"What do I want of it?" cried Gerald. "What a question!—
"O Hilda, fair beyond compare!
I'll make a garland of thy hair,
Shall twine my heart forevermair,
Until the day I dee!"
"Very proper!" said Hilda. "I am glad to find that you know your ballads. What else will you do with it, for example?"
"Wi' ae lock o' thy yellow hair
I'll theek my nest when it grows bare!"
Gerald went on. "The excelsior is coming out of my mattress, and I thought—"
"I can't spare enough for that," said Hildegarde. "Any other uses for my poor hair?"
"The Mater has a single hair of George Washington's, done up in a gold snuffbox," cried the boy. "If you'll give me two, I will hunt up a snuffbox. There's a fine old stingo in the Chemical Works who takes snuff, and I will get his, and give him a tomato can instead, and keep one hair in that."
"And the other?" Hilda persisted, taking the long tresses in her hand, and running them through her fingers in a tantalizing manner,—"the other hair, Master Obadiah?"
"Oh, dear! what a persistent thing a girl is! I—must you really know? Because you mightn't like it, if I told you the truth." The ingenuous youth here turned a somersault, and coming up on one knee, remained in an attitude of supplication, clasping his hands imploringly. Hilda laughed, but still caressed her locks, unmoved.
"The other hair!" she said.