Little Lucy's Wonderful Globe Part 7

Lucy felt like the little boy in the fable, who could not get either the dog, or the bird, or the bee, to play with him.

"When do you play?" she asked.

"We have an hour's interval after dinner, and another at supper-time, but then we prepare our work for the morrow," said one of the boys, looking up well satisfied.

"Work! work! Are you always at work?" exclaimed Lucy; "I only learn from nine to half-past twelve, and half an hour to get my lessons in the afternoon."

"You are a maiden," said the little boy with civil superiority; "your brothers learn more hours."

"More; yes, but not so many as you do. They play from twelve till half-past two, and have two half-holidays in the week."

"So, you are not industrious. We are. That is the reason why we can all act together, and think together, so much better than any others; and we all stand as one irresistible power, the United Germany."

Lucy gave a little gasp! it was all so very wise.

"May I see your sisters?" she said.

The little sisters, Gretchens and Katchens were learning away almost as hard as the Hermanns and Fritzes, but the bigger sisters had what Lucy thought a better time of it. One of them was helping in the kitchen, and another in the ironing; but then they had their books and their music, and in the evening all the families came out into the pleasure gardens, and had little tables with coffee before them, and the mammas knitted, and the papas smoked, and the young ladies listened to the band. On the whole, Lucy thought she should not mind living in Germany, if they would not do so many lessons.

CHAPTER XV.

PARIS IN THE SIEGE.

"AND Uncle Joe is in France, where the fathers and brothers of those little Prussian boys have been fighting. Suppose and suppose I could see it."

There was a thunder and a whizzing in the air and a sharp rattling noise besides; a strange, damp, unwholesome smell too, mixed with that of gunpowder; and when Lucy looked up, she found herself down some steps in a dark, dull, vaulted-looking place, lined with stone, however, and open to the street above. A little lamp was burning in a corner, piles of straw and bits of furniture were lying about, and upon one of the bundles of straw sat a little rough-haired girl.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Ah! Mademoiselle, good morning. Are you come here to take shelter from the sh.e.l.ls?"

_Page 123._]

"Ah! Mademoiselle, good morning," she said. "Are you come here to take shelter from the sh.e.l.ls? The battery is firing now; I do not think Mamma will come home till it slackens a little. She is gone to the distribution of meat, to get a piece of horse for my brother, who is weak after his wounds. I wish I could offer you something, but we have nothing but water, and it is not even sugared."

"Do you live down here?" asked Lucy, looking round at the dreary place with wonder.

"Not always. We used to have a pretty little house up over, but the cruel sh.e.l.ls came crashing in, and flew into pieces, tearing everything to splinters, and we are only safe from them down here. Ah, if I could only have shown you Mamma's pretty room! but there is a great hole in the floor now, and the ceiling is all tumbling down, and the table broken."

"But why do you stay here?"

"Mamma and Emily say it is all the same. We are as safe in our cellar as we could be anywhere, and we should have to pay elsewhere."

"Then you cannot get out of Paris?"

"Oh no, while the Prussians are all round us, and shut us in. My brothers are all in the Garde Mobile, and, you see, so is my doll. Every one must be a soldier now. My dear Adolphe, hold yourself straight" (and there the doll certainly showed himself perfectly drilled and disciplined). "March--right foot forward--left foot forward." But in this movement, as may be well supposed, little Coralie had to help her recruit a good deal.

Lucy was surprised. "So you can play even in this dreadful place?" she said.

"Oh yes! What's the use of crying and wearying oneself? I do not mind as long as they leave me my kitten, my dear little Minette."

"Oh! what a pretty long-haired kitten! but how small and thin!"

"Yes, truly, the poor Minette! The cruel people ate her mother, and there is no milk--no milk, and my poor Minette is almost starved, though I give her bits of my bread and soup; but the bread is only bran and sawdust, and she likes it no more than I."

"Ate up her mother!"

"Yes. She was a superb Cyprus cat, all grey; but, alas I one day she took a walk in the street, and they caught her, and then indeed it was all over with her. I only hope Minette will not get out, but she is so lean that they would find little but bones and fur."

"Ah, how I wish I could take you and her home to Uncle Joe, and give you both good bread and milk! Take my hand, and shut your eyes, and we will suppose and suppose very hard, and, perhaps, you will come there with me. Paris is not so very far off."

CHAPTER XVI.

THE AMERICAN GUEST.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "What can that be, coming at this time of day?"

_Page 126._]

NO; supposing very hard did not bring poor little French Coralie home with Lucy; but something almost as wonderful happened. Just at the time in the afternoon, blind man's holiday, when Lucy had been used to ride off on her dream to visit some wonderful place, there came a knock at the front door; a quite real substantial English knock and ring, that did not sound at all like any of the strange noise of the strange worlds that she had lately been hearing, but had the real tinkle of Uncle Joe's own bell.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Good morning. Where do you come from?"

_Page 131._]

"Well," said Mrs. Bunker, "what can that be, coming at this time of day?

It can never be the doctor coming home without sending orders!

Don't you be running out, Miss Lucy; there'll be a draught of cold right in."

Lucy stood still; very anxious, and wondering whether she should see anything alive, or one of her visitors from various countries.

"There is a letter from Mr. Seaman," said a brisk young voice, that would have been very pleasant if it had not gone a little through the nose; and past Mrs. Bunker there walked into the full light a little boy, a year or two older than Lucy, holding out one hand as he saw her and taking off his hat with the other. "Good morning," he said, quite at his ease; "is this where you live?"

"Good morning," returned Lucy, though it was not morning at all; "where do you come from?"

"Well, I'm from Paris last; but when I'm at home, I'm at Boston. I am Leonidas Saunders, of the great American Republic."

"Oh, then you are not real, after all?"

"Real! I should hope I was a genuine article."

"Well, I was in hopes that you were real, only you say you come from a strange country, like the rest of them, and yet you look just like an English boy."