"Poor Baby," said Denny, "I'm so sorry." She stooped down to kiss him, but it was so dark it wasn't easy to find his mouth, and she only managed to kiss the tip of his nose, which was as cold as a little dog's. This made Herr Baby begin laughing, which was a good thing, wasn't it? And he was so taken up in explaining to Lisa how funny it felt when Denny kissed his nose, that he had not time to think of his sorrows again till they were at the foot of the large flight of steps leading up to the big hotel where they were to sleep.
"Nice big house," said Baby, looking round; and as he caught sight of some of the waiters running about, he asked Lisa if "them was new servants instead of Thomas and Jones."
"Him likes Thomas and Jones best," he went on, the corners of his mouth going down again, so that Lisa was obliged to assure him the servants were not going to be instead of Thomas and Jones, they were all only just going to stay one night at this big house, and to-morrow they would set off in the great ship to cross the sea.
The mention of the ship fortunately gave a new turn to Baby's thoughts; and he allowed Lisa to take him upstairs and warm him well before a good fire before she undressed him and put him to bed. The other children thought it great fun to sleep in strange rooms, in beds quite unlike those they had at home, and to have to hunt for their nightgowns and brushes and sponges in two or three wrong carpet bags before they came to the right one; but Baby's spirits were rather depressed, and it was not easy to keep him from crying in the sad little way he had when his feelings were touched.
"He is tired, poor little chap," said auntie, as she kissed him for good-night. "It is ever so much later than he has ever been up before. It is nearly ten."
"Him were up till ten o'clock on Kissmass," said Herr Baby, brightening up. "Him were up dedful late, till, till, p'raps till near twenty o'clock."
Auntie would have liked to laugh, but she took care not, for when Baby was in this sort of humour there was no telling whether other people's laughing might not make him take to crying, so she just said,
"Indeed! That must have been very late; well, go to sleep now, and sleep till twenty o'clock to-morrow morning, if you like. We don't need to start early," she added, turning to Lisa; and I think poor Lisa was not sorry to hear it!
If I were to go on telling you, bit by bit, all about the journey, and everything that happened big and little, it would take a good while, and I don't know that you would find it very interesting. Perhaps it is better to take a jump, as people do in real big story books, and to go on with Herr Baby's adventures a few days later, when he, and Denny, and Fritz, and Celia, and Lisa, and mother, and auntie, and grandfather, and the "bully," and the "calanies," and Tim, and Peepy-Snoozle, and Linley, mother's maid, and Peters, grandfather's man, and I forget if there was any one else, but I think not; and all the boxes and carpet-bags, and railway-rugs, were safely arrived at Santino, the pretty little town with mountains on one side and the sea on the other, where they were all going to spend the winter. I must not forget to tell you one thing, however, which, I daresay, some of you who may have crossed "over the sea," and not found it very delightful, may be anxious to know about. I mean about the voyage in the 'normous boat, which Baby had been so looking forward to, poor little fellow.
Well, wasn't it lucky, he was not at all disappointed? They had the loveliest day that ever was seen, and Baby thought 'normous boats far the nicest way of travelling, and he couldn't understand why grandfather couldn't make them go all the way to Santino in the nice boat, and when they explained to him that it couldn't be, because there was no sea for boats to go on all the way, he thought there must have been some great mistake in the way the world was made. And when they got to Santino, and the first thing he saw was the sea, blue and beautiful like a fairy dream, Baby was quite startled.