 
 her little hands warm ! 
 
 And oh, you should have seen, besides, what the little 
 maid found waiting for her when she went down to break 
 fast on that happy birthday ! A gift from Mama, and an 
 other from Papa. One of the gifts was very quiet, for it 
 held a secret ; the other at first was just a little noisy, and 
 he soon told Vemba all he knew. 
 
 WAITING FOR VEMBA ! 
 
THE CROW-CHILD 
 
 10 
 
THE CROW-CHILD 
 
 MIDWAY between a certain blue lake and a deep forest 
 there once stood a cottage, called by its owner "The 
 Rookery." 
 
 The forest shut out the sunlight and scowled upon the 
 ground, breaking with shadows every ray that fell, until 
 only a few little pieces lay scattered about. But the 
 broad lake invited all the rays to come and rest upon her, 
 so that sometimes she shone from shore to shore, and the 
 sun winked and blinked above her, as though dazzled by 
 his own reflection. The cottage, which was very small, 
 had sunny windows and dark windows. Only from the 
 roof could you see the mountains beyond, where the light 
 crept up in the morning and down in the evening, turning 
 all the brooks into living silver as it passed. 
 
 But something brighter than sunshine used often to 
 look from the cottage into the forest, and something even 
 more gloomy than shadows often glowered from its win 
 dows upon the sunny lake. One was the face of little 
 Euky Lynn ; and the other was his sister s when she 
 felt angry or ill-tempered. 
 
 They were orphans, Cora and Euky, living alone in the 
 cottage with an old uncle. Cora or "Cor," as Ruky 
 
 147 
 
148 THE LAND OF PLUGK 
 
 called her was nearly sixteen years old, but her brother 
 had seen the forest turn yellow only four times. She was, 
 therefore, almost mother and sister in one. The little fel 
 low was her companion night and day. Together they ate 
 and slept, and when Cora was not at work in the cot 
 tage together they rambled in the wood, or floated in 
 their little skiff upon the lake. 
 
 Itiiky had bright, dark eyes, and the glossy blackness of 
 his hair made his cheeks look even rosier than they were. 
 He had funny ways for a boy, Cora thought. The quick, 
 bird-like jerks of his raven-black head, his stately baby 
 gait, and his habit of pecking at his food, as she called it, 
 often made his sister laugh. Young as he was, the little 
 fellow had learned to mount to the top of a low-branching 
 tree near the cottage, though he could not always get down 
 alone. Sometimes when, perched in the thick foliage, he 
 would scream, " Cor ! Cor ! Come, help me down ! " his 
 sister would answer, as she ran out laughing, " Yes, little 
 Crow ! I in coming." 
 
 Perhaps it was because he reminded her of a crow that 
 Cora called him her little bird. This was when she was 
 good-natured and willing to let him see how much she 
 loved him. But in her cloudy moments, as the uncle 
 called them, Cora was another girl. Everything seemed 
 ugly to her, or out of tune. Even Euky was a trial ; and, 
 instead of giving him a kind word, she would scold and 
 grumble until he would steal from the cottage door, and, 
 jumping lightly from the door-step, seek the shelter of his 
 tree. Once safely perched among its branches he knew 
 she would finish her work, forget her ill-humor, and be 
 
THE CROW-CHILD 149 
 
 quite ready, when he cried " Cor ! Cor ! " to come from 
 the cottage with a cheery, " Yes, little Crow ! I in coin- 
 in 2 ! I m cominsj ! " 
 
 O o 
 
 No one could help loving Kuky, with his quick, affec 
 tionate ways; and it seemed that Ruky, in turn, could 
 not help loving every person and thing around him. He 
 loved his silent old uncle, the bright lake, the cool forest, 
 
 THE HOME OF CORA AND RUKY. 
 
 and even his little china cup with red berries painted upon 
 it. But more than all, Ruky loved his golden-haired sis 
 ter, and the great dog, who would plunge into the lake at 
 the mere pointing of his chubby little finger. In fact, that 
 finger and the commanding baby voice were " law " to Nep 
 at any time. 
 
 Nep and Ruky often talked together, and though one 
 used barks and the other words, there was a perfect under 
 standing between them. Woe to the straggler that dared 
 to rouse Nep s wrath, and woe to the bird or rabbit that ven 
 tured too near ! those great teeth snapped at their prey 
 
 10" 
 
150 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 without even the warning of a growl. But Euky could 
 safely pull Nep s ears or his tail, or climb his great shaggy 
 back, or even snatch away the untasted bone. Still, as I 
 said before, every one loved the child; so, of course, Nep 
 was no exception. 
 
 One day Euky s "Cor! Cor!" had sounded oftener than 
 usual. His rosy face had bent saucily to kiss Cora s up 
 turned forehead, as she raised her arms to lift him from the 
 tree; but the sparkle in his dark eyes had seemed to kindle 
 so much mischief in him that his sister s patience became 
 fairly exhausted. 
 
 " Has Cor nothing to do but to wait upon you? " she cried, 
 " and nothing to listen to but your noise and your racket ? 
 You shall go to bed early to-day, and then I shall have 
 some peace." 
 
 "No, no, Cor. Please let Euky wait till the stars come. 
 Euky wants to see the stars." 
 
 " Hush ! Euky is bad. He shall have a whipping when 
 Uncle comes back from town." 
 Nep growled. 
 
 " Ha ! ha ! " laughed Euky, jerking his head saucily from 
 side to side ; " Nep says No ! " 
 
 Nep was shut out of the cottage for his pains, and poor 
 Euky was undressed, with many a hasty jerk and pull. 
 
 " You hurt, Cor ! " he said, plaintively. " I m going to 
 take off my shoes my own self." 
 
 " No, you re not," cried Cora, almost shaking him ; and 
 when he cried she called him naughty, and said if he did 
 not stop he should have no supper. This made him cry all 
 the more, and Cora, feeling in her angry mood that lie 
 deserved severe punishment, threw away his supper and 
 
THE CROW-CHILD 151 
 
 put him to bed. Then all that could be heard were Euky s 
 low sobs and the snappish clicks of Cora s needles, as she 
 sat knitting, with her back to him. 
 
 He could not sleep, for his eyelids were scalded with 
 tears, and his plaintive "Cor! Cor ! " had reached his sister s 
 ears in vain. She never once looked up from those gleam 
 ing knitting-needles, nor even gave him his good-night 
 kiss. 
 
 It crew late. The uncle did not return. At last Cora, 
 
 o 
 
 sulky and weary, locked the cottage door, blew out her 
 candle, and lay down beside her brother. 
 
 The poor little fellow tried to win a forgiving word, but 
 she was too ill-natured to grant it. In vain he whispered, 
 " Cor, Cor ! " He even touched her hand over and ever 
 again with his lips, hoping she would turn toward him, 
 and, with a loving kiss, murmur, as usual, " Good night, 
 little bird." 
 
 Instead of this, she jerked her arm angrily away, saying: 
 
 " Oh, stop your pecking and go to sleep ! I wish you 
 were a crow in earnest, and then I d have some peace." 
 
 After this, Euky was silent. His heart drooped within 
 him as he wondered what this " peace " was that his sister 
 wished for so often, and why he must go away before it 
 could come to her. 
 
 Soon, Cora, who had rejoiced in the sudden calm, heard 
 a strange fluttering. In an instant she saw by the starlight 
 a dark object circle once or twice in the air above her, then 
 dart suddenly through the open window. 
 
 Astonished that Euky had not shouted with delight 
 at the strange visitor, or else clung to her neck in fear, 
 she turned to see if he had fallen asleep. 
 
152 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 No wonder that she started up, horror-stricken, Euky 
 was not there ! 
 
 His empty place was still warm ; perhaps he had slid 
 softly from the bed. With trembling haste she lighted the 
 candle, and peered into every corner. The boy was not to 
 be found ! 
 
 Then those fearful words rang in her ears : 
 
 "I wish you were a crow in earnest ! " 
 
 Cora rushed to the door, and, with straining gaze, looked 
 out into the still night. 
 
 " Euky ! Euky ! " she screamed. 
 
 There was a slight stir in the low-growing tree. 
 
 " Euky, darling, come back ! " 
 
 " Caw, caw ! " answered a harsh voice from the tree. 
 Something black seemed to spin out of it, and then, in 
 great sweeping circles, sailed upward, until finally it settled 
 upon one of the loftiest trees in the forest. 
 
 " Caw, caw ! " it screamed, fiercely. 
 
 The girl shuddered, but, with outstretched arms, cried 
 out : 
 
 " Oh, Euky, if it is you, come back to poor Cor ! " 
 
 " Caw, caw ! " mocked hundreds of voices, as a shadow 
 like a thunder-cloud rose in the air. It was an immense 
 flock of crows. She could distinguish them plainly in the 
 starlight, circling higher and higher, then lower and lower, 
 until, with their harsh " Caw, caw ! " they sailed far off 
 into the night. 
 
 " Oh, Euky, answer me ! " she cried. 
 
 Nep growled, the forest trees whispered softly together, 
 and the lake, twinkling with stars, sang a lullaby as it lifted 
 
THE CROW-CHILD 153 
 
 its weary little waves upon the shore: there was no other 
 sound. 
 
 It seemed that daylight never would come ; but at last 
 the trees turned slowly from black to green, and the lake 
 put out its stars, one by one, and waited for the new day. 
 
 Cora, who had been wandering restlessly in every direc 
 tion, now went weeping into the cottage. " Poor boy ! " she 
 sobbed ; " he had no supper." Then she scattered bread- 
 crurnbs near the doorway, hoping that Euky would come 
 for them; but only a few timid little songsters hovered 
 about, and, while Cora wept, picked up the food daintily, 
 as though it burned their bills. When she reached forth 
 her hand, though there were no crows among them, and 
 called " Euky ! Euky ! " they scattered and flew away in 
 an instant. 
 
 Next she went to the steep-roofed barn, and, bringing 
 out an apronful of grain, scattered it all around his favorite 
 tree. Before long, to her great joy, a flock of crows came 
 by. They spied the grain, and soon were busily picking it 
 up with their short, feathered bills. One even came near 
 the mound where she sat. Unable to restrain herself 
 longer, she fell upon her knees with an imploring cry : 
 
 " Oh, Euky ! is this you ? " 
 
 Instantly the entire flock set up an angry " caw," and, 
 surrounding the crow, who was hopping closer and closer to 
 Cora, hurried him off, until they all looked like mere specks 
 against the summer sky. 
 
 Every day, rain or shine, she scattered the grain, tremb 
 ling with dread lest Nep should leap among the hungry 
 crows, and perhaps kill her " little bird " first. But Nep 
 
154 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " OH, RUKY! is THIS YOU? " 
 
 knew better ; lie never stirred when the noisy crowd set 
 tled around the cottage, excepting once, when one of them 
 pounced upon his back. Then he started up, wagging his 
 tail, and barking with uproarious delight. The crow flew 
 off in a flutter, and did not venture near him again. 
 
THE CROW-CHILD 155 
 
 Poor Cora felt sure that this could be no other than 
 Kuky. Oh, if she only could have caught him then ! Per 
 haps with kisses and prayers she might have won him back 
 to Kuky s shape ; but now the chance was lost. 
 
 There was no one to help her ; for the nearest neighbor 
 dwelt miles away, and her uncle had not yet returned. 
 
 After awhile she remembered the little cup, and, filling 
 it with grain, stood it upon a grassy mound. When the 
 crows came, they fought and struggled for its contents 
 with many an angry cry. One of them made no effort to 
 seize the grain. He was content to peck at the berries 
 painted upon its sides, as he hopped joyfully around it 
 again and again. Nep lay very quiet. Only the tip of his 
 tail twitched with an eager, wistful motion. But Cora 
 sprang joyfully toward the bird. 
 
 "It is Kuky !" she cried, striving to catch it. 
 
 Alas ! the cup lay shattered beneath her hand, as, with a 
 taunting " caw, caw," the crow joined its fellows and flew 
 away. 
 
 Next, gunners came. They were looking for other birds; 
 but they hated the crows, Cora knew, and she trembled 
 for Kuky. She heard the sharp crack of fowling-pieces 
 in the forest, and shuddered whenever Nep, pricking up 
 his ears, darted with an angry howl in the direction of 
 the sound. She knew, too, that her uncle had set traps 
 for the crows, and it seemed to her that the whole world 
 was against the poor birds, plotting their destruction. 
 
 Time new by. The leaves seemed to flash into bright 
 colors and fall off almost in a day. Frost and snow came. 
 Still the uncle had not returned, or, if he had, she did not 
 
THE CROW-CHILD 157 
 
 know it. Her brain was bewildered. She knew not 
 ^whether she ate or slept. Only the terrible tiring reached 
 her ears, or that living black cloud came and went with its 
 ceaseless " caw." 
 
 At last, during a terrible night of wind and storm, Cora 
 felt that she must go forth and seek her poor bird. 
 
 " Perhaps he is freezing dying ! " she cried, springing 
 frantically from the bed, and casting her long cloak over 
 her night-dress. 
 
 In a moment, she was trudging barefooted through the 
 snow. It was so deep she could hardly walk, and the sleet 
 was driving into her face ; still she kept on, though her 
 numbed feet seemed hardly to belong to her. All the way 
 she was praying in her heart ; promising never, never to 
 be passionate again, if she only could find her bird not 
 Piuky the boy, but whatever he might be. She was will 
 ing to accept her punishment. Soon a faint cry reached 
 her ear. With eager haste, she peered into every fold of 
 the drifted snow. A black object caught her eye. It was 
 a poor storm-beaten crow, lying there benumbed and stiff. 
 
 For Ruky s sake she folded it closely to her bosom, and 
 plodded back to the cottage. The fire cast a rosy light on 
 its glossy wing as she entered, but the poor thing did not 
 stir. Softly stroking and warming it, she wrapped the 
 frozen bird in soft flannel and blew into its open mouth. 
 Soon, to her great relief, it revived, and even swallowed a 
 few grains of wheat. 
 
 Cold and weary, she cast herself upon the bed, still fold 
 ing the bird to her heart. "It may be Euky ! It is all I 
 ask," she sobbed. " I dare not ask for more." 
 
158 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 "JUST TWO HOURS." 
 
 Suddenly she felt a peculiar stirring. The crow seemed 
 to grow larger. Then, in the dim light, she felt its feathers 
 pressing lightly against her cheek. Next, something soft 
 and warm wound itself tenderly about her neck, and she 
 heard a sweet voice saying : 
 
 "Don t cry, Cor, I 11 be good." 
 
THE CROW-CHILll 
 
 159 
 
 She started up. It was, indeed, her own darling ! The 
 starlight shone into the room. Lighting her candle, she 
 looked at the clock. 
 
 It was just two hours since she had uttered those cruel 
 words ! Sobbing, she asked : 
 
 " Have I been asleep, Kuky, dear ? " 
 
 " I don t know, Cor. Do people cry when they re 
 asleep ? " 
 
 " Sometimes, Kuky," clasping him very close. 
 
 " Then you have been asleep. But Cor, please don t let 
 Uncle whip Kuky." 
 
 " No, no, my little bird I mean, my brother. Good 
 night, darling ! " 
 
 " Good night." 
 
TRAPPEK JOE 
 
TRAPPER JOE STOOD ON THE EDGE OF THE TIMBER-LAND LISTENING 
 TO "HE L-ID N T KNOW WHAT." (PAGE 173.) 
 
TEAPPEE JOE 
 
 How strange it all seemed to little Winifred ! One 
 
 O 
 
 year ago, or, as she reckoned it, one snow-time and one 
 flower-time ago, she was living in Boston, and now she 
 was in the wilds of Colorado. It was a great change 
 this going from comfort and luxury to a place where com 
 fort was hard to find, and luxury not to be thought of ; 
 where they had a log-hut instead of a house, and a pig in 
 place of a poodle. But, on the whole, she enjoyed it. Her 
 father was better, and that was what they came for. The 
 doctor had said Colorado air would cure him. And, though 
 her young Mother often looked tired and troubled, she 
 certainly never used to break forth into happy bits of song 
 when Father was ill in bed, as she did now that he was 
 able to help cut down trees in the forest. Besides, who 
 ever saw in Boston such beautiful blue flowers and such 
 flaming red blossoms ? And what was the frog-pond com 
 pared with these streams that now, in the springtime, 
 came rushing through the woods silently sometimes, and 
 sometimes so noisily that, if it were not for their sparkle 
 when they passed the open, sunny places, and the playful 
 
 103 
 
164 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 way they had of running into every chink along the banks, 
 one would think they were angry ? Yes, on the whole, 
 Winifred liked Colorado ; and so did her little brother Nat ; 
 though, if you had told him Boston was just around the 
 corner, he would have started to run there without wai(hg 
 to put on his cap. 
 
 A little mite of a fellow -Nat was, full of good nature 
 and sunshine. Although he thought himself quite a big 
 boy, as he strutted about in his home-made jacket and 
 trousers, one thing could sorely trouble him and that 
 was to be away from Mother, even for an hour. There 
 was something in Mother s way of singing, Mother s way 
 of kissing hurt little heads and fingers, Mother s way of 
 sprinkling sugar upon bread, and Mother s way of rock 
 ing tired little boys, that Nat approved of most heartily. 
 He loved his father, too, and thought him the most power 
 ful woodcutter that ever swung an ax, though really the 
 poor man had to stop and rest at nearly every stroke. 
 
 See these two children now trudging toward the shal 
 low bend of the little river near by, quite intent upon the 
 launching and sailing of a tiny sloop that Father had made 
 for Nat on the evening before, warranting only that she 
 would float. This she did, and reared her one sail most 
 gallantly. But alas ! inspired by the current she sailed too 
 well. It required the restraining efforts of both children 
 to keep her near shore; and when at last Winnie remarked 
 in cold scorn that she did n t see much fun in sailing a 
 boat that had to be pulled back all the time, Nat and she 
 promptly decided to try some other kind of sport. 
 
 Father s big rowboat was moored close by, and why not 
 
TRAPPER JOE 
 
 165 
 
 get into it and set it a-rocking ? Father and Mother both 
 had laughed the other day to see them do this so of 
 course there could be no harm in it. 
 
 But when they had climbed into the rowboat they found 
 it too hot and sunny. At least Winnie said it was so. 
 
 "NOT MUCH FUN IN SAILING A BOAT THAT HAD TO BE PULLED BACK 
 ALL THE TIME." 
 
 "Let s try the canoe," she added, in a sprightly way. 
 " I m sure Papa would let us just sit in it." 
 
 " Course he would," responded Nat, promptly beginning 
 to climb out of the boat as he spoke. 
 
 The canoe was tied to a stake a little farther downstream, 
 where the river grew narrow, and the current was much 
 stronger. It was made of bark, and was pointed at both 
 ends. Now that the stream was swollen and flowing fast, 
 it was fine fun to sit together in the middle and "get 
 bounced about/ as Winnie said. 
 
166 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " You get in first, because you re the littlest," said Win 
 nie, holding her dress tightly away from the plashing wa 
 ter with one hand, and pulling the boat close to the shore 
 with the other. 
 
 " No, you get in first, cause you m a girl," said Nat. " I 
 don t want any helpin . I m going to take off my toos and 
 tockies first, cause Mama said I might." 
 
 Nat could say " shoes and stockings " quite plainly 
 when he chose, but everybody said " toos and tockies " 
 to him ; so he looked upon these words, and many other 
 crooked ones, as a sort of language of Nat, which all the 
 \vorld would speak if they only knew how. 
 
 In at last, both of them, and a fine rocking they 
 had. The bushes and trees threw cool shadows over the 
 canoe, and the birds sang, and the blue sky peeped down 
 at them through little openings overhead, and, altogether, 
 with the plashing water and the birds and pleasant murmur 
 of insects, it was almost like Mother s rocking and singing. 
 
 At first they talked and laughed softly. Then they lis 
 tened. Then they talked a very little ; then they listened 
 again, lying on the rushes in the bottom of the canoe. 
 Then they ceased talking, and watched the branches wav 
 ing overhead ; and, at last, they both fell sound asleep. 
 
 This was early in the forenoon. Mother was very busy 
 in the cabin, sweeping the room, making the beds, heating 
 the oven, and doing a dozen other things. At last she took 
 a plate of crumbs, and went out to feed the chickens. 
 
 " Winnie ! Nat ! " she called, as she stepped out upon 
 the clean, rough door-stone. " Come, feed the chickens ! " 
 
TRAPPER JOE 
 
 167 
 
 1 
 
 Then she added, in a surprised way, to herself : " Why, 
 where in the world can those children be? They must 
 have stopped at the new clearing to see their father." 
 
 At dinner-time, she blew the big tin horn that hung by 
 the door, and soon her hus 
 band came home alone, hun 
 gry and tired. 
 
 "Oh, you little witches!" 
 laughed the mother, without 
 looking up from her task of 
 bread-cutting. "How could 
 you stay away so long from 
 Mama? Tired, Frank?" 
 
 " Yes, very. But what do 
 you mean ? Where are the 
 youngsters ? " 
 
 She looked up now, ex 
 claiming in a frightened voice, 
 as she ran out past her hus 
 band : " Oh, Frank ! I Ve not 
 seen them for two or three 
 hours. I thought they were 
 with you. They surely would 
 n t have played all this time with the little sloop ! " 
 
 The father, who was indeed very weary, and not at all 
 alarmed, sat quietly awaiting her return. But when, in a 
 few moments, she rushed in screaming : " Oh, Frank ! 
 Frank ! the canoe is gone ! " he sprang up, and together 
 they ran toward the stream. 
 
 FRANK 
 
 CANOE is GONE!" 
 
168 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 All that long, terrible day, and the next, they searched. 
 They followed the stream, and at last found the canoe 
 but it was empty ! In vain the father and mother and 
 their only neighbor wandered through the forest in every 
 direction, calling : " Winnie ! Winnie ! Nat ! Nat ! " In 
 vain the father and the neighbor took their boats and 
 explored the stream for miles and miles no trace could 
 be found of the poor little creatures who, full of life and 
 joy, had so lately jumped into their father s canoe to " be 
 bounced about." 
 
 Where were they ? Alas ! they themselves did not 
 know. They only knew that they had been wakened sud 
 denly by a great thump, and that when they sprang out 
 of the canoe, and started to go home, everything was dif 
 ferent. There was no foot-path, no clearing where trees had 
 been cut down, no sound of Father s ax near by, nor of 
 Mother s song and the stream was rushing on very an 
 grily over its sandy bed. The canoe, which had broken 
 loose and, borne on by the current, had drifted away with 
 them nearly three miles from the stake, was wedged be 
 tween two great stones when they jumped out of it ; but 
 now it was gone the waters had taken it away. After a 
 while, in their distracted wanderings, they could not even 
 find the stream, though it seemed to be roaring in every 
 direction around them. 
 
 Now they were in the depths of the forest, wandering 
 about, tired, hungry and frightened. That night they cried 
 themselves to sleep in each other s arms under the black 
 trees ; and, as the wind moaned through the branches, 
 Winnie had prayed God to save them from the wolves, 
 
TRAPPER JOE 
 
 169 
 
 and little Nat had screamed, " Papa ! Mama ! " sobbing as 
 if his heart would break. 
 
 In the morning all they could find to eat was a few 
 sweet red berries that grew close to the ground. 
 
 Every hour the poor children grew fainter, and, at last, 
 Nat could n t walk at all. 
 
 " I m too tired and sick," he said, " and my feets all tut. 
 My toos and tockies is in the boat. 
 Winnie ! Winnie ! " he would 
 cry, with a great sob, " why don t 
 Mama n Papa come ? Oh, if 
 Mama d only come and bring us 
 some bread ! " 
 
 " Don t cry, dear don t cry," 
 Winnie would say over and over 
 again. " I 11 find some more red 
 berries soon ; and God will show 
 us the way home. I knoiv he will. 
 Only don t cry, Nat, because it 
 takes away all my courage." 
 
 "What?" asked Nat, looking 
 wildly at her as if he thought cour 
 age was something they could eat. 
 
170 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 "All my courage, Nat." And then, after searching in 
 vain for more red berries, she would moan : " Dear Father 
 in Heaven, I can t find anything more for Nat to eat. 
 Oh, please show us the way home ! " 
 
 Often she would tie her handkerchief high upon some 
 sapling, and, charging Nat on no account to " move a single 
 inch, dear," she would place him down by the tree, and 
 then press through the thicket and stumble over fallen 
 boughs in the vain hope of spying a foot-path or at least 
 the gleam of the noisy stream. Never once, however, did 
 she lose sight of the handkerchief that hung limp and 
 spiritless above Nat s head. 
 
 In vain. There was no path ; only the wilderness and 
 the growing darkness in every direction ; not a berry any 
 where. Eeturmng to her brother, and stroking his restless 
 little hands and whispering cheery words, she would sink 
 to the ground, and sob, in spite of herself. 
 
 What was that quick sound coming toward them ? The 
 underbrush was so thick Winnie could not see what caused 
 it, but she held her breath in terror, thinking of wolves 
 and Indians, for there were many of both, she knew, lurk 
 ing about in these great forests. 
 
 The sound ceased for a moment. Seizing Nat in her 
 arms, she made one more frantic effort to find her way to the 
 stream, then, seeing a strange look in the poor little face 
 when she put him down to take a firmer hold, she screamed : 
 
 " Nat ! Nat ! Don t look so ! Speak to Winnie ! " 
 
 " Hello, there " shouted a voice through the under 
 brush, and in another instant a tall, keen-faced man came 
 stamping and breaking his way through the bushes. 
 
TRAPPER JOE 171 
 
 " Hello, there ! What on airth s up now ? Ef old Joe 
 hain t come upon queer game this time. Two sick young 
 sters an ef they ain t a-starving ! Here, you young uns, 
 eat some uv this ere, and give an account uv yourselves." 
 
 With these words, he drew from a leather pouch at his 
 side, a couple of crackers. 
 
 The children clutched at them frantically. 
 
 " Hold up ! Not so sharp ! " he said ; " you must have a 
 little at a time for an hour yet. Here, sis, give me the 
 little one I 11 feed him ; and as for you, jest see that 
 you don t more n nibble ! " 
 
 " Oh, give me a drink ! " cried Winnie, swallowing the 
 cracker in two bites, and for an instant even forgetting 
 Nat. 
 
 The man pulled a canteen or flat thin flask from his belt 
 and gave her a swallow of water; then he hastened to 
 moisten Nat s lips and feed him crumb after crumb of 
 the broken cracker. 
 
 "Another day," he muttered to himself, as he gently fed 
 the boy and smoothed back the tangled yellow hair from 
 the pale little face, " another day, and he d a been past 
 mendin ." 
 
 Winnie looked up quickly. 
 
 " Is he going to die ? " she asked. 
 
 " Not he," said the man ; " he 11 come through right end 
 up yet. He s got a fever on him, but we 11 soon knock 
 that under. How d you get here, little gal ? " 
 
 Winnie told her story, all the while feeling a glad cer 
 tainty at her heart that their troubles were over. 
 
 The strange man carried a gun, and he had a big pistol, 
 
172 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 and a knife at the back of his belt. He looked very fierce, 
 too, yet she knew he would not harm her. She had seen 
 many a trapper since she had come to the West, and, be 
 sides, she felt almost sure he was the very trapper who had 
 been at her father s cabin a few months before, and taken 
 supper, warming himself by the big fire while he told 
 wonderful stories about Indians and furs, and about hav 
 ing many a time had "fifty mile o traps out on one 
 stretch." Yes, he was the very man, she believed, who had 
 told her parents how he had seen a bear walking one moon 
 light night across the very spot where their cabin now stood. 
 She remembered, too, that her father had told her the 
 next day that trappers lived by catching with traps all 
 
TRAPPER JOE 173 
 
 sorts of wild animals, and selling their furs to the traders, 
 and that this particular trapper had been very successful, 
 and had great influence among the Indians in fact, that 
 he was " one of the big men of that country," as he said. 
 
 These thoughts running through her mind now as she 
 told how they had been lost in the forest for two whole 
 days, and a night, and the sight of Nat falling peacefully 
 asleep on the trapper s shoulder, made her feel so happy 
 that she suddenly broke forth with, " Mr. Trapper ! I. 
 can run now. Let s go right home ! " 
 
 THE stars came out one by one that night, and winked 
 and blinked at a strange figure stalking through the forest. 
 He had a sleeping child on his arm, and yet carried his 
 gun ready to fire at an instant s notice. Trudging on, with 
 poor little Winnie half running beside him, he muttered 
 to himself: 
 
 " Well, old Joe, you Ve bagged all sort o game in this 
 ere forest, and trapped most everything a-goin , but you 
 ain t never had such a rare bit o luck as this. No wonder 
 I stood there on the edge of the timber-land, listening to I 
 did n t know what! Eeckon here s a couple o skins now 11 
 be putty popular at one market at any rate, fetch most 
 any price you could name. But I 11 let em go cheap ; all 
 the pay I want for these ere critters is jest to see the 
 antics of them poor frightened - Hello ! there s a light ! 
 What, ahoy ! Neighbor, hello ! hello ! " 
 
 " Got em both ! " he shouted, as three figures, two men 
 and a woman, came in sight through the starlight. "All 
 right got ein both ! " 
 
174 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 The children are awake now. What sobs, what laughter, 
 what broken words of gratitude and joy, fall upon the mid 
 night air ! Little Nat utters only a faint " Hello, Papa ! 
 hello, Mania ! " as he slides from Trapper Joe s strong hold 
 into his mother s outstretched arms. 
 
 Mother, Father, Trapper Joe, and the neighbor seem all 
 to be talking at once and Winnie, wondering and thrilled 
 with strange happiness, is saying to herself : " I knew God 
 would show us the way home ! " 
 
THE BRIGHTON CATS 
 
\ 
 
 MAY AND MABEL. 
 
THE BRIGHTON CATS 
 
 MABEL AND MAY, the twins, were very fond of cats. 
 From the time when they first toddled about the house arid 
 garden, they had a pet kitten that was their special pride 
 and joy. Strange to say, under these circumstances, this 
 kitten had a very comfortable though active existence, 
 and seemed to think that, instead of the twins owning 
 it, it owned the twins. 
 
 Well, one happy day when May and Mabel were eight 
 years old, their Uncle Jack came home from a long visit 
 in fact, as Mabel said, he had been away from them " a 
 whole half-year." He always had lived on Long Island, but 
 now he had been to Europe, and that, the twins insisted, 
 " made a great difference." He had seen the bears at Berne ; 
 the poll-parrots at Havre ; the lions and tigers at Hamburg ; 
 the monstrous birds and all the wonderful things in the 
 Jar din des Plantes in Paris ; and the fishes and sea-marvels 
 in the London Aquarium. But best of all, to the twins, 
 he had seen the amazing and delightful Brighton cats 
 those highly intelligent and dramatic creatures that, at one 
 time, were celebrated throughout Great Britain, 
 
 13 177 
 
178 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 It was on a winter evening, after their early supper, that 
 the twins first heard about the Brighton cats. Uncle Jack, 
 bowing elegantly, asked them to " step into the library, 
 please." 
 
 When they were cozily seated by the big table, he ob 
 served : " I believe you two like cats and kittens best of 
 all your animal friends." 
 
 " Oh, yes ! indeed we do ! " exclaimed the twins. 
 
 At this, Uncle Jack ran his hand deep down into the 
 inner breast-pocket of his coat, and held it there mysteri 
 ously, while the twins waited eagerly to see what new sur 
 prise was coming. Slowly he drew forth a small packet of 
 pictures, carefully laying them before him, backs up. 
 
 " Oh ! " said Mabel. 
 
 " Oh ! " said May. 
 
 " Just so," remarked Uncle Jack. " We understand one 
 another perfectly." And, somehow, he contrived by his tone 
 and manner to let them know that he highly approved of 
 their patient politeness, and that he would now proceed. 
 
 And this is the story he told them true from begin 
 ning to end. And the pictures of the Brighton cats, shown 
 in these pages, are carefully copied from the very photo 
 graphs that Uncle Jack took from his pocket that evening. 
 
 DID ever you hear of the Brighton cats ? No ? Well, 
 that is strange, for they are very famous fellows, I assure 
 you. Brighton is in England, you must know. They are 
 trained cats, and they are not only very good actors, but, 
 what is more pleasant still, they seem to enjoy their own 
 
THE BRIGHTON CATS 
 
 179 
 
 performances very much. Their master loves them clearly, 
 and every day they jump up on his shoulders, and, rubbing 
 their soft cheeks against his beard, purr gently, as if to 
 say, "Ah, master dear, if it were not for you, how stupid 
 
 I IMPKINS PAINTS. 
 
 we should be ! You have taught us everything." Then 
 the master laughs and strokes them, before he sets them 
 at work. Then he says: 
 
 " Pussies, attention ! " 
 
 Down they jump, their eyes flashing, their ears twitch 
 ing and eager, their very tails saying "Aye, aye, sir." 
 
180 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " Pimpkins, to work ! " 
 
 Pimpkins is a painter ; that is, he has learned to hold a 
 palette and mahlstick in one paw, and a brush in the 
 other, which you 11 admit is doing very well for a cat. 
 With his master s help, he is soon in readiness, perched 
 upon a stool and painting away for dear life on the canvas 
 before him. There is always a very queer-looking picture 
 on the easel unfinished, and pussy daubs away at it when 
 
 A GAME OF CHESS. 
 
 visitors are by ; but when asked whether he did it all or 
 not, he keeps very still, and so does his master. 
 
 Meantime the two other pussies, whom we must know 
 as Tib and Miss Moffit, obeying a signal from the master, 
 seat themselves at a table, and begin a lively game at 
 chess. The chessmen stand in proper order at first, and 
 both pussies look at them with an air of unconcern. Soon 
 
THE BRIGHTON CATS 
 
 181 
 
 Tib moves his man. Then Miss Moffit moves hers. On 
 comes Tib again, this time moving two men at once. In 
 stantly Moffit moves three. The game now grows serious. 
 Moffit s men press so thickly on Tib s that suddenly he 
 gives all of them a shove, and Miss Moffit is check-mated ! 
 Then Tib is grand. Leaning his elbows on the table, and 
 
 MISS MOFFIT HANGS THE CLOTHES TO DRY. 
 
 tipping his head sideways, he looks severely at Moffit until 
 she fairly glares. 
 
 After this all the pussies are, perhaps, requested to 
 wash for their master. And they do it, too, in fine style, 
 though, when they are through, Tib and Pimpkins gen 
 erally squabble for a bath in the tub, or pretend to do 
 so. The fact is, they hate soapy water ; but being great 
 actors, they scorn to show their real feelings while per 
 forming. Meanwhile Miss Moffit takes the clothes they 
 12* 
 
182 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 are supposed to have washed, and demurely hangs them 
 on the line to dry. 
 
 After work comes play. Miss Moftit and Pimpkins 
 have a little waltz, and Tib slides down the balusters. 
 Sometimes Tib amuses himself by drawing the cork from 
 
 MISS MOFFIT AND PIMPKINS WALTZ. 
 
 his master s ale-bottle. And then if the foaming ale 
 happens to be unusually lively, it makes a leap for Tib, 
 and Tib rubs his nose with his paws for five minutes 
 afterward. 
 
 Are they ever naughty ? Yes, indeed. But even then 
 their good master is gentle with them. He never whips 
 them, but simply looks injured, and orders them to " do 
 
THE BRIGHTON CATS 183 
 
 TIB ACTS AS BUTLER. 
 
 penance." Poor Tib and Moffit, for they generally are 
 the naughty ones, how they hate this ! But they never 
 think of such a thing as escaping the punishment. No, 
 indeed ; they jump upon a chair at once, and, shutting their 
 eyes, stand as you see them in the picture, two images of 
 misery, until their master says they may get down. 
 
 What else can they do ? Why, ever so many bright 
 things, I suppose, though I have told you of all that comes 
 to my mind at present. Ah, yes, they bowed; yes, all 
 three stood in a line and bowed gravely whenever the 
 pleased audience applauded very warmly. Sometimes, 
 too, they would place their right paws upon their hearts 
 as they bowed ; but this was an uncertain part of the per 
 formance, and their master pretended not to notice when 
 they failed. 
 
 One day an old woman from the country, after intently 
 
184 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 watching these talented cats, painting, chess-play in <? and 
 all that, shook her head solemnly. " I dunno as it s 
 right," she said ; " it s onnatural cuttin about and actin 
 like Christians as they do." 
 
 Tib stood on his hind legs at this, and Miss Moffit shook 
 paws with Pimpkins as well she might. 
 
 So ended Uncle Jack s true story. While telling it lie 
 had always, at the right moment, presented May and Mabel 
 with the fitting photograph so that they might see exactly 
 how these Brighton cats appeared in each scene. 
 
 DOING PENANCE. 
 
WOETH YOUR WEIGHT IN GOLD 
 
 (A TALK WITH GIRLS) 
 
WOETH YOUK WEIGHT IN GOLD 
 
 A STORY FROM LIFE 
 
 " YES, Miss Mamie, dat s jes what de missus sed to me, 
 Aunt Patsy/ ses she, you s jes wuf yo weight in 
 gole. An so I wuz, Miss Mamie ; I know d it. Poor 
 weak ole cull d pusson as I is, I know d she war tellin d 
 exac trufe. De Lord knows t ain t no vain-gloruf cation 
 fur ole Patsy t say dem words. I don take no pus nal 
 credit bout it, Miss Mamie. Cookin takes practice, but 
 it s got to come fus by natur . De ang l Gabr el hisse f 
 could n t make a cook out o some folks. It s got to be 
 born inter yer like. I se mighty umble and fearful ub 
 myse f bout some t ings, but not bout cookin . Dat I 
 un stan ; an dat s what made me wuf my weight in gole. 
 Missus did 11 hab no sort troubl bout nothin afer once dis 
 chile come. You s jes wuf yo weight in gole, she say to 
 ole Patsy one ebenin in my kitchum, when I was a-gettin 
 de supper ready for de fam ly. She say so. Ain t no use 
 talkin bout it dem s her cise words ter prove it. 
 
 " Well, de work wuz mighty heavy in dat house. Stacks 
 o comp ny, and massa war one ob dem perwiders dat don 
 hab no sort o notion how many pots kin go onto de stobe, 
 
 187 
 
188 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 and seem t t ink de oben was mos big as de barn. Many s 
 de time I got so tired seem d to me s if I d drop ; but 
 af er missus sed dat, I did n mind nuffin . Patsy, sez I, 
 when I seed myse f gettin done up, yer goo f nuffin lazy 
 nigger, wha s matter wid yer ? Don yer know yer s wuf 
 yo weight in gole ? and dat ud fotch me squar up. 
 Many s de time I se sed dem words to myse f sence dat 
 day, but wid dis diff ence : Missus, dear soul ! she done 
 gone to Ab am s bosom four year go ; an ole Patsy eber 
 sence s been mos too fur on wid dis ere cough to be much 
 count to white folks and so I keep sayin to myse f, 
 Yer wuz wuf yer weight in gole. Don you nebber forgit 
 dat. " 
 
 And, all this time, the brightly kerchiefed and check- 
 aproned speaker was going on briskly with her work, while 
 I sat looking at her with an amused smile ? 
 
 Not a bit of it. She was helpless in bed, dying of con 
 sumption, and my heart was full of reverence as I stood 
 gently fanning her. She was talking beyond her strength, 
 but I knew it was useless to check her while her thoughts 
 were with this treasured saying of her " missus." Presently 
 she sank into a doze. I stood there, afraid to move lest I 
 should wake her. 
 
 In a few moments she opened her eyes. 
 
 " Bress yer heart, Miss Mamie, don stan dere no lon 
 ger. Ole Patsy don want ter be missed like she war a 
 queen." 
 
 Her eyes were so bright and her tones so cheerful that I 
 thought she was going to laugh ; but, instead, she said 
 softly : 
 
WORTH YOUR WEIGHT IN GOLD 189 
 
 " T ain t fur much longer, Honey ; de Lord 11 soon sen 
 his char ot an take me to glory." 
 
 She ceased speaking. I knew by her face, though not a 
 sound could be heard, that she was singing under her 
 breath one of the dear old negro hymns that we had been 
 used to hearing when she was up and at work ; and then 
 she fell into another doze. 
 
 Two weeks from that day the chariot came. 
 
 HAPPY old Aunt Patsy ! Even with the memory of her 
 illness and suffering fresh in mind, I always think of her 
 as " happy old Aunt Patsy," for had she not been worth 
 her weight in gold ? The dear old woman always laid 
 great stress not at being prized at her weight in gold, but 
 in being really wuf it. That was the point. And the best 
 of it was that her precious weight being mainly in her 
 value as a good servant, it increased just so much in pro 
 portion as she excelled. Simple-hearted creature though 
 she was, she would have scorned the idea of weight, in this 
 connection, being a matter of mere flesh and bones. No, 
 it was Patsy the cook who was weighed in the balance. 
 
 It seems to me now that if I had seen Aunt Patsy 
 when I was a little girl, and heard her tell her story, it 
 would have been a great help. It would have taught me, 
 in one easy lesson, that to be worth your weight in gold is 
 a great advantage, and that the best way of becoming 
 worth your weight in gold is to learn to do some one 
 thing thoroughly well. Aunt Patsy could cook. That is 
 a fine thing in itself. Cooking is a good business when 
 one has one s living to make, and a valuable accomplish- 
 
190 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 ment when one has a living ready-made. Every one of 
 us girls, little and big, young and old, should know some 
 thing about it, and should seize all good opportunities to 
 improve in the art. But I am not going to ask you to 
 learn to cook ; that is, not now ; especially if it is not 
 " born into you." I only throw out as a friendly sugges 
 tion the idea that every girl should make it an object, as 
 Aunt Patsy did, to learn to do one thing well at a time. 
 If, as a start, she selects some style of housework, so much 
 the better. Let it be sweeping and dusting ; let it be 
 bed-making; let it be clear-starching, silver-cleaning or 
 cutting and sewing, or even one branch of cookery, such as 
 bread-making, or that rare art, potato-boiling. Let her 
 aim at real excellence in any one of these, taking the most 
 exact pains, looking out day by day for ways of improve 
 ment, aiming to excel herself at each effort, until, at last, 
 " Jenny did it " (or whatever her fortunate name may be) 
 shall stand as a guarantee for excellence in this or that 
 special department. Let Jenny s butter, or Jenny s bread, 
 be the best her father and mother ever tasted ; or let them 
 feel that no one else can so brighten the silver, or the tins, 
 or furniture ; that it is sure to be all right if Jenny but 
 sweeps the halls and stairs, or Jenny but makes the pud 
 ding, " It s her specialty, you know," and you will see, 
 if you are Jenny, what satisfaction there is in it. 
 
 Then, when one style of work is mastered, another can 
 be taken up and made a study ; and so on, till you are 
 worth your weight in gold to your family. Mind, I do not 
 mean to say that while these special endeavors are going 
 
WORTH YOUR WEIGHT IN GOLD 191 
 
 on you are to do all other work carelessly and without in 
 terest. Not so, of course. I mean only that one branch at 
 a time shall receive most care and attention till it is mas 
 tered to the utmost of your ability. Nor do I mean that 
 you are to spend all of your young life in housework. An 
 average of half an hour a day devoted to such work, or 
 even less, all through one s girlhood, will in many cases be 
 all that is necessary or desirable. But certainly a girl is 
 to be pitied who never is taught to sew, nor given an oppor 
 tunity to learn practically the rudiments of housewifery. 
 I hope none of you who read this are so unfortunate. 
 
 There are other fields of effort which you may cultivate. 
 Sewing or music, reading, fancy-work, drawing, certain 
 school-studies, gardening whichever of them seems most 
 attractive to you will serve as a starting-point. I have 
 dwelt principally upon the art of cooking, because Aunt 
 Patsy set me talking ; but there are many fair paths open 
 ing in every direction. Take the one nearest by, whether 
 it lead to the kitchen, the parlor, the library, or out of 
 doors. But be sure to be thorough as you go along. Don t 
 shimble-shamble through everything, and then wonder 
 that those who love you best are not quite satisfied with 
 your progress that you do not really add to any one s 
 comfort or interest ; in short, that you are not your worth 
 in gold. 
 
 " I love books best, but can I be a help to anybody at 
 home if I sit and read all day ? " you may ask. 
 
 And I answer, you cannot. If you read too much, you 
 are not reading well. If you read too steadily, you are not 
 
192 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 reading well. And if you read books that do not make you 
 more intelligent, more sunny, more charitable and high- 
 minded than you otherwise would be, you are reading 
 very badly indeed. If you sit reading for hours, selfishly 
 neglecting some duty, and filling your mind with false ideas 
 of life, and arousing thoughts that in your secret heart 
 you know are not good for you, you are doing an injury, 
 not only to yourself, but to others with whom you hence 
 forth may be brought in contact. 
 
 But if at seasonable times, and after proper intervals of 
 play or bodily exercise, you read in an inquiring, sincere 
 way books that entertain or instruct the best part of you 
 (we all soon find out what that best part of our nature is), 
 and that have been selected under guidance of some one 
 competent to help you, then you are doing good to others 
 as well as to yourself, by reading. You hardly can go up or 
 down stairs when in the mood such reading engenders with 
 out doing somebody good. If it is only the cat on the land 
 ing, she 11 get the benefit of it somehow. A sunny, healthy 
 mind sheds beams of light unconsciously ; and then there 
 are the cheery word, the pleasant smile, the ready spirit 
 of fun, the thoughtful question or answer, the entertaining 
 bubbles of talk that rise to the surface of a mind set 
 sparkling by good books worthily read. You will soon 
 find the value of it all, or some one else will. 
 
 It is not so much what good thing we do, though that is 
 of great consequence, but how well we do it that deter 
 mines our success. A pragmatic, conceited manner, or a 
 too selfish eagerness, will spoil any pursuit. There is such 
 a thing, you must know, as being unpleasantly pleasant, 
 
WORTH YOUR WEIGHT IN GOLD 193 
 
 meanly generous, incompetently competent, or even wick 
 edly pious. If you will think a moment, you will see that 
 it must be so. 
 
 For instance, a gift that really is of help to one needing 
 it may be given in the spirit of display or of rivalry with 
 some other giver. This is not true generosity. A merely 
 surface quality, however effective to outsiders, cannot be 
 the same as a quality which is so true, so deep and genu 
 ine, so in the grain from use and steady growth, that it 
 has become a part of one s own soul. 
 
 Doubtless circumstances make the paths of improve 
 ment easy for some and difficult for others but a life 
 that is easy at the start is not necessarily a fortunate life. 
 Hindering things sometimes are the stepping-stones to 
 prosperity and peace. I know to-day noble women whose 
 lives are the fitting flower of a beautiful, happy, indus 
 trious girlhood women who did not spend their early, 
 most impressive years solely for enjoyment s sake, with a 
 vague sense of something far ahead, called life, which had 
 very little to do with their present plans and pleasures 
 even with their studies and occupations. 
 
 Some persons, if once started on a road, will be so confi 
 dent of their way that they 11 forget to make the proper 
 turnings ; and there are persons who, in their tremendous 
 efforts for usefulness or self-improvement, make all around 
 them uneasy and uncomfortable. That is over-zeal. Such 
 persons are not worth their weight in gold to anybody. Then 
 we have the self-satisfied kind, the worst of all, perhaps. 
 Self-satisfaction is a wall that, builded by a girl s own 
 vanity, shuts her in completely. She cannot get outside of 
 
 13 
 
194 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 it herself, and no one cares to scale it in order to get at her. 
 A state of entire self-satisfaction is the loneliest thing on 
 earth. Self-approbation is another matter. It is worth 
 trying for because it is, in itself, good. But we must build 
 steps with it, not walls. 
 
 That is what Aunt Patsy did. She cooked better and 
 better every day. She worked hard for self-approbation, 
 and slowly made it her stairway. Steadily she mounted, 
 always humble and fearful of herself, but always hearing 
 her mistress s words, " worth your weight in gold " ; and 
 when at last she stood on the top of the little flight, she 
 felt sure the Lord was pleased that Old Patsy had been of 
 use to somebody. 
 
 To-day, in the soft twilight, a golden haze slowly 
 hiding the hilltops, gentle memories gathering within my 
 soul, I can hear the echo of Aunt Patsy s sweet refrain : 
 
 " Swing low, sweet chariot, 
 Comin for to carry me home." 
 
BIANCA AND BEPI>0 
 
" HARK! SAID BEPPO; WHAT is THAT * 
 
BIANCA AND BEPPO 
 
 BIANCA and Beppo were two little Italian children. 
 Their father was a Duke, and they lived years and years 
 ago when many of the Dukes of Italy were at war with one 
 another. Young as they were, Bianca and Beppo were 
 used to the sight of grim cavalcades of armed men and 
 mail-clad warriors. 
 
 It was a beautiful castle, adorned with fine pictures, 
 tapestries, and statues. Gay flowers bloomed at many a 
 window ; and the colors on the walls and floors were so 
 cunningly mingled that they were known to be there 
 only by a sense of brightness that filled the great rooms. 
 There were singing birds, too, that sang just as our birds 
 sing to-day. But pictures, or flowers, or birds, were not 
 half so bright, blooming, and merry as Beppo and Bianca. 
 Their father often said that the very armor in his halls 
 tingled with their childish laughter. 
 
 One day their mother, with an armed escort composed 
 of the most trusty of the duke s retainers, went away on a 
 visit to her father, a fierce old Baron, whose castle was 
 many miles distant in the heart of the Apennines. That 
 
 13* 107 
 
198 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 very night trouble came to the home where these children 
 dwelt. In their little carved and gilded beds, side by side, 
 they were wakened by a sudden commotion, as if men 
 were scuffling below ; and after that they could not go to 
 sleep again, because the castle was so very, very still. 
 For a long time they lay trembling and silent ; at last 
 Beppo said : 
 
 "Bianca, wait thou here. I will go down and rouse our 
 father. Perhaps he is still asleep. What if evil work has 
 been done?" 
 
 " Nay, Beppo," said Bianca, shuddering, " our men have 
 been fighting, and it may be their swords are drawn yet. 
 Do not go among them. Thou knowest how the people of 
 the wicked Duke Faustino fell upon young Martigni one 
 night when they were drunken, and would have killed 
 him had not help come. Martigni is taller by a head 
 than thou art." 
 
 "Aye, but the duke s men are not overloyal to his 
 house ; besides," said Beppo, proudly, " I could handle a 
 sword myself, if need be." 
 
 "Take me with thee," said Bianca. 
 
 So the two children rose softly, and hastily putting on 
 their clothes, stole down the dark stone stairway together. 
 A ray of moonlight, coming through a high, narrow window 
 overhead, made them start, but when they reached their 
 father s chamber and found the door wide open, the bed 
 empty, disordered, and signs of violence in the moonlighted 
 room, they clung to each other in dread find terror. 
 
 "What ho! without there!" cried Beppo, finding voice 
 at last. 
 
BIANGA AND BEPPO 199 
 
 There was no answer. 
 
 Bianca, hardly knowing what she did, ran screaming from 
 the chamber, out into the long dark hall, and on through 
 the great oaken door, which, to her surprise, was wide open. 
 Finally, she stood irresolute upon the marble terrace. 
 
 Beppo followed her. On his way he saw one of the 
 duke s chief attendants lying very still. 
 
 " Fesco ! Fesco ! are you hurt ? " called Beppo, again and 
 again. 
 
 But Fesco did not answer ; and with a shudder, the boy 
 bounded past him and joined Bianca on the terrace. 
 
 Down the long broad walk, past the beautiful garden, 
 and out through the open gateway they flew together, two 
 scantily- clad little children, chilly with fear on that warm, 
 bright night, and trembling at every sound. Oh, if their 
 father were but with them! 
 
 The forest was near by gloomy and grim now in its 
 shadows, but safer, at any rate, than the open highway. 
 They would hide there, they thought, till morning. 
 
 But night was nearly over; very soon the faint pink 
 streaks that lit the edge of the sky spread and grew 
 brighter and brighter. The children sat on a mossy mound 
 for a while and with tearful eyes watched the growing 
 light. Then Bianca remembered some fruit that she had 
 stowed the day before in the satchel hanging from her 
 girdle. She put it into Beppo s cap, and begged him to eat. 
 
 " I cannot," said Beppo. " Hark ! What is that ? " 
 
 They listened. It was a faint sound as of some one 
 moaning. 
 
 " Oh ! oh ! " sobbed Bianca, " what can it be ? " 
 
200 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 But when Beppo rose and bravely ran in the direction 
 of the sound, she followed him, and peered as sharply as 
 he into every bush. Suddenly Beppo sprang forward with 
 a joyful cry. 
 
 He had seen his father. 
 
 In an instant the two children were bending over him, 
 eagerly trying to catch his indistinct words. 
 
 " I have been wounded, my little ones," he said, slowly ; 
 " can you bring me water ? " 
 
 They did not wait to wring their hands and cry. Beppo, 
 forgetting his fears, forgetting everything but that his 
 father needed help, flew to his home. 
 
 At the portal, whom should he see but Fesco, standing 
 in the doorway, staring wildly about him. 
 
 The water was soon obtained, though it might have 
 been brought sooner, if Beppo, in his excitement, had not 
 forgotten the little stream near the great sycamore. And 
 Beppo and Fesco ran to the forest together. 
 
 When they reached the spot where the duke lay, Bianca, 
 under her father s directions, was doing all she could to 
 bathe his wound ; her little face was very pale, but she 
 looked up with a bright smile as Beppo approached. 
 
 " Father says he will get well, Beppo, but we are not to 
 move him from this soft bed, he says. See, I have heaped 
 leaves under his head, and I have brought water in my 
 hands from the brook." 
 
 It is a long, long story, if you hear every word of it ; 
 but you will be glad to get quickly to its ending. .Beppo 
 was right ; there had been evil work. The duke had been 
 dragged from the castle and stabbed. His guilty, frightened 
 
BIANGA AND BEPPO 201 
 
 assassins, thinking him dead, had thrown him into the 
 forest. All of the duke s servants, excepting Fesco, had 
 either been badly wounded or had fled in terror at the first 
 alarm. He had been drugged, and had slept so heavily, 
 that, but for the fresh night-air blowing in upon him, he 
 mio ht never have wakened. 
 
 o 
 
 Fesco now tried to persuade his wounded master to be 
 taken back to his own chamber, but the duke would not 
 consent. He lay concealed in the forest for a week, and 
 every day his children tended him faithfully. They 
 brought him cooling drinks and fruits, and fanned him 
 when the breezes were low ; and as he grew better they 
 sang sweet little songs to him, and carried messages back 
 and forth between the duke and Fesco. 
 
 Meantime the frightened servants had returned ; but 
 Fesco knew he could not trust them with his secret. Only 
 Mino, the old nurse, was told that the duke was alive, and 
 that the children must be allowed to go to him; but Fesco 
 threatened her with such terrible things if she breathed a 
 word about it, that she was only too glad to pretend to 
 mourn for her master with a grief that seemed as genuine 
 as that of the other servants. Through the faithful Fesco, 
 the duke contrived to send word to his wife, bidding her 
 stay in safe quarters for a while, until he should be able 
 to join her. The two children, busy as bees, and thought 
 ful night and day for their dear patient hidden in the 
 forest, were secretly happy as children could be despite 
 the somber black in which they had been clothed by old 
 Mino. It was Bianca s delight to gather flowers in the 
 coolest places and heap them up under her father s head ; 
 
202 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 and Beppo was proud to stand guard, sword in hand, ready 
 to fight off any enemy that might approach. 
 
 But no enemy came ; only the good friends health and 
 strength. And one dark night the duke and the children, 
 cleverly disguised by Fesco, were driven away in an old 
 wagon for miles and miles, until at last they came to a 
 shepherd s cottage, where the duchess was waiting for 
 them; and a happier meeting than theirs never took place 
 on earth. 
 
 After that, Beppo s father and mother went to live, for a 
 while, in Germany, taking their children with them, while 
 Fesco stayed at home to look after his master s posses 
 sions. But one fine day, the warfare came to an end, as all 
 things do soon or late ; and, his troubles over, the duke 
 was free again. He and his family were able to go back 
 and live in their castle peacefully and happily; and once 
 more the armor on the old walls tingled with the merry 
 laughter of Bianca and Beppo. 
 
A LAW THAT COULD NOT BE BEOKEN 
 
OLD MK. FEATHEK-BEU ! ALL YOU VE GOT TO DO IS TO CATCH IT. 
 
A LAW THAT COULD NOT BE BROKEN 
 A YOUNG LAWYER S STORY 
 
 ONE evening I was reading aloud to my wife, not one 
 of my "never-ending law books," as she called them, but 
 something, to my mind, much heavier. My wife had a 
 strange fancy for primary scientific reading, and I as a 
 wise husband humored her taste whenever I could. So 
 tliis time the book chanced to be one called Amott s 
 " Physics or Natural Philosophy." Suddenly, in the very 
 middle of a sentence, I laughed aloud. 
 
 Now, Arnott s " Physics " is by no means a droll book. 
 I am quite sure there is not a joke in it, from cover to 
 cover. So, when I laughed, my wife looked up in great 
 surprise, for, naturally, my reading had put the dear little 
 lady in a decidedly thoughtful mood. 
 
 " What is it, Eob ? " she asked, smiling in spite of her 
 self when she met my broad grin. 
 
 " Tills part here, about the center of gravity and its 
 always taking the proper place," answered I, tapping the 
 page with my fingers, " made me think of something." 
 
 205 
 
206 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " Did it ? " she said with solemn surprise. 
 
 As the precious girl please don t mind my speaking 
 in this way of my little wife, for, the fact is, we have been 
 married but two years, and she is just twenty to my twenty- 
 five, as the precious girl evidently did not expect an 
 answer to her question, I took up the book again and read : 
 
 "By attending to the center of gravity of the bodies around us 
 on the earth, we are enabled to explain why, from the influence 
 of gravity, some of them are stable, or firmly fixed, others tot 
 tering, others falling. * * * The line of a plummet hanging 
 from the center of gravity is called the line of direction of the 
 center, or that in which it tends naturally to descend to the 
 earth. 
 
 " You remember, Lily," said I, interrupting myself, 
 " the law we read in Gale yesterday : 
 
 "While the line of direction falls within the base upon which 
 the body stands, the body cannot upset; but if the line fall 
 beyond the base, the body will tumble." 
 
 Then, taking a pencil and note-book from my pocket, I 
 made a picture of a coach tilted by a great stone in such 
 a way that a perpendicular line drawn from its center of 
 gravity fell beyond the base of the coach, that is, outside of 
 the point where its wheels touched the ground, and she 
 saw at a glance, with a little womanly shiver, that the 
 coach must upset. 
 
 " Oh, yes, I understand it now, perfectly," she exclaimed, 
 quite pleased. 
 
 So I read on, as Dr. Arnott proceeded to tell us how to 
 find the center of gravity of any object, and to explain in 
 
A LAW THAT COULD NOT BE BROKEN 207 
 
 a very clear and delightful way the principle shown in 
 rolling balls, leaning towers, and unsafe chimneys; in the 
 graceful positions of skaters; in tumbling dolls and the 
 movements of various toys, 
 
 " Eob ! " exclaimed my wife. 
 
 " No, dear," said I, listening a moment and thinking 
 that she had fancied she heard the baby cry. 
 
 " Eob ! " she exclaimed again, " what were you laughing 
 about ? " 
 
 " When ? " said I. 
 
 " Why, a moment ago." 
 
 " Oh," I said, " did n t I ever tell you, my dear ? It was 
 such a capital illustration of the laws we have just been 
 studying, though I did n t know it at the time." 
 
 "Well?" said she. 
 
 She drew her chair close to mine, with a comical look 
 of curiosity on her face, and I began in a dramatic voice: 
 
 " T is now about fifteen years since a small boy, full of 
 mischief by nature, but very cautious by education, found 
 himself alone in the upper part of a fine city mansion. 
 His mother was out. The servants were in the kitchen, 
 and this small boy felt that, perhaps, never again would 
 lie have such a grand chance to be up to something, lie 
 hardly knew what." 
 
 "Was it you, Eob?" 
 
 " It was," said I. "Well, as the boys say, I cast about 
 for some time, not able to settle on a plan. Many delight 
 ful projects entered my head, but they were all more or 
 less connected with danger. There was the roof, as steep 
 and as slanting as heart of bov could wish ; but T had been 
 
208 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 made so thoroughly to understand that to tumble from it 
 would be to break every bone in my body, to say nothing 
 of being killed stone dead, that I gave up my half-formed 
 plan at once. Then there was the window. It would be 
 fun to let myself down from it by tying a stout rope to the 
 bed-post, and so sliding to the ground. But the rope 
 might break, or I might not be able to hold on and the 
 wild thought was abandoned in a flash. Suddenly an idea 
 came to me : 
 
 "There was a beautiful porcelain vase on the top of 
 father s bookcase, high out of reach. Often had I longed 
 to see it near by, or perhaps to take it into my own hands, 
 but always I had been met by a harrowing array of 
 reasons why my wish could not be gratified. In the first 
 place the vase was precious secondly, it was fragile 
 thirdly, it was expensive fourthly, it had been firmly 
 perched upon the top of that solid bookcase so that it 
 might be safely out of harm s way fifthly, there was 
 no sense in my desiring a nearer view of it, a sharp-eyed 
 little fellow like me sixthly, they had no time to bother 
 with such nonsense seventhly, they would n t, and so on, 
 till, in the course of time, I had been given twenty good 
 reasons, more or less, why that vase should n t, could n t, 
 and must n t be disturbed. These, of course, w r ere soon 
 twisted by my perverse but most lovable self into twenty 
 or less good reasons why I should, could, and must hold 
 that vase in my own hands and enjoy a good, long, linger 
 ing look at it. Now was my opportunity. Why not ? 
 There was no one nigh to hinder. But 
 
 " What if I should break it I 
 
A LAW THAT COULD NOT BE BROKEN 209 
 
 "A happy thought came. Nothing could harm it if I 
 only could put a feather-bed between it and destruction. 
 I knew where there was a tine fat one. Glorious ! now I 
 could manage to pull the vase down from its perch as 
 easy as a wink, and without breaking it ! " 
 
 " You little goose ! then, not now," added Mrs. Robert, 
 hastily. 
 
 " Goose or not, I tried it," said I. " It was nearly time 
 for mother to return. There was not a moment to be lost, 
 and I had to make important preparations. 
 
 " The bed was made up in fine style, with its great 
 ruffled pillow fixings and its silken spread all tucked in 
 as if it were never to come out again. But I hauled off 
 the covers, and with many a tug and pull brought the 
 feather-bed to the floor. Then I dragged it to the book 
 case. The next thing was to fetch a step-ladder from the 
 garret no easy job for a ten-year-old. This done, it was 
 evident I should need some sort of a stick with which I 
 could tenderly start the vase. Father s umbrella with its 
 crooked handle was just the thing. 
 
 " Good! said I to myself. Won t it be larks to knock 
 down the vase and never hurt it a bit ! Good for you, too, 
 Old Mr. Feather-Bed ! All you ve got to do is to catch it. 
 
 "With this, seizing the umbrella after the manner of 
 the boy and flag in Excelsior, and hastily adjusting the 
 ladder, I mounted to the top and 
 
 " O Rob ! " cried Mrs. Robert, laughing. " I remember 
 hearing all about it ! Yes, just as well as if it were yes 
 terday. Your mother had been to our house, and my 
 mother had gone home with her. They went right 
 
210 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 up-stairs, and just as they opened the door they heard 
 such a crash, and there were you and the ladder on the 
 floor ! No, the ladder was on the feather-bed, mama said, 
 and you were on the floor. You must have pitched over 
 backward, Eob, just as the ladder slipped from under 
 you." 
 
 "Very likely," said I. 
 
 " Well, I declare ! That was a caper ! What a funny 
 little wisp of a boy you were ! And to think of our 
 actually being married thirteen years afterward! But 
 what about the vase ? " 
 
 " Oh, that was safe enough, you may be sure, for the 
 umbrella had n t time to touch it." 
 
 "Eob," said Mrs. Robert, "if you had opened that ladder 
 a little wider, or taken a plummet up with you and been 
 careful to have the line of direction from the center of 
 gravity fall within the base of the ladder, all would have 
 been well, would n t it, my 
 
 Just then little Rob was heard in the next room scream 
 ing like a good fellow. Off ran Mrs. Robert. I was left 
 alone to ponder over the laws of gravitation. 
 
A GAEEET ADVENTURE 
 
A GAEEET ADVENTURE 
 
 "SNOW! snow! snow!" 
 
 So it did ! But Ned Brant need not have been so cross 
 about it. He seemed to think, as he said the words, that, 
 of all unfortunate, ill-used fellows, he was the most to be 
 pitied ; and, of all hateful, malignant things, those soft, 
 white, downy specks, flitting past the window, were hate- 
 fulest and most malignant. 
 
 " Christmas week, too, and new skates ! new skates and 
 no skating ! " said Ned, bitterly. 
 
 So it was ; and perhaps the snow ought to have been 
 ashamed of itself ; but it did n t seem to be. 
 
 At this moment a great clattering was heard at the 
 back door. 
 
 " They ve come ! after all," cried Ned, rushing out of 
 the room and down the stairs, all his wretchedness gone 
 in an instant. 
 
 His two sisters were at the door before him, and the 
 three opened it together. 
 
 " Oh, oh, howdy-do ? we were afraid you would n t 
 come ! " said some voices, and " Hello ! where s your 
 
214 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 scraper ? " " Pooh ! we were n t going to mind such a little 
 snow as this," cried others, all in a chorus. 
 
 Six visitors ! Think of that. Two lived next door on 
 one side, two lived next door on the other side, and two 
 lived right across the way. The first pair were Wilbur 
 and Rob ; the second pair were Herbert and Dickie ; the 
 third pair were Jamie and Tommy. Wilbur had on an 
 overcoat and a muffler, for he had a weak chest. Eob had 
 a tippet tied over his ca,p, for he was subject to ear-ache. 
 Herbert had a cap and a gray overcoat ; Dickie had a cap 
 and no overcoat ; Jamie wore a Scotch suit ; and Tommy 
 wore a short bob-jacket and long trousers. I tell you this 
 so that you may know how they appeared. As for their 
 faces, they were so rosy and bright that they all looked 
 alike when the door opened. All the visitors were boys, 
 as any one would have known who heard the tramping as 
 the party went up-stairs. 
 
 Yes, up-stairs they went, nine of them, talking every 
 step of the way. The home children, Ned, Euth and 
 Dot, almost always took any visitor that came, right to 
 their mother s room either to introduce them, or, at any 
 rate, to give them the benefit of her hearty " How do you 
 do, my dears ? " But this time they went straight past her 
 door, up, up, to the very garret. 
 
 " Ned," his mother had said in the morning, " if the 
 children come this afternoon to help you keep the holi 
 days, either play in the yard or up in the garret, for I 
 shall be quite busy. Have all the fun you can. but be 
 sure not to break anything and not to take cold." 
 
 You may wonder why Mrs. Brant did not say : " Be 
 
A GARRET ADVENTURE 215 
 
 sure not to be naughty." But she would almost as soon 
 have said : " Be sure not to cut off your heads," as to have 
 said that. She knew her children too well to think they 
 did not wish to be good. As for telling them " not to 
 take cold," that only meant they must be sure to dress 
 warmly if they played out of doors. The garret was never 
 very chilly, because the heat from the furnace always 
 crept up there whenever it had a chance. 
 
 It was a lovely old garret, light, yet mysterious, with 
 plenty of stored-away things in it to make it interesting, 
 and a great cleared space to play in. Just now it was 
 even more delightful than usual, for in one corner of it 
 was a very big heap of " potter s clay." 
 
 " Oh, what s that ? " cried the visitors, the moment they 
 reached the garret door. 
 
 " That s potter s clay," said Euth. " It s splendid for 
 lots of things. Father s going to make some kind of 
 what-you-call- ems out of it." 
 
 Thereupon the six visitors all stood in a row and gazed 
 at the heap. It was gray, dusty and lumpy, and looked 
 something like faded-out garden soil. 
 
 " What s he going to make ? " said Tommy. 
 
 " I don t know, exactly," said Euth, " it only came 
 yesterday." 
 
 " Was it a Christmas present to your papa ? " asked little 
 Dickie, innocently. 
 
 "No, indeed," replied Ned, with lofty scorn. "He had 
 slippers. What d your father get ? " 
 
 " Slippers, too," said Dickie. 
 
 " So did my papa," remarked Wilbur, laughing. 
 
216 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " I guess all gentlemens get em," said Dickie, thought 
 fully, "but I d rather have most anything sides them." 
 
 Still the children stood staring at the heap of clay. 
 
 " Let s sit on it," said Jamie, with great daring. " I 
 guess it 11 dust off." 
 
 A hint was enough. The heap soon was covered with 
 children, and when they jumped up they found that Jamie 
 was right. It " dusted off" admirably. 
 
 " Let s make a road," cried one of the others. 
 
 "All right !" said Ned, in great glee ; but he looked at 
 Euth, and she answered his look with, " Yes ; we d best 
 ask Mania." 
 
 Ned was down the garret stairs in a twinkling. Then 
 on the next flight he stopped half-way and called : 
 "Mother! Mother ! may we play with the clay?" No 
 answer came; so he ran on down. Mrs. Brant was very 
 busy, fitting a dress for her mother. 
 
 " Don t come in, Ned ! " she called, as Ned knocked at the 
 door. " I m busy with Grandma ; what do you want ? " 
 
 " May we play with the clay, Mother ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes, I suppose so," said the mother, pinning a plait 
 on Grandma s shoulder; "do what you please with it, only 
 don t throw it about and get it into one another s eyes." 
 
 "Oli, no, certainly not," answered Ned, as he rushed 
 toward the garret stairs again, quite delighted. 
 
 But when he reached the top he found all the children 
 with tears in their eyes. 
 
 They had already forgotten the clay ; for Euth had taken 
 a big onion from a bunch that hung on one of the rafters. 
 Wilbur had cut it in slices, and now every one was hold- 
 
A GARRET ADVENTURE 217 
 
 ing a piece to see "which could smell the onion longest 
 without crying." 
 
 "What a pack of ninnies ! " cried Ned, laughing, and all 
 the ninnies laughed with him, except little Dot, who 
 whined a little and wished she had not tried it. 
 
 " Have you given up the road ? " asked Ned, but nobody 
 answered him, for that old garret had so much in it to 
 look at, so many odd nooks and corners, that before the 
 eight pairs of eyes were dry their owners were all scudding 
 and burrowing about like so many rabbits. What a de 
 lightful time they had ! I cannot begin to tell you all the 
 games they played, and the comical talks they had, nor 
 how they "dressed up" in the old hats and garments they 
 found hanging on the nails, nor how the boys made the 
 girls scream by crying, " Look out ! a rat ! kill him ! kill 
 him!" and then flinging their victim across the floor in the 
 shape of an old boot or a bit of torn fur. At last Tommy 
 looked out of one of the little square windows, which was 
 half covered with cobwebs. " I say, it s snowing harder 
 than ever there d have been good skating by to-morrow 
 if it had n t snowed ! " 
 
 This had the effect of making all the party serious for a 
 moment. 
 
 " It is n t so very bad," said Euth, who always looked on the 
 bright side of things. " There 11 be splendid snowballing." 
 
 " Who cares for snowballing ! " cried little Dickie, 
 "skatin s the best." 
 
 Everybody laughed at this, for Dickie was only six 
 years old, and could n t skate a stroke, not even on roller 
 skates. 
 
218 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 Suddenly Wilbur cried, "Oh!" and stood motionless, 
 looking steadily at the floor. Eob Hew to him like a good 
 brother, as he was, and gave him a poke. 
 
 " What on earth s the matter, Wilbur ? " 
 
 " Nothing. Only I bet we could ! Sure as I live we 
 could ! " 
 
 " Could wliat ? " cried Tommy. 
 
 "Why, make a skating-pond here, right here, in this 
 very garret ! " 
 
 " Yes, you could," sneered Tommy, who, by the way, was 
 the only fellow who had taken off his hat ; Euth had ex 
 cused the others because the garret w T as not very warm. 
 
 " I tell you, I could, man. I say, Ned, let s do it ! We 
 can have a pond here before night. You have a bath-room 
 on the next floor, have n t you ? Here are pots and pans 
 enough for all of us." 
 
 All the eight stared at Wilbur, as if they thought his 
 wits were leaving him, but he added eagerly: 
 
 " I tell you, it will be grand. We 11 have as big a circle 
 as we can get here in the middle of the garret, and make a 
 bank out of that clay, after we Ve moistened it so it will 
 stick together. Clay holds water perfectly. Then we 11 
 fill up the circle with water." 
 
 Their eyes danced at this, but Tommy chilled their 
 ardor with a sarcastic 
 
 " Ho ! skate on water ! ho ! " 
 
 " We 11 open the scuttle and - the windows, and let the 
 pond freeze overnight " said Wilbur. 
 
 " Jimminy ! " screamed Ned ; " so we can ! Come on 
 here; we 11 have the bank in a jiffy ! " 
 
A GARRET ADVENTURE 219 
 
 " Hurrah ! " cried the rest. 
 
 In an instant all hands were at work all but Euth, 
 who looked troubled, and begged Dot to "go down and 
 ask Mama." She should have gone herself, for Dot was 
 only six years old, and a very uncertain young person in 
 the art of carrying messages. 
 
 Soon Dot, clambering down two sets of stairs, rushed into 
 her mother s room with, " Mama. Euth wants to know if 
 we can do it ? " 
 
 " Do what, Dot ? (Mother, do look at that child s cheeks 
 they re just like roses.) Do what, my pet ?" 
 
 " Why, play bank with the clay," panted Dot. 
 
 " Oh, I suppose I must," laughed the mother. " Tell 
 her yes, Dot." As the little girl ran out of the room and 
 up the stairs, screaming, "Yes, yes, Mama says you can 
 do it," Mrs. Brant said to Grandma, " I ought to go up, I 
 suppose. But they can t do more than make a mess with 
 it, and they can clear it all up to-morrow. If I were you, 
 Mother, I d never let Madame Pomfret make me a gown 
 again. I can improve this a little, but the cut was all 
 wrong in the first place." 
 
 "You re too easy with those children, Eliza," said 
 Grandma, quietly, adding, as Mrs. Brant hurriedly took 
 up her sewing again, " but they re such dear little things, 
 I don t wonder you like to make em happy." 
 
 " Good ! " cried Ned, when Dot s happy message was de 
 livered. " Mother s splendid. I say, we must fill up all 
 these cracks with the clay, boys." 
 
 " You re sure Mother said we could, Dot ? " 
 
 " Course she did," said Dot, decidedly. " She laughed, too." 
 
220 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 Poor little Dot had no idea that she had told her mother 
 only half of their plan. Her own head was so full of it that 
 she thought every one else must know all about it, too. As 
 for Euth, she being three years older, could not help being 
 surprised at their mother s consent to such wild fun, yet 
 she never dreamed but that her mother had consented. 
 It was a time of deep delight to her, for she could work as 
 hard as any of the boys. 
 
 In a little while the bank was made. "Many hands 
 make light work." It was a fine affair, well packed and 
 quite regular in shape, for Wilbur had chalked a circle on 
 the floor for them " to work by." 
 
 So before very long Ned and Tommy took two pails that 
 were in a corner of the garret and ran to the bath-room 
 for water. Euth gave a pitcher to Jamie, a basin to Her 
 bert, a tub to Wilbur, and, seizing a big earthen jar for 
 herself, gave the word for all to follow. 
 
 It was hard work, but it passed for play, and they all 
 played with a will. They let the water run from both of 
 the faucets into the bath-tub, so that after a while some 
 could fill at the faucets and others could dip as much 
 water as they wished out of the tub. 
 
 Up and down, down and up, the laughing children went, 
 panting and puffing, filling and pouring, bucketful, pailful, 
 pitcherful, basinful, crockful, over and over again, till at 
 last the pond began to show in earnest. Wilbur seized an 
 old spade out of a broken cradle, and had as much as he 
 could do to watch the clay bank, and mend breaks, and 
 beat it solid with the back of the spade. 
 
 "Keep on ! keep on ! " shouted Ned, still leading the way, 
 
A GARRET ADVENTURE 221 
 
 while the rest followed. "We 11 have her full in less than 
 no time." 
 
 " Eliza ! " said Grandma, " do hear the tramping. What 
 on earth can those children be doing ? " 
 
 " Oh," laughed Mrs. Brant, " they re playing some game 
 or other. Betsey 11 look after them. She s busy up-stairs, 
 for I hear the water running." 
 
 " It s mighty queer," said Ned, dashing in a pailful, as 
 Euth emptied her crock for the twentieth time " mighty 
 queer how long it takes the thing to fill but keep on, 
 fellows. Don t stop ! " 
 
 In a few moments the street door opened, and in came 
 Mr. Brant. He went at once up to the sewing-room. 
 
 " How d ye do, how d ye do ? " said he cheerily, kissing 
 Mrs. Brant and his mother. " Well, this is a busy party 
 put up your work, my dear, and come up to the library 
 I ve something to tell you and Mother. Ho ! ho ! here s 
 baby awake. Well, we must take him up, too." 
 
 Baby shouted with delight to find himself in Papa s 
 arms. Mrs. Brant laid down her work, Grandma took her 
 crochet-basket in her hand, and they all went up to Papa s 
 light, pleasant library on the floor above. 
 
 " Well, my dear, what is it ? Some good news, I m 
 sure," said Mrs. Brant, as Grandma nestled in her easy 
 chair, and Papa, setting baby on the floor with a toss and a 
 flourish, proceeded to place a chair for himself between 
 his wife and mother. 
 
 " Yes, it is good news, dear, I m happy to say," he an 
 swered, with a bright smile. " I don t know when I ve 
 
A GARRET ADVENTURE 223 
 
 had anything so pleasant to Halloa, what the mischief s 
 the matter ? " 
 
 They started up. Surely enough, something was the 
 matter. It was raining ! A shower was coming down on 
 their heads, the ceiling was cracking, the baby screaming. 
 Patter, patter came the water, faster and faster. What 
 could it be ? Perhaps the house was on fire and the fire 
 men already were up-stairs with their hose ! The thought 
 made Grandmother scream as she rushed to the baby s 
 rescue. Mr. Brant dashed up the stairs, almost knocking 
 down Dot and Kob on the way. 
 
 " What s going on up here ? Quick ! where does the 
 water come from ? " 
 
 No need of asking the question. There were the pond, 
 the startled faces of the children, the pitchers, basins and 
 pails. 
 
 " What in the world ! " cried the father, seizing a pail 
 and scooping up as much as he could from the pond. 
 " Here, lend a hand, all of you ! Call Betsey ! we must 
 empty this as quickly as possible." 
 
 He had opened the little window by this time, had 
 emptied the pail, and was now dipping from the pond 
 again. The children meantime took the hint, and, opening 
 the other window, went to work as hard as they could. 
 Well, they emptied the pond in a quarter of the time it 
 had taken to fill it. Mrs. Brant, Grandma and Betsey came 
 to the rescue and did wonders with towels, sheets and 
 everything of that sort they could lay their hands on. In 
 her excitement, Mrs. Brant came near wiping the floor 
 with the baby. 
 
224 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 The worst was soon over, but it seemed the library 
 ceiling could n t get over it in a hurry. It dripped, and 
 dripped, and broke out in great damp blotches and cracked 
 and whimpered as if it were alive. Fortunately, the con 
 tents of the bookcases escaped wetting, and the carpet 
 did n t "run," as Grandma said; so it might have been worse. 
 
 But those six visitors who shall describe their emo 
 tions ! As one of them afterward said, they "were fright 
 ened to death and bursting with laughter." They all tried 
 to hide behind one another when Mr. Brant, half angry, half 
 amused, asked them what they would like to do next. 
 
 " Go home, sir, I guess," said Tommy. 
 
 And home they went. 
 
BORROWING TROUBLE 
 
HE LAY ON THE SOFT GRASS UNDER HIS FAVORITE TREE, PONDERING 
 
 THE JESTER S WORDS." 
 
BOEKOWING TROUBLE 
 
 A FEW hundred years ago, there lived near Florence a 
 handsome little prince and a beautiful little princess. 
 These two children had everything that a good human 
 heart of that day could have, excepting trouble. It seemed 
 that this could not come to them. From the day that a 
 careless lady of the court had remarked in Francesca s 
 presence, "Ah, Leonardo ! thou well mayst say this world 
 has trouble enough for all," the little princess had won 
 dered what trouble was, and why, if there was enough for 
 all, she and her brother had none of it. Often the princess 
 would say : 
 
 " Ferdinand, what is trouble ? " And Ferdinand would 
 reply : "Alas ! Francesca, I do not know." 
 
 "Let us ask our parents to give us some," pursued Fran 
 cesca ; " they never refuse us anything." 
 
 But the king and queen shuddered at their request : 
 
 " No, no, dear children," they cried ; " you do not know 
 
 227 
 
228 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 what you ask. Pray that these wicked wishes may vanish 
 from your hearts ! " 
 
 But the prince and princess were not satisfied with this 
 answer. They applied to the most powerful of their cour 
 tiers, and, to their great astonishment, met with a refusal, 
 accompanied with a smile and a polite bow. They even 
 had recourse to the court jester. 
 
 "Ah, that trouble is a very precious thing," said the 
 jester. " One cannot buy it, and it is not to be had for the 
 asking. But one may borrow it." 
 
 " Good ! " cried the delighted pair. " We shall borrow 
 some." 
 
 " But," added the jester, " if you borrow any, you must 
 pay back in the same coin." 
 
 "Alas ! " sighed the prince and the princess. " How can 
 we, if we have no trouble which belongs to us ? " 
 
 " True ! There is the trouble," said the jester, as he 
 skipped away. 
 
 " What did he mean by those words ? " said the prince, 
 nearly out of patience ; " but we need not concern our 
 selves about what he says he is only a fool ! " 
 
 Still the prince did concern himself about it, and he lay 
 long on the soft grass under his favorite tree that day, 
 pondering the jester s words. 
 
 The princess sought Master Cap-and-Bells again, but 
 the interview ended sadly ; for her little highness turned 
 away despairingly, and the jester looked sorely puzzled. 
 " What stupidity," he muttered to himself, " for the whole 
 court to be compelled to keep this royal youth and maiden 
 in ignorance of such a fact as trouble the common lot of 
 
BORROWING TROUBLE 
 
 229 
 
 THE INTERVIEW ENDED SADLY. 
 
 all ! " But he flourished his bauble and jingled his bells as 
 he danced off for was he not the court jester ? 
 
 Next, in despair, the brother and sister went in search 
 of their faithful nurse. 
 
 " Dear Catherine," said they, " we have never had any 
 trouble. The contessa told my lord Leonardo that there was 
 enough in this world for all. Have you had yours ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes, my darlings ; I have always had more trouble 
 than I want," wailed the old woman, shaking her head. 
 
 "Oh, oh ! Give us some ! Give us some, good Catherine!" 
 eagerly exclaimed the prince and princess. 
 
 But Catherine lifted her hands in horror, and tottered 
 away, mumbling her prayers. 
 
 15* 
 
230 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 Then the prince and princess wandered into the garden, 
 and sat down upon a mossy seat. 
 
 " Nobody will give us what we have asked for," said 
 Francesca. "It is very cruel." 
 
 " Yes, very cruel," replied Ferdinand, with a sigh. 
 
 " Our parents never refused us before," resumed Francesca. 
 
 " Never ! " echoed Ferdinand. 
 
 " Nor the courtiers," added Francesca, 
 
 " Nor the courtiers," echoed Ferdinand. 
 
 " Nor our dear old nurse," said Francesca, with a strange 
 feeling in her eyes. 
 
 " Nor our dear nurse." 
 
 " It is ingratitude ! " 
 
 " Very great ingratitude ! " 
 
 " It is cruelty ! " finished Francesca, with sobs ; " and my 
 eyes are all wet ! Are yours, Ferdinand ? " 
 
 " No, Francesca. But there is a choking in my throat." 
 
 Just then the chief gardener came that way. 
 
 " My dear prince and princess ! " he exclaimed, throw 
 ing himself on his knees before them. " You are sad ! are 
 weeping ! Oh, Heaven ! to think that these noble and 
 beautiful children should have so much trouble." 
 
 " Trouble ! " echoed Ferdinand and Francesca. " Is this 
 trouble, Antonio ? " 
 
 "Assuredly, I think so," said Antonio, much puzzled. 
 
 Then the prince and princess arose gaily and clapped 
 their hands, and ran to the palace as happy as two birds. 
 Their wish had been gratified at last. 
 
HEAVIEE THAN AIE 
 
THE PICTURE IN THE GALLERY. 
 
HEAVIER THAN AIR 
 
 ONCE upon a time, two little French children, while being 
 led through a picture-gallery, suddenly came upon a very 
 startling painting by the French artist Verlat. In vain 
 their lonne, or nurse, tried to draw them away. They 
 either were too much frightened, or too much amused, to 
 stir from the spot. 
 
 " Matilde ! " they cried, still gazing at the picture, 
 " what does it mean ? What is it all about ? " 
 
 " Nothing," said Matilde. " Come away. Those dread 
 ful, ugly things will bite you. Come, Henri !" 
 
 "Ho!" retorted Henri, stoutly. "How can a picture 
 bite ? Oh ! if Mama were only here to tell us how the 
 poor monkeys got up in the air so high!" 
 
 " I know how the blackest one got there," said the other 
 child; "the white one pulled him up with his tail." 
 
 Henri laughed at this, but after the sober manner of 
 one who has a great deal on his mind: " No, no, Marie, he 
 did n t go up that way. / think he s holding on to that 
 fellow s tail now so that he may not fall." 
 
 233 
 
234 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " Oh ! oh ! " exclaimed Marie, with eager sympathy. 
 " That s it ! They re both going to fall in a minute. 
 That s why they look so frightened. Monsieur 3 " she 
 added, running up to an old gentleman who stood near by, 
 " don t you think those monkeys are going to tumble ? " 
 
 The bonne caught her arm with an angry "Hist ! " but 
 the kind old gentleman turned to look at the picture 
 with Marie. 
 
 " Yes, my little one," he answered with a smile ; " in 
 one instant more those poor fellows will be whirling down, 
 down, to certain destruction." 
 
 " Eight upon the roofs ? " Marie asked, with her eyes 
 very wide open. 
 
 " Eight upon the roofs. You see the balloon is burst." 
 
 Henri nodded wisely. He began to suspect what was 
 the matter. 
 
 " I suppose, Monsieur, the monkeys tried to go up in a 
 balloon, and it hit against something and bursted, and 
 
 " Hit against wlicit thing, my little man ? " 
 
 Henri and Marie peered into the picture. Marie, with 
 a questioning glance at Monsieur, pointed to the little 
 balloon in the corner; but he shook his head. At last 
 Henri said: 
 
 " I think it broke its own self." 
 
 " Eight ! " said Monsieur. " If Mademoiselle will permit, 
 I will tell you all about it." 
 
 The bonne looked troubled, wondering what Madame 
 would say when she heard that the children had been al 
 lowed to talk with a stranger. But she nodded her head, 
 and the old gentleman seated himself on a chair that 
 
HEAVIER THAN AIR 235 
 
 chanced to be near by, and asked the children if they had 
 ever seen a balloon. 
 
 "Oh, yes," said Marie; "don t you remember, Henri, 
 how we saw one on the Emperor s birthday sailing up way 
 over the Champs de Mars ? But it was n t a bit like this 
 thing, and it had n t any monkeys in it. It was like the 
 little one up there in the picture." 
 
 " That looks little," said the old gentleman, " because it 
 is very far off in the air. / have been up in a balloon even 
 higher than that." 
 
 The children stared first at Monsieur, then at the picture, 
 and Marie asked timidly : 
 
 "With a monkey ? " 
 
 " No, no," he laughed, " not with a monkey. But once I 
 went up at night with a scientific friend, and we took a 
 carrier-pigeon with us. We let him loose with a note tied 
 under his wing telling his owner that we were safe and 
 happy and more than a mile high. And, another time, two 
 friends and myself went up in late autumn, and actually 
 sailed into a snow-storm, high, high over the world, and 
 with clouds both above and below us." 
 
 Marie hardly heard. She was gazing at the picture. 
 
 "Ah ! I see you must be satisfied about those apes be 
 fore you will listen to anything more. One cannot tell 
 from a picture all that has been happening ; but / think 
 this : I think those two monkeys belonged to a public 
 garden, and one day, when a balloon was going to make its 
 ascent from there, the monkeys jumped in before any 
 one could stop them, and loosened the cords that held the 
 balloon down, and up it rose high in the air, amid the 
 
WE TOOK A CARRIER-PIGEON WITH US. 
 
HEAVIER THAN AIR 237 
 
 shouts and screams of the spectators. At first it was all 
 very fine; they enjoyed their sail and crouched in the 
 bottom of the balloon-car, chattering to each other at a 
 great rate, for they had no idea of their danger. The bal 
 loon was kept up in the air by its great, big, varnished 
 silk bag, being full of hydrogen gas, which is about sixteen 
 times lighter than air Then Henri spoke : 
 
 " Did it float in the air something as soap-bubbles do ? 
 because they re so much lighter than anything else." 
 
 " Yes," said Monsieur, wondering whether it were worth 
 while to explain that the soap-bubble is just a bag made 
 of a very thin sheet of water and filled with warm breath. 
 "Anything that is lighter than air, if set free, will rise. But 
 the air grows thinner and lighter the higher one goes up 
 above the earth, and when a balloon gets into very thin 
 air, the gas within the bag, finding that it is not pressed upon 
 so much by the heavy air outside, begins to swell and try to 
 get out ; and the higher it goes, the more the gas pushes, 
 until, at last, it bursts the bag tlicn what happens?" 
 
 " The monkeys get frightened," said Marie, gazing earn 
 estly at the picture. 
 
 Henri was older and wiser ; so he answered that " most 
 likely the balloon would all shrivel and tumble down if 
 the gas came out of it, just as a toy balloon would if some 
 one should prick it." 
 
 " Very good," assented Monsieur. " Now, in the top of 
 all balloons there is a valve or little door for letting out the 
 gas when it begins to swell, and a man seated in the bal 
 loon-car has only to pull a certain string when he wishes 
 to open the valve. But our monkeys knew nothing of 
 
238 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 this. And so, after a while, their balloon burst with a 
 terrible bang, and at once began to tumble and pitch about 
 at such a rate that the poor fellows were bumped out of the 
 car and had to hold on to the wreck as well as they could ; 
 for, now that the gas was out, their balloon was heavier 
 than the air, and would have to go down." 
 
 " It s awful to be a monkey way up in a balloon, when 
 it s all bursted," said Marie, nearly ready to cry. " Oh ! " she 
 added, suddenly turning her earnest blue eyes full upon 
 Monsieur s face. "I do wish you had gone with them, so 
 you could have pulled the string ! " 
 
 Monsieur laughed, but the bonne stepped briskly for 
 ward, fearing that her little charge was growing too 
 talkative. 
 
 " Now, children, thank the kind gentleman, and come 
 home to Mama." 
 
 Marie took her hand willingly ; but Henri had another 
 question to ask : 
 
 " What word is that, Monsieur, printed on the balloon 
 in the corner ? " 
 
 " Montgolfier, the name of two brothers. They were 
 the first men who ever sent a balloon up in the air. This 
 was in the summer-time, about a hundred years ago." 
 
 " Where did they get the gas ? " asked Henri, hurriedly, 
 for the lonne was looking at him, with her lips pressed 
 impatiently. 
 
 "They did n t use gas at all, my boy; they kindled a 
 fire, and filled the bag with smoke. They thought the 
 smoke carried up the balloon, but in reality it was the hot 
 air, which is very much lighter than ordinary air." 
 
HEAVIER THAN AIR 
 
 239 
 
 BALLOONING THROUGH A SNOW-STORM. 
 
 " Oh ! " said Henri, as the bonne took hold of his hand, 
 " I do wish I could stay all day and hear more about bal 
 loons, and how often you have been up in them ! " 
 
 " So do I. Ask your papa, my boy. He can tell you, 
 I think, all about Montgolh er, and Lunardi, and Gay- 
 Lussac, and Glaisher, and 
 
 "0 Matilde!" cried Henri, "do stop your pulling! Good 
 
240 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 day, Monsieur I m very much obliged to you, Monsieur 
 if it was n t for Matilde, I d 
 
 And out stalked Matilde through the doorway with the 
 children, one on each side of her; both looking back 
 Henri at the old gentleman, and Marie at the picture. 
 
 "0 Matilde!" cried Henry indignantly, when they 
 reached the street, "you cruel Matilde! not to let me 
 wait and hear all about Lunardac, and Glaishac, and 
 Montgolfy, and all the rest." 
 
 " That s too bad ! " said Marie, looking sympathetically 
 at him across Matilde s skirts. " I d like to hear about 
 em too were they monkeys?" 
 
 
 BACK TO EARTH AGAIN. 
 
WHAT THE SNOW-MAN DID 
 
 L6 
 
WHAT THE SNOW-MAN DID 
 
 IT was twelve years ago, and midwinter. There had 
 been good skating at Kockville for nearly a week ; but, on 
 a certain cold Friday, it suddenly began to snow. The 
 great white flakes came down, slowly at first, then more 
 rapidly, until the air seemed a tumultuous mass of eider 
 down. Then the ground, the fences, the trees, began to 
 take their share, and the whole country-side grew white. 
 In the city, not far off, people bemoaned the " bad walking " 
 that already threatened them ; but country folk as promptly 
 looked forward to sleigh-rides and frolic. 
 
 The boys and girls of Kockville reveled in the discus 
 sion of various plays for Saturday if it should keep on 
 snowing. Thoughts of snowballing, fort-building, coast 
 ing, and all kinds of snow sport scurried through their busy 
 young noddles ; and, as soon as they came out of school, the 
 boys and girls divided off into merry groups, some eagerly 
 chatting, some frolicking in the soft snow ; while a party 
 of five boys dashed off toward the large, frozen pond half 
 a mile away. These were the shinny-boys. They had 
 agreed to play a game of shinny on the ice after school 
 
 243 
 
244 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 the next day ; but, now, as the snow threatened to stop 
 their promised sport, they had decided not to wait, but to 
 have their game at once. 
 
 The beautiful storm ceased as suddenly as it had begun ; 
 but that night the snow came again, and this time to con 
 tinue until morning. Then youthful existence in that region 
 was comprised in the term, "lots of fun." The coasting- 
 hill was crowded on that Saturday. Snow forts, hastily 
 erected, became scenes of bold attack and desperate de 
 fense, and three hardy boys proceeded to make the biggest 
 ball of snow ever seen in that locality ; it grew and grew 
 until it reached to their shoulders, and finally it was as 
 much as the three could do to roll it to the edge of the 
 precipice called in Bockville by the young ladies "the 
 Lovers Leap " ; and by the boys " Clifford s Jump," be 
 cause a daring young fellow of that name really had 
 jumped from it once, and had taken a good, long rest 
 in the hospital afterward. 
 
 Well, the mammoth ball after the boys ecstatic " One, 
 two, three I Let her go /" went over " Clifford s Jump " in 
 fine style. It dashed down the steep descent, distributing 
 itself in blocks and fragments as it went, and was soon 
 forgotten. The shinny-pond had yielded overnight to cir 
 cumstances and become as white as its own level shores. 
 Before dusk the forts were demolished or abandoned, and 
 snow-day foes returned to the ways of peace. 
 
 Meantime, four fine fellows, Hal McDougal, Charley 
 Green, and Sydney Burton and his brother Will, eager to 
 enjoy their Saturday to the utmost, had assembled after 
 early breakfast behind the McDougal cottage. 
 
WHAT THE SNOW-MAN DID 
 
 245 
 
 THE SHINNY BOYS HAVE THEIR GAME. 
 
 " Shall we build a fort, or a what ? " asked Charley 
 Green. 
 
 "A what," responded Sydney Burton, promptly. 
 
 " Oh, bother ! " retorted Charley ; " don t begin your 
 fooling. I mean, shall we build a fort or a man ? I vote 
 for the man." 
 
 " And I 111 for a fort," put in Will. 
 10* 
 
246 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " It will be twice the fun to make a snow-man, Will," 
 said his brother Sydney ; " won t it, Charley ? " 
 
 Now, Charley had a way of saying " Of course " that was 
 worth a bushel of arguments to a boy like Will ; so when 
 he said " Of course," and Hal added scornfully, " Who 
 wants a fort ? " the thing was settled : a man it should be. 
 
 Nearly all day the boys worked. A strong clothes-pole 
 served as a backbone around which the figure was built 
 from the ground upward. None of them had ever made a 
 snow-man before, and to make a large, well-shaped one was 
 not a very easy task. Even with their determination to 
 have him well proportioned, he turned out, as Sydney con 
 fessed, to be "rather short for his thickness"; and Will s 
 plan of helping this trouble, by piling the snow on top 
 of the big white head, did n t work well at all. Still he 
 would insist upon holding up great balls, and shouting: 
 " Help yourself, Syd, pile up ! " 
 
 And Sydney as resolutely shouted back : 
 
 "Don t want it. I tell you he s got twice too much 
 forehead already." 
 
 " Fudge ! " Charley would say ; " take it, Syd, make it 
 into a hat." 
 
 "A hat would n t do any good," Sydney would insist, 
 from the top of the barrel on which he was standing ; " not 
 a bit of good ; the man himself is out of proportion. 
 Don t you understand ? I Ve taken a heap from the top of 
 his noble brow already. Do you know I wish this chap 
 were marble instead of snow ? I ve been thinking, ever 
 since we began, T d like to make a statue in earnest." 
 
 Meantime, Hal McDougal, shaping the arm, fell to think- 
 
WHAT THE SNOW-MAN DID 247 
 
 ing that if one had to get up a contrivance that would 
 do all that a boy s arm does, what a task it would be ! and, 
 anyhow, what a wonderful thing a real arm was, with 
 its muscles and sinews and all the little blood-vessels and 
 jig-a-rigs. And then the rest of the machine the heart 
 and lungs and brain he wished he knew all about them; 
 he d study it all out some day. Yes ! he would begin 
 straight off reading anatomy in the evenings declare 
 if he would n t. All this time he said nothing, but kept 
 on shaping the sleeve, whistling and trying to build out 
 something like a fist. 
 
 Charley Green, the oldest boy of them all, did n t care 
 anything about the height of the forehead, nor did he 
 trouble his brain by comparing this solid man of snow 
 with the wonderful human animal. What bothered him 
 was the snow itself. 
 
 " It s a gay old puzzle, anyway," he thought, "this water. 
 I don t wonder the Eastern tyrant had that traveler put 
 to death (if it was the law to bowstring liars) who said 
 that in his country water was sometimes like a cloud, 
 sometimes like a feather, sometimes like solid blocks of 
 glass. Nobody could believe it unless he saw it. And 
 then hang it all! they tell you water itself is made of 
 two gases ; and, again, that there s water in everything 
 even in dust. I m going to study up on water. I m going 
 to find out what this sparkle in the snow means, and why 
 melted snow tastes different from other water. I have n t 
 cared for chemistry so far; but I 11 take it up in earnest, 
 if a fellow can really find out things by studying it." 
 " Halloo ! Charley," scolded Will at this point ; " stop 
 
WHAT THE SNOW-MAN DID 249 
 
 blowing your mittens and looking like an owl, and lend a 
 hand here. I in in for breaking off this military gentle 
 man s head and building him up higher, and clapping it 
 on again. The shoulder-straps are easy to change." 
 
 " Fiddle for the straps," broke forth Sydney, quite out 
 of patience. " If you heap up the shoulders, there s your 
 body too long, and your arms too short, and all your 
 features too little." 
 
 " That would n t make a bit of difference," was Will s 
 ready answer. " We could just shift the belt up, and I d 
 alter the buttons in less than no time. Come on, Charley!" 
 
 " That s just like you, Will," said Sydney. " I declare 
 if he does n t think more of regimentals than a drum- 
 major. I m goin to scoop out the legs no use in havin 
 the old general run down all in one solid piece." 
 
 "Who would n t go in for regimentals?" retorted Will. 
 " I never saw anything like the way all these snow-buttons 
 have made a soldier of the old chap. Why, he was n t any 
 thing without them. The more I look at him, the more T 
 can see no two ways about it. A man, whether lie s flesh 
 or snow, is n t more than half a man till you make him a 
 soldier." 
 
 Don t you see how it .all ended ? Many a time has the 
 grass grown green and withered over the spot where the 
 great snow-soldier melted away; but the thoughts that 
 came into those four boyish heads that day have kept on 
 growing and gathering strength. How little they knew 
 then, as they sang, and shouted, and whistled, and clapped 
 the snow on here and there, that the fancies flitting to 
 
250 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 them from the white soldier would never leave them 
 again ! that while they were busily shaping his body, 
 head, and arms to their satisfaction, he was quietly shaping 
 them, actually molding their careers ! 
 
 Neither did haughty Milly Scott imagine, as she walked 
 by in her best clothes, that the snow-man would quite 
 change her ways of thinking and acting; nor did little 
 Ben, her brother, have any idea that the same shining 
 white soldier would make him a prisoner for six weeks 
 not he. Yet these things all came to pass. 
 
 To-day, Sydney Burton (I do not give you his real 
 name) is a sculptor in Eome ; his brother, Colonel William 
 Burton, is stationed somewhere on our Western frontier ; 
 Charley Green is soon to be made professor of chemistry 
 in one of our Northern colleges ; and solemn Hal Mc- 
 Dougal is studying hard in the French Institute of Surgery. 
 
 As for Master Ben Scott and his sister Milly, perhaps 
 I should have told you about them sooner in the story. 
 
 Poor Milly ! She was not a bad-hearted girl, but she 
 was very proud, and often blind to the feelings of others. 
 She cared more for her fine clothes, her fancy boots, her 
 wavy hair, than for anything else in the world, except 
 her mother and father and little Ben. She disliked plain, 
 unfashionable people exceedingly; and as for the really 
 poor and ragged, they seemed to her too disagreeable to 
 be thought of for an instant. She always avoided the 
 wretched places where they lived, and never seemed to 
 suspect that the little children whom Christ blessed were 
 not all dressed in fine garments. 
 
 On this particular day, she had seen a child tumble over 
 
WHAT THE SNOW-MAN DID 251 
 
 a big frozen lump on the road, and when Ben tried to 
 run toward it, she had pulled him back, saying: 
 
 " Stop, Benny ! Don t touch the dirty little creature ! 
 Let her alone she 11 stop crying in a minute." 
 
 " I wish I could give her a pair of shoes," Ben had said ; 
 " her feet look so cold ! " 
 
 " Oh ! poor people like her don t feel the cold. They 
 are used to going barefoot," Milly had answered, still hurry 
 ing him on. 
 
 They ended their homeward walk in silence. Benny 
 was feeling sorry for the very shabby and unhappy little 
 girl, and Milly was trying not to blame herself, or at least 
 to forget that pitiful little face by saying to herself: " It s 
 nothing to me, anyway." 
 
 That night, long after everybody was asleep, the snow- 
 soldier came to Milly. 
 
 She was frightened at seeing him standing near her, 
 but, somehow, she could n t call out or make any noise. 
 
 " Get up ! " he said sternly. 
 
 She obeyed him. And now comes the strangest part of 
 the story. She was Milly still, and yet so light that she 
 seemed to float beside him out of the room, and down the 
 stairs, and through the front door, and straight to the 
 wretched part of the city where the poor folks lived. 
 There she saw men, women, and children huddled together 
 on bare floors or heaps of straw and rags, with scarcely any 
 thing to cover their poor, shivering bodies. Whenever the 
 snow-man put his head in at the windows and doors, they 
 would shiver worse than before, and utter moans that 
 
252 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 made Milly tremble. In one place she saw a pale young 
 woman, with a baby in her arms, crouching before an 
 empty stove. A few ashes lay on the hearth, and these 
 would light up a little whenever the mother blew upon 
 them. As the snow-man rattled the broken window- 
 sash, the poor woman cried bitterly, and tried to warm 
 the baby by holding it against her breast ; but Milly knew, 
 by the pinched look of the thin baby-face, that it was 
 dying of hunger and cold. 
 
 Other sights they saw that made Milly s heart ache 
 as it never had ached before; and when she asked leave 
 to go home and send blankets and coal and wood to all 
 these poor creatures, he held her back, growling : 
 
 " Come on ! Poor people like these don t feel the cold. 
 They re used to it." 
 
 This sounded so cruel, so heartless, that Milly drew 
 back in horror. Then the snow-man vanished. Whether 
 he floated off or melted away, as snow-men often do, she 
 never knew. But one tiling is quite certain : from that 
 night Milly began to improve. One does not in a twink 
 ling conquer habits of selfish indifference and gain a life 
 of good deeds and kindly sympathy for others. But Milly 
 did improve wonderfully; and she never again said: "Oh! 
 poor folks don t feel the cold." 
 
KITTY S CANAKY 
 
KITTY S CANARY 
 
 SUCH a pet as Fluffy became at first sight ! Papa had 
 bought him to cheer Kitty when she was recovering from 
 a tedious fever, and it really seemed as if Fluffy understood 
 all about it. He appeared hardly to care for himself at all, 
 though a new bird in a strange house certainly must have 
 lonely and uneasy feelings at first. Fluffy never had lived 
 the free out-of-door life that birds of his kind always enjoy 
 in the Canary Isles ; but he had come from a beautiful, 
 sunny shop where there were rows upon rows of cages, and 
 all the birds living in them knew one another by note, and 
 were sure of having plenty of everything to make them 
 comfortable. Mr. Carr, their owner, knew how important 
 it was that his singers should be well cared for, and he al 
 ways gave them fresh food and water every day. 
 
 Whether some other little bird told him or not, or whe 
 ther Fluffy heard Kitty softly sobbing because the doctor 
 had said she must stay in the house for a week longer, no 
 body can say. I only know that as soon as Fluffy s cage 
 was hung by the window in Kitty s room, the little fellow 
 began to take an interest. Yes, really to take an interest. 
 
256 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 Kitty said so. He hopped from one perch to another, 
 twitched his head this way and that, glanced about him 
 with his quick little black eyes, saw that Kitty was down 
 hearted, and straightway began to sing ! 
 
 " Cheer up, Kitty," he seemed to say. " I in here. 
 Listen ! " And then a trill, so sweet and soft and cheery, 
 floated around the room and through the open window 
 that Kitty brightened up wonderfully. Everything seemed 
 different to her in an instant. To be confined to the house 
 for a few days longer was not so bad, after all ; and to 
 be well enough to sit up and watch Fluffy, why, that was 
 perfectly delightful ! And what a dear, pretty little crea 
 ture he was so light and soft and helpless, if you thought 
 of him in one way ; so brave and wise and wonderful, if 
 you thought of him as he sat there cheering little Kitty ! 
 How he hopped, too : now to the floor of the cage, now to 
 the perches, now to the seed-cup, stopping to sing at almost 
 every turn ! Kitty said it made her laugh to think how she 
 would feel if she were to jump down to the kitchen, up to the 
 roof, out in the garden, in at the window, all in a minute. 
 
 But \vas n t he tired ? Did n t he want something more 
 to eat ? Would sugar hurt him ? Was it safe to give him 
 orange-peel ? Did n t he need more gravel ? More water ? 
 More anything ? And if he did n t now, would n t he very 
 soon ? Kitty asked these questions of herself and those 
 around her again and again. Her mother laughingly told 
 her that as Mr. Warbler would need to be attended to 
 every single day, he would be troublesome enough after a 
 while. And Kitty hoped lie would. It would be so nice 
 to take care of the dear little fellow. Hey, Fluffy ? So it 
 
KITTY S CANARY 257 
 
 would. And all the time Fluffy kept on singing, as if to 
 say: 
 
 " Yes, Kitty, you look out for me, I 11 look out for you, 
 and we 11 get on finely ; so we will. 
 
 "This is a nice house, Kitty," his song seemed to say, 
 when, after a while, he and the little girl were left alone 
 together ; " a very nice house. Pleasant window too, sunny 
 and fine ; pretty curtains, white as clouds, and thin as mist. 
 Kitty, Kitty, Kitty, Kitty, Kit tee-e-e ! I like the way 
 the wind lifts them. Don t you ? Don t you ? Every 
 one s so good to you, Kitty Mama, Papa, Uncle Will, 
 and all. Soon you can go out and play. Hey, Kitty ? 
 Eh Kitty, Kitty, Kitty, Kitty, Kitty, Kit, Kit tee-e-e-e-e /" 
 
 It all sounded so plain to Kitty, that, somehow, there 
 was nothing strange in it. Why should n t dear little 
 Fluffy say just such things to her when really her own 
 heart was saying the same to him ? She felt this all the 
 while as she leaned back in the big easy-chair. It was a 
 kind of duet between herself and Fluffy, growing softer and 
 sweeter, sweeter and softer, every minute. Then when he 
 happened . to give an extra loucl note of joy, she would 
 rouse herself with a start and revel again in the delight 
 of having a dear little canary-bird like Fluffy to love and- 
 care for. 
 
 The little fellow did not miss the bird-colony at Mr. 
 Carr s, in the least. His new cage was large and pretty, 
 and Kitty, who kept it in perfect order " all herself," was 
 only too happy to attend to his every need. Even after 
 she became able to go out and sit in the sunshine, she 
 often would look up at the house and wave her hand 
 
 17 
 
258 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 to Fluffy, or try to whistle to him as he merrily hopped 
 about in his gilded cage. 
 
 But sometimes, as Kitty grew stronger and her little 
 playmates began to call for her, right after breakfast, to 
 join in this or that sport, she would fly out to them, 
 actually neglecting to give Fluffy fresh seed and water. 
 His cage hung out on the upper veranda now. 
 
 "An hour or so can t make any difference," she would 
 say to herself, "he s all right"; and poor Fluffy would 
 have to wait for her till after school. 
 
 How it came about, Kitty could n t tell. But, somehow, 
 in meeting the girls again, and racing through the fields 
 with them, and studying her lessons, and going out driving 
 with Uncle Will, and doing all sorts of pleasant things, 
 time slipped by ; until one day, as she sat resting on the low 
 stone fence in her father s orchard, watching a pair of busy 
 birds flitting about among the branches of a stunted little 
 tree, she wondered why they did not seek pleasanter 
 quarters, and then she suddenly thought of Fluffy ! 
 
 With a quick pang of remorse and fright, Kitty sprang 
 to the ground. She ran to the place where the cage hung. 
 The water-cup was empty, the feed-cup empty nothing but 
 a few dried seed-husks scattered about. Fluffy was there, 
 silent and alone, sitting on the lowest perch, and looking 
 oh, so grieved ! 
 
 " Fluffy ! Fluffy ! " sobbed Kitty, " here I am ! I I for 
 got you, Fluffy but don t die ! " and she started to get him 
 something to eat. 
 
 But he already had fallen from his perch. With a cry 
 Kitty tore open the little wire door, and, taking him in her 
 
KITTY S CANARY 259 
 
 hand, felt that he was still alive. He did not open his 
 eyes, but when she moistened his bill with water, and 
 sprinkled him, and laid him down on the sunny grass, 
 now feeding him drop by drop with sweetened water, 
 he stirred feebly ; then he sank back. 
 
 " Mama, mama ! " she called loudly, " come quick 
 Fluffy s dying!" 
 
 But her mother had gone to the village with a friend. 
 Their nearest neighbor, Mrs. Scott, came to the window; 
 and Kitty called to her. 
 
 "Oh, Mrs. Scott! You have canaries. Do, please, tell 
 me what to do for Fluffy ! I forgot him, and he s starved." 
 
 " Oh, you child ! " exclaimed the neighbor, and in a few 
 minutes (though it seemed a very long while to Kitty) she 
 was kneeling beside the little girl, bending over Fluffy. 
 She had a sheet of soft cotton in her hand. Tenderly and 
 lightly folding the bird in it, she rose, and, pitying and 
 comforting him as only a bird-lover could, she hastened 
 home with the little sufferer hardly noticing Kitty, 
 except to repeat reproachfully, now and then, "Oh, you 
 child ! you child ! " 
 
 " Can you do anything ? Can you, Mrs. Scott ? " pleaded 
 Kitty, following her on a run. 
 
 " We 11 see. Oh, the poor little fellow ! " said the neigh 
 bor, as they entered her cottage. 
 
 Did Fluffy live ? 
 
 Well, well you should have seen him a week or two 
 later in his cage, jumping from perch to perch, on the floor, 
 up to the seed-cup and down again, snapping the seeds 
 
260 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 hither and thither, and singing: "Kitty, Kitty, here we 
 are ! sweet and sunny ; lovely, is n t it ? Kitty ! Kitty ! 
 Kitty ! Here we are ! Here we are ! " 
 
 "Oh, you little sweetness!" cried Kitty, clasping her 
 hands with joy. " I 11 never, never, never neglect you 
 again ! Mama says she 11 try me once more." 
 
 "Kitty, Kit-Kit-Kittee ee-ee!" sang Fluffy. 
 
GRANDMOTHER 
 
 17" 
 
GRANDMOTHER S AFTERNOON NAP. 
 
GRANDMOTHER 
 
 ONE fine October afternoon some years ago, my sister 
 and I, happening to be in Germantown, that beautiful sub 
 urb of Philadelphia, went to call upon our well-remembered 
 
 classmate Elsie G . We found her and her two sisters, 
 
 Helen and Mary, at home in the sunny, quaintly windowed 
 living-room and three very lovely girls they were. After 
 they and their grandmother had given us a hearty wel 
 come, Elsie said : 
 
 " Girls, Grandmother was just going to tell us some 
 thing about Patty Burlock, as you came in. Would n t 
 you like to hear it ?" 
 
 We assured her that we should be delighted, and 
 Grandmama, after a little coaxing, began: 
 
 " It is only a simple incident that came to my mind a 
 few moments back, hardly worth telling to an audience of 
 five. It occurred at a church wedding that I attended 
 eighteen dear me ! twenty-two years ago. I knew the 
 bride and Patty too, as I was telling the children " (here, 
 Grandmama looked beamingly at Helen, Elsie, and Mary). 
 " Well, the long and short of it is, little Patty did speak right 
 out loud in the middle of the ceremony. 
 
 263 
 
264 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 "But if the minister had asked any other question 
 than the one he did, it never would have happened. 
 
 " Or if it had been on any other day than that one 
 particular day, it would n t have happened. 
 
 " If any other little boy in the whole wide universe ex 
 cepting Eobby Burlock had been with Patty, it never 
 would have happened," she went on, with a playful nod. 
 
 " And I need n t tell you if it had been two strangers 
 standing before the altar, instead of their sister Jessie and 
 Herbert Norris, it never could have happened. 
 
 " But it did happen, for all that. 
 
 " If any one here present, said the minister, looking 
 kindly upon the sweet bride with the brave young man 
 beside her, and then glancing calmly over the little church- 
 ful of wedding guests, knows of any reason why this man 
 and this woman should not be joined together in the holy 
 bonds of matrimony, let him speak now, or, 
 
 " Wheat s all that ? whispered Eobby, in great scorn, to 
 Patty. I guess he does n t know. There ain t any bounds 
 of materony about it. 
 
 " That was enough. Young as he was, Eobby was her 
 oracle. Up jumped Patty, anxious to set things right, 
 and determined that the wedding should go on, now that 
 Sister Jessie had on her white dress and orange-flowers 
 and lovely veil. 
 
 " I do ! she called out in a sweet, resolute voice, as 
 she held up a warning finger. I do. Please wait, Mr. 
 Minister. There ain t any materony about it at all. 
 They came on purpose to be married ! 
 
 " O course they did ! muttered Eobby, distinctly. 
 
GRANDMOTHER 
 
 265 
 
 " Everybody stared at Patty. It was a dreadful moment, 
 as you may believe, but the wedding went on all the same. 
 
 "And Patty and Eobby, content and unabashed, were 
 among the very first to kiss the bride." 
 
266 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 We all laughed heartily as the old lady ended her story, 
 and she laughed with us. 
 
 " It so happened," she added, " that I was seated quite 
 near the children, and I heard the whole thing. Their 
 parents were with them, but were separated from them by 
 Eobby s little hat and coat, and Patty s big Leghorn hat, 
 which lay on the seat. 
 
 " By the way, did n t one of you young folks tell me a 
 while ago that Patty Burlock herself is going to be married 
 next week ? " 
 
 "Yes, indeed, Grandmother. We have cards for the 
 wedding and you must go, too." 
 
 " Not I, my dears. Grandma s getting a little too stiff 
 in her old age to be ambling to weddings and such things 
 but your young eyes will see it all, and you 11 tell me all 
 about it." 
 
 The pleasant old lady leaned back in her rocker with so 
 happy and satisfied an air as she said this, that, later, when 
 Elsie, my sister, and I were sauntering through the grounds 
 toward the summer-house, I could not help saying to our 
 young hostess : " How changed your grandmother is ! and 
 for the better ; she used to be so very quiet and grave. 
 And how charmingly she told that little story ! " 
 
 A peculiar expression crossed Elsie s face, as though the 
 remark had given her both pain and pleasure. Then she 
 replied, as she led the way into the crimson- vined summer- 
 house : 
 
 " Yes, Grandmother has changed. So have we, for that 
 matter. Come in and sit down a moment. I 11 tell you 
 how it all came about: 
 
GRANDMOTHER 267 
 
 "For a long time I did not understand it at all. I 
 thought that, because grandmothers often were feeble and 
 old-fashioned, they could never really feel as we children 
 do ; that they needed no particular notice or enjoyment, 
 for it was their nature to sit in rocking-chairs and knit. 
 They seemed quite different from the rest of the world, 
 and not to be especially thought about; that is, by girls 
 who were as full of merry plans as we were. 
 
 " Grandmother had lived with us of late years, as father 
 is her only son. We had a vague idea that she helped 
 Mother mend the clothes, and knitted Father s woolen 
 stockings, besides some pairs for our church society. We 
 were supposed to love her, of course, and we were never 
 openly rude, for indeed we had been taught to be polite to 
 all aged persons. As for Grandmother, she was one of 
 those peaceful souls who never make any trouble, but just 
 go on in their own way so quietly that you hardly know 
 they are in the house. Mother sat with her sometimes, 
 but we girls, in our gay, busy pursuits, rarely thought of 
 such a thing. She seemed to have no part in our existence. 
 
 " It went on so for some time, till one day I happened at 
 sundown to go into the sitting-room, and there sat Grand 
 mother, alone. She had fallen asleep in her chair by the 
 window. The sun was just sinking out of sight, casting a 
 ruddy glow of light into the room, and in this glow I saw 
 Grandmother saw her really for the first time in my life ! 
 
 " She had been reading her Bible, and then, as if there 
 had been no need of reading more, since its treasure al 
 ready lay shining in her soul, she had turned the book 
 over upon her lap and leaned back to enjoy the evening. 
 
268 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " I saw it all in a moment, her gentleness, her patience, 
 her holiness. Then, while her love and beautiful dignity 
 seemed to fold about me like a bright cloud, the sweet 
 every-day lines in her face told me a secret, that even 
 then in the wonderful sunset of life she was, oh, how hu 
 man ! So human that she missed old faces and old scenes; 
 so human that she needed a share of what God was giving 
 us, friends, home interests, little surprises and expecta 
 tions, loving offices, and, above all, a recognition in the 
 details of our fresh young lives. 
 
 " Girls, when Grandmother woke up, she found us all 
 three stealing softly into the room; for I had told my 
 sisters about it, and we all had talked it over. Mary only 
 kissed her and asked if she had been having a good nap ; 
 Susie lifted her ball of yarn off the carpet, where it had 
 rolled, and began to wind it, all the while telling her a 
 pleasant bit of news about one of the school-girls ; and I 
 well, I knelt down at Grandmother s feet and, just as I 
 was going to cry, I gave her knees a good hard hug, and 
 told her she was a darling. 
 
 " That s all, girls. Grandmother is different. And it s 
 been different with us too ever since that day when she 
 fell asleep by the window. Instead of our waking her, 
 you see, she really wakened us." 
 
TWO MAY-QUEENS 
 
 
TWO MAY-QUEENS 
 
 ONCE, riot very long ago, and in a place not very far off, 
 a ragged little lame girl sat upon a stone in the doorway 
 of a poor hut, saying softly to herself : 
 
 "April showers bring forth May-flowers." 
 
 " They do, do they ? " screeched a sharp voice from 
 within. " I 11 May-flowers you, if you don t look out ! 
 What you settin out there for, Lerviny, and them clothes 
 a-getting cold in the pail ? " 
 
 " I m a-lettin em soak," answered the lame child gently, 
 without looking up. 
 
 " You be, be you ? Well, just you take yerself off of 
 that, and come here to yer work. There s them collars 
 all got to be starched." 
 
 Laviny, taking her rough little crutch, rose as quickly 
 as she could, and, entering the dingy room, worked her 
 way among tubs and broken chairs to an old pine table 
 that held a pan of hot starch and a number of dry collars 
 tied in a ragged towel. 
 
 " Can t I take em out in the sun, Aunt ? I can t half see 
 to do em in here." 
 
 Her aunt, who at the moment was bending over a tub- 
 ful of steaming-hot clothes, was rubbing the schoolmaster s 
 
 271 
 
272 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 shirts so hard upon the washboard that she did not hear 
 all that Laviny said. She saw the child s movement toward 
 the door, however, and checked her with an impatient " No ; 
 stay where you be." 
 
 For a while after that, the only sounds in the cheerless 
 room were the soft skish, s-k-ish of the starch under La- 
 viny s thin little palms and her aunt s heavy rub, rub, rub 
 upon the washboard. 
 
 Did the aunt hate little Laviny ? Not she. Eliza Green 
 was only rough, quick-tempered, and tired. If she thought 
 about her conduct at all, she thought only that she was 
 doing her duty in not letting the child "gad about out 
 doors " and in " puttin a stop to the lazy ways she was a- 
 getting into." Laviny, or Lavinia, was the orphan child of 
 this washerwoman s sister, and it evidently was a settled 
 matter somewhere far in the depths of the poor woman s 
 dull, neglected heart that "so long as there was a day s 
 washing to be found, or a crust or a smitch left, the poor 
 little creetur should n t want for food and shelter ; no, nor 
 for careful trainin ." Presently, Laviny, squeezing a collar 
 very hard and letting the starch ooze slowly through her 
 fingers, looked wistfully toward the open doorway. Some 
 white clouds were floating by in the distance. 
 
 " What s got into yer, Lerviny ? I 11 give yer somethin 
 to stare at if you don t take your eyes off that there sky." 
 
 (Only the day before, Eliza Green had told her friend 
 Mrs. Delany, who lived in the shanty beyond, that that 
 queer look of Laviny s always gave her "a crawl like 
 as if she was goin to be took away from me, you know." 
 But she did not say this to Laviny.) 
 
TWO MAY-QUEENS 273 
 
 "Why, Aunt," answered the little girl, in her sweet, 
 patient voice, " I was only wondering about Miss Du- 
 plaine s May-pole. Did n t you hear how Miss Duplaine s 
 little girl s going to be a May-queen ? They re going to 
 have a great high pole, oh ! ever so high ! all hung full of 
 flowers, and Miss Lotty s a-going to have on her lovely 
 white frock and loads of flowers around her head ! " 
 
 " How d yer know ? " 
 
 " Why, I heard em talkin about it when Jake Delany 
 and me went last night to take home Miss Duplaine s clean 
 clothes." 
 
 " Much you took home Miss Duplaine s clothes ! " 
 
 " Well, I went with Jake, anyhow, an I love him he s 
 so good about carryin me when I m tired." 
 
 " Lerviny ! Now, see you looking so again ! Let that 
 there sky be ! If you don t stop that way of lookin up 
 smilin at the clouds, I 11 be after you, so I will." 
 
 " I was only thinkin how good Jake is. And, Oh, Aunt ! 
 you ought to see the throne ! " 
 
 The aunt gave a jump. " What throne, you on arthly 
 child, you ? " 
 
 "Why, the one that s for dear little Miss Lotty Du- 
 plaine. It s all made up pretty and green, and to-day she s 
 going to sit on it for Queen of May, and have a whole 
 bushel o flowers all throwed over her ! " 
 
 " Sakes ! what goin s-on them rich folks do have ! I 
 don t see no sense into it." 
 
 "Oh, Aunt Lizer! /do!" 
 
 Just then they heard a sound of mingled shouts and 
 laughter and the tramping of little feet. 
 
 18 
 
274 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " Jake ! Jake ! Jake Delany ! " screamed the chorus. 
 
 " What s a-wantin ? " shouted back a gruff voice from 
 the Delany shanty, which, with its low roof (like an old 
 hat) slouching over its clear windows, stood quite near. 
 
 " Oh ! we want you to come help us get some apple- 
 blossoms. Come quick ! we can t reach." 
 
 Laviny ran to the door and the aunt followed briskly. 
 It was just noon. Jake Delany, Mrs. Delany s great, good- 
 natured son, was shuffling his way toward Eliza Green s 
 hut, and right outside, close to the very door-step, pressed 
 a troop of happy, soiled, ragged, laughing children and 
 all carrying flowers ! The girls had them in their aprons ; 
 the boys, bareheaded, held them in their hats and caps. 
 One girl had a pailful of grass and dandelions, and a 
 chubby little fellow, with red hair, held an old cracked 
 pitcher full of blossoms and sprays of willow. 
 
 At the kindergarten up the village street the children 
 rushed to the door and windows eager to see what was 
 happening. 
 
 And nearer still, Mrs. Delany s little girl younger than 
 Jake stood gazing wistfully at the merry crowd. 
 
 " Come along, Ma-ri-er," shouted some one ; " we re going 
 to have lots of fun ! " 
 
 " I can t," Maria called back. " The children are kind 
 of ailin and Ma can t spare me. I Ve got to stay home 
 with them." 
 
 " Hallo, Laviny ! " shouted half a dozen ; " we re going 
 to be needin you soon." 
 
 " Needin me ? " almost screamed Laviny, her face spark 
 ling with delight and astonishment. " Why, what for ? " 
 
TWO MAY-QUEENS 
 
 " We re going to keep May," answered the biggest girl, 
 speaking for all, " and we re going to make you Queen." 
 
 CAN T. MA CAN T SPARE ME." 
 
 " Oh ! oh ! oli ! " said Laviny, clasping her hands. "And 
 have flowers throwed all over me ? " 
 
 " Yes," said the big girl, " and we re goin to crown you 
 beautiful, and we re goin to fix a wand for you like Miss 
 
276 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 Lotty s. We Ve all been up to look through the bushes at 
 her. My ! it s splendid ! " 
 
 " She looks like a angel," put in one of the little girls, 
 " with the loveliest white shoes and " 
 
 "Ho!" interrupted another scornfully. "They don t 
 have no shoes on angels." 
 
 "How you know?" 
 
 " Cause I seed a piety er of em. Ain t yer smart ! " 
 
 "She had the elegantest ribbons onto her back, too, 
 Laviny," spoke the big girl again. "But they took her 
 right indoors. Traid of her bein so thin-dressed, I guess. 
 Ready, Laviny ? We want you right off." 
 
 " Where we going ? " asked Laviny, all in a glow. 
 
 " Why, where we Ve been fixin the things, to be sure. 
 Jake and Charley and Pete 11 have the blossoms all tied 
 to the pole fore we get there. His daddy s long rake- 
 handle makes a splendid one." 
 
 "Do let me go please do," said Laviny, turning sud 
 denly to her aunt. " Oh, can t I ? " 
 
 " Why, what s got inter yer, Laviny ? " said the aunt, 
 sharply ; " anybody d think I was a bear to hear you go on. 
 You hain t got a clean smitch on you, but never mind; go get 
 your cape, it may blow up colder bimeby. Some o you 11 
 have to help her long a little," she added, turning to the 
 children, as Laviny went back into the shanty ; " the poor 
 child s too much of a cripple to be May what-you-call-it." 
 
 " Oh ! no, she is n t," shouted two or three. " We 11 take 
 care of her." 
 
 " We picked her out for that," added a little girl quickly, 
 " and because she s so pretty and good." 
 
TWO MAY-QUEENS 277 
 
 " She is that," said Eliza Green, with a queer shine in 
 her eyes; then, changing her tone, "Here, you, Laviny, 
 don t you know they re a-waitin ? You ain t a-makin 
 that air cape, be yer ? I never see such a child." 
 
 Laviny came stumbling out with her crutch only half 
 under her arm. Her face was so flushed and happy-look 
 ing that Mrs. Green gave her a slap as she passed out. 
 " Oh ! oh ! " exclaimed one of the girls. 
 " That s nothing," laughed Laviny ; " that s only her 
 way o kissiii me. Aunt s real good. Maybe she 11 go 
 with us if you ask her." 
 
 One of the girls ran into the shanty, but came quickly 
 out again with, " She says what s the washin to do, she d 
 like to know ? " 
 
 Nobody stopped to answer the question, and now Jake 
 and Charley and Pete came running toward them. 
 
 " Up for a ride, little missy, grunted Jake, as, suiting the 
 action to the word, he lifted Laviny up to a secure seat on 
 his great square shoulder. " Here we go ! " 
 
 It was a beautiful procession, after all. Jake ahead 
 with his sunburned cheek looking all the ruddier beside 
 Laviny s sweet, pale face, Tom Tice with his pitcherful, 
 Kitty Carr with her pailful, and all the rest following with 
 laden aprons and caps it was a procession of flowers led 
 on by the lily -girl shining up in Jake s arms. At last they 
 reached the May-ground. It was only two fields off from 
 Mrs. Duplaine s elegant place. They could see Lotty s 
 beautiful May-pole distinctly, with its fluttering ribbons 
 and long festoons of flowers. What if their May -pole was 
 only a rake planted in the ground and wreathed with 
 
278 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 daisies and dandelions ! What if the throne was made of 
 an old tub and a stool sprinkled over with cut grass ! 
 Did n t they trim Laviny s crutch with violets and apple- 
 blossoms ? Did n t they crown her with a beautiful 
 wreath ? Did n t they throw nearly a bushel of grass and 
 flowers at her feet ? And did n t the biggest girl walk up 
 to her, and with a funny little bob of a courtesy read these 
 lines, written by Jake on a piece of wrapping-paper ? 
 
 " Laviny Green, 
 You are our May-Queen." 
 
 That night, two little sisters, nestling in their straw bed 
 on the floor, talked over the events of the day. 
 
 " Was n t Laviny sweet ? " said one. " I do think she s 
 feelin real happy now, if she is lame ! It s dreadful hard 
 to have to walk crooked, ain t it ? " 
 
 " Bet it is ! But I m glad we made her Queen o May," 
 said the other. 
 
LITTLE HAL S EICHES 
 

LITTLE HAL S EICHES 
 
 ONE day our little Hal was invited to spend the after 
 noon with his young playmate Johnny Lewis. Johnny s 
 mother had died when he was a baby, but his father was 
 still living. Johnny was an only child, and he dwelt in a 
 fine house, and on Sundays rode to church in the grandest 
 carriage to be met with in all the country round. He had 
 a great many toys, and a real watch that would go all day 
 and every day without stopping ; and as for candies and 
 cakes, why! the physician who attended the family said 
 that Johnny had enough of such things given him to sup 
 ply a whole regiment of little boys. He was a funny doc 
 tor, and liked to make droll speeches ; but, for all that, he 
 would often shake his head very gravely when he felt his 
 little patient s pulse; then lie would look sternly at the 
 big gold watch which he held in his hand while counting 
 Johnny s pulse-beats, and mutter, " Too many good things 
 are bad things for youngsters." Johnny would try for 
 a while to puzzle out the strange sentence, but as he was 
 ill on these occasions, he would soon give up the attempt 
 
 281 
 
282 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 in despair, and close his eyes, longing to get well, so that 
 he might eat plumcake and popcorn balls again. 
 
 But Johnny was not always sick ; and, as I said before, 
 he had many beautiful things. So, of course, this visit 
 promised Master Hal a world of enjoyment. But, alas ! 
 when the poor little fellow returned home in the after 
 noon, his brow was clouded, and he had a dismal look in 
 his blue eyes, and the least bit of a pout on his cherry lips. 
 
 Something was wrong, I knew, and at last Hal gave it 
 words. 
 
 " Mother, Johnny has money in loth his pockets ! " 
 
 " Has he, dear ? " 
 
 " Yes ; and he says he could get ever so much more, if 
 he wanted it," 
 
 " Well, now, that makes it very pleasant for Johnny," I 
 returned cheerfully, as a reply evidently was expected. 
 " Very pleasant ; don t you think so ? " 
 
 " Yes, only " 
 
 " Only wliat, Hal ? " 
 
 " Why, he has a big pop-gun and a gold watch and a 
 hobby-horse, and lots of things." And Hal looked up into 
 my face with a disconsolate, doleful stare. 
 
 " Well, my boy, what of that ? " 
 
 " Nothing, Mother," and the telltale tears sprang to his 
 eyes, " only I think we re very poor, are n t we ? " 
 
 " No indeed, Hal, dear ; we are very far from being 
 poor. But we are not so rich as Mr. Lewis s family, if 
 that is what you mean." 
 
 " Oh, Mother ! " insisted the little fellow, " I do think 
 we re very poor ; anyhow / am ! " 
 
LITTLE HALS RICHES 283 
 
 " Oh, Hal ! " I exclaimed reproachfully. 
 
 " Yes, ina am, I am" he sobbed ; " I have n t anything at 
 all scarcely I mean anything that s worth money 
 except things to eat and wear, and I d have to have them 
 anyway." 
 
 "Have to have them?" I echoed, at the same time laying 
 my book upon the couch on which we were sitting, and 
 preparing to reason with the young gentleman on this 
 point ; " do you not know, my son 
 
 Just then Uncle Ben called out from the next room, 
 where he had been reading his newspaper, " What s the 
 matter with the little man ? Come in here, my boy." 
 
 " Hal," said he solemnly, nodding slyly to me by way 
 of showing that he had overheard our conversation, " you 
 know I m a doctor, and if you 11 give me a chance to 
 try some experiments you can earn a lot of money." 
 
 " Can I ? " asked Hal, looking up quickly through his 
 tears ; " I d like that ever so much ; but what is a speri- 
 ment, Uncle ? " 
 
 " An experiment," said his uncle, " is a trial, a way of 
 finding out things. If you want to find out what will 
 happen when sugar is put into water, you simply try the 
 experiment of putting a lump into this tumbler, so, and 
 you 11 find out that the sugar 11 melt and the water will 
 become sweet. If you should put slices of lemon into the 
 water, what would happen ? " 
 
 " The water would be sour," replied Hal, promptly. 
 
 " Yes, sir ; you re right," said his uncle. " So much for 
 experiment. Now for business. 
 
 " I want to find out something about eyes ; so, if you 11 
 
284 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 let me have yours, I 11 give you ten dollars apiece for 
 them." 
 
 " For my eyes ! " exclaimed Hal, astonished almost out 
 of his wits. 
 
 " Yes," resumed Uncle Ben, quietly, " for your eyes. I 
 promise not to hurt you a particle. Only you could n t 
 see out of them any more. Come, sir ! ten dollars apiece, 
 cash down. What do you say ? " 
 
 " Give you my eyes, Uncle ! Why, I d be blind ! " cried 
 Hal, looking wild at the very thought. " For two ten dol 
 lars ? I think not ! " and the startled little fellow shook his 
 head defiantly. 
 
 " Well, thirty ; forty ; fifty ; a hundred dollars, 
 then ? " but Hal shook his head at every offer. 
 
 " No, sir ! I would n t let you for a thousand dollars. 
 Why, what could I do without my eyes ? I could n t see 
 Mother, nor the baby, nor the flowers, nor the horses, nor 
 anything," added Hal, waxing warmer. 
 
 " I 11 give you five thousand ! " urged Uncle Ben, taking 
 a roll of bank-notes out of his pocket. Poor little Hal, 
 standing at a respectful distance, shouted that he never 
 would do any such thing. 
 
 " Very well," continued his uncle, with a serious, busi 
 nesslike air, at the same time writing down something in 
 his note-book, " I can t afford to give you more than five 
 thousand dollars, Hal ; so I shall have to do without the 
 eyes ; but," he added, " I 11 tell you what I will do : T 11 
 give you twenty dollars if you will let me put a few drops 
 out of this bottle into your ears. It will not hurt, but it 
 will make you deaf. I want to try some experiments with 
 
LITTLE HAL S RICHES 285 
 
 deafness, you see. Come now. Here are the twenty dol 
 lars all ready for you." 
 
 " Make me deaf ! " shouted Hal, without even looking at 
 the money temptingly displayed upon the table. " I guess 
 you won t do that either. Why, I could n t hear a word 
 if I was deaf, could I ? " 
 
 " Probably not," replied Uncle Ben, dryly. So, of course, 
 Hal refused again. He would never give up his hearing, 
 he said, " No, not for three thousand dollars ! " 
 
 Uncle Ben made another note in his book, and then 
 came out with prodigious bids for Hal s " voice," for his 
 "right arm," then " left arm," "hands," "just one leg," " feet," 
 and so on, finally ending with an offer of ten thousand dol 
 lars for " Mother " and five thousand for " the baby." 
 
 To all of these offers, however, Hal shook his head, his 
 eyes flashing, and exclamations of surprise and indigna 
 tion bursting from his lips. At last Uncle Ben said he 
 must give up his experiments, for the young man s prices 
 were entirely too high. 
 
 " Ha-ha ! " laughed Hal exultingly, and he folded his 
 arms and looked as if to say, " I d like to see the man 
 who could pay them ! " 
 
 " Why, Hal, look at this!" exclaimed Uncle Ben, peering 
 into his note-book, " here is a big addition sum ; come, help 
 me do it." 
 
 Hal looked into the book, and there, surely enough, were 
 all the figures. Uncle Ben read the list aloud : 
 
 " Eyes, $5000 ; ears, $3000 ; voice, $2000 ; right arm, 
 $4000 ; left arm, $4000 ; hands, $2000 ; one leg, $4000 ; 
 feet, $3000 ; Mother, $10,000 ; Baby, $5000." 
 
286 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 He added the numbers together, and they amounted in 
 all to forty-two thousand dollars. 
 
 " There, Hal," said Uncle Ben, " don t you think you 
 are foolish not to take to some of my offers ? " 
 
 " No, sir, I don t," answered Hal resolutely. 
 
 "Then," said Uncle Ben, "you talk of being poor, and 
 by your own showing you have treasures that you 11 not 
 take forty-two thousand dollars for. What do you say to 
 that ? " 
 
 Hal did n t know exactly what to say ; so he laughed 
 and blushed for a second, and then with shining eyes 
 exclaimed : 
 
 " Why, I m awful rich ! all of us you and Mama and 
 everybody ! but Uncle 
 
 "Well, sir?" 
 
 " Why, Johnny Lewis has got em too besides the gold 
 watch and the money in his pockets and everything ! " 
 
 " My stars ! " cried Uncle Ben in great surprise for, 
 to tell the truth, he was a little taken aback (as lie after 
 ward confessed to me, in confidence) " Well, what s going 
 to be done about it ? " 
 
 " Nothing," said Hal, rosy with joy as he strode about, 
 proud of his legs, his muscle, and all his possessions 
 " It s all right everybody s rich enough after they find it 
 out." 
 
 " Right you are," said Uncle Ben, quietly slipping from 
 the room. 
 
ONLY A ROSE 
 
THE SISTERS. 
 
ONLY A EOSE 
 
 A TRUE STORY 
 
 ONE day, many years ago, Mother summoned all of us 
 children Marie, Gertrude, and me to her sitting-room, 
 and made an announcement. 
 
 " Children," said she, " I am going to the country with 
 your father, to remain a week." 
 
 Dear me ! how our hearts sank ! 
 
 "Miss Ellis will remain at home with you," continued 
 Mother, " and I trust she will have a pleasant account to 
 give me on my return. She will tell me, I think, Marie, 
 that you have been a kind, faithful girl, keeping good 
 watch over your younger sisters." (Marie smiled, though 
 her eyes were fast filling with tears.) " That you, Lilly, 
 have been quite steady, getting into no mischief whatever." 
 (I was the wild one of the household.) "And that you, 
 my little Rosebud" (kissing Gertrude), "have obeyed her 
 in everything like a little lady." 
 
 When Mother ceased speaking, she put her arms round 
 us, and looked into our faces to see what answers she 
 
 19 289 
 
290 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 could find there. Marie met her glance in a way that, I 
 know, satisfied Mother. I kissed her, and inwardly re 
 solved that I would n t go to the sugar-bowl all the while 
 she was gone ; no, not once ! And little Gertrude, who was 
 not four years old, looked up and shook her head saucily 
 as if to say, " I 11 think about it, Mother. My conduct 
 will depend entirely upon what turns up." 
 
 This is the way Gertrude looked, I say ; but, if the truth 
 could be known, we probably would find that she had al 
 ready forgotten Mother s words, and just shook her head 
 because we all were watching her. 
 
 Mother talked with us a little longer, and then sent 
 down-stairs for our governess. This was Miss Ellis, a 
 dear, good lady, who was almost as kind as Mother. We 
 loved her very much, and when she looked brightly at us 
 and said, " Oh, I am sure they all will be very good and 
 obedient while Mama is gone," we echoed her words from 
 the depths of our saddened little hearts. 
 
 It was interesting enough .to see Miss Ellis put all the 
 wonderful things into the trunk gloves, laces, the fan 
 that sparkled when you shook it, the little pink shawl 
 trimmed with swans down, that Mother used to throw 
 around her shoulders when she " dressed up " ; the funny 
 work-bag that shut by pulling two strings ; and the beau 
 tiful chintz dress with birds flying all over it. But our 
 hour of enjoyment was short. When the trunk was 
 locked, strapped, and placed in the hall ; when Father, who 
 came home to dinner that day, told Miss Ellis just how to 
 send for them in case anything should happen ; and when, 
 above all, Father and Mother kissed us for " good-by " and 
 
ONLY A ROSE 291 
 
 were really going, and we sobbing ones (after a whispered 
 hint from Miss Ellis) were wishing them " a very hap-ap- 
 py time," we felt that nothing more dreadful had ever 
 happened to three poor, forsaken children. 
 
 As soon as the carriage rolled away, and Miss Ellis 
 closed the street door, Marie just leaned her back against 
 it and cried ; I sat down on the mat, forgetting my clean 
 white dress, and sobbed aloud ; and little Gerty cried be 
 cause Marie and I did. I do believe, if some fairy had 
 made my new wax doll walk down-stairs at that moment, 
 and take a seat on my lap, I should n t have noticed it 
 much ; or if the sugar-barrel had come bumping up the 
 kitchen stairs, and rolled past me, spilling sugar all the 
 way, I really could not have taken any for at least two 
 minutes, I was so wretched. 
 
 Seven days ! Only to think of it ! Why, a day appeared 
 nearly as long to me then as a month does now, and a week 
 without Mother seemed too cruel to think of almost as 
 dreary as going through a dark tunnel fifty miles long. I 
 had yet to learn that to sit down and cry over such a trouble 
 was one of the silliest things in the world. Miss Ellis 
 told us so then, and tried to comfort us, but we hardly 
 heeded her. Indeed, we might have sobbed there for an 
 hour longer, if a well-known voice had not called us, from 
 the foot of the kitchen stairs : 
 
 " Doan be cryin dar, chillen ! Come down ter ole Lizer. 
 I m a-gwine ter make cookies ! " 
 
 Those words sent a ray of bright sunshine through the 
 lonely hall, I can tell you ! Marie gave her eyes one or two 
 final rubs with her apron ; Gerty clapped her hands and 
 
292 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 ran to " Lizer " ; and I rose and walked slowly down the 
 hall, letting my lips stick out pretty far, so as to feel 
 miserable as long as possible. 
 
 " Jump, dearie ! " we heard the cheerful voice say to 
 Gerty, who loved, when nearly at the bottom of the stairs, 
 to leap into Eliza s arms. " Jump-a-daisy ! doan be afeard ! 
 Ole Lizer 11 ketch yer ! " 
 
 In another moment, Marie and I rushed joyfully into the 
 kitchen, exclaiming, "Will you bake us a bogie man, Eliza? 
 Will you bake us a bogie man ? " 
 
 " Course I will, honey ; but you muss all be circum 
 spections, now. Can t hab no f ussin in dis yere kitclmm." 
 
 We were so well accustomed to this command, that it 
 produced but little effect upon us. I was upon the kitchen 
 table " as quick as a wink," and Gerty ran up and down 
 the well-scrubbed floor, laughing and shouting with delight. 
 Meanwhile, Eliza moved slowly and steadily about the 
 large kitchen, from pantry to table, from table to dresser, 
 her shining brown face beaming with kindness, yet grand 
 to our eyes with its look of importance ; her great plump 
 form arrayed in a dark calico gown, covered with the 
 cleanest of check aprons ; a bright plaid kerchief tied 
 about her head ; another folded over her bosom. I can 
 hear her soft, heavy tread yet as it sounded that day while 
 she placed the sugar, eggs, butter, dishes, and other articles 
 upon the kitchen table. At last came the white flour- 
 pail, crowned with a big sieve, and then I knew that my 
 time to dismount from the table had arrived. Eliza spoke 
 even while I was scrambling down : " Get off of dar, Miss 
 Lilly ; can hab no chillen cumberin up dis yere table ! " 
 
ONLY A ROSE 293 
 
 Oh, what fun it was to see the butter and sugar, all 
 lumpy and mottled when first stirred together, grow into 
 a smooth golden paste under the strokes of her wooden 
 spoon ! to see the beaten eggs, like a little sea of foam, 
 grow less and less in their fragrant bed ! then the snow- 
 like fall of flour, as with one hand she shook the sieve, 
 while stirring briskly with the other ! and, above all, to 
 see the completed dough flatten out under the rolling-pin, 
 all ready to be stamped into cookies ! Marie, being the 
 eldest, always had the privilege of stamping out a few with 
 the tin cover of the little nutmeg-can; and, provided I had 
 faithfully kept my fingers out of the cinnamon-box and 
 not upset anything upon the table, I was sometimes 
 allowed to test my skill too. As soon as the cookies were 
 finished came the grand performance of bogie-baking. Such 
 lovely men ! One for Marie, one for Gerty, and one for me 
 all with arms thicker than their legs, and noses bigger 
 than their feet ; or, rather, they often developed these pe 
 culiarities after they were put into the oven. Two pieces 
 of cloves for eyes, and a strip of citron for the mouth, com 
 pleted their charms. Soon the oven was quite filled. The 
 kitchen grew more and more delightful with the odor of 
 baking cookies, and we children clustered together on the 
 great window-bench, while Eliza made the kitchen, as she 
 said, look " a leetle scrumptuous " again. 
 
 When we went up-stairs, Miss Ellis let us play in the 
 nursery until tea-time ; so the afternoon passed away pleas 
 antly enough, though we felt lonely at supper, notwith 
 standing the cookies and our beautiful little bogies. It 
 seemed doleful to close our eyes that night without 
 iy* 
 
294 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 Mother s " good night " kiss ; but Miss Ellis allowed Marie 
 and me to pommel each other with the pillows for a while 
 before going to sleep, and that was a great consolation. 
 
 I cannot recall much of the second day of Father s and 
 Mother s absence. Probably we were good and happy, or I 
 should remember something about it, for clouds are apt 
 to make stronger pictures on the memory than sunshine. 
 Oh, yes; Henry Garnet came in from the country. He 
 was Eliza s husband, or " ole man," as she called him, and 
 he well knew that he was always welcome to a home with 
 us for Eliza s sake. He was old and infirm, and would sit 
 by the kitchen stove hour after hour, rising only when 
 Eliza s cheerful voice said, " Here, ole man, just fotch me a 
 skettle o coal, if you ain t grow d fast ter dat yar stool," or, 
 " Here, ole man, just fotch in a pail of water, will yer?" 
 
 These little demands attended to, old Henry would sit 
 down again and settle into his afternoon doze, leaning his 
 head tenderly against the wooden mantel, and folding his 
 hands before him, quite sure that " Lizer " would set him 
 up straight, in case he "took to leanin over too much to one 
 side," as he often did. It was strange to see her pause in 
 her busiest moments, and, walking toward the dozing old 
 man, straighten his leaning form in the most businesslike 
 way, never murmuring though she had to repeat the per 
 formance half a dozen times during his nap. 
 
 "Ah, Miss Ellis," she said, one day, " men is unhandy 
 things ter hab aroun , specially in a kitchuin ; but den de 
 old gem m an s had a hard time bein knocked about in dis 
 woiT, an while de Lord spares him, ole Lizer doan mind 
 de trouble." 
 
ONLY A ROSE 295 
 
 Well, Henry came just before dinner, and the rest of the 
 day is a blank in my mind ; but the next morning stands 
 out bright and clear. It was Sunday. After breakfast, 
 Marie and I were dressed for church, and, while Miss Ellis 
 was getting ready to go with us, we were all three allowed 
 to walk a while in the garden. It was a plain city yard, 
 with grassplot in the middle, bordered with a flower-bed 
 with fine rose-bushes in eacli corner. During the past few 
 days we had been watching the buds with great interest 
 (for it was June), and now, to our great joy, we found three 
 lovely new roses nestling amid the green. Our shouts of 
 delight brought Miss Ellis to the window. 
 
 After gently chiding us for making so much noise, Miss 
 Ellis told us (especially Gerty) not on any account to pick 
 the roses, for she wished the bush to look as beautiful as 
 possible when our parents should return. Marie and I saw 
 Gerty look wistfully up at the window, after Miss Ellis left it, 
 and then walk slowly toward the bush. We almost kneiu 
 that she meant to pick a rose (the very prettiest one of all) 
 hanging within reach of her chubby hand. Either Marie 
 or I could easily have prevented it ; but Mother s wish was 
 forgotten. Was Marie " keeping faithful watch over her 
 sisters " ? Was I " steady, keeping out of all mischief " ? 
 No ! we both looked on Marie indifferently, and I, filled 
 with mischievous glee, thinking of " the time " Miss Ellis 
 would make if Gerty should disobey her. 
 
 In a few moments the rose was pulled from its stem. 
 While we were looking at it, Miss Ellis came to the door 
 of the back piazza in plain sight of the blooming rose-bush, 
 which was still stirring after its tussle with Gerty. 
 
296 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 " Who picked that rose ? " she asked sternly. 
 
 Gerty held the flower so tightly that it was all crushed ; 
 but none of us answered. 
 
 " Did you pick it, Gerty ? " asked Miss Ellis, in a sorrow 
 ful tone. 
 
 " Es ; Gerty picked it," replied Gerty, backing toward us 
 as she spoke. 
 
 "Then Gerty has been disobedient. Gerty must be 
 punished." 
 
 The frightened little creature began to cry. Marie and 
 I held our breaths. Miss Ellis took her up to one of the 
 garret rooms ; it had nothing in it but an old chair and a 
 doll, which lay upon the floor. It was a gloomy room, with 
 only one window, and that was so high up that we never 
 could look out of it without climbing up on something. 
 
 Gerty sobbed bitterly when Miss Ellis told her, as they 
 started for this room, that she must stay there alone for five 
 minutes, and we felt half tempted to follow and rescue 
 her by main force. But when we heard our governess shut 
 the door of the lonely room, and walk away, we ran down 
 into the front hall as fast as our legs could carry us. 
 
 It was now nearly church-time, the bells were ringing, 
 and as we stood on the front stoop, waiting for Miss Ellis 
 to join us, we saw the people walking quietly on their way 
 to church. We felt sorry for Gerty, but tried to comfort 
 ourselves with the secret falsehood that we could n t help 
 it. " Pshaw ! " I thought, " it was only a rose, after all ; 
 there s no harm done." " It was disobedience, too, and 
 you should have saved your little sister from the act," 
 whispered something within me ; but I hushed the voice, 
 
ONLY A ROSE 297 
 
 and kept repeating as I stood there, " It was only a rose, 
 anyhow." 
 
 By this time I felt sure that the " five minutes " must be 
 nearly over, and was raising my eyes to the dormer windows 
 of the garret, and feeling very sorry for the poor little 
 prisoner, when suddenly I saw something spinning down 
 through the air from the very top of the house spinning, 
 falling, nearer and nearer, until it struck the iron railing 
 of the front piazza, and then fell heavily upon the stone 
 pavement. Oh, it was Gerty ! Gerty ! our own darling 
 little sister ! 
 
 Eliza and old Henry came rushing up the front cellar 
 steps. I remember his bent body ; the gathering crowd ; 
 the quiet little form upon the pavement ; the crimsoned arm ; 
 the screams and sobs of Marie, Miss Ellis, and Eliza ; the 
 momentary tumult and terror ; then the awful hush when 
 she was laid, still and white, upon the sofa. Would she 
 ever open her eyes ever speak to us again ? The doctor 
 shook his head when Miss Ellis looked imploringly into 
 his face. She was frantic with grief, and Eliza, groaning 
 and crying, dashed water upon Gerty s white face, without 
 effect. The kind-hearted creature, even in her distress, had 
 a word of sympathy for Miss Ellis. 
 
 "Ah, chile," she sobbed, "don t take on don t take on 
 de Lord knows yer was tryin to do right. Oh ! if dose 
 bressed little eyes would on y look at ole Lizer jist once. 
 If you d ou y brought out de chair, Miss Ellis but still it 
 seemed out o natur for de poor little creatur to drag it to 
 de winder all herself. Oh, doctor, doctor, is she killed ? 
 De Lord have mercy. Is she killed ? " 
 
298 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 Soon the surgeon arrived. After he had been with her for 
 nearly an hour, set and bandaged the poor little arm, which 
 was broken in two places, and with his assistant attended 
 to her dreadful wounds and bruises, we were told that Gerty 
 had opened her eyes and asked faintly for a drink of water. 
 A messenger had gone on horseback to summon Father 
 and Mother. He crossed the ferry to Long Island, and 
 then, lashing his horse, never halted until he readied 
 the farm-house where they were visiting. The horse bore 
 him nobly, but fell dead a few moments after reaching the 
 house. Gerty did not know Father and Mother when they 
 came. She did not notice anything, but she was living, and 
 that was more than they had dared hope for. 
 
 It was a terrible time. For weeks their little one hovered 
 between life and death ; but their prayers were answered. 
 In course of time she grew stronger ; new color bloomed 
 in her cheek, and her pattering feet once more made music 
 for the household. She lived, a bright, playful child, and 
 not an invalid or cripple, as all had feared she would be ; 
 but never again did either Marie or I, while thinking upon 
 all that happened on that sad June morning, dare say in 
 our hearts, " It was only a rose." 
 
LIMPETTY JACK 
 
THE BOYS HELD MANY A CONSULTATION IN FRONT OF THE COUNTRY STORE. 
 
LTMPETTY JACK 
 
 ONCE upon a time there was a very stupid fellow whom 
 nearly all the boys of the neighborhood, "just for fun," 
 called Limpetty Jack. It would have been better if they 
 had pitied him for his stupidity, and tried to help him to his 
 wits as well as they could. But none of them thought of 
 that. Probably if the boys had thought of it, they would 
 have gone to work and helped him heartily. But, at all 
 events, they did n t. They made, instead, more and more 
 sport of him every day, until at last they resolved to have 
 some very wonderful fun indeed. So, after many a con 
 sultation in front of the country store, they worked and 
 conjured with an ugly mask and brown stuff and wire 
 and long seaweeds and big green goggles until they suc 
 ceeded in producing a horrid-looking monster that is, 
 when they had persuaded a young man to try on the 
 mask and all the trappings. It was one Philigan McDer- 
 mot who thus consented to join in their so-called fun. 
 
 Then they took Philigan to a damp, gloomy cave by the 
 sea ; and after dressing him in the hideous rig, they made 
 him squat down on a rock in the dimmest corner. Such a 
 dreadful-looking object surely was never seen before, and 
 
 301 
 
302 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 the man himself, as he sat there, shivered to think of his 
 own appearance. Well, meantime some of the rest who 
 had joined in this cruel plan to frighten Limpetty Jack, 
 ran to find him, and to tell him that " a gentleman waited 
 to see him alone on important business." 
 
 " Won t it be too jolly ! " they whispered to one another 
 in great glee. "We 11 not let any harm really come to 
 Limpetty, but we 11 make him think he s in a peck of 
 trouble before we get through with him." 
 
 So they all chimed in, " Oh ! yes, Limpetty ! it s so ! 
 The gentleman wants to see you alone. Very important 
 business ! You 11 find him in the cave by the water." 
 
 "And be quick, Limpetty Jack ! " added their leader. 
 " He s the husband of the beautifulest mermaid that ever 
 lived. She sends you a bag of gold by him. He 11 be 
 wanting a sacrifice of you to pay for the gold, but never 
 you mind. Do as he tells you, and all will be right." 
 
 "Ay, but I will!" cried poor Limpetty Jack in great glee. 
 "A bag of gold from a mermaid ! Bless my lucky stars ! " 
 And off he ran to make himself fine for the wonderful 
 person who sat waiting for him in the cave by the water. 
 
 Now it so happened that just when Limpetty Jack was 
 about to start, he was joined by Philly Mac, as he was 
 affectionately called the little son of the Philigan Mc- 
 Dermot who now crouched in the cave waiting for Lim 
 petty Jack. 
 
 " Let me go with you, Jack ! " cried little Philly. 
 
 " No ! no ! " answered Limpetty Jack. " I must go 
 alone to get my bag of gold. It s a great secret. Stay 
 you where you be." 
 
LIMPETTY JACK 303 
 
 But Master Phil was a self-willed little fellow, and he 
 followed Limpetty Jack on the sly, slipping in and out 
 among the low bushes and rocks, not showing himself till 
 they were at the very mouth of the cave. All those 
 thoughtless boys were hidden away in the cave, almost 
 bursting with suppressed laughter, and waiting to see 
 what Limpetty Jack would do when he should come upon 
 the monster. 
 
 " You can t go in with me," whispered Limpetty Jack to 
 Philly, when at last he discovered him just outside the 
 entrance to the cave. 
 
 " But I will" insisted the child. 
 
 " We 11 see," said Limpetty Jack, as, catching the boy 
 in his arms, he waded into the water with him and set 
 him down upon a great rock that reared its top out of 
 the waves. 
 
 " Sit ye there like a good boy till I come back with the 
 bag of gold," said Limpetty Jack. There was no danger 
 of his being disobeyed, for, little as he was, Phil knew he 
 must drown if he slid off of the rock. And if he should 
 try it, who could hear him scream through all the wailing 
 of the sea ! 
 
 " Now ! " said Limpetty Jack, as he entered the cave. 
 
 " My stars ! " he cried faintly, as his astonished gaze 
 fell upon the terrible figure squatted in the corner, " but 
 the mermaids have a mighty queer taste in the way of 
 husbands ! " 
 
 Still lie was too eager for his bag of gold to back out 
 now. 
 
 " Good day, sir," said he, bowing as well as he could, 
 
304 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 considering his wet legs and the trembling that suddenly 
 came over him. 
 
 " Good day to you," croaked a strange voice. " I have 
 brought you a bag of gold from my wife." 
 
 " Many thanks to her, I m sure, sir," faltered Limpetty 
 Jack, bowing again, and stepping slowly forward inch by 
 inch. 
 
 " But," roared the mermaid s husband, " you cannot have 
 it for nothing. There must be a sacrifice. Get your fine 
 dog Shag, and stand him on the great rock near by, in the 
 sea, and when the waves wash him off and take him to my 
 wife, the gold is yours." 
 
 Poor Jack s teeth chattered. Stupid though he was, he 
 dearly loved Shag, and Shag loved him ; but he could not 
 bear to give up the gold. 
 
 " Your Mightiness," said he plaintively, " could n t ye 
 think of some other sakeryfice ? " 
 
 " Not another," bellowed the mermaid s husband, and a 
 low rumbling sound seemed to spring up in the cave ; but 
 it was only those wicked jokers trying not to laugh. One 
 of them had whispered to another : 
 
 " Now for it ! Limpetty s so scared he 11 never remem 
 ber that Shag s a swimmer ! " 
 
 But with that ugly monster before him, the poor dull- 
 witted fellow was ready to believe that any impossible 
 thing might happen. Some other dreadful creature might 
 appear from the depths and drag his beloved Shag down 
 under the sea. 
 
 " Well, sir," said Limpetty Jack, after a little bewildered 
 hesitation, " I have n t any too much sense. That I know 
 
LIMPETTY JACK 305 
 
 as well as the best one. But I like my dog Shag too well 
 to give him up for all the gold of the sea," and with a 
 great sigh he turned to go away. 
 
 " Hold ! " he cried, suddenly recollecting something. " I 
 did leave behind rue, on the great rock in the sea, a most 
 beautiful boy. I did n t mind me to do it ; but he would 
 follow me against my will. So I set him there to keep 
 him out of sight till I could meet your worship alone as I 
 was told. Yes, he s there a most beautiful boy, your 
 worship, the son of one Philigan McDerm " 
 
 Oh ! but you should have seen the monster spring to his 
 feet, cast off his mask, and tear out of the cave, he and all 
 the wicked jokers after him ! Limpetty Jack ran too, and 
 now he cared far more for finding poor little Phil than for 
 all the gold that ever was seen. 
 
 The tide had risen fast, and nearly covered the great 
 rock, and there on the very top, with the water close upon 
 his tiny feet, stood frightened, screaming little Phil. 
 
 It seemed as if the waves each greater than the one 
 before it must throw him off. They rushed into the sea. 
 It was hard work; but Limpetty Jack was first. The 
 rising waters were knee-high breast-high chin-high; 
 and all the while the waves were dashing them against 
 the sharp rocks. The strongest of them drew back dis 
 couraged. Then all they could distinguish was Limpetty 
 Jack s black head. They had seen the frantic little boy 
 leap toward it as if Jack had called him, and then Phil 
 McDermot, who had stood in the waves as if turned into 
 stone, was thrown violently back upon the shore. 
 
 When he opened his eyes, there stood his little son beside 
 
 20 
 
306 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 him, screaming with terror at the father s outlandish dress. 
 The boys were crowding about Limpetty Jack, cheering 
 him, shaking his hands, clapping his shoulders, and thank 
 ing him with full hearts. He seemed dazed at first ; but 
 after they had hurried him into the nearest house, and put 
 dry clothes upon him, he asked for little Philly Mac, and 
 wept with joy to know that the child was safe. 
 
 Strange to say, he seemed to brighten in his wits from 
 that day. It might have been owing to the shock, or to 
 his bravery in saving little Phil, or to the fact that people 
 young and old at last thought of helping him. Certain 
 it is, the boys were his friends. Never again did even 
 the most mischievous among them play any prank upon 
 Limpetty Jack. 
 
BUBBLES 
 
BUBBLES 
 
 AS TOLD BY JOEL STACY 
 
 IT is so long since it happened, my dears, that whenever 
 I think about it, the youngest of my acquaintances fade- 
 quite out of sight ; dear middle-aged faces grow rosy and 
 youthful ; Mary, my grave little wife, suddenly goes dan 
 cing down the garden path with a skipping-rope ; our worn- 
 out old Dobbin becomes a frisky colt ; the tumbled-down 
 affair yonder, behind the pile of brush, straightens it 
 self into a trim, freshly -painted woodshed ; and well, the 
 long and short of it is this : the memory of that day always 
 carries me back to the time when I was a little boy. 
 
 You see, I sat on the porch blowing soap-bubbles. I re 
 member it just as if it were yesterday. The roses were out 
 and the wheelbarrow had a broken leg ; the water in the 
 well was low, and if you tried to climb up on the curb to 
 look down into it you d have some one calling for you 
 to " come away from there." But you could do what you 
 pleased on the porch. It was so warm and sunny that 
 Mother let me leave off my shoes as a matter of course. It 
 seems to me that I can remember just how the hot boards 
 felt to the soles of my tiny bare feet. Certainly I can re- 
 
 20* 309 
 
310 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 call how Eover looked, exactly he has been dead these 
 dozen years, poor fellow! 
 
 The lather must have been precisely right, for I know it 
 worked beautifully. Such bubbles as I blew that morning ! 
 What colors they displayed! How lightly they sailed up 
 into the clear air ! Sometimes a little one with a bead at 
 the end a failure would fall upon Rover s nose and 
 burst so quickly that I could n t tell whether its bursting 
 made him blink or his blinking made it burst. Sometimes 
 a big one would float off in the sunlight and slowly settle 
 upon the soft grass, where it would rock for an instant, then 
 snap silently out of sight, leaving only a glistening drop 
 behind. And sometimes but here I must begin afresh. 
 
 The little girl who lived next door very soon came and 
 leaned her bright head out of the window. A bubble had 
 just started at the end of my pipe. I did n t look up ; but 
 I knew she was watching me, and so I blew and blew just 
 as gently and steadily as I could, and the bubble grew big 
 ger, bigger, bigger, until at last it almost touched my nose. 
 Then it let go ; and looking up at it, I saw in the beautiful 
 ball first the blue sky, then perfect little apple-tree bran 
 ches, then I saw the house, then the open window and the 
 little girl ! 
 
 This made me shout with joy. I called out, but the 
 little girl was gone. Probably she had bobbed her head 
 back into the room. It was just like little girls to do so, 
 you know. Then I blew others, and knew she was watch 
 ing me again ; and, all of a sudden, Mother called me. 
 
 Well, I cannot remember much more about that sum 
 mer. It seems to me that there were peaches, and that 
 
BUBBLES 3H 
 
 Rover learned to draw a wagon ; but I m not sure whether 
 that happened just then or a year or two later. 
 
 The next thing that conies up is a school-room. I 
 must have been a big boy by that time, for I remember 
 having my pockets full of marbles ; also I remember hav 
 ing a black eye on account of a fellow named Townley. 
 (Townley is in the sugar business now.) Besides, I was in 
 fractions, and, though I did n t care very much for study, 
 I did n t wish her to think I was stupid. Who ? Did n t 
 I tell you ? Why, a little girl who went to the same 
 school, a little girl in a pink calico dress and a white 
 sunbonnet. She had a way of dropping her books on her 
 way home from school, I remember, and we fellows used 
 to jump for them so as to have the fun of handing them to 
 her. Well, the way I used to try to get up head in the 
 classes when she was there \vas astonishing. The other 
 fellows tried to show off, too ; but I knew by the way that 
 she did n t ever notice me unless I spoke to her that she 
 thought my bubble was the biggest. You see it was only 
 blowing bubbles again, after all. 
 
 Well, time flew along, and at last war came. I was a 
 stout fellow then ; Mother said I could go, bless her brave 
 heart! and I went. The scenes, the horrors of that war! 
 But we 11 not talk of them now. It s enough to say that 
 though I felt patriotic and all that, I specially wished to 
 distinguish myself well, I don t mind telling you in 
 confidence so that Somebody with brown, laughing eyes 
 and a gentle voice would be almost as proud as Mother 
 to see me coming back with honors. 
 
 Blowing bubbles again, you 11 observe. 
 
312 
 
 THE LAND OF PLUCK 
 
 "THERE SAT MY LITTLE MAN, AND IF THE YOUNG SCAMP WAS N T BLOWING 
 
 BUBBLES ! " 
 
 Once more time flew along. Why not ? And again I 
 found myself trying this time to make money. The 
 day, as I look back, is so close that the old faces put on 
 their own look again, and the young acquaintances come 
 to light once more, and Mary, my wife, no longer skipping 
 down the garden path, sits at her little work-table sewing. 
 Well, as I have said, this time I am trying to make 
 money. There is great excitement in Wall street. Men 
 are being made ricli or poor in an hour. I have a good, 
 steady clerkship, but a chance for blowing a great big, big 
 bubble comes to me. I can see a happy face already look 
 ing up at me from its golden surface. 
 
BUBBLES 313 
 
 Other men have succeeded. She shall be rich now ! 
 
 I blow and blow, and the bubble bursts ! All gone, 
 gone in a flash, the savings of years ! Euined ! 
 
 I hurry home though it is but the middle of the day. 
 No one there. I sit down to think. Euined ? Not a bit 
 of it. Have n t I health and honesty and strength ? 
 Have n t I Father and Mother and have n t I Mary and 
 have n t I young Joe ? 
 
 With this thought, and hearing our Ponto give a brisk 
 questioning bark of attention, and Joe calling me, I stepped 
 to the back window and looked out. Surely enough, there 
 sat my little man, and if the young scamp was n t blowing 
 bubbles ! And, if you 11 believe me, the little girl next door 
 was leaning out of the window watching him ! Just then, 
 Mary came in, I mean just now, for the fact is I in 
 writing about this very day. And both Mary and I think 
 
 O t/ i/ i/ 
 
 it is n t such a very dreadful thing, after all, to lose a few 
 hundred dollars, for I have my clerkship yet, and I in 
 determined never to speculate witli my savings again. 
 No, I m going to be a steady, faithful, hard-working fel 
 low, and Mary and Mother and Joe and I are going to be 
 just as comfortable and happy as birds and and 
 
 You see, I am blowing this new bubble so slowly and 
 cautiously in the sunlight that I know it will be all safe. 
 And right in the heart of it I see Mary Mary who has 
 looked brightly up at me from every bubble that I have 
 ever blown in all my life. 
 
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 BERKELEY 
 
 Return to desk from which borrowed. 
 This book is DUE on the last date stamped below. 
 
 3War 53FF 
 KftRl 2 1953 U 
 
 * bet 
 
 LD 21-100w-7, 52(A2528sl6)476 
 
U. C. BERKELEY LIBRARIES 
 
 M230423 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY