"Guess I wouldn't make much hand at that," answered John.
"But you are big and strong, John."
"Yes, I'm big and strong enough; but it takes more than that to make a good nurse. If it came in my way to do a good turn for a sick body, and there was no one else to do it, why I'd lend a hand; but I don't know as they'd thank me for it."
"Oh yes they would, John," said Maggie, eagerly; "if I was sick and had no one to take care of me, and you came to do it, I'd thank you ever so much."
"Well, I'll do it when you come to that pass," said John, without the least idea what the little girls were driving at.
"He don't seem to understand yet," whispered Maggie to her sister; "try him with the 'Golden Rule.'"
"John," said Bessie, "are you not very fond of doing as you would be done by?"
"As fond as most folks, I guess," said John. "'Gee, there! gee, Whitefoot!"
Bessie waited till they had passed through the gate of the orchard, then began again.
"John, if there was a chance to do as you would be done by, and you did not think of it, would you like some one to tell you of it?"