that those who lifted him up trusted to his being not
really injured by the very noise he made in his distress.
Marten and Mary ran to him, but they were as strangers
to him, for his eyes were dimmed by tears, and his
ears closed by his own wailings; and luckily for all
three one of the servants, for, as I said before, they
had come to see the young people at play, and who
was a motherly kind of woman, advanced into the room
and offered to take the charge of the child and comfort
him before she put him to bed. Marten was most
thankful for this offer, and you may be sure Mary
was not sorry to part with the sobbing boy, and thus
Marten put it out of his own power to keep his voluntary
boast to Nurse at home about sleeping with his brother,
for when the riotous evening closed, for it was a
very riotous evening, Reuben had been asleep some
hours, and in a quarter of the house appropriated to
the use of the young ladies where beds were as plentiful
as requisite on an occasion like the present.
Marten then had nothing for it but to beg Mary to
see after his brother, which the young lady as thoughtlessly
promised to do, and then he accompanied his young companions
to that department of the house appropriated to the
use of the boys, where, as might be expected after
a little more rude sport, he fell into a sleep so
profound and long, that every thought of Reuben was
banished from his mind. And now, to return to
the poor baby, the victim of mismanagement, or of
his brother’s self-conceit. Sobbing and
roaring he was carried or dragged up stairs, undressed,
and put to bed, where the extreme violence of his
grief proved its own relief, for he fell asleep with
the tear in his eye, and long long after the cause
of sorrow was forgotten, his sobs might be heard proclaiming
that the effect even now had not passed away.
By and bye, however, the calm of sleep restored him
more to himself again, and before the motherly woman
who had taken pity on him left the chamber, he was
sleeping the refreshing sleep of childhood.
As the young people had gone to bed so late the evening
before, for it was quite twelve o’clock, and
the next day was also to be a day of indulgence, it
was nearly half-past eight before Marten awoke, and
what with one thing and another it was quite nine
before he had an opportunity of asking any one after
Reuben, or indeed of discovering that no one knew
anything of the little one farther than that he had
awoke at his usual hour, seven o’clock; that
the kind woman who had attended him the night before
had helped to wash and dress him, and having told
him to be quiet, lest he should awake the children
asleep in his bed room, she left him as she thought
safe in the young ladies’ sitting room, to amuse
himself as best he might. Two hours nearly had
passed since then, and no further information could
be obtained of the little boy; but he was gone, that
was certain for he was nowhere to be found in any
part of Mr. Jameson’s large house. It so