"The most elastic there are. Hold! while waiting, do you want a good fruit to take away your thirst?" And, while speaking, Harris went to gather from a tree some fruits, which seemed to be as pleasant to the taste as those from the peach-tree.
"Are you very sure, Mr. Harris," asked Mrs. Weldon, "that this fruit can do no harm?"
"Mrs. Weldon, I am going to convince you," replied the American, who took a large mouthful of one of those fruits. "It is a mango."
And little Jack, without any more pressing, followed Harris's example, He declared that it was very good, "those pears," and the tree was at once put under contribution.
Those mangos belonged to a species whose fruit is ripe in March and April, others being so only in September, and, consequently, their mangos were just in time.
"Yes, it is good, good, good!" said little Jack, with his mouth full. "But my friend Dick has promised me caoutchoucs, if I was very good, and I want caoutchoucs!"
"You will have them, Jack," replied Mrs. Weldon, "because Mr. Harris assures you of it."
"But that is not all," went on Jack. "My friend Dick has promised me some other thing!"
"What then, has friend Dick promised?" asked Harris, smiling.
"Some humming-birds, sir."