August 3rd. Sunday.
It was long before I fell asleep again; and then I did not awake till half -past six, when he appeared to have been awake a considerable time. I bathed him and myself, as usual, made a fire in the kitchen, and went for the milk. It was a perfect morning, with broad and bright sunshine, and, I believe, not a single cloud over the whole sky; unless it were a few mist wreaths here and there on the distant hill-sides. The lake was as smooth as glass, and gave motionless reflections of the woods and hills. This glassy surface is the best aspect of so small a sheet of water. At Luther Butler's we found his father-in-law, old Mr. Barnes, cutting a young man's hair. The patient was seated in a chair at the kitchen door ; and the old fellow seemed to perform the operation with a good deal of skill, and had made a pretty even surface all over his head, leaving the hair about an inch long.
I told Julian that I was going to send him to get Bunny after breakfast. The little man's face quite glowed with delight, but yet he seemed confused. "Why, papa," said he," you see I left Bunny there to be Ellen's own; so I can't take him, unless they should send him back." I quieted his scruples by telling him what Mrs. Tappan had said; and he immediately became very desirous to go and get Bunny. At about nine o'clock I let him go; and in half an hour or so he came back with Bunny, in his little house. Poor Bunny seemed to have lost a good deal of his confidence in human nature, and kept himself as close as he could in a corner of the box, and made no response to my advances, nor would take a lettuce leaf which I offered him. I rather think he has lived in great torment during his absence. Julian says it was a great while before he could come away with him, on account of Bruin; so desirous was that naughty dog to get poor little Bunny.
I read " Pendennis " till twelve, while the old boy amused himself hither and thither ; then, seeing him down in the valley, I went and lay under an apple tree. Julian climbed up into the tree, and sat astride of a branch. His round merry face appeared among the green leaves, and a continual stream of babble came dripping down upon me, like a summer shower. He said how he should like to live always in the tree, and make a nest of leaves. Then he wanted to be a bird, so that he might fly far away ; and he would go to a deep hole, and bring me back a bag of gold ; and he would fly to West Newton, and bring home mamma on his back ; and he would fly to the Post Office for letters, and he would get beans and squashes and potatoes. After a while, I took him down from the tree; and removing a little way from the spot, we chanced upon a remarkable echo. It repeated every word of his clear little voice, at his usual elevation of talk; and when either of us called loudly, we could hear as many as three or four repetitions— the last coming apparently from far away beyond the woods, with a strange fantastic similitude to the original voice, as if beings somewhat like ourselves were shouting in the invisible distance. Julian called " Mamma," " Una," and many other words; then he shouted his own name, and when the sound came back upon us, he said that mamma was calling him. What a strange weird thing is an echo, to be sure!
At two o'clock the whole family had dinner: Julian an end of bread, myself a custard pie, and Bunny some nibblings of the crust. The little man and I walked down to the lake. The crusade against thistles still continues; and the mulleins, likewise, come in for their share of the blows. After loitering awhile on the shore of the lake, we came homeward through Mr. Wilcox's field and through his tall pine wood. I lay on my back, looking upward through the branches of the trees, while Julian spent nearly a quarter of an hour, I should think, beating down a single great mullein-stalk. He certainly does evince a persevering purpose, sometimes. We strolled through the wood among the tall pillars of those primaeval pines, and thence home along the margin of a swamp, in which I gathered a sheaf of cat-tails. This brings the history up to the present time, within a few minutes of five o'clock.
Either I have less patience to-day than ordinary, or the little man makes larger demands upon it; but it really does seem as if he had baited me with more questions, references, and observations, than mortal father ought to be expected to endure. He does put me almost beside my propriety, never quitting me, and continually thrusting in his word between the clauses of every sentence of all my reading, and smashing every attempt at reflection into a thousand fragments.
I put him to bed at seven ; gathered and crushed some currants; took a meditative walk to-and-fro, behind the house, looking out on the lake and hills; ate the currants; pored over a paper (having finished the first volume of "Pendennis "), and went to bed before ten.
It was long before I fell asleep again; and then I did not awake till half -past six, when he appeared to have been awake a considerable time. I bathed him and myself, as usual, made a fire in the kitchen, and went for the milk. It was a perfect morning, with broad and bright sunshine, and, I believe, not a single cloud over the whole sky; unless it were a few mist wreaths here and there on the distant hill-sides. The lake was as smooth as glass, and gave motionless reflections of the woods and hills. This glassy surface is the best aspect of so small a sheet of water. At Luther Butler's we found his father-in-law, old Mr. Barnes, cutting a young man's hair. The patient was seated in a chair at the kitchen door ; and the old fellow seemed to perform the operation with a good deal of skill, and had made a pretty even surface all over his head, leaving the hair about an inch long.
I told Julian that I was going to send him to get Bunny after breakfast. The little man's face quite glowed with delight, but yet he seemed confused. "Why, papa," said he," you see I left Bunny there to be Ellen's own; so I can't take him, unless they should send him back." I quieted his scruples by telling him what Mrs. Tappan had said; and he immediately became very desirous to go and get Bunny. At about nine o'clock I let him go; and in half an hour or so he came back with Bunny, in his little house. Poor Bunny seemed to have lost a good deal of his confidence in human nature, and kept himself as close as he could in a corner of the box, and made no response to my advances, nor would take a lettuce leaf which I offered him. I rather think he has lived in great torment during his absence. Julian says it was a great while before he could come away with him, on account of Bruin; so desirous was that naughty dog to get poor little Bunny.
I read " Pendennis " till twelve, while the old boy amused himself hither and thither ; then, seeing him down in the valley, I went and lay under an apple tree. Julian climbed up into the tree, and sat astride of a branch. His round merry face appeared among the green leaves, and a continual stream of babble came dripping down upon me, like a summer shower. He said how he should like to live always in the tree, and make a nest of leaves. Then he wanted to be a bird, so that he might fly far away ; and he would go to a deep hole, and bring me back a bag of gold ; and he would fly to West Newton, and bring home mamma on his back ; and he would fly to the Post Office for letters, and he would get beans and squashes and potatoes. After a while, I took him down from the tree; and removing a little way from the spot, we chanced upon a remarkable echo. It repeated every word of his clear little voice, at his usual elevation of talk; and when either of us called loudly, we could hear as many as three or four repetitions— the last coming apparently from far away beyond the woods, with a strange fantastic similitude to the original voice, as if beings somewhat like ourselves were shouting in the invisible distance. Julian called " Mamma," " Una," and many other words; then he shouted his own name, and when the sound came back upon us, he said that mamma was calling him. What a strange weird thing is an echo, to be sure!
At two o'clock the whole family had dinner: Julian an end of bread, myself a custard pie, and Bunny some nibblings of the crust. The little man and I walked down to the lake. The crusade against thistles still continues; and the mulleins, likewise, come in for their share of the blows. After loitering awhile on the shore of the lake, we came homeward through Mr. Wilcox's field and through his tall pine wood. I lay on my back, looking upward through the branches of the trees, while Julian spent nearly a quarter of an hour, I should think, beating down a single great mullein-stalk. He certainly does evince a persevering purpose, sometimes. We strolled through the wood among the tall pillars of those primaeval pines, and thence home along the margin of a swamp, in which I gathered a sheaf of cat-tails. This brings the history up to the present time, within a few minutes of five o'clock.
Either I have less patience to-day than ordinary, or the little man makes larger demands upon it; but it really does seem as if he had baited me with more questions, references, and observations, than mortal father ought to be expected to endure. He does put me almost beside my propriety, never quitting me, and continually thrusting in his word between the clauses of every sentence of all my reading, and smashing every attempt at reflection into a thousand fragments.
I put him to bed at seven ; gathered and crushed some currants; took a meditative walk to-and-fro, behind the house, looking out on the lake and hills; ate the currants; pored over a paper (having finished the first volume of "Pendennis "), and went to bed before ten.
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