Exercise 37.—Change the following indirect quotations to direct quotations:—
1. The fir tree wished it were tall enough to go to sea, and asked the stork to tell it what the sea looked like; but the stork replied that it would take too much time to explain.
2. The little boy asked his grandmother whether the swarm of white bees had a queen bee and she replied that they certainly had.
3. Rip asked in despair whether nobody there knew Rip Van Winkle, and some one answered that he stood leaning against a tree yonder. Rip looked, and beheld a precise counterpart of himself as he went up the mountain. The poor fellow was now completely confounded and wondered whether he was himself or another man. In the midst of his bewilderment, the man in the cocked hat demanded who he was and what was his name. Rip replied that he was not himself but somebody else, and that he could not tell who he was.
Exercise 38.—Write from dictation.
1. A little daughter of a clergyman was not feeling well, and had to be put to bed early.
"Mother," she said, "I want to see my dear father."
"No, dear," said her mother, "father is not to be disturbed just now."
Presently came the pleading voice, "I want to see my father."
"No, dear," was the answer, "I cannot disturb him."