“O, in this little pond, when it is done raining.”

“But you had better have a little pond now, in the shed.”

“How can we?” said Rollo.

“You might have it in a milk-pan.”

“So we can.  Could you come and get it for us?”

“Yes, in a few minutes—­by the time you get your boats made.”

Rollo and Lucy were much pleased with this, and they sat down, one on each side of the milk-pan pond, and sailed their boats a long time.  He cut small pieces of the apple and of the pear for cargo, and Rollo put in the stem of the pear for the captain of his boat.  Each one was good-humored and obliging, and the time passed away very pleasantly, until it was near dinner-time.  When they came in to dinner, they observed that it was raining again very fast.

THE PRINCIPLES OF ORDER.

“Father,” said Rollo, at the dinner-table, “do you think it will rain all the afternoon?”

“It looks like it,” replied his father, “but why?  Do you not enjoy yourselves in the house?”

“O yes, sir,” said Rollo, “we have had a fine time this morning; but Lucy and I thought that, if it did not rain this afternoon, we might go out in the garden a little.”

“It may clear up towards night; but, if it does, I think it would be better to go down to the brook and see the freshet, than to go into the garden.”

“The freshet?  Will there be a freshet, do you think?”

“Yes, if it rains this afternoon as fast as it does now, I think the brook will be quite, high towards night.”

Rollo was much pleased to hear this.  He told Lucy, after dinner, that the brook looked magnificently in a freshet; that the banks were brimming full, and the water poured along in a great torrent, foaming and dashing against the logs and rocks.

“Then, besides, Lucy,” said he, “we can carry down our little boats and set them a sailing.  How they will whirl and plunge along down the stream!”

Lucy liked the idea of seeing the freshet, too, very much; though she said she was afraid it would be too wet for her to go.  Rollo told her never to fear, for his father would contrive some way to get her down there safely, and they both went to the back entry door again, looking out, and wishing now that it would rain faster and faster, as they did before dinner that it would cease to rain.

“But,” said Lucy, “what if it should not stop raining at all, to-night?”

“O, it will,” said Rollo, “I know it will.  Besides, if it should not, we can go down to-morrow morning, you know, and then there will be a bigger freshet.  O how full the brook will be by to-morrow morning!”

And Rollo clapped his hands, and capered with delight.

“Yes,” said Lucy, soberly, “but I must go home to-night.”

“Must you?” said Rollo.  “So you must.  I did not think of that.”