“Pap, I know next to nothing about anatomy and physiology, but from certain indications I should judge you to be hollow all the way down to the soles of your boots.”
“Oh, Elfie! how could you?” exclaimed Erminie. “Have you no veneration at all?”
“Not much. I’m afraid there’s a hole where that bump ought to be. But, as I said before, I don’t want to talk of myself, but of my glorious old governor. Well, at that dinner we had a sort of explanation; for you may be sure, not knowing that I was going on to fetch him, he was as much astonished at seeing me there as I was at seeing him. So in answer to his questions, I told him that, knowing very well he wasn’t able to take care of himself even in the best of times, I had started out with the intention of bringing him home. And then I demanded to know how it happened that he should be loafing about the Relay House in such a disrespectable way; and he told me that, feeling stiff and sore, and hungry and tired, he had got off at the Relay House with the intention of resting for the night before going on to Washington. And then the old fellow got sentimental, and called me his darling child and his brave girl; but I stopped all that by firing off at him the news of Britomarte’s and Justin’s resurrection from a ‘watery grave.’ Girls, it did him more good than all the surgeon’s plasters, and even the bath and dinner. He felt better immediately, and proposed that we should start for Washington by the evening train to welcome you back. But of course I wouldn’t allow that. Instead of letting him go to Washington, I made him go to bed, and carried him a cup of tea, and read to him all the evening. It was the full account of the battle of Gettysburg in the morning paper.”
“But he must have know all about that,” put in Erminie.
“Must he, then? I tell you he was in the thick of the fighting, and yet he knew nothing or next to nothing of it; at least not one-tenth part as much as we know, who were not there, yet who read the papers. ‘It was a dusty place. It was a noisy place. Shot and shell were a flying thick and fast. I was struck several times, but we whipped the rebels!’ That was the sum and substance of all the information I could gain from my warlike pap about the battle; but he listened to the Republican’s long account of it with the deepest interest, and fell asleep in the midst of it. I let him sleep, seeing that he was tired out, and knowing that we would have to continue our journey in the morning.”
“But, Elfie, dear, what have you done with your father now? Let me go to him; he must feel neglected.”
“Oh, no, he don’t. I took him at once to his bed-room and made him lie down and rest; and I asked Catherine to take him up a glass of wine and some biscuits. He’s all right, and will join us at dinner. And now, with your good leave, I will go to my room and get a little of this dust and smoke out of my eyes and nose before presenting myself to the Reverend Justin Rosenthal,” said Elfie, rising.
“Then come to us in the drawing-room, for we are going down there,” said Erminie.
Elfie nodded assent, and then flew out of the room, singing:
“We are coming, Father Abraham,