“I don’t think really brave men do,” answered Squib, with decision. “The boys at school say that it’s always the cowards and the bullies who do the bragging and the boasting; the really brave boys don’t have to be always telling of themselves.”
Seppi quite agreed in this, and told a few stories he had heard from others of his father’s prowess, and they drew many happy fancy pictures of the days to come when Squib should become a great mountain climber, and Ernsthausen should go with him right up into the land of cloud and snow, across the blue mysterious glaciers, and ever upwards and onwards to the soaring peaks beyond. Squib’s face flushed with delighted anticipation as he lifted it towards the eternal snows and thought of all the triumphs that lay before him; but presently his expression changed, and putting out his hand he took Seppi’s gently in it, and said,—
“I wish you could go too!”
Seppi smiled without any sadness.
“But, little Herr, I never could climb, you know,” and he looked at his poor, little, shrunken limb.
“I know,” answered Squib quickly, “but I mean I wish that that hadn’t happened to you.”
The little goat-herd looked thoughtfully out before him.
“I’m not sure that I do,” he said.
“O Seppi! what do you mean?”
“I was thinking,” answered Seppi dreamily, “that if I had been strong and active like Peter, perhaps I should not have had the goats to mind. I think Ann-Katherin would have taken them, and I should have worked at home with mother and Peter; and then, you see, I should not have had all those talks with Herr Adler, and I should not have had my drawing; and I should not have had you, little Herr!”