UNCLE JACK.
"What young bears most boys are!" said my Uncle Jack, watching his oldest hope pushing his sister in the swing so vigorously that she almost fell out, and then pulling one side of the rope at a time, making her fairly dizzy with swaying from side to side while she alternately screamed and entreated.
"Just about the same, all of them," Uncle Jack went on. "Talk about boyish chivalry, I never found it, especially toward a boy's own kith and kin. There may be some Highland Marys with juvenile adorers, but nine times out of ten a boy would rather frighten a girl than kiss her. My John here's just a specimen. Come here, sir," raising his voice. "Do you want to hear a story about the days when I was just such another cub as yourself?"
This suggestion brought John and his sister both in from the swing. When Uncle Jack began to "spin a yarn," as he often called it, all the family were sure to want to be present at its unravelling.
"You see," he began, "my sister Nelly wasn't my sister at all; but it was all the same, as far as my feeling for her went. When I was only three years old my mother's best friend died, and left Nelly, a little, wailing, two-months-old baby, to my mother's care. Her father had been killed before she was born, in a railroad accident, so there was no one but my mother to see to her; and she brought the little thing home and adopted her, thankfully enough, for though she had four good stout boys, of whom I was the youngest, there was never a girl in the family till Nelly came.
"We all loved her, as she grew older. She was a pretty little blossom as you would want to see, with her black eyes, and the crisp, black hair falling about her rosy cheeks. She had a funny little rose-bud of a mouth, too, and the daintiest little figure,—well-made all through, and no mistake about it.
"I think I loved her, if any thing, better than the rest did, considering that she was nearer my age, and so we were more continually together, but, bless you, there wasn't any chivalry in it. It didn't keep me from painting her doll's face black, or hiding its shoes, or from listening when she was talking with her girl cronies, and then bursting out among them, and yelling their choicest secret to the four winds.
"I would have knocked any boy down, from the time I was big enough to use my fists, who had said a saucy word to Nelly; but I said plenty of them myself. I believe I liked to tease her for the sake of hearing her beg me not to; just as I've seen you tease your sister a hundred times, Master John.