“Then I said,
“‘Two wise men of Gotham went to sea in a bowl; if the bowl had been stronger, my tale would have been longer.’ Then the minister laughed and asked me if I believed that; then I said ‘Yes, it is printed in a real book, in my Mother Goose, at home;’ and then the minister told me to ‘say some more Mother Goose,’ and then I told him all about ‘Old Mother Hubbard, who went to the cupboard,’ and ‘Jack and Gill,’ and ‘Four-and-twenty black-birds,’ and ‘Little Bo-peep;’ and then the minister laughed and said, ‘Mother Goose forever!’ I did not know what that meant, and I did not dare to ask, because the ministers boy came into the room just then, and said, ‘What a nice baby you have got on your knee, father;’ and that made my face very red; and I asked the minister to let me get down, and then the minister’s boy came up to me and said, ‘Sis!’ and I said, pouting, ‘I ain’t sis, I am Susy;’ and then he laughed, and said again, ‘What a queer one!’ and began pulling the cat’s tail.”
“How ugly—I wish I’d been alive then, I would have pulled his hair for teasing my mother so. What happened next, mother?”
“Then Betty brought in the roast turkey, and the hot potatoes, and the oysters, and things; and then the minister himself lifted me up in my high chair, between him and my mother, and then he folded his hands and said a blessing.”
“Was it very long, mother?”
“No, only a few words, and then he carved the turkey, and gave me the wish-bone.”
“Why, mother, he was not a bit like a minister; was he? Well?”
“Then I ate, and ate, and ate; and the minister gave me all the plums out of his pie, because he said that he could not find four-and-twenty black-birds to put in it; and after dinner he picked out my nuts for me; and when his boy called me ‘Sis,’ he said, ‘John, behave!’ After dinner, I asked the minister if he knew how to play cat’s-cradle; he said he used to know once; then he said to his wile, ‘Mother, can’t you give us a string, this little one and I are going to play cat’s-cradle.’ He was such a while learning that I told him I did not think ministers could play cat’s-cradle; but his wife said he was stupid on purpose, to see what I would do; he got the string into a thousand knots, and I got out of patience, and then I wouldn’t teach him any more; then he told me to see if I could spell cro-non-ho-ton-thol-o-gus, without getting my tongue in a kink. Then the minister’s boy said, ‘Try her on Po-po-cat-a-pet-el, father.’ Then the minister and I played ‘Hunt the Slipper,’ and ‘Puss in the Corner,’ and ‘Grand Mufti,’ and I was so sorry when a man drove up to the door, in a sleigh, and carried the minister off to see a poor sick woman.”
“Why, mother, I never heard of such a kind of a minister as he was. I thought ministers never laughed, and that they thought it was wicked to play; and that’s why I don’t like them, and am afraid of them. I wish our minister, Mr. Stokes, was like that minister you have been telling about; then I wouldn’t cross over the street when I see him coming. Do you think Mr. Stokes likes little children, mother? When he sees me he says, ‘How is your mother, Susy?’ but he never looks at me when he says it, and goes away after it as fast as ever he can; but what else happened at your minister’s, mother?”
“Well, by that time, the sun began to go down, and the frost began to thicken on the windows; and though the large wood fire blazed cheerfully in the chimney, my mother said we had such a long, cold ride before us, that it was time we were starting. So I went out in the kitchen to tell the red-faced coachman to tackle up his horses, and there he lay asleep on the wooden settle.”