ETH ELIZA.--Oh, yes. Now I can say it.

"The boy stood on the burning deck,
Whence all but him had fled;
The flames rolled on, he would not go
Without his father's word."

But it used to rhyme. I don't know what has happened to it.

MRS. PETERKIN.--Elizabeth Eliza is very particular about the rhymes.

ELIZABETH ELIZA.--It must be "without his father's _head_," or,
perhaps, "without his father _said_" he should.

JULIA.--I think you must have omitted something.

AMANDA.--She has left out ever so much!

MOTHER.--Perhaps it's as well to omit some, for the ice-cream has
come, and you must all come down.

AMANDA.--And here are the rest of the girls; and let us all unite in a
song!

[_Exeunt omnes singing._]

THE PETERKINS CELEBRATE THE FOURTH OF JULY.

The day began early.

A compact had been made with the little boys the evening before.

They were to be allowed to usher in the glorious day by the blowing of
horns exactly at sunrise. But they were to blow them for precisely
five minutes only, and no sound of the horns should be heard afterward
till the family were downstairs.

It was thought that a peace might thus be bought by a short, though
crowded, period of noise.

The morning came. Even before the morning, at half-past three o'clock,
a terrible blast of the horns aroused the whole family.

Mrs. Peterkin clasped her hands to her head and exclaimed: "I am
thankful the lady from Philadelphia is not here!" For she had been
invited to stay a week, but had declined to come before the Fourth of
July, as she was not well, and her doctor had prescribed quiet.

[Illustration]

And the number of the horns was most remarkable! It was as though
every cow in the place had arisen and was blowing through both her own
horns!

"How many little boys are there? How many have we?" exclaimed Mr.
Peterkin, going over their names one by one mechanically, thinking he
would do it, as he might count imaginary sheep jumping over a fence,
to put himself to sleep. Alas! the counting could not put him to sleep
now, in such a din.

And how unexpectedly long the five minutes seemed! Elizabeth Eliza was
to take out her watch and give the signal for the end of the five
minutes, and the ceasing of the horns. Why did not the signal come?
Why did not Elizabeth Eliza stop them?

And certainly it was long before sunrise; there was no dawn to be
seen!

[Illustration]

"We will not try this plan agai