“It’s a funny kind of story!” said Eddie dubiously, agitating the popper, and not to be distracted by Freddie’s whispers.
“But this quilt I’m telling about,” went on Tante, “this new quilt was made up of pieces out of nearly all the old ones; fresh, bright pieces, most of them, the best and strongest part of the many-colored counterpanes of the world. Every one of these pieces was needed to make up the new pattern, sewed with the thread of old tradition, law and order. Every patch had its own place in the great getting-together, named a Union.”
“Why, the United States is a great Round Robin, isn’t it, Mumsie?” cried Nancy. “I never thought of it before.”
“So it is!” nodded Victor. “And some day we shall have a still bigger League, when all the nations of the world get together and make their squares fit into a beautiful pattern, without losing each its own shape.”
“That’s it!” Tante nodded. “The whole world will not be free until it is bound together; bound by something besides cables and railroads and wireless.”
Gilda was bending over the quilt studying it eagerly. “Zere is a square of La Belgique!” she cried, pointing to a patch of black, red, and yellow. “Hurrah for brave Belgium!” cried Dick. “We need her pluck that saved the world.”
“And there is a bit of Italy,” said Norma, laying a finger on a cornerwise patch of red and green, with white between.
“Mother had a dress of that pretty print,” interpolated Tante. “How Italy does bring brightness everywhere! And there is the tricolor of France. The blue and red are a little faded, Victor, because France with her fine gifts has been here in our quilt a long time; among the very first. French sailors, Norse and Icelandic, all came to America before the Spanish named it and the English mapped it.”
“My grandmother was French,” said Nelly Sackett. “She came from Canada.”
“I am part Spanish,” said Dick. “I guess that’s why I am so much interested in pirates. I’m a regular Patchwork Quilt myself! I’m part Irish and part Dutch and part Swedish, too. They all had a hand in building America.”