“What will mamma say?” I asked.

Toddie gazed, first blankly and then inquiringly, into my face; finding no answer or sympathy there, he burst into tears, and replied:—­

“I dunno.”

The ringing of the lunch-bell changed Toddie from a tearful cherub into a very practical, business-like boy, and shouting “Come on, Budge!” he hurried down-stairs, while I tormented myself with wonder as to how I could best and most quickly undo the mischief Toddie had done.

I will concede to my nephews the credit of keeping reasonably quiet during meals; their tongues doubtless longed to be active in both the principal capacities of those useful members, but they had no doubt as to how to choose between silence and hunger.  The result was a reasonably comfortable half-hour.  Just as I began to cut a melon, Budge broke the silence by exclaiming:—­

“O Uncle Harry, we haven’t been out to see the goat to-day!”

“Budge,” I replied, “I’ll carry you out there under an umbrella after lunch, and you may play with that goat all the afternoon, if you like.”

“Oh, won’t that be nice?” exclaimed Budge.  “The poor goat! he’ll think I don’t love him a bit, ’cause I haven’t been to see him to-day.  Does goats go to heaven when they die, Uncle Harry?”

“Guess not—­they’d make trouble in the golden streets, I’m afraid.”

“Oh, dear! then Phillie can’t see my goat.  I’m so awful sorry,” said Budge.

“I can see your goat, Budgie,” suggested Toddie.

“Huh!” said Budge, very contemptuously.  “You ain’t dead.”

“Well, Izhe goin’ to be dead some day ’an zen your nashty old goat sha’n’t see me a bit—­see how he like zat.”  And Toddie made a ferocious attack on a slice of melon nearly as large as himself.

After lunch Toddie was sent to his room to take his afternoon nap, and Budge went to the barn on my shoulders.  I gave Mike a dollar, with instructions to keep Budge in sight, to keep him from teasing the goat, and to prevent his being impaled or butted.  Then I stretched myself on a lounge, and wondered whether only half a day of daylight had elapsed since I and the most adorable woman in the world had been so happy together.  How much happier I would be when next I met her!  The very torments of this rainy day would make my joy seem all the dearer and more intense.  I dreamed happily for a few moments with my eyes open, and then somehow they closed, without my knowledge.  What put into my mind the wreck-scene from the play of “David Copperfield,” I don’t know; but there it came, and in my dream I was sitting in the balcony at Booth’s, and taking a proper interest in the scene, when it occurred to me that the thunder had less of reverberation and more woodenness than good stage thunder should have.  The mental exertion I underwent on this subject disturbed the course of my nap, but as wakefulness returned, the sound of the poorly simulated thunder did not cease; on the contrary, it was just as noisy, and more hopelessly a counterfeit than ever.  What could the sound be?  I stepped through the window to the piazza, and the sound was directly over my head.  I sprang down the terrace and out upon the lawn, looked up, and beheld my youngest nephew strutting back and forth on the tin roof of the piazza, holding over his head a ragged old parasol.  I roared—­