“I love little children,” replied the School-teacher.
The child put his hand into the pocket of his apron and drew out a battered toy—a cheap, little, painted, wooden toy, so broken and worn that no one could tell what animal it was originally intended to represent. He held it up for the Schoolteacher's admiration.
“Gup,” he said.
“He means a horse,” the woman explained. “He's heard folks down to the mill say 'git up' to horses they was ridin', an' he thinks that's the name of it, but he's got names of his own. Now he calls a bird an' a fish an' a mouse a 'giggle.' I don't know why. Because a bird ain't like a fish, an' neither one of them ain't like a mouse.”
“I believe I understand why he gives them all the same name,” replied the School-teacher.
The woman came closer to the man and the child. Her eyes took on an expression of deep inquiry.
“What do you reckon is the reason? I've thought about it often.”
“I think it's because a bird, a fish and a mouse all appear to him to have the same motion, to wiggle.”
The woman's face cleared. “I never thought of that. I reckon that is it. But now, he's got names that ain't like the things at all. Because he calls milk 'bugala' and there ain't no such word as 'bugala.' An' if it's sour or anything he calls it 'nim bugala.'”
The woman recalled with the word, the morning when, to wean him, she had blackened her breast with charcoal, and the child had pushed away the blackened breast with his little hand and said, “nim bugala.”