Sam might well exclaim, for Harry was beginning to help him, and had seized the scythe. With cut number one he had shaved off the top of a fine verbena. With cut number two, he had driven the point of the sharp tool into the sod. Where the third cut would have gone, I can’t say; for Sam, hobbling up to the young workman, the young workman frisked off, and seized the barrow half full of grass.
“Jump in, Fred!” he exclaimed; and of course Fred soon made himself a seat on the soft green contents, and then away went the barrow as fast as Harry could run, and of course right away from the place where Sam would require it next.
Poor old Sam! He loved his master’s boys, and he loved to scold them too, as much as they loved to torment him; and in all their skirmishes—one of which always occurred whenever they came into his garden, as he called it—Sam always got the worst of it, and had to yield to numbers. And so in this case he saw that he should lose the day, and therefore he declared a truce, and called up Philip to act as mediator.
“Now, Master Phil, if you’ll promise not to bother me any more, I’ll put you all up to something.”
“What is it?” said Philip.
“Ah, you fetch them tother ones here, and I’ll show you.”
Away darted Philip, and soon returned with Harry, the barrow, and Fred.
Old Sam made sure of the barrow by sitting down upon the edge, and would have been canted over by Harry, only he expected, and very naturally, that it would make the poor old man cross.
“Now, Sam, what is it?” said Harry. “Come, look sharp.”
“Ah,” said Sam, “I’ve a good mind not to tell you. You don’t deserve it, you know.”