Minnie stood for a long time watching the pearly drops as they trickled slowly through the pipe, wondering why the water never rose any higher in the trough. At length her father showed her a little pipe which carried off the waste water into the ground.
They were sitting at the supper table, and Minnie was giving a glowing account of her discoveries, when they were startled by a loud shouting: “Stop, Israel! Go along, Moses! Ssh! hi! there, Obadiah! Here, Jonah, Amos, Nebuchadnezzar, Moses! what are you about?”
“What is the stupid fellow bringing up the sheep at this time for?” queried Mr. Sullivan, glancing at the clock; and then, seeing the look of merriment on the faces of his visitors, he burst into a hearty laugh.
“I believe you’ll have to excuse me,” he said, rising hastily. “Isaac will never be able to get them into the fold alone.”
“I want to go, too,” whispered Minnie.
She was rather frightened at first at the loud bleating of the ewes, and the responsive cries of the lambs; but keeping close to the shepherd, had the satisfaction of feeling that she was of great assistance in driving them into the enclosure.
The moment they began to enter the sheep-house, the boy, Isaac, commenced a loud, shrill whistle, which the sheep seemed to understand, and which her friend informed her directed them to the troughs for their supper.
“I didn’t mean to shelter them for an hour yet,” exclaimed the lad, when his master blamed him for driving them to the fold so early; “but Jeroboam butted down a rail in the fence, and before I knew it, the crazy creatures were all out in the garden.”
“We must kill that fellow if he does much more mischief,” Mr. Sullivan said; and taking Minnie’s hand, they returned to the house.
“It speaks well for Isaac’s knowledge of Scripture,” remarked Mr. Lee, archly, “that he has chosen the names so appropriately.”