ttle boy! He was
not much like the nephews I had left behind, but I soon found him to be
a good-hearted, brave little lad.

His mamma and I were sitting one rainy morning with our work before a
great wood fire, when Frankie and his bosom companion, Abe, a young
darky, came in with an armful of long dry corn stalks, a handful of
chicken feathers, and two kitchen knives.

"Now, Frankie, you are going to make a mess, so get some papers and put
them down on the floor," said Frankie's mamma. Abe ran to get the
papers, and very soon the two boys were down on their knees, peeling the
stalks.

I noticed that the stalks were old and brittle, and that the boys
preserved the hull. After watching them for some minutes, I began to
make inquiries as to what the stalks were for.

"Dese is fur cattle," said Abe, grinning.

I then asked how they made cattle. Frankie did not seem communicative,
so Abe again answered my question.

"Wa'al, we jest cuts 'em. If yer waits a minute I'll show yer."

He cut off a piece of the peeled stalk about four inches long, then
split the hull into four pieces about a quarter of an inch wide and two
inches long. He stuck two of these pieces near one end of the stalk for
hind-legs, and the two others at a quarter of an inch from the other end
for front ones. He then cut a piece of the stalk about an inch long for
the head, a niche for the mouth, two pins for eyes, and narrow bits of
hull for horns; another little strip of hull was stuck first into the
head and then into the body to form the neck, a chicken feather put in
for the tail, and the job was finished.

"Now, den," said Abe, triumphantly, holding it up, "don't yer see dat's
a cow?"

I smiled, but Abe was too good-natured to notice it. This animal I
found, with slight variations, was made to represent horses, cows,
mules, sheep, dogs, and pigs, and even chickens, which, of course, were
much smaller, and had only two legs. In the course of the morning
Frankie and Abe manufactured a sow with seven little pigs, two cows, a
mule, and a horse.

It had stopped raining, so the boys asked if I would not like to go out
and see their farms. Under a shed in the yard were these two farms,
arranged as nearly as possible like Frankie's father's. Barns, stables,
wagon-houses, and pig-pens were made of bricks on a very small scale,
and inhabited by corn-stalk cattle.

A wagon made of a chip tied to two spools was hitched up with two
corn-stalk oxen, t