“Honey, honey, let me in!” she called again, rapping louder. Still no answer.
“Honey, honey, it’s Mabel. Let me in.”
There was silence for several seconds; then a man’s voice, cold and full of dignity, came from the other side of the door:
“Madame, this is not a beehive; it’s a bathroom.”
Leigh Hunt was asked by a lady at dessert if he would not venture on an orange. “Madam,” he replied, “I should be happy to do so, but I am afraid I should tumble off.”
Mrs. Prattle looked at her visitor with reproach in her wide blue eyes. “Talk,” she said eagerly, “our baby talk? Well, I guess he can. He’s three months younger than my cousin’s boy and he’s a year ahead of him in language. You know often people tell you their children can say things, and when you hear them you have to work hard with your imagination to tell what they’re saying.
“Now, there’s my cousin’s baby—the one I spoke of. They declare that child has a vocabulary of fifteen words, but, my dear, if you could hear him. He says ‘bay’ for bread, and ‘flis’ for fish, and ‘cang’ for candle, and ‘hort’ for horse, and ‘apa’ for father. Now I’ll try Harold with those very words, and you’ll see the difference.