The tailor looked compassionately at the poor, sobbing boy, shrugged his narrow shoulders, and, after an abrupt "good by," left the house.
Mother Bopp put the child in the cradle, ordered Walter to rock it and watch the baby, and told Maggie to set the table for supper. This command soon brought the still quarrelling brother and sister again together. They all bestirred themselves busily, shoved the heavy oaken table from the wall out into the middle of the room, and put stools and benches round it. Maggie set a tin salt-cellar upon it, and placed a large spoon near the salt. The four children took their seats at the table. The mother soon brought in a great earthen bowl, full of smoking potatoes, and put them on the table. She then seated herself in the arm-chair, and they all began to eat their supper. But Walter still remained alone on the floor in the corner, and rocked the cradle, while he eagerly breathed the vapor from the smoking potatoes, which soon spread itself through the low room.
A considerable time had elapsed, in which Maggie had often touched her mother's arm, and looked pleadingly and significantly towards Walter, but it had not produced the least effect upon Mother Bopp. Maggie had eaten very little herself, and two or three potatoes, which she had carefully selected, still lay before her, which she boldly protected against all Conrad's attempts to appropriate to himself. At last, Mother Bopp cried, "Walter!" and the boy hastened to her side.
"Will you always mind what I say to you? will you always do what I tell you to do, and never again lie, like a little idler, upon the floor?"
"Yes!" sobbed the boy, "I will never again forget to rock Johnny, even if my father should play upon the clarionet!"
"Well, then, if you will promise always to be good, I will punish you no more to-day. Sit down, then, and eat your supper, and mind that you begin no quarrelling with the children!"
Walter slipped quietly to the corner of the table, where Maggie made room for him, and secretly shoved before him the potatoes which she had so carefully chosen.
"See now," growled Conrad, "you can pick and peel potatoes enough for Walter, but I have to peel them for myself. Can't he peel them for himself as well as I can?"
"No, for you are a great deal larger than he is, and can peel two before he is ready with one; and you have already eaten a great many, and he is just beginning," answered his sister.
"But I will have these, too!" he cried, defiantly, and attempted to seize them.