Chatterbox, 1906 Part 54

'Mother's dear, good, brave, darling boy!' giggled all the figures.

'Mother's loyal, courageous son!' And Hugh's shame knew no bounds.

'Don't, _please_,' he begged, humbly, in vain trying to restrain a sob.

'I don't mind being punished now. I will tell Mother I am not good.

Please--please go away!'

'Yes! yes! we will go away,' answered they, still giggling. 'Why should we trouble about you? What does it matter, after all, if you grow up a careless, disobedient, untruthful boy? It's really not worth while troubling to punish you.'

'Of course,' went on the girl. 'Find your head, shepherd lad, and let's go.'

'Listen!' said one of the stately dames. 'Let's give a bit of good advice to his mother. Let us ask her to allow the boy to do as he likes.

Why should she think so much of correcting his faults? He doesn't care to let her see him as he really is.'

'A capital idea!' exclaimed all the others.

'It's not!' exclaimed Hugh, jumping up in his bed. 'You shan't go! You shan't go! And my mother won't listen to you. I will throw my pillow at you and break you all, if you say that again. My mother _shall_ punish me when I'm naughty.'

He _did_ throw his pillow, and the figures vanished. In an instant he was wide awake, and wondering where the figures had gone: and then he knew that it was all a dream, and that his Conscience had been using the figures for her purpose. They had done her work well. The boy slipped quietly into Mother's room, and I think you can guess what happened there. _I_ know that Mother is still proud of her little boy, because she still sees him just as he is.

PUZZLERS FOR WISE HEADS.

7.--ANAGRAMS (_Eatables_).

1. I am a corn.

2. Area, Vic 3. Esau, Turk, R.A.

4. Blew, rash, Tib.

5. Cool car, cheat me.

C. J. B.

[_Answers on page 214._]

6.--KEY TO GEOGRAPHICAL LETTER ON PAGE 147.

Dear _Adelaide_,--This morning, being up betimes, and having had an early _Bath_ and breakfast, I take the opportunity of writing to you.

Yesterday, my Uncle _Adrian_ and his daughter _Florence_ came to see us.

Two slight accidents marred their visit: to begin with, my cousin fell upon the _Stair_, and afterwards, while we were out driving, a _Stone_ caused the horse to slip. We were then obliged to walk, but the way was rough, and presently a stream barred all progress. However, we discovered an _Iron bridge_, which enabled us to go _Over_. After eating an _Orange_ and a _Sandwich_ apiece, we felt refreshed, and went on until we came to a tall _Poplar_. Here we sat _Down_, and uncle amused us by _Reading_. The rest I will tell you later; till then believe me,--Your affectionate friend, _Victoria Ross_.

THROWING AWAY A FORTUNE.

A fisherman, rowing along the Bay of Fundy sh.o.r.e, in Nova Scotia, noticed what he took to be a very large lump of tallow floating on the water. He picked it up, took it home, and presented it to his wife. She was busily engaged in a local industry, the making of soft soap, and used the 'tallow' for it. The find, however, failed to behave as tallow should, and the fisherman was reproached by his wife for interfering and spoiling the soap. In a fit of disgust he threw the remainder of the supposed tallow away.

He talked the matter over at the country store, and it was suggested that his tallow was possibly the very valuable substance known as ambergris. The man went home in haste, and managed to collect six pounds, all that remained of the large quant.i.ty he brought home! The local chemist identified it as ambergris, and showed the astonished fisherman the price list, where it was quoted at thirty dollars an ounce. His dismay can be imagined when he learned that, through his ignorance, he had literally thrown away a fortune.

Ambergris is a secretion formed in the intestines of the sperm whale. It is of a dull grey colour, and resembles tallow, excepting in the odour, which is sweet and strong.

ROSS FRAME.

A HUNDRED YEARS AGO.

True Tales of the Year 1806.

VI.--JOHN COLTON'S DILEMMA.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

Cape Colony in 1806 was a very different country from the Cape Colony about which, of late years, we have heard so much. It was then a quiet, sleepy place under Dutch rule, having been given up to Holland by the British, after the Peace of Amiens, in 1801. There were a few farms, spa.r.s.ely scattered over the country, and farmed in a most slovenly manner by the Boers, or rather by their Hottentot slaves, for a true Boer then thought work of any sort beneath him.

One of these farms, however, bore a great contrast to the rest; it was about seventy miles from Capetown, and was known as the 'Garden Farm,'

from the rare fact of its possessing a well-stocked garden and a large orchard of peach and apricot trees, all fenced in with a stout wooden railing to keep off the pigs and cattle that were allowed to root and rummage around the other homesteads at their own sweet will. The owner of this farm was an Englishman, named John Colton: but he was a naturalised burgher and married to a Dutch wife, so that every one--perhaps even Colton himself--had long forgotten that he had not been born and bred in his adopted country.

The year 1806 was, however, to change all this. Great Britain was at war with France, and as the Cape was then the great highway to India, it was felt that Capetown must be secured at all costs, for it was too important a place to be allowed to fall into the hands of Buonaparte.

So a British force of some five thousand men, under Sir David Baird, was at once sent out, and on a sultry January day was marching from Leopard's Bay, over scrub and veldt, towards Capetown.

All this, however, was undreamt of by honest John Colton as he sat with his wife on the verandah of his house, watching the antics of a puppy that was playing with the children in front of them.

Suddenly the man's quick ears caught the sound of horses' hoofs in the distance. He strained his eyes across the veldt, and, after a minute or two, could make out a man riding at utmost speed.

'There's something amiss somewhere,' he told his wife; 'maybe some one is injured, and he is coming here for help.' For accidents from wild beasts were common in those days, and John had a certain fame as a binder-up of broken limbs.

Now the rider had come up to the farm, but though he drew up, he did not dismount. 'You are to be in Capetown market-place, with horse and gun, by sunset on Thursday,' he said as he handed John an official blue paper. 'The British have landed, and General Janssens is summoning all the burghers. There will be a big fight, but we shall drive the red-coats into the sea.'

[Ill.u.s.tration: "He handed John an official paper."]

The man could not stop for a meal, though he was glad of the refreshment which Mrs. Colton handed to him in the saddle; and then he rode away as quickly as he had come, leaving Colton almost dazed by the news.

'The British have landed!' he repeated, looking at his blue paper, 'and I am to go to Capetown to fight them!'

'Oh, Jan!' said his wife, 'don't let those red-coats shoot you!'

John did not answer. He took down his gun from the wall and looked gloomily down the barrel; then he threw it on the table, and, looking at his wife, said sternly, 'I cannot fight against my own countrymen, and I do not wish to fight against yours.'

'But you are a burgher, Jan,' said his wife, timidly, 'and all the burghers are summoned.'