THE BROKEN BRIDGE.
It was early in April, and the travelling was very bad, for the frost was just coming out of the ground. Mary, Moses, and the twins attended a private school, on the other side of the river, and Patty went with them; but they were all rather tired of her company.
"Mother, we're afraid she'll get lost in one of the holes," said Moses. "Won't you make her stay at home?"
Mrs. Lyman stood before the brick oven, taking out of it some blackened cobs which had been used for smoking hams, and putting them into a dish of water.
"What are you doing with those cobs?" asked Moses, while Patty caught at her mother's skirts, saying,—
"I won't lose me in a hole, mamma! Mayn't I go to school?"
"I will tell you what I am doing with the cobs, Moses," said Mrs. Lyman; "making pearlash water. I shall soak them a while, and then pour off the water into bottles. Cob-coals make the very best of pearlash."
How queer that seems to us! Why didn't Mrs. Lyman send to the store and buy soda? Because in those days there was no such thing as soda.
"But as for Patience," said she, "I really don't see, Moses, how I can have her stay at home this week. Rachel is weaving, Dorcas is spinning, and the baby is cutting a tooth. Just now my hands are more than full, my son."
Patty was delighted to hear that. It never once occurred to her to feel ashamed of being such a trial to everybody. Dorcas tied her hood, pinned her yellow blanket over her little shoulders, kissed her good by, and off she trotted between Mary and Moses, full of triumph and self-importance.