LITTLE CRUMBS AND OTHER STORIES
By Anonymous
Fully Illustrated
Boston: D. Lothrop And Company
1885
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CONTENTS:
[ LIT-TLE ROS-A-BEL'S AD-VEN-TURE. ]
[ LIT-TLE CRUMBS, AND LIT-TLE DROPS. ]
[ IN THE DOVE COT—TWO KIND LIT-TLE GIRLS. ]
[ THE FAM-I-LY ROGUE IS CAUGHT AT LAST. ]
[ HOW DAN-NY SAID HE WAS SOR-RY. ]
[ WHAT PA-PA AND MAM-MA SAW. ]
[ A FIN-GER SONG.—LIT-TLE KATE. ]
A GRAVE CONSULTATION,—"I SHALL LEAVE THEM OUT OF MY CHERRY PARTY."
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Yes, the rob-in's nest had
been robbed—their own
rob-in's nest un-der the bush,
with its dar-ling lit-tle eggs of
the true robin's blue! The
nest was pulled out and tip-
ped on the ground, and the
love-ly eggs were gone.
"I know well e-nough," said
Beth, "that those were the
ver-y eggs that your broth-er
Jim-my was a-car-ry-ing a-bout
strung on a straw, Sat-ur-day
af-ter-noon."
"Yes," said Bes-sie, sad-ly,
"he and Dick must have found
our bush and looked un-der
it, and pulled out the nest. If
they weren't my broth-ers, I'd
nev-er speak to them in this
world any more, no, nev-er and
nev-er! I'm sor-ry they had
to come in-to the coun-try with
us, they do so much dam-age!"
"O, you'll have to speak to
them," said Beth; "but when
peo-ple do cru-el things I do
think it ought not to go as if
they had done on-ly right! I
think they ought to be left out
a while, an' I shall leave them
out of my cher-ry par-ty."
Jim-my and Dick were Bes-
sie's broth-ers; but she a-greed,
and the boys got no cards for
the cher-ry par-ty.
"It is be-cause you broke up
the rob-in's nest," said Bes-sie
se-vere-ly. "It is to make you
feel that girls don't like cru-el-
ty to birds!"
AND JIM-MY'S AN-SWER.
Jim-my looked so-ber for a
min-ute. Then he kicked up
his heels on the car-pet. "Ho,
ho!" said he. "Such girls a-
set-ting up to pun-ish us!
Girls that wear whole birds on
their hats all win-ter!"
SOME-THING SWEET.
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Christ-mas Day some-thing
sweet hap-pened to Ba-by
Ralph—some su-gar can-dy.
Ralph had nev-er tast-ed
can-dy be-fore, and you should
have seen his big blue eyes.
"Some mo' an' some mo'
an' some mo'!" he said.
"Some more next Christ-
mas," said mam-ma. And
now ev-er-y morn-ing Ralph
asks, "Kwis'-mas this day?"
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Oh, list-en while the chil-dren sing
(The first one's name is
Mol-ly),
So loud their mer-ry voi-ces ring—
(Th e sec-ond one is Dol-ly),
They sound like black-birds in
the spring
(The third is Oua-ker Pol-ly).
A CHRIST-MAS CAROL, LIT-TLE ROS-A-BEL'S AD-VEN-TURE.
Lit-tle Ros-a-bel liked sto-ries
the best of any-thing in the
world; and she be-lieved that
all her lit-tle pict-ure books
were true, and O, how she did
wish she were a stor-y-book
girl her-self, and that such
things would hap-pen to her.
Dear lit-tle Ros-a-bel, she used
to go out in the green lanes
and grass-y dells and hunt for
fair-ies, and list-en for talk-ing
birds and talk-ing flow-ers.
And one day lit-tle Ros-a-
bel thought she would try one
of the sto-ries and see if it
would come true with her.
She chose the sto-ry of "Lit-tle
Red Rid-ing-hood," be-cause
she had a red hood and be-
cause she knew a poor old
wom-an who lived a-lone in an
old house. So she put a pat
of but-ter and a cust-ard-pie in
a lit-tle bask-et, tied on her red
hood, and started a-way. But
there were no woods to go
through, and so no wolf came
a-long. Ros-a-bel called "Wolf!
Wolf!" man-y times, but no
wolf came. When she came
to the old house she tried to
reach the big knock-er. But
she couldn't, so she knocked
with her lit-tle knuck-les. A
ver-y thin, low voice said, "Lift
the latch and come right in!"
Ros-a-bel did, and there was a
poor old grand-moth-er right in
bed, just like the stor-y!
"O, have you any-thing to eat
in that bask-et?" said the voice.
"I have sprained my an-kle
and I can't walk, and there has
no-bod-y been here for two
days, and I am al-most starved,
and I want some-bod-y to go
for a doc-tor. Can you go?"
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Yes, Ros-a-bel could. A-way
she ran to mam-ma, and mam-
ma and the doc-tor both came,
So Ros-a-bel was not on-ly in a
real sto-ry, her-self, but she al-so
did a great deal of good.
MORN-ING AT OUR HOUSE.
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When the first gray light
creeps in through the cur-tains
there is gen-er-al-ly a sud-den
nest-ling to be heard in the crib
that stands at one side of the
bed. Soon Ar-thur's curl-y
yel-low head pops up out of
the pil-lows.
"Are you waked up, Dol-ly-
ba-by?" calls a mer-ry voice.
"Coo-ah-goo-coo" an-swers
Dol-ly-ba-by.
"Mam-ma, I want to see
her," says Ar-thur, sit-ting up
to look o-ver.
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Then mam-ma parts the lace.
cur-tains of Dol-ly-ba-by's crib,
and dis-clos-es the lit-tle sis-ter,
all sweet and ro-sy with sleep,
smil-ing on her pil-low.
"Loves Dol-ly-ba-by," says
Ar-thur, throw-ing a kiss.
Dol-ly makes fun-ny eyes at
her broth-er, and throws up
her fat lit-tle hands. "Ah-
goo-goo!" she says.
"Let me have her, please,
mam-ma," says Ar-thur.
Then Dol-ly-ba-by is lift-ed
o-ver in-to the big crib; and
there is rock-ing and sing-ing
and smil-ing and coo-ing un-til
nurse comes to car-ry both
rogues a-way to be dressed.
MOON FOLKS.
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See how quiet it is at e-ven-
ing in the house of the Man in
the Moon. The Moon moth-
er sits down to knit baby
stock-ings like the mam-mas
here; and the Moon fa-ther
wears a smok-ing cap as oth-er
pa-pas do—and on-ly just see
what the sweet lit-tle Moon
ba-by has got for a ham-
mock!
"By-lo-by!" the Moon ba-by
sings. "How bright the earth
shines to-night! I like to
swing in the ham-mock by
earth-light!"
"I won-der if an-y-bod-y
lives in the earth," says the
Moon moth-er.
"That is some-thing I sup-
pose we nev-er shall know,"
says the Moon fa-ther.
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LIT-TLE CRUMBS, AND LIT-TLE DROPS.
"Crumbs of Crack-ers" and
"Drops of Milk" were, the
names of two lit-tle girls.
Would you like to know how
they got these fun-ny names?
It was this way: Lit-tle
"Crumbs" was al-ways nib-
bling crack-ers, and lit-tle
"Drops" lived up-on noth-
ing but milk.
They met for the first
time one day by the fence
be-tween their gar-dens. Lit-
tle Drops was sip-ping from
her sil-ver cup and lit-tle
Crumbs was munch-ing her
crack-er. The big sun-flower
thought there must be a dog
and a kit-ty in the gar-den.
"I've seen you out here
twice," said Crumbs bold-ly,
"and both times you was a-
drink-ing milk."
"An' I's seen you two times,
and bofe times you was a-eat-
ing cwack-ers!" said Drops.
Then the lit-tle girls looked
at each oth-er through the
fence. Bold lit-tle Crumbs
spoke first: "I don't like milk."
"I does," said Drops.
"My mam-ma says I was
brought up on one cow."
"Was you once a tru-ly
lit-tle bos-sy calf?" asked
Crumbs.
But Drops did not like that
ques-tion. "You isn't ber-ry
nice to me," she said.
Then Crumbs was sor-ry.