Rollo at Play; Or, Safe Amusements Part 16

"That is the only condition," replied Rollo's mother.

"But why, mother," said he, "why may we not keep him shut up safe?"

"If I were to tell you the reasons now, they would not satisfy you, you are so eager to keep him. I think you had better determine to comply with the condition, good-humoredly, and say no more about it, but try to think of a name for him."

"Well, mother, what do you think would be a good name?"

"I do not know: you and Lucy must think of one."

Just then uncle George finished tying his horse, and came along to where the children were standing, and, hearing their conversation, and finding that Lucy and Rollo were perplexed about a name, he told them he thought they might, not improperly, call him Noah, as, like Noah, by floating in a sort of ark, he was saved from a flood.

"I think he was more like Moses than Noah," said Lucy.

"Why?" said her father.

"Because Moses was a little thing when they found him, and then the ark of bulrushes was something like a birdsnest. I think you had better name him Moses, Rollo," said she.

Rollo seemed a little at a loss: he said he thought he was a good deal like Moses, but then he did not think that Moses was a very pretty name for a bird.

"Do you think it is, mother?" said he.

"I do not know but that it would do very well. You might alter it a little; call him Mosette, if you think that would be any better for a bird's name."

Rollo and Lucy repeated the name Mosette to themselves several times, and concluded that they should like it very much. By this time, the horses were all ready, and Jonas recommended that they should hide Mosette away somewhere, until they returned from the mountain, for it would be troublesome to them, and somewhat dangerous to the bird, to carry him up and down.

The children approved of this plan, though they were rather unwilling to part with the bird, at all. They went just into the bushes, and found a very secret place, by the corner of a large rock, where the shrubs and wild flowers grew thick, so that it would be entirely out of sight.

GOING UP.

They then set forward, the children in advance of the rest. Jonas walked with Rollo and Lucy, and he had round his waist a broad leather belt, which he always wore on such occasions, and which had, on one side, his hatchet and knife, and on the other a sort of bag or pocket, containing several things, such as matches, a little dipper, &c.

Rollo's father and mother, and his uncle George, walked along behind them. The way was, for some distance, a sort of cart-path, too steep and rough for a chaise, but hard and dry, and pretty comfortable walking.

Rollo and Lucy asked Jonas if he would not tell them a story, as they went along, to beguile the way.

Jonas began a story, about a boy that lived a long time on a mountain alone, but he had not proceeded far, before they heard a voice behind, calling them. They looked buck, and saw that Rollo's father was beckoning them to stop.

They waited till he came up, and he told them he wanted to give them their orders for the day; and they were rules, he said, which ought to be observed on all berrying expeditions, by children.

"_First_" said he, "always keep in sight of _me_. For this purpose, watch me all the time, when we are stepping, and keep before, rather than behind, when we are walking.

"_Second_. Take no unnecessary steps, but keep in the right path, and walk slowly and steadily there, so as to save your strength. Otherwise you will get tired out very soon.

"_Third_. Do not touch any flower or berry that you see, except blueberries, without first showing them to one of us."

The children listened to these rules, and promised to obey them, and then walked on. They tried to walk slowly and steadily, listening to Jonas's story. They turned off, after a time, into a narrower and steeper path, and ascended, stepping from stone to stone The trees and bushes hung over their heads, making the walk shady and cool.

After slowly ascending in this way, for some time, they came out of the woods into an opening of rocky ground, and patches of blue berry-bushes.

They saw, also, at some distance before them, three or four boys, sitting upon a rock, with pails and baskets in their hands, talking and laughing loud. They did not take much notice of them, but walked on quietly. They were going on directly towards them, but Rollo's father called them, and pointed for them to turn off to the right, round a rocky precipice which was in that direction.

The children were turning accordingly, when they heard a shout from the boys before them,--"Hallo,--come this way, and we will show you where the blueberries are."

"Father," said Rollo, as he stopped and turned round to his father, "the boys say they will show us the blueberries, out that way: shall we go and see?"

"No," said his father in a low voice, so that the boys did not hear.

"No: go the way I told you."

They went along, and presently got round the precipice out of sight of I he boys again. They walked slowly until their parents overtook them.

"Father," said Rollo, "why could you not let us go out with those boys?

They said they were thickest out there."

"Because," said he, "I presume they are not good boys, and I do not want you to have any thing to do with them."

"But, father, they must be good boys, or they would not want to show us the blueberries. If they were bad, selfish boys, they would want to keep all the good places to themselves."

If Rollo had only asked his father, in a modest manner, how it could be that the boys were bad, when they wanted to show him the best place for blueberries, it would have been very proper; but his manner of speaking showed a silly confidence in his own opinion, which was very wrong. His father, however, did not attempt to reason with him, but only said,

"I think they are bad boys, for I overheard them using bad language; and I wish you to have nothing to do with them."

He then found a good place for them to begin to gather their berries.

It was a beautiful spot of open ground, between the thick woods on one side, and a broken, rocky precipice on the other.

Uncle George took Jonas forward alone, until they were out of sight, and presently returned without him. Rollo asked where Jonas was gone, and his uncle told him that that was a secret at present. They heard, soon after, the strokes of his hatchet in the woods, on before them, but could not imagine what he could be doing.

Thus things went on very pleasantly, and they gathered a large quant.i.ty of berries. There was, indeed, in the course of the day, a serious difficulty between Rollo and the bad boys; and there is an account of it given in the next story of "TROUBLE ON THE MOUNTAIN." With Ibis exception, every thing went on well until about, noon, when Rollo observed that Jonas had been missing a long time.

THE SECRET OUT.

"Where is Jonas, all this time?" said Rollo to Lucy.

Lucy said that he had been busy, a long time, doing something over beyond some rocks, but she did not know what, for her father told her she must not go to see. Rollo wondered what the secret was, and he was just going to ask his father to let him go and see what Jonas was doing, when they saw him coming out from the bushes. He came up to Rollo's father, and told him that it was all ready. Then Rollo's father called to all the company, and told them it was time to stop gathering berries, and they might take up their baskets and follow him.

The baskets and pails were heavy and full, and the whole party walked along, carrying them carefully towards the place where Jonas had come from. Rollo's. .h.i.ther led the way. They entered into a little thicket, and pa.s.sed through it by a narrow path. They came out presently into a sort of opening, on a brow of the mountain. On one side they could look down upon a vast extent of country, exhibiting a beautiful variety of forests, rivers, villages, and farms. On the other side was a rocky precipice, rising abruptly to a considerable height, and then sloping off towards the summit of the mountain. They walked along a few steps on a smooth surface of the rock, between patches of gra.s.s and blueberry-bushes, until Lucy and Rollo ran forward to a brook which came foaming down the precipice, and then, after tumbling along over rocks a little way, took another foaming leap down the mountain, and was lost among the trees below.

The party all stepped carefully over this brook, and then walked along up the bank on the opposite side until they came to the precipice. Here they were surprised and pleased to see a large bower built, in front of a little sort of cavern or recess in the rock. Jonas had built it of large limbs of trees and bushes, which he had leaned up against the rock, in such a manner as to enclose a large s.p.a.ce within. There was an opening left round on the farther side, next the rock, and they all went round mid went in--Rollo first, then Lucy, then the others. They found that smooth and clean logs and stones were arranged around the sides of the bower; and in the middle, on a carpet of leaves, was very abundant provision for a rustic dinner.

There was bread, and b.u.t.ter, and ham, and gingerbread, and pie, and gla.s.ses for water from the brook. Rollo and Lucy wondered how all those things could have got up the mountain. Presently, however, they recollected that, when they were coming up, Jonas had two covered baskets to bring, and they thought, at the time, that they seemed to be heavy.

Thus the day pa.s.sed away, and towards evening they came down the mountain. Some remarkable things happened when they were coming down, which will be related in the story called "TROUBLE ON THE MOUNTAIN."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Coming down the Mountain"]