"Limby ride," said he—"Limby ride!" and rose up in his chair, as if to reach the dish.
"Yes, my ducky, it shall have some mutton," said his mother, and immediately gave him a slice, cut up into small morsels.
That was not it. Limby pushed that on the floor, and cried out: "Limby on meat! Limby on meat!"
His mother could not think what he meant. At last, however, his father recollected that he had been in the habit of giving him a ride occasionally, first on his foot, sometimes on the scroll end of the sofa, at other times on the top of the easy chair. Once he put him on a dog, and more than once on the saddle; in short, he had been in the habit of perching him on various things, and now Limby, hearing this was a saddle of mutton, wanted to take a ride on it.
"Limby on! Limby ride on bone!" said the child in a whimper.
"Did you ever hear?" said the father.
"What an extraordinary child!" said the mother. "How clever to know it was like a saddle, the little dear! No, no, Limby; grease frock, Limby."
But Limby cared nothing about a greasy frock, not he—he was used enough to that—and therefore roared out more lustily for a ride on the mutton.
"Did you ever know such a child? What a dear, determined spirit!"
"He is a child of an uncommon mind," said his mother. "Limby, dear—Limby, dear, silence! silence!"