he essayed to
teach her to speak English, and, humoring his every freak, she sought to
profit. She would fix intent eyes upon him and turn her head askew to
listen heedfully while she lisped after his lisping exposition of "Archie
Royston." He grew heady with his sense of erudition. He would fairly roll
on the puncheon floor in the vainglory of his delight when she identified
chair and fire and bed and door by their accurate English names.
Sometimes, in a surge of emotion, hardly gratitude or a sense of comfort,
neither trust nor hope, but the sheer joy of love, the child would come
at her in a tumultuous rush, cast himself in her arms, and cover her face
with kisses--the face that had at first so terrified him, that was so
typical of cruelty and craft and repellent pride. Then as they nestled
together they would repeat in concert--poor woman! perhaps she thought it
a mystic invocation charged with some potent power of prayer or
magic--"Ding-dong-bell!" and the comparative biographies of little Johnny
Green and little Johnny Stout, and the vicissitudes of the poor pussycat
submitted to their diverse ministrations. He was wont to sing for her
also, albeit tunelessly, and as he sat blond and roseate and gay,
warbling after his fashion on the hearth, her clouded old eyes were
relumed with a radiance that came from within and was independent of the
prosaic light of day. His favorite ditty was an old nursery rhyme in
which the name "Pretty Polly Hopkins" occurs with flattering iteration,
and he began to apply it to her, for he had come to think her very
beautiful--such is the gracious power of love! And while the snow was
flying, and the sleet and hail tinkled on the batten shutter, and the
draughts bleated and whined in the crevices, he made the rafters ring:

"'Pretty, pretty Polly Hopkins,
How de do?--how de do?'

"'None the better, Tommy Tompkins,
For seeing you, for seeing you!'

"'Polly, I've been to France
And there spent all my cash.'

"'More the fool for you, Mister Tompkins,
Fool for you, fool for you!'"

It was a valuable course in linguistics for the inmates of the cabin,
and Archie Royston was far more intelligible and skilled in expressing
himself when that door, that had been closed on the keen blast, was
opened to let in the suave spring sunshine and the soft freshness of the
mountain air.

XII.

With the return of fine weathe