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A Letter from Bubby Short

Dear Billy, —

My mother is all the one that I ever wrote a letter to before. So excuse poor writing, and this pen isn't a very good pen to write with I bet. I am very sorry that you can't come back quite yet. I hope that it won't be a fever that you are going to have. Does your grandma think that 't is going to be a fever? Do you take bitter medicine? I never had a fever. I take little pills every time I have anything. My mother likes little pills best now. But she used to make me take bitter stuff. Once she put it in my mouth and I wouldn't swallow it down. Then she pinched my nose together and it made me swallow it down. Once I ate up all the little pills out of the bottle, and she was very scared about it. It wasn't very full. But the doctor said that it wouldn't hurt me any if I did eat them. How many presents did you have? I had five. Dorry he says he hopes that it won't be a slow fever that you are going to have if you do have any fever, for he wants you to hurry and come back. Some new fellows have come. One is a tip-top one. And one good "pitcher." I hope you will come back very soon, 'cause I like you very much.

Do you know who 't is writing? I am that one all you fellers call

Bubby Short.

-

As may be gathered from the foregoing letter, William Henry did not go back to school with the rest. He was taken ill just at the close of vacation, and remained at home until spring. Grandmother said it was such a comfort that it didn't happen away. And it seemed to me that this thought really made her enjoy his being sick at home.

Indeed, the people at Summer Sweeting place seemed ready to get enjoyment from everything, even from gruel, which is usually considered flat. I passed a day there at a time when William Henry was subsisting on this very simple but wholesome food. Aunt Phebe and Uncle Jacob came in to take tea at grandmother's. The old lady was bringing out her nice things to set on the table, when Aunt Phebe said suddenly, I suppose seeing a hungry look in Billy's eyes. She said, —

"Now, Grandmother, I wouldn't bring those out. Let's have a gruel supper, and all fare alike! We'll make it in different ways, – milk porridge, oatmeal, corn-starch, – and I think 't will be a pleasant change."

"Gruel is very nourishing, well made," said Grandmother; "but what will Mr. Fry say?"

"Mr. Fry will say," I answered, "that milk porridge, with Boston crackers, is a dish fit for a king."

"I'm afraid Jacob won't think he's been to supper," said Grandmother.

"O yes," said Uncle Jacob, "I'll think I have at any rate. But I like mine the way the man in the moon did his, or part of the way."

"Yes," said Aunt Phebe, "I understand! The last part – the 'plum' part!"

"O, don't all eat gruel for me," said Billy. "Course I sha' n't be a baby, and cry for things!"

But Aunt Phebe seemed resolved to develop the gruel idea to its utmost. She made all kinds, – Indian meal, oatmeal, corn-starch, flour, mixed meals, wheat; made it sweetened, and spiced with plums, and plain. One kind, that she called "thickened milk," was delicious. "Course" we had one cup of tea, and bread and butter, and I can truly say that I have eaten many a worse supper than a "gruel supper."

Here is a letter from William Henry to Dorry, written when he began to get well: —

William Henry's Letter to Dorry

Dear Dorry, —

I'm just as hungry as anything, now, about all the time. My grandmother says she's so glad to see me eat again; and so am I glad to eat myself. Things taste better than they did before. Maybe I shall come back to school again pretty soon, my father says; but my grandmother guesses not very, because she thinks I should have a relapse if I did. A relapse is to get sick when you're getting well; and, if I should get sick again, O what should I do! for I want to go out-doors. If they'd only let me go out, I'd saw wood all day, or anything. There isn't much fun in being sick, I tell you, Dorry; but getting well, O, that's the thing! I tell you getting well's jolly! I have very good things sent to me about every day, and when I want to make molasses candy my grandmother says yes every time, if she isn't frying anything in the spider herself; and then I wait and whistle to my sister's canary-bird, or else look out the window. But she tells me to stand a yard back, because she says cold comes in the window-cracks: and my uncle Jacob he took the yardstick one day, and measured a yard, and put a chalk mark there, where my toes must come to, he said. If I hold the yardstick a foot and a half up from the floor, my sister's kitty can jump over it tip-top. My sister has made a Red-Riding-Hood cloak for her kitty, and a muff to put her fore paws in, and takes her out.

Yesterday Uncle Jacob came into the house and said he had brought a carriage to carry me over to Aunt Phebe's; and when I looked out it wasn't anything but a wheelbarrow. My grandmother said I must wrap up, for 't was the first time; so she put two overcoats on me, and my father's long stockings over my shoes and stockings, and a good many comforters, and then a great shawl over my head so I needn't breathe the air; and 't was about as bad as to stay in. Uncle Jacob asked her if there was a Billy in that bundle, when he saw it. "Hallo, in there!" says he. "Hallo, out there!" says I. Then he took me up in his arms, and carried me out, and doubled me up, and put me down in the wheelbarrow, and threw the buffalo over me; but one leg got undoubled, and fell out, so I had to drag my foot most all the way. Aunt Phebe undid me, and set me close to the fire; and Lucy Maria and the rest of them brought me story-books and picture-papers; and Tommy, he kept round me all the time, making me whittle him out little boats out of a shingle, and we had some fun sailing 'em in a milk-pan. Aunt Phebe had chicken broth for dinner, and I had a very good appetite. She let me look into all her closets and boxes, and let me open all her drawers. But I had to have a little white blanket pinned on when I went round, because she was afraid her room wasn't kept so warm as my grandmother's. Soon as Uncle Jacob came in and saw that little white blanket he began to laugh. "So Aunt Phebe has got out the signal of distress," says he. He calls that blanket the "signal of distress," because when any of them don't feel well, or have the toothache or anything, she puts it on them. She says he shall have to wear it some time, and I guess he'll look funny, he's so tall, with it on. The fellers played base-ball close to Aunt Phebe's garden. I tell you I shall be glad enough to get out-doors. I tell you it isn't much fun to look out the window and see 'em play ball. But Uncle Jacob says if the ball hit me 't would knock me over now. Aunt Phebe was just as clever, and let me whittle right on the floor, and didn't care a mite. And we made corn-balls. But the best fun was finding things, when I was rummaging. I found some pictures in an old trunk that she said I might have, and I want you to give them to Bubby Short to put in the Panorama he said he was going to make. He said the price to see it would be two cents. They are true ones, for they are about Aunt Phebe's little Tommy. One day, when he was a good deal smaller feller than he is now, he went out when it had done raining one day, and the wind blew hard, and he found an old umbrella, and did just what is in the pictures. The school-teacher that boarded there, O, she could draw cows and pigs and anything; and she drew these pictures, and wrote about them underneath.

I wish you would write me a letter, and tell Benjie to and Bubby Short.

From your affectionate friend,

William Henry.

P. S. What are you fellers playing now?

-

Thinking the school-teacher's pictures might please other little Tommys, I have taken some pains to procure them for insertion here. Little "fellers" usually are fond of carrying umbrellas, – large size preferred. Nothing suited Tommy better than marching off to school of a rainy day with one up full spread, provided he could hold it. His cousin Myra once took an old umbrella and cut it down into a small one, by chopping off the ends of the sticks, supposing he would be delighted with it. But no, he wanted a "man's one."

TOMMY ON HIS TRAVELS

Tommy sets forth upon his travels around the house, taking with him his whip.

At the first corner he picks up an umbrella. A larger boy opens the umbrella, and shows him the way to hold it. Being an old umbrella, it shuts down again. But Tommy still keeps on in his way.

At the second corner a gust of wind takes down the umbrella, and blows his capes over his head. He pushes on, however, whip in hand, dragging the umbrella behind him.

On turning the third corner a hen runs between his legs, and throws him down in the mud.

He is taken inside, stripped and washed, and left sitting upon the floor in his knit shirt, waiting for clean clothes. He can reach the handle of the molasses-jug. He does reach the handle, and tips over the jug. His mother finds him eating molasses off the floor with his forefinger. Tommy looks up with a sweet smile.

Here we have William Henry back at school again.

William Henry to his Grandmother

My dear Grandmother, —

I've been here three days now. I came safe all the way, but that glass vial you put that medicine into, down in the corner of the trunk, broke, and some white stockings down there, they soaked it all up; but I sha' n't have to take it now, and no matter, I guess, for I feel well, all but my legs feeling weak so I can't run hardly any. When I got here, the boys were playing ball; but they all ran to shake hands, and slapped my shoulders so they almost slapped me down, and hollered out, "How are you, Billy?" "How fares ye?" "Welcome back!" "Got well?" "Good for you, Billy!" Gus Beals – he's the great tall one we call "Mr. Augustus" – he called out, "How are you, red-top?" And then Dorry called out to him, "How are you, hay-pole?" Dorry and Bubby Short want me to tell you to thank Aunt Phebe for their doughnuts, and you, too, for that molasses candy. The candy got soft, and the paper jammed itself all into the candy, but Bubby Short says he loves paper when it has molasses candy all over it. I gave some of the things to Benjie. Something hurt me all the way coming, in the toe of my boot; and when I got here I looked, and 't was a five-cent piece right in the toe! I know who 't was! 'T was Uncle Jacob when he made believe look to see if that boot-top wasn't made of mighty poor leather. I went to spend it yesterday, down to the Two Betseys' shop. Lame Betsey called me a poor little dear, and was just going to kiss me, but I twisted my face round. I'm too big for all that now, I guess. She looked for something to give me, and was just going to give me a stick of candy; but the other Betsey said 't was no use to give little boys candy, for they'd only swallow it right down, so she gave me a row of pins, for she said pins were proper handy things when your buttons ripped off. Just when I was coming back from the Two Betseys' shop I met Gapper Skyblue. He goes about selling cakes now. A good many boys were round him, in a hurry to buy first, and all you could hear was, "Here, Gapper!"

"This way, Gapper!" "You know me, Gapper!" "Me, me, me!" One boy – he's a new boy – spoke up loud and said, "Mr. Skyblue, please attend to me, if you please, for I have five pennies to spend!" He came from Jersey. The fellers call him "Old Wonder Boy," because he brags and tells such big stories. But now, just as soon as he begins to tell, Dorry begins too, and always tells the biggest, – makes them up, you know. O, I tell you, Dorry gives it to him good! You'd die a laughing to hear Dorry, and so do all the fellers. W. B., – that's what we call Old Wonder Boy sometimes, – W stands for Wonder, and B stands for Boy, – he says cents are not cents; says they are pennies, for the Jersey folks call them pennies, and he guesses they know. He says he gets his double handful of pennies to spend every day down in Jersey. But Bubby Short says he knows that's a whopper, for he knows there wouldn't anybody's mother give them their double handful of pennies to spend every day, nor cents either, nor their father either. And then Dorry told Old Wonder Boy that he supposed it took his double handful of pennies to buy a roll of lozenges down in Jersey. Then W. B. said that our lozenges were all flour and water, but down in Jersey they were clear sugar, and just as plenty as huckleberries. Dorry said he didn't believe any huckleberries grew out there, or if they did, they'd be nothing but red ones, for the ground was red out in Jersey. But W. B. said no matter if the ground was red, the huckleberries were just as black as Yankee huckleberries, and blacker too, and three times bigger, and ten times thicker. Said he picked twenty quarts one day.

Dorry said, "Poh, that wasn't much of a pick!" Says he, "Now I'll tell you a huckleberry story that's worth something." Then all the boys began to hit elbows, for they knew Dorry would make up some funny thing. Says he: "I went a huckleberrying once to Wakonok Swamp, and I carried a fourteen-quart tin pail, and a great covered basket, besides a good many quart and pint things. You'd better believe they hung thick in that swamp! I found a thick spot, and I slung my fourteen-quart tin pail round my waist, and picked with both hands, and ate off the bushes with my mouth all the while. I got all my things full without stirring two yards from the spot, and then I didn't know what to do. But I'll tell you what I did. I took off my jacket, and cut my fishing-line, and tied up the bottom ends of my jacket sleeves and picked them both full. And then I didn't know what to do next. But I'll tell you what I did. I took off my overalls, and tied up the bottoms of their legs, and picked them so full you wouldn't know but there was a boy standing up in 'em!" Then the boys all clapped.

"Well," Old Wonder Boy said, "how did you get them home?"

"O, got them home easy enough," Dorry said. "First I put the overalls over my shoulders, like a boy going pussy-back. I slung all the quart and pint things round my waist, and hung the covered basket on one arm, and took the fourteen-quart tin pail in that same hand. Then I tied my jacket to the end of my fishing-pole, and held it up straight in my other hand like – like a flag in a dead calm!"

O, you ought to 've seen the boys, – how they winked at one another and puffed out their cheeks; and some of 'em rolled over and over down hill to keep from laughing! Bubby Short got behind the fence, and put his face between two bars, and called out, "S – e – double l!" But Dorry says they don't know what a "s – e – double l" is down in Jersey. But I don't believe that W. B. believes Dorry's stories; for I looked him in the face, and he had a mighty sly look when he asked Dorry how it was he got his huckleberries home.

To-day they got a talking about potatoes. Old Wonder Boy said that down in Jersey they grow so big you have to pry 'em up out of the hill, and it don't take much more than two to make a peck. Dorry told him that down in Maine you could stand on top the potato-hills and look all round the country, they were so high; and he asked W. B. how they planted 'em in Jersey, with their eyes up or down? He said he didn't know which way they did turn their eyes. Then Dorry told him the Yankees always planted potatoes eyes up, so they could see which way to grow. Said he planted a hill of potatoes in his father's garden, last summer, with their eyes all down, and waited and waited, but they didn't come up. And when he had waited a spell longer, he raked off the top of that hill of potatoes, and all he saw was some roots sticking up. And he began to dig down. And he kept digging. Followed their stems. But he never got to the potato-tops; and says he, "I never did get to those potato-tops!" O, you ought to 've heard the boys!

Old Wonder Boy wanted to know where Dorry thought they'd gone to. Dorry thought to himself a minute, and looked just as sober, and then says he, just like a school-teacher, "The earth, in the middle, is afire. I think when they got deep enough to feel the warm, they guessed 't was the sun, and so kept heading that way."

Is the world afire in the middle? Dorry told me that part of his story was really true. How Uncle Jacob would laugh to sit down and hear Dorry and Old Wonder Boy tell about whales. W. B. calls 'em wales. His uncle is a ship-captain, he says, and once he saw a wale, and the wale was making for his ship, and it chased 'em. And, no matter how they steered, that wale would chase. And by and by, in a calm day, he got under the vessel and boosted her up out of water, when all the crew gave a yell, – such a horrid yell that the wale let 'em down so sudden that the waves splashed up to the tops of the masts, and they thought they were all drowned.

"O, poh!" Dorry cried out. "My uncle was a regular whaler, and went a whaling for his living. And once he was cruising about the whaling-grounds and 't was in a place where the days were so short that the nights lasted almost all day. And they got chased by a whale. And he kept chasing them. Night and day. And there came up a gale of wind that lasted three days and nights; and the ship went like lightning, night and day, the whale after them. And, when the wind went down, the whale was so tuckered that he couldn't swim a stroke. So he floated. Then the cap'n sang out to 'em to lower a boat. And they did. And the cap'n got in and took a couple of his men to row him. The whale was rather longer than a liberty-pole. About as long as a liberty-pole and a half. He was asleep, and they steered for the tail end. A whale's head is about as big as the Two Betseys' shop, and 't is filled with clear oil, without any trying out. The cap'n landed on the whale's tail, and went along up on tiptoe, and the men rowed the boat alongside, and kept even with him; and, when he got towards her ears, he took off his shoes, and threw 'em to the men to catch. After a while he got to the tip-top of her head. Now I'll tell you what he had in his hand. He had a great junk of cable as big round as the trunk of a tree, and not quite a yard long. In one end of it there was a point of a harpoon stuck in, and the other end of it was lighted. He told the men to stand ready. Then he took hold of the cable with both hands, and with one mighty blow he stuck that pointed end deep in the whale's head, and then gave one jump into the boat, and he cried out to the men, 'Row! row for your lives! To the tail end! If you want to live, row!' And before that whale could turn round they were safe aboard the ship! But now I'll tell you the best part of the whole story. They didn't have any more long dark nights after that. They kept throwing over bait to keep her chasing, and the great lamp blazed, and as fast as the oil got hot it tried out more blubber, and that whale burned as long as there was a bit of the inside of him left. Flared up, and lighted up the sea, and drew the fishes, and they drew more whales; and they got deep loaded, and might have loaded twenty more ships. And when they left they took a couple in tow, – of whales, – and knocked out their teeth for ivory, and then sold their carcasses to an empty whaler."

Dorry says some parts of this story are true. But he didn't say which parts. Said I must look in the whale-book and find out.

Your affectionate grandchild,

William Henry.

P. S. I wish you would please to send me a silver three-cent piece or five-cent. Two squaws have got a tent a little ways off, and the boys are going to have their fortunes taken. But you have to cross the squaws' hands with silver.

W. H.

Georgianna's Letter to William Henry

My dear Brother Billy, —

O Billy, my pretty, darling little bird is dead! My kitty did it, and O, I don't know what I shall do, for I love my kitty if she did kill my birdie; but I don't forget about it, and I keep thinking of my birdie every time my kitty comes in the room. I was putting some seeds in the glass, and my birdie looked so cunning; and I held a lump of white sugar in my lips, and let him peck it. And while I was thinking what a dear little bird he was, I forgot he could fly out; but he could, for the door was open, and he flew to the window. I didn't think anything about kitty. It flew up to that bracket you made, and then it went away up in the corner just as high as it could, on a wooden peg that was there. I didn't know what made it flutter its wings and tremble so, but grandmother pointed her finger down to the corner, on the floor, and there was my kitty stretching out and looking up at my bird. And that was what made poor birdie tremble so. And it dropped right down. Before we could run across to catch kitty, he dropped right down into her mouth. I never thought she could get him. I didn't know what made grandmother hurry. I didn't know that kitties could charm birds, but they do. She didn't have him a minute in her teeth, and I thought it couldn't be dead. But, O Billy, my dear birdie never breathed again! I warmed him in my hands, and tried to make him stir his wings, but he never breathed again. Now the tears are coming again. I thought I wasn't going to cry any more. But they come themselves; when I don't know it, they come; and O, it was such a good birdie! When I came home from school I used to run to the cage, and he would sing to meet me. And I put chickweed over his cage.

Grandmother has put away that empty cage now. She's sorry, too. Did you think a grandmother would be sorry about a little bird as that? But she'd rather give a good deal. When she put the plates on the table, and rattled spoons, he used to sing louder and louder. And in the morning he used to wake me up, singing away so loud! Now, when I first wake up, I listen. But O, it is so still now! Then in a minute I remember all about it. Sometimes kitty jumps up on the bed, and puts her nose close down, and purrs. But I say, "No, kitty. Get down. You killed little birdie. I don't want to see you." But she don't know what I mean. She rubs her head on my face, and purrs loud, and wants me to stroke her back, and don't seem as if she had been bad. She used to be such a dear little kitty. And so she is. She's pretty as a pigeon. Aunt Phebe says she never saw such a pretty little gray and white kitty as she is. I was going to have her drowned. But then I should cry for kitty too. Then I should think how she looked all drowned, down at the bottom, just the same way I do now how my birdie looked when it couldn't stir its little wings, and its eyes couldn't move. My father says that kitty didn't know any better. I hope so. I took off that pretty chain she had round her neck. But grandmother thinks I had better put it on again. Aunt Phebe's little Tommy says, "Don't kye, Dordie, I'll bung dat tat. I'll take a tick and bung dat tat!" He calls me Dordie, I guess I rather have kitty alive than let her be drowned, don't you? Grandmother wants you not to catch cold and be sick.

From your affectionate sister,

Georgianna.

P. S. Grandmother showed me how to write this letter.

-

A caged bird is never a very interesting object to me. But this little canary of Georgie's was really a beautiful creature, and very intelligent. They used to think that he listened for her step at noon and night; for no sooner was it heard in the entry than he peeped out with his little bright eyes, and tuned up, and sang away, as if to say, "Glad! glad! glad you've come! glad you've come!"

Then she would go to the cage and talk to him, and let him take sugar from her mouth, and would hang fresh chickweed about its cage. Mornings she used to sing, from her bed, and the bird would answer. Indeed, he really seemed quite a companion for her.

At the time the accident happened I had been staying for a few weeks at the hotel, a mile or two off, and called at the farm that very day. Lucy Maria told me, as I stopped at their door, what the kitten had done, and how Georgianna had cried and mourned and could not be comforted.

I found her sitting on the doorstep. She had placed the bird in a small round basket, lined with cotton-wool, and was bending over, and stroking it. I had always noticed the bird a great deal, used to play with it, and whistle to make it sing louder and louder. The sight of me brought all this back to her mind, and she burst into tears again, sobbing out, "O, he never – will sing – any more! Dear little birdie! He had to fall down! He couldn't – help it!"

I talked with her awhile, in a cheerful way, and when she had become quite calm I held out my hand and said, "Come, Georgie, don't you want to go with me and find a pretty place where we can put birdie away, under the soft grass? And we will plant a flower there."

The idea of the soft grass and the flower seemed to please her. She took my hand, and we went to look about.

We thought the garden not a very good place, because it was dug up every year, and the field would be mowed and trampled upon. But just over the fence, back of the garden, we came upon some uneven ground, where the old summer-sweeting trees grew. In one place there was a sudden pitch downwards, into a little hollow, which grass and plantain leaves made almost forever green. For here was what they called the Boiling Spring. The water bubbled out of the ground on the slope of the bank, and in former times, before the well was dug, had been used in the family. Several trees grew about there, – wild cherry, damson, and poplar, – and a profusion of yellow flowers, wild ones. Some of these grandmother called "Ladies' Slipper"; the others, "Sullendine." The spring had once been stoned up and boxed over. But the boards were now rotting away, the stones falling in, and our little hollow had quite a deserted look. The water trickled out and ran away around the curve of the bank.

Grandmother came with us, and Georgie's teacher, and Matilda and Tommy. We hollowed out a little place under the wild-cherry tree, wrapped the birdie in cotton-wool, lay him in, and covered him over with the green sod. I then went down by the stone wall, where sweetbriers were growing, dug up a very pretty little one, and set it out close by, so that it might lean against the cherry-tree. Tommy kept very sober, and scarcely spoke a word, till it was all over. He then said to me, in a very earnest tone, "Mr. Fwy, now will another birdie grow up there?" I suppose he was thinking of his father's planting corn and more corn growing.