“Not I, nor any of my people. Let me hear no more about it, if you please. I have given no orders to have a bridge built.”
Marius withdrew. The cow-horns were presently no longer heard—not that Marius had done any thing to silence them. He knew that the blowers were not thinking of either him or his master; but merely passing to their place of rendezvous, calling all frolickers together by the way.
“Temple, you find you can live without your squirrels, I hope,” said the tender father. “Now, no crying! I will not have you cry.”
“Bring me your papa’s cup, my dear,” interposed his mother; “and persuade him to try these early strawberries. The gardener surprised us this morning with a little plate of strawberries. Tell your papa about the strawberries in the orchard, my dear.”
In the intervals of sobs, and with streaming eyes, Temmy told the happy news that strawberries had spread under all the trees in the orchard, and were so full of blossom, that the gardener thought the orchard would soon look like a field of white clover.
“Wild strawberries, I suppose. Tasteless trash!” was the remark upon this intelligence.
Before a more promising subject was started, the door opened, and Dr. Sneyd appeared. Mr. Temple hastened to rise, put away, with a prodigious crackling and shuffling, the papers he held, quickened Temmy’s motions in setting a chair, and pressed coffee and strawberries on “the old gentleman,” as he was wont to call Dr. Sneyd. It was impossible that there could be much sympathy between two men so unlike; but it singularly happened that Dr. Sneyd had a slighter knowledge than any body in the village of the peculiarities of his son-in-law. He was amused at some of his foibles, vexed at others, and he sighed, at times, when he saw changes of looks and temper creeping over his daughter, and thought what she might have been with a more suitable companion; but Temple stood in so much awe of the philosopher as to appear a somewhat different person before him and in any other presence. Temmy now knew that he was safe from misfortune for half an hour; and being unwilling that grandpapa should see traces of tears, he slipped behind the window blind, to make his observations on the troop which was gathering in the distance on the way to the creek. He stood murmuring to himself,—"There goes Big Brawn and the Brawnees! I never saw any women like those Brawnees. I think they could pull up a tall tree by the roots, if they tried. I wonder when they will give me some more honey to taste. There[There] goes Dods! He must be tired before the frolic begins; for he has been making bricks ever since it was light. I suppose he is afraid papa will be angry if he does not make bricks as fast as he can. Papa was so angry with the rain for spoiling his bricks before! There goes David——" And so on, through the entire population, out of the bounds of Temple Lodge.
“I came to ask,” said the doctor, “how many of your men you can spare to this frolic to-day. Arthur will be glad of all the assistance that can be had, that the work may be done completely at once.”
The reply was, that Arthur seemed an enterprising young man.
"He is: just made for his lot. But I ought not to call this Arthur’s enterprise altogether. The Creek is no more his than it is yours or mine. The erection is for the common good, as the disaster last night"—(a glance from Mrs. Temple to her husband’s face, and a peep from Temmy, from behind the blind)—“was, in fact, a common misfortune.”