Hildegarde's Home

"Wait just a moment, Jack. I think I know it all now.

"'By Thetis' tinsel-slippered feet,
And the songs of Sirens sweet' —

Isn't that lovely, Jack?"

"Oh, yes," answered Jack absently. "What have you been doing here, Hilda?" He was studying the jars that were already marked, and now read aloud, —

"'William the Conqueror, his Jam, 1066.'

"'Peach Marmalade

Put up by Hamlet, Prince of Denmark,

For his own use.'

"What an extraordinary girl you are, Hildegarde!"

"Not at all extraordinary!" cried Hildegarde, laughing and blushing. "Why shouldn't I amuse myself? It hurts no one, and it amuses me very much."

Jack laughed, and went on, —

"'Marmaladus Crabappulis

C. J. Cæsar fecit

Jam satis.'

"'Crab-apple Jelly

Macbeth, Banquo & Co., Limited.'

"'Peach Marmalade

Made by

John Grahame, Viscount Dundee. Gold Medal.'

"This ought to be mine."

"It shall be yours, greedy viscount. Get a spoon and eat it at once, if you like."

"Thank you so much. I would rather take it home, if I may. I say, what is that brown stuff out on the porch, with mosquito netting over it? Nothing very valuable, I hope?"

"Oh, Jack!" cried Hildegarde, springing up, "my peach leather! What have you – did you fall into it? Oh, and I thought you were improving so much! I must go – "

"No, don't go," said her cousin. "I – I only knocked down one plate. And – Merlin was with me, you know, and I don't believe you would find any left. I am very sorry, Hilda. Can I make some more for you?"

"I think not, my cousin. But no matter, if it is only one plate, for there are a good many, as you saw. Only, do be careful when you go home, that's a good boy."

"What is it, anyhow?"

"Why – you cook it with brown sugar, you know."

"Cook what? Leather?"

"Oh, dear! the masculine mind is so obtuse – peaches, O sacred bird of Juno!"

"The eagle?"

"The goose. You really must study mythology, Jack. You cook the peaches with brown sugar, and then you rub them through a sieve, – it's a horrid piece of work! – and then spread them on plates, just as you saw them, and cover them to keep the flies off."

"And leave long ends trailing to trip up your visitors."

"One doesn't expect giraffes to make morning calls. So after a few days it hardens, if it has the luck to be left alone, and then you roll it up."

"Plates and all?"

"Of course! and sprinkle sugar over it, and it is really delicious. I might have given you that plate you knocked over, but now – "

"It was the smallest, I remember."

"And, Jack, I made it all myself. No one else touched it. And all this marmalade, and three dozen pots of currant jelly, and four dozen of crab-apple."

"Sacred bird of Juno!" ejaculated her cousin.

"Do you dare call me a goose, sir?"

"She drove peacocks, didn't she? I do know a little mythology.

"But, Hildegarde, be serious now, will you? I'm in a peck of trouble, as Biddy says. I want consolation, or advice, or something."

"Sit down, and tell me," said Hildegarde, full of interest at once.

Jack sat down and drummed on the table, a thing that Hildegarde had never been allowed to do.

"I got a letter from Daddy, yesterday," he said, after a pause. "Herr Geigen is going to Germany now, in a week, and Daddy says I may go if Uncle Tom is willing."

"And he isn't willing?" Hilda said. "Oh!"

Jack got up and moved restlessly about the room, laying waste the chairs as he went. "Willing? He only roars, and says, 'Stuff and nonsense!' which is no answer, you know, Hilda. If he would just say 'No,' quietly, I – well, of course you can make up your mind to stand a thing, and stand it. But he won't listen to me for five minutes. If he could realise – one can get as good an education at Leipsic as at Harvard. But his idea of Germany is a country inhabited by a crazy emperor and a 'parcel of Dutch fiddlers,' and by no one else. I shall have to give it up, I suppose."

"Oh, no!" cried Hildegarde hopefully. "Don't give it up yet. You know when mamma spoke to him, he didn't absolutely say 'No.' He said he would think about it. Perhaps – she might ask him if he had thought about it. Wait a day or two, at any rate, Jack, before you write to your father. Can you wait?"

"Oh, yes! but it won't make any difference. I suppose it's good for me. You say all trouble is good in the end. Have you ever had any trouble, I wonder, Hilda?"

"My father!" said Hildegarde, colouring.

"Forgive me!" cried her cousin. "I am a brute! an idiotic brute! What shall I do?" he said in desperation, seeing the tears in the girl's clear eyes. "It would do no good if I went and shot myself, or I would in a minute. You will forgive me, Hilda?"