"But I don't like to have him down to the river: the Indians might carry him off."
"I'll get him to go to the old Cuthbert house: there's good clay there, and the spring where Cuthbert got his water."
The next morning Mr. Seth said to Sam,—
"Your mother don't like to have you down to the river: it's too far away; the Indians might come; we don't any of us think it's safe. You must play with your clay at the Cuthbert house: it's near the garrison, and then you'll all be safe."
"It isn't play," said Sammy, straightening him self up: "what makes you call it play? It isn't foolish play to make a bean-pot and things for folks to use, and that they have to buy at Baltimore: it's real work. It isn't a bit like making mud-puddin's, cob-houses, or playing marbles or horse, or having a war-post and making believe kill Indians."
"Indeed it's not," said Uncle Seth, more delighted than he cared to express, and patting the young enthusiast on the head.
"I don't want to go to the Cuthbert house, 'cause it's handsome down to the river; and the raft's there, and the fireplace, and water, and plenty of wood to bake the pots; and the clay down there is real soft, and just as blue as indigo, and feels greasy; and I can cut it with my knife, and it won't dull it one mite."
"I know that; but it's not so good clay to make pots as the gray at the Cuthbert house. It will do to make bricks by putting sand with it; but it's liable to crack, blister, and melt in the fire, 'cause there's so much iron in it."
"It don't look so red when it's burnt, that Cuthbert clay don't."
"Well, then, you can bring up a little of that from the river to color it: 'twon't take but a mite. There's more wood lying round Cuthbert's door than you can burn in six months; then you can have the house to dry your ware in, and to work in when it rains, and the great fireplace to build your kiln in."