“Thee has one of the best mothers that ever lived, my boy. I want thee always to mind thy mother.”
“And remember this: A child that won’t mind its mother won’t mind its God!”
“Click, clack,” went the horse’s hoofs; and Pollio stood on the fence till horse and rider were far out of sight. Still these words rang in his ears:—
“A child that won’t mind its mother won’t mind its God.”
Next morning he and Teddy were wakened by the firing of guns; and both sprang out of bed with a bound, and Pollio with a “whoop.” He had a new “pair o’ clo’es,” which he was not to wear till next Sunday; but I grieve to say, that, thinking he could not do too much for his country, he put them on, and ran down stairs after Teddy.
Posy, who slept in the next room with Edith, wished also to do something for her country, but fell asleep, and forgot it.
The two boys rushed out of doors as if there were no time to be lost; but it was so very early that nobody was to be seen but Beppo, and Muff the gray cat, whose tail had a yellow tip, as if it had been scorched. The village-boys, who had been firing guns and ringing bells, had gone to bed to make up their sleep; and there was no sound now except from time to time the crowing of a cock, or the braying of Judge Pitcher’s donkey, which Pollio called by mistake “the Yankee.”
There were “fairies’ tablecloths” on the grass,—I mean spiders’ webs,—covered with dew: the flowers hung their heads, and the trees hardly stirred. The world did not look natural to the two little boys at this early hour.
“Let’s go in the barn and take a nap,” yawned Teddy, not half as wide awake as his brother.
“How now, boys? what makes you so sober?” called out somebody from the piazza. “Come up here and see what I’ve got for you.”
The words were very refreshing; but at the same time Nunky let fly three beautiful red, white, and blue balloons, the largest and gayest ever seen.
Teddy was as wide awake now as Pollio, and cut as many capers of delight.
“So you like them, do you?” laughed Nunky. “They are for you and Posy, from your ‘thee-and-thou friend.’”
“Oh! he’s the goodest man that ever lived, ’cept you!” shouted Pollio.
“Fank you,” said Pollio with a fearful pull at his front-hair; and over he went in a somerset.