DAISY’S SURPRISE.
LULU’S PETS.
BY MARY STANDISH ROBINSON.
FIRST, there was Tom Doddles; and he was a bother. Grandma said so, when she found him snugly curled up in her favorite arm-chair, grandpa stumbled over him in the doorway, and sister Caroline declared that “the little plague shouldn’t go with her when she went to take her music lessons.” Don’t imagine that Tom Doddles cared for music; O, not at all; he plainly said so when he heard any, by a series of howls, and little, jerky barks.
But he liked to drive out in the phaeton, and stand up with his fore-paws on the dash-board, and look at the horse, with the most solemn air imaginable.
That is, he would do so for a short distance, until thinking, doubtless, that the wise traveler should improve all opportunities, he would dash down and away for a nearer inspection of bird or butterfly. And once he had too much curiosity about a bee; after that, he thought bees were rather disagreeable, and quite ignored their society.
And you see, scrambling through sand-heaps, and splashing through mud-puddles, was apt to disarrange his toilet. And he didn’t care in the least, but would jump back again in a social manner, that was very distressing to Caroline.
She did not like to have her clean frocks “mussed” and disfigured by mud, and ever so many little black and white hairs.