untenance was impressed here--what have I not suffered,
what have I not felt? Oh, the pangs unspoken, burning as an ardent coal
in a fiery and uncontaminated bosom!" said Bonaparte, bending forward
again.

"Dear Lord!" said Trana to herself, "how foolish I have been! The old
man has a pain in his stomach, and now, as my aunt is out, he has come
to me to help him."

She smiled kindly at Bonaparte, and pushing past him, went to the
bedroom, quickly returning with a bottle of red drops in her hand.

"They are very good for benauwdheid; my mother always drinks them," she
said, holding the bottle out.

The face in the trap-door was a fiery red. Like a tiger-cat ready to
spring. Tant Sannie crouched, with the shoulder of mutton in her hand.
Exactly beneath her stood Bonaparte. She rose and clasped with both arms
the barrel of salt meat.

"What, rose of the desert, nightingale of the colony, that with thine
amorous lay whilest the lonesome night!" cried Bonaparte, seizing the
hand that held the vonlicsense. "Nay, struggle not! Fly as a stricken
fawn into the arms that would embrace thee, thou--"

Here a stream of cold pickle-water, heavy with ribs and shoulders,
descending on his head abruptly terminated his speech. Half-blinded,
Bonaparte looked up through the drops that hung from his eyelids, and
saw the red face that looked down at him. With one wild cry he fled.
As he passed out at the front door a shoulder of mutton, well-directed,
struck the black coat in the small of the back.

"Bring the ladder! bring the ladder! I will go after him!" cried the
Boer-woman, as Bonaparte Blenkins wildly fled into the fields.

*****

Late in the evening of the same day Waldo knelt on the floor of his
cabin. He bathed the foot of his dog which had been pierced by a thorn.
The bruises on his own back had had five days to heal in, and, except
a little stiffness in his movements, there was nothing remarkable about
the boy.

The troubles of the young are soon over; they leave no external mark.
If you wound the tree in its youth the bark will quickly cover the
gash; but when the tree is very old, peeling the bark off, and looking
carefully, you will see the scar there still. All that is buried is not
dead.

Waldo poured the warm milk over the little swollen foot; Doss lay very
quiet, with tears in his eyes. Then there was a tap at the door. In an
instant Doss looked wide awake, and winked the tears out from between
his little lid