"Molly, put the kettle on,
Molly, put the kettle on,
Molly, put the kettle on—
We'll all take tea."
Thus sang the cheerful mother of the Donald family, as she set the kettle of potatoes over the fire to boil for breakfast. The kettle was a tight fit for so many potatoes, and Bonny, looking on with interest from his high chair by the fire, remarked,
"Full, mamma; ain't it?"
"Yes, laddie, full as it can hold—just like our house."
"How it spatters and boils over, mamma!"
"And our house spatters and boils over with us, too, wee one."
Sure enough the Donald dozen did live in such a small tenement that it was a puzzle how they ever could all get packed into it at once.
But then early in the morning the father went out to his work; Alec followed to the shop, Jeanie to the store, Nickie to sell morning papers, some to school and some to do errands, till Bonny and the baby would be left alone with the mother. Then, shutting the door after the last, she would say,
"Do you see how they all boil away, Bonny?" and she would sing merrily as she scrubbed, swept, and cooked.
She did not sing so often after father Donald fell one day and broke a leg. Nor did she fill the kettle of potatoes as full either after that. Mr. Donald lay helpless, and worried about the place he feared he should lose.