In returning from a walk, by a short cut across the field, I met a boy who was running just about as fast as he could.
Soon after I came to another and much smaller boy, who was not running at all, but was sitting flat upon the ground, under a tree, and crying with might and main. This smaller boy proved to be Tommy. On a branch of the tree, just out of his reach, hung a broom, towards which his weeping eyes were turned in despair. A paper of peanuts which I happened to have soon quieted him, because, in order to crack them, he had to shut his mouth. At the first of it, however, he went on with his crying while picking out the meats, which so amused me that I was obliged to turn aside and laugh.
It appeared that Tommy had been riding horseback on his mother’s broom “to see Billy,” and when he had made believe get there, he wanted to hitch his horse. A larger boy, out of mischief, or rather in mischief, bent down a branch of the tree, telling Tommy there was a tiptop thing to tie up to. He helped Tommy to tie the horse to the branch, and then ran off across the field. It is very plain what happened when the branch sprang back to its place.
I unhitched the animal, and then Tommy and I mounted it, he behind me, and away we cantered to the house, my amazing gallops causing the little chap to laugh as loudly as he had cried.
My dear Grandmother,—
Please to tell my sister I am much obliged to her for picking up that old iron for me. But that old rusty fire-shovel handle, I guess that will not do to put in again. For my father said, the last time, that he had bought that old fire-shovel handle half a dozen times. But Aunt Phebe’s Tommy, he pulls it out again to ride horseback on.
I know a little girl just about as big as my sister, named Rosy. Maybe that is not her name. Maybe it is, because her face is so rosy. She had a lamb. And she’s lost it. It ate out of her hand, and it followed her. It was a pet lamb. But it’s lost. Gapper came up to inquire about it. Mr. Augustus wrote a notice and nailed it on to the Liberty Pole, and then Dorry chalked out a white lamb on black pasteboard, and painted a blue ribbon around its neck, and hung that up there too.
Gapper let Bubby Short and me have his donkey-cart to go to ride in. He kicked up when we licked him, and broke something. But a man came by and mended it. So we didn’t get back till after dark. But the master didn’t say anything after we told the reason why. Did you ever see a ghost? Do you believe they can whistle? I’ll tell you what I ask such a question for.
There is an old house, and part of it is torn down, and nobody lives in it. It is built close to where the woods begin. The boys say there is a ghost in it. I’ll tell you why. They say that if anybody goes by there whistling, something inside of that house whistles the same tune. Dorry says it’s a jolly old ghost. Mr. Augustus thinks ’tis all very silly. Now I’ll tell you something.