Meg looked perplexed at this request, for a moment, but soon recovered herself. Fortunately, Mother Goose’s melodies are the common property of infant humanity, from the royal palace to the rag-picker’s hut, and Meg struck up the nursery-classic—
“By, Baby-Bunting!”
She had a very sweet voice, which certainly soothed the child, for he listened in drowsy delight. He well understood that he himself was the Baby-Bunting in question. But when she sang the next line:
“Popper’s gone a-hunting.”
He opened his sleepy eyes and said:
“No, no; me dot no popper!”
“Never mind; some Baby-Buntings have—”
“Mommer’s gone a-milking.”
“No, no; Lenny mammer don’t go miltin’! Dane do miltin’, and Mawy, and Suzy—down home in tountry. And Lenny do wid ’em too—see milt tow,” he exclaimed, quite waking up, as the memory of the rural pleasures of Old Lyon Hall flashed over his mind.
“Well, never mind; some mommers do, you know—”