THE DOERS

BY

WILLIAM JOHN HOPKINS

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS

[Illustration]

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY

 BOSTON--NEW YORK--CHICAGO--DALLAS SAN FRANCISCO

The Riverside Press Cambridge

COPYRIGHT, 1914, BY WILLIAM JOHN HOPKINS

 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED INCLUDING THE RIGHT TO REPRODUCE THIS BOOK OR PARTS THEREOF IN ANY FORM

_School Edition_

The Riverside Press

CAMBRIDGE--MASSACHUSETTS

PRINTED IN THE U. S. A. 

CONTENTS

 I. THE DIGGING-MEN STORY 1

 II. THE MASON STORY 10

 III. THE DINNER-TIME AND JONAH STORY 22

 IV. THE CARPENTER STORY 34

 V. THE WATER-MEN STORY 46

 VI. THE SHINGLE AND CLAPBOARD STORY 57

 VII. THE PLUMBER STORY 73

 VIII. THE PAINTER STORY 86

 IX. THE TREE-MEN STORY 101

 X. THE CLEARING-UP STORY 113

 XI. THE SETTING-OUT STORY 125

 XII. THE POLE-MEN STORY 138

 XIII. THE MOVING-MEN STORY 155

[Illustration]

I

THE DIGGING-MEN STORY

Once upon a time there was a little boy who was almost five years old. And his mother used to let him wander about the garden and in the roadnear the house, for there weren't many horses going by, and the menwho drove the horses that did go by knew the little boy and they werecareful. 

So this boy wandered about and played happily by himself. 

He had his cat and his cart and his shovel and his hoe, and he alwayswore his overalls. And wherever he went his cat went too. 

One morning he saw some men come with a big cart and two horses, andthey stopped in a field near his house where there were some queerboards nailed on sticks that were stuck in the ground; and the boardsturned corners, and there were strings across from one board toanother. 

And the men got out of the big cart and unhitched the horses from thecart, and the little boy thought he had better go there and see whatthey were going to do. 

So he went, dragging his cart behind him, with his shovel and his hoerattling in the bottom of it. 

And his cat saw him going, and she ran on ahead with her bushy tailsticking straight up in the air. 

And the little boy came to the men and the horses and he stopped andstood still. 

And his cat stopped too, but she didn't stand still; she rolled overon her back on the ground and wanted to play, but nobody would pay anyattention to her. 

Pretty soon one of the men looked down and saw the little boy. 

"Hello!" he said. 

"Hello, " said the little boy. "What are you going to do?"

"Why, " said the man, "we're going to dig dirt. "

"Are you going to dig a hole?" the little boy asked. 

"Yes, " said the man; "a great big hole. "

"And what is the hole for?" the little boy asked. "Is it to plantsomething in?"

"No, " said the man, "it's going to be the cellar of a house. "

"Oh, " said the little boy, "is it? And do you think I could help youdig? I've got my shovel and my cart. "

"I'm afraid, " said the man, "that it wouldn't do. You see that greatscoop?"

He pointed to a big iron scoop that was in the cart. 

The little boy looked and nodded. 

"Is that a scoop? What is it for?"

"The horses drag it, and a man takes hold of those two handles likeplough-handles, and it scoops the dirt right up. "

The little boy nodded again. 

"You can watch us if you want to, " the man said then. "But you must becareful not to get in the way of the horses. "

"And can my kitty watch too?"

The man laughed and said his kitty could watch if she wanted to. 

And the other men took pickaxes out of the cart, the handles of thepickaxes and their iron heads, and each man slipped the head of hispickaxe over the handle and gave it a tap on the ground to drive thehead on. 

And they walked slowly in under the strings between the boards andthey got in a line. 

And the little boy sat down on a stone that was just the right sizeand watched them. His cat came and got right between his feet. 

Then the man at the end of the line raised his pickaxe high above hishead, and the next man did the same, and then the third man, and so onto the other end of the line. 

And the first man struck his pickaxe down hard into the ground, and itmade the ground grunt, _Mnh!_

And the second man did the same, and the ground gave another grunt, _Mnh!_

And then the third man did the same thing, and so on to the other endof the line. 

Then the first man was ready again, so that the sound of the pickaxeswas as regular as the ticking of the tall clock. 

When the pickaxe was in the ground, each man gave a kind of a pry thatloosened the dirt. 

And when they had picked, the men went ahead a little short step andpicked a new place and left the loosened dirt behind, so that, prettysoon, they were walking on the dirt that they had loosened. 

The cat had got tired of lying between the little boy's feet andhaving no attention paid to her, so she got up and ran off a littleway, and stopped and looked back, but the little boy wouldn't look. 

So she walked back, with her bushy tail straight up in the air, andrubbed against the little boy's legs. 

Still the little boy didn't notice her. And the reason why he didn'tnotice her was that the horses were being hitched to the big ironscoop. 

As soon as the horses were hitched to the scoop, they started walkingalong; and the scoop turned right over on its face, upside down, because the man didn't have hold of the handles. 

And the horses dragged the scoop, upside down, and it bumped over thestones and made a ringing kind of noise, and they dragged it inbetween the boards and over the dirt that had been loosened by thepickaxes, and when they got to the end of the loosened dirt, theystopped. 

[Illustration: THE DIRT-SCOOP]

Then the man turned the horses around, and he took hold of the handlesof the scoop and turned it over; and he kept hold of the handles, andthe horses started, and the scoop dug into the loose dirt and scoopedit right up and carried it along. 

Now the field, where they were digging the cellar, sloped down behindwhere the cellar was to be, so that, when the horses came to that part, they were walking down-hill. 

And the man let go of the handles of the scoop, and it turned over anddumped its load of dirt. 

And when the horses heard the scoop bumping and banging on the ground, they turned around of their own accord and walked back to get a newload. 

And so they did until they had scooped out all the dirt that had beenloosened. 

Then the pickaxe men went back and began again on the part that hadbeen scooped, but the horses had to wait for the dirt to be loosened, and they stood outside of the cellar. 

It was beginning to look a little bit like a cellar now, but a veryshallow one. 

And the little boy was getting tired of watching the pickaxes rise andfall and of listening to the noise the ground made. So he got up. 

And his cat saw him getting up, and she ran to him, and she saw thathe was going to the man with the horses, so she ran ahead, with herbushy tail sticking straight up in the air. 

The man saw them coming, and he looked at the little boy and smiled. 

"I've got to go now, " the little boy said, when he had come to the man. 

"So soon?" asked the man. "I hope you aren't tired. "

"I think I'd better go home, " the little boy said. "P'r'aps my motherwould like to see me. "

"I shouldn't wonder if she'd like to see you pretty often, " the mansaid. "You tell her that you'll be safe here. I'll keep my eye on you. "

"How will you get your eye on me?" the little boy asked. 

The man laughed. "Will you come again?"

"I'll come to-morrow, " the little boy said. "P'r'aps I'll come thisafternoon. Good-bye. "

"Good-bye, " said the man. 

And he watched the little boy as he trudged away, dragging his cart, with his hoe and his shovel rattling in the bottom of it, and with hiscat walking beside him and looking up into his face. 

And that's all of this story. 

II

THE MASON STORY

Once upon a time there was a little boy and he was almost five yearsold. And there weren't any other children near for him to play with, so he used to play happily all by himself. 

He had his cat and his cart and his shovel and his hoe, and he alwayswore his overalls. 

One morning he was sitting right down in the gravel of his front walk, the walk that led to the front door of the house that he lived in, andhe had been digging in the gravel. The hole that he was digging wassquare. 

And he had picked the dirt all over with a big nail, and pried itloose, and then he had pretended that his shovel was a big iron scoopthat could scoop the dirt out just the way the big scoop did when itwas dragged by the horses. 

For he had been watching the men dig a cellar in the field next to hishouse. 

And his cat was there, rolling in the gravel and playing with the air. 

Pretty soon his mother looked out of a window, and then she camerunning out. 

"My dear little boy, " she said, "what are you digging?"

The little boy got up, and the cat scampered away a few feet, with herbushy tail straight up in the air. 

"I'm digging a cellar for a house, " said the little boy. 

"Oh, " said his mother. "Well, don't you think you'd better build thehouse over near the sand-pile? People coming in might not see thishouse, and they might kick it over and walk on it. But the masons havecome to work on the real cellar. "

"The masons?" the little boy asked. 

"The men to build the cellar wall. You may go and watch them if youlike. "

The little boy nodded again. Then he put his shovel into his cart, andtook hold of the handle of the cart. Then he looked back. 

"Good-bye, " he said. 

"Good-bye, my dear little son, " his mother said. 

And she watched him trudging away, dragging his cart, with his shoveland his hoe rattling in the bottom of it. 

And his cat ran on ahead, with her bushy tail sticking straight up inthe air. 

The little boy saw a man hoeing slowly at something in a big shallowwooden box. 

And the something that he was hoeing at was all white and it sloppedhere and there; and the hoe was all white, and the outside of the boxwas all covered with slops of the same white stuff, and the man'sshoes were white, too, and the bottoms of his overalls. 

And there was a pile of new sand that looked all moist and just rightto play in. 

There was another man standing at the edge of the cellar and lookingdown into it. 

The cellar itself was so deep now that the little boy could just seethe tops of the hats of the men who were working in it. 

The man who had been looking down into the cellar heard the shovel andthe hoe rattling in the cart and looked up. 

"Hello!" he called. 

"Hello, " said the little boy. "What are you doing?"

"I'm just looking to see if the men do their work right. Come overhere and I'll show you. "

So the little boy left his cart beside the pile of sand and walkedover to where the man was. 

And the man met him and took hold of his hand; and they walkedtogether to the edge of the cellar and looked down into it, and theman stooped down and kneeled on one knee, with his arm half around thelittle boy so that he wouldn't fall in. 

In the cellar the little boy saw a great many big stones that lay allabout the middle, where they had been dumped; and there were six menworking around the edge of the cellar building the wall. 

In part of the cellar the wall had been begun and was about two feethigh; but in another part there was nothing but the smooth dirt at thebottom, and the smooth sides of the cellar that went straight up. 

And two of the men were digging a trench in the smooth bottom of thecellar where the wall would be. 

When they had the shallow trench dug for a few feet, one of the menput down his shovel and went to the pile of stones. 

And he found some stones that were the size he wanted, each of themjust about as big as he could carry in one hand. And he took two ofthese and went to the trench and put them in. 

Then he went to the pile and got two more, and he put them in thetrench, too. And so he did until the bottom of the trench was allcovered. 

Then he got smaller stones and threw them in on top of the bigger ones;and, on top of those, still smaller stones that were flattish. 

The flat stones filled the trench up nearly to the top, and he didn'tput in any more but took up his shovel again and helped the other mandig. 

Then two of the other men came, and they looked at the trench to seeif it was all right. 

Then they went to the pile of big stones and they picked out one ofthe biggest, and they took their big iron crowbars and put the pointsof the bars under the stone, to move it. 

The little boy wondered. 

"What are they going to do?" he asked. "Are they going to move it? Canthey move it?"

The man nodded. 

"Easy enough, " he said. "You watch. "

And the men pried with their crowbars, and the big stone started fromits place and rolled down from the pile. And the men got it over tothe trench, sometimes prying it with their crowbars and sometimesrolling it with their hands, and they set it in its place on top ofthe small flat stones. 

Then one of the men shut one of his eyes and squinted along the wallthat was done to see if the stone was just in the right place; and theother man moved the stone with his crowbar just a little until it wasin exactly the right place. 

Then they went to the pile again and got another big stone in the sameway, and they got it over to the trench and set it in its place besidethe first. 

Then the men went to the pile again, and they picked out a stone thatwas nearly as big as the bottom stones, and they hammered it withgreat hammers and split off some thin, flat pieces. 

That was to make it fit better in the place where it was to go. Theground all about the wall was covered with thin, flat pieces that hadbeen hammered off other stones. 

And they got a great thick board, and they put one end of the board ontop of the bottom stones which they had just put in the trench, andthey put the other end of the board on the ground in front of thestone which they had been hammering, and they rolled the stone slowlyup the board until it came to the end. 

And they rolled it off the end upon the bottom stones, and got it intoits place with their crowbars. 

And where it did not fit well enough, they put in thin, flat piecesthat they picked up from the ground. 

The man who knelt on one knee at the edge of the cellar told thelittle boy about it as the men worked. 

And, when the men had put in the little flat pieces of stone, one ofthem looked up and smiled at the little boy and said that they calledthe thin, flat pieces "chocks. "

"Not woodchucks, " he said, "but just chocks. "

The little boy smiled and nodded. He had never seen a woodchuck, butthere was a picture of one in his animal-book. It wasn't a very goodpicture. 

"I guess, " he said, "that they are stone-chucks. "

All the men who heard him laughed. And they went to work again, andthe little boy turned to the man who was holding him. 

"I've got to go now, " he said, "and play in that pile of sand. "

"All right, " said the man. "You play there just as long as you wantto. "

So the little boy went over to the man who was hoeing the white stuff. It wasn't so white as it had been and it was thicker, just about likenice mud. 

And his cat came up from somewhere. The little boy didn't know whereshe had been, but he didn't pay any attention to her. He just stoodand watched the man. 

"What are you making?" he asked at last. 

"I'm making mortar, " the man said. "They put it in the cracks of thewall, to hold it together. "

"Oh, " said the little boy. "Well, would you like to have me help you?"

"You might bring me a load of sand, " said the man, "if you want to. Ishall have to put in more sand. "

So the little boy went to his cart, and he threw out his hoe. Hewasn't careful where he threw it, and the handle of the hoe hit thecat. 

And the cat ran home as fast as she could go. But the little boydidn't know it, he was so busy. 

[Illustration: MAKING MORTAR]

And he backed the cart up to the sand-pile, and he took his shovel andshoveled sand into the cart until the man said that was enough. 

Then he took hold of the handle and pulled. It was heavier than hethought it would be, but he pulled it over to the box of mortar. Itwas only a few steps. 

Then the man told him to shovel it in, a little at a time. 

And the little boy shoveled it in slowly, and he felt very proud, forhe was helping to make real mortar. 

And he kept on shoveling until the man said that was enough. 

The man hoed the mortar for a few minutes, and then he took up aqueer-looking thing that he said was his hod. 

It was made of two boards that were put together like a V with thepoint down; and another board was nailed across one end, but the otherend was left open. 

It was a kind of a trough; and a stick like a broom-handle stuck downfrom the middle of it. 

And the man filled this hod with mortar, and he turned around and putthe hod across one shoulder with the bottom of the trough resting onhis shoulder. 

And he took hold of the stick, and he walked off, down a ladder intothe cellar. 

And he dumped the mortar out of the hod on to a board near the men whowere building the wall. Then he came up again. 

The little boy watched him until he had come up out of the cellar. Andhe asked the man whether he would want any more sand, but the man saidthat he wouldn't for some time. 

So the little boy went and played in the sand-pile for a long time, and, while he was playing, his cat came and rubbed against him. Thenthe little boy got up. 

"I've got to go now, " he said to the mortar man. "Good-bye. "

"Good-bye, " said the man. "Come again. "

"Yes, " said the little boy, "I will. "

And he put his shovel and his hoe into his cart, and he took hold ofthe handle of the cart, and he walked off, with his shovel and his hoerattling behind him. 

And his cat ran on ahead, with her bushy tail sticking straight up inthe air. 

And that's all of this story. 

III

THE DINNER-TIME AND JONAH STORY

Once upon a time there was a little boy and he was almost five yearsold. And there weren't any other children near for him to play with, so he used to play happily all by himself. 

He had his cat and his cart and his shovel and hoe, and he always worehis overalls when he was playing. 

They were building a house in the field next to that little boy'shouse, and he used to go there almost every day to watch the men andto help. 

One day it was late when he went, because his mother had taken himwith her down to the Square to do an errand, and when he came back hehad to change his clothes and put on his overalls. His mother wouldn'tlet him wear his overalls down to the Square. 

And when he had his overalls on, he hurried and got his cart and hisshovel and his hoe, and he called his cat, and she came running, withher bushy tail sticking straight up in the air. 

And he hurried to the new house, dragging his cart; and his shovel andhis hoe rattled in the bottom of it. 

The mortar man saw him. 

"Hello, " he said. 

"Hello, " said the little boy. "Did you wonder where I was?"

"I did that, " said the mortar man. 

"Well, I had to go on an errand with my mother, " the little boy said, "but I hurried and came as soon as I could, and here I am. Do you wantsome sand?"

[Illustration: THE MORTAR MAN]

But the mortar man didn't want any more sand then. He filled his hodwith mortar, and he stooped down and took the hod of mortar on hisshoulder, and he went trotting to the ladder, and he went down theladder. 

Then the little boy couldn't see him, because the cellar walls weredone and the carpenters had come, and they had put on the great squarebeams that lie on top of the cellar walls, and they had put in thebeams that go across from one side to the other and hold up the floors. 

But there were some men in the cellar, for the little boy could hearthem laughing and talking. 

And the mortar man had told him that they were the bricklayers whowere building the chimneys and two of the masons who were smearingmortar over all the cracks of the wall, so that the water wouldn'tleak through from the ground into the cellar. 

The little boy wished that he could see those men, but he was afraidthat it wouldn't be being careful to go down that ladder, and hedidn't think he could do it, anyway, for the steps were too far apart. 

So he looked about and he saw the man who had held the handles of thescoop, and who had held him that other day, while he looked down intothe cellar and saw the masons building the wall. He was called theforeman. 

The foreman was glad to see the little boy, and beckoned to him. 

And the little boy went, and the foreman took hold of his hand, andthey went together right up on the floor beams; but the foremancarried him when they got up there, because there weren't any boardson the beams yet, and the little boy might have fallen through betweenthe beams. 

And when they got to the right place, they both stooped over andlooked down between the beams, through a great big square hole. Achimney would come up through the hole, and the bricklayers werebuilding it. 

The little boy was surprised to see how enormous a chimney had to beat the bottom. 

There were four men laying bricks as fast as ever they could, but itwas all the little boy could do to watch one of the men. 

First, he took up a brick from the pile, with his left hand, and hegenerally tossed the brick up a little way in the air, and it turnedover before he caught it again, so that he saw all sides of it; and, with the flat trowel which he held in his right hand, he scooped upsome mortar. 

And he slapped the trowelful of mortar down on the bricks where hewanted to put that other brick, and he gave a little wipe with thetrowel around the edges, and he pressed the brick that he was holdingin his left hand down into place, and he tapped the brick with thehandle of the trowel, and the mortar squeezed out all around, and, with his trowel, he scooped off the mortar that had squeezed out, andhe slapped that down in a new place. 

Then he began again, and reached down for another brick. 

The little boy was so busy watching the bricklayer that he forgot allabout the masons who were putting mortar on the wall. 

But, pretty soon, all the men said something to all the other men, andthey stopped laying bricks, and they began to take off their overalls. 

"What are they going to do now?" the little boy asked. 

"They are going to eat their dinner, " said the foreman. "Come on. "

So the foreman and the little boy got down on the ground again, andthe foreman set the little boy down, and he took his hand, and theywent back, near the pile of sand, where there were some nice boards tosit on. 

And the men all came trooping out of the cellar, and each man went andgot his dinner from the place where he had put it when he came therein the morning. 

Some of the men had their dinner in pails and some had theirs inbaskets and one man had his in a newspaper, so that he wouldn't haveanything to carry home at night. 

And the men came where the nice boards were, and they sat aroundanywhere, and they opened their pails and their baskets and thenewspaper bundle, and they began to eat their dinners. 

The little boy had sat down, too, but he didn't feel very comfortable. 

He thought that, perhaps, he ought to have brought his dinner, but hedidn't know about it, so how could he have brought it?

And he got up and started home, but the foreman called after him andasked him why he was going. 

And the little boy said that he was going to bring his dinner, too, and eat it with them. 

And the foreman said that they would give him some of their dinner, and that there were all sorts of nice things that their wives hadcooked. 

And the little boy said that he would ask his mother, and he wouldhurry as fast as he could. 

In a few minutes, the little boy came back to the place where the menwere sitting. 

He walked very carefully, because he was carrying a cup of milk; andhis cat walked beside him and looked up at the cup of milk all thetime, and, every few steps, she stood on her hind legs and tried toreach the milk. 

But she couldn't, and the little boy didn't pay any attention to her. 

When he got to the men, the foreman asked him what his mother said. 

And the little boy told him that his mother said he could have some oftheir things if they didn't give him any cake or any pie, and that anyof the men could have their tea or coffee warmed for them if theywould take it to his house. 

The men who had tea or coffee were glad to hear that, and they went tothe little boy's house and took their tea and their coffee. 

Some had it in bottles and some had it in the covers of theirdinner-pails, with the cup to drink out of fitting over the top. 

The foreman didn't go, and the little boy sat down close to him andbegan to drink his milk; but his cat bothered him by trying to get it. 

So the little boy gave her a push with his foot. 

"Get away, kitty, " he said. "You can't have any. "

Then the foreman laughed, and he broke off a piece of white bread andgave it to the little boy. And the little boy took a great enormousbite. 

"Is it good?" the foreman asked. 

The little boy nodded. "M--m--m!" he said. He couldn't really sayanything because he had his mouth full of bread. 

"My wife made it, " said the foreman. "I think she's a very fine cook. "

The little boy put his mouthful of bread in his cheek so that he couldspeak. 

"Yes, " he said, "I think so too. "

The foreman laughed again, and then the men began to come back. 

They all wanted to give the little boy something; and some of themgave him other little pieces of white bread, and some of them gave himlittle corners of their sandwiches, and some gave him little pieces ofdark-colored bread. 

And he ate his pieces of bread and drank his milk, and the foremangave him two of some little thin molasses cookies that were allcrackly and crumbly; for little crackly cookies like those aren't muchlike cake. 

When all the men had finished their dinner and had drunk their tea andtheir coffee, they went and put their pails and their baskets away andthen came back and sat down again, and some of them got out theirpipes and filled them. 

The little boy was very happy, and he sat on the board with his handsin his lap, and he smiled. 

"Now, " said the foreman, "there's time for a story before you go towork again. Do any of you know a story?"

He looked all about and, last of all, he looked at the little boy. "Doyou know any story?"

"Well, " the little boy said, "I know about Jonah. "

"Will you tell us about Jonah?" the foreman asked. "I should like tohear that story. "

"Yes, " said the little boy, "I will tell it. Well, once upon a timethere was a man named Jonah. And he had to go to Nineveh to tell thepeople how bad they were. But he didn't want to go; so he didn't. Heran away in a ship. 

"And when he got into the ship, he lay down and went to sleep. And theship started, and pretty soon the wind began to blow terribly hard, and there were 'normous great waves, and the ship got all tippy. Andthe sailors were afraid, and they threw out the things that were inthe ship. 

"So the captain went to the place where Jonah was. 'Wake up, Jonah!'he said. 'Why don't you get up and pray?'

"Then the sailors talked together, and said that it must be Jonah'sfault. 'Who is this Jonah, anyway?' they said. 'Where did he come from, and what is he doing here? Let's ask him. '

"So they did. And Jonah told them, and said: 'I guess you'll have tothrow me out of the ship. ' So they threw Jonah over into the water, and there wasn't any more storm. 

"And Jonah, he went down and down and down in the water, and I guesshe thought he was going to be drowned. Then a great, big whale camealong and saw Jonah, and he opened his mouth wide and went at Jonahand swallowed him. But he didn't bite him or chew him or anything. 

"But Jonah was terribly scared, 'cause he couldn't hardly guess wherehe was. The insides of the whale were all wet, and it was all pitchydark in there. 

"There wasn't anything for Jonah to do but to think, and after he hadthought for a long, long time, the whale up-swallowed him and spittedhim out on to the beach. And I s'pose Jonah went and washed hisclothes, because they were all whaley. 

"And then he went to Nineveh and told them to be more better, and theydid be. "

And that's all of Jonah. 

IV

THE CARPENTER STORY

Once upon a time there was a little boy and he was almost five yearsold. And there weren't any other children near for him to play with, so he used to play happily all by himself. 

He had his cat and his cart and his shovel and his hoe, and he alwayswore his overalls when he was playing. 

They were building a house in a field near that little boy's house;and, one morning, he had heard the sounds of hammers and of malletsall the time he was at breakfast. 

So he hurried to get through, and he slipped down from his chair andtook off his napkin and he wiped his mouth and he turned to his mother. 

She was sitting still, smiling because he was in such a hurry. 

"You seem to be in a good deal of a hurry, " she said. 

"Yes, " he said, nodding, "I am. I think I had better go over to thenew house. "

"To see whether the men are doing their work right?" she asked. 

"You see, I have to help the mortar man, " he explained. "Good-bye. "

"Good-bye, dear, " she said. Then she kissed him. "Be very careful. "

"Yes, I will. "

Then he went out, and he got his cart, and he put his shovel and hishoe in it, and he called his cat; but no cat came. And he called heragain, but she didn't come then. 

So he took up the handle of his cart, and he walked over to the newhouse, dragging his cart behind him, with his shovel and his hoerattling in the bottom of it. 

The mortar man was still there, hoeing mortar for the bricklayers touse, for the chimneys weren't done yet. 

"Hello, " said the mortar man. 

"Hello, " the little boy said. "I came as soon as I could. "

"Where's your kitty?" the mortar man asked. "You couldn't find her, could you? Well, look around behind you. "

The little boy looked around behind him. 

He was standing with his back to the house, so that, when he lookedbehind him he saw the new house and the carpenters who were working atgreat beams which were on wooden horses that stood on the ground. 

And he saw his cat, too. She was walking toward him, with her bushytail sticking straight up in the air. 

But the little boy was too much interested in what the carpenters weredoing to pay much attention to his cat. 

"What are those men doing?" he asked of the mortar man. 

"The carpenters? They are cutting mortises in those girts. That is, little holes in those big beams. The ends of other beams will be madesmall enough to go in those holes, and they will hold the floor up. "

"Mor--tar!" shouted one of the men who were building the chimney. 

The mortar man hurried off with his hod of mortar, and the little boywandered over to where the carpenters were. 

His cat went, too, but he left his cart by the pile of sand. 

There were two carpenters there, and they both looked up and smiled. 

They had great thick chisels and heavy wooden mallets in their hands, and there was a big bit, or "borer, " as the little boy called it, lying on the ground between them. And I don't know why "borer" isn't abetter name for it. 

There were some round holes in the beams which had been made by theborer, and the men were making those round holes square with thechisels. 

One of the men had just finished a hole when the little boy came, andhe went ahead to the next round hole, and he put the edge of thechisel carefully against the wood, and he struck it with the mallet. 

_Plack!_ _Plack!_ _Plack!_ shrieked the mallet on the chisel. 

_Ugh!_ _Ugh!_ _Ugh!_ the wood grunted, and it seemed to shiver whenthe mallet struck. 

[Illustration: CUTTING A HOLE]

Then there was a splintering noise and a part of the wood broke away. 

_Plack!_ _Plack!_ _Plack!_ screamed the mallet again. 

The wood grunted again, but it was of no use, and another piece brokeaway. 

And then the man hit the chisel again and another piece broke off, andthe chisel came through on the other side of the beam. 

And the carpenter drove the chisel through at the other side of thehole, in the same way; and what had been a round hole was a square one. 

Then he laid the mallet down and took the chisel in both hands, and heleaned over the square hole and made the sides all smooth with thechisel. 

Then he made a sort of sloping hole, a kind of a little square trench, and it went from the side of the beam into the square hole. 

Then he put his tools down and looked at the little boy again andsmiled. 

"There!" he said. "That's done. "

The little boy smiled back at him. 

"Is it?" he said. "What goes in that hole? I could put my hand in it. "

"It's not for little boys' hands, " answered the carpenter. "The end ofa short beam goes in there. I'll show you. We have to make places forthe chimneys to come through and so people can go upstairs withoutknocking their heads. Did you ever think of that?"

The little boy shook his head, and he came nearer. "Show me. "

So the carpenter went to a little pile of short beams; and he took oneand brought it back. 

And he turned the big beam on edge, and fitted the end of the littlebeam into the hole. 

The end of the little beam had already been made small, so that itwould go in. 

"There, " he said. "Now here, where I stand, will be the stairs forpeople to go up, and there will be that other big beam on the otherside. We have to leave this big hole in the floor so that a man can goon the stairs without hitting his head, you know. Everywhere else willbe a floor, except where the chimneys come through. Do you understand?"

The little boy nodded. He thought that he understood, although it wasnot very easy to understand. 

And while he was trying to understand better, there came a voicebehind him. 

"Hello! I wondered where you were. "

And he looked around and there was his friend the foreman, and the cathad gone to meet him and was coming back beside him, and she waslooking up into the foreman's face, and her bushy tail was stickingstraight up into the air. 

"Hello, " said the little boy; and he leaned back against the horsethat the beam rested on. 

"Your kitty, " said the foreman, "came up here all by herself, and shefollowed me about. "

The little boy laughed. 

"She's a funny kitty, " he said. 

The foreman stooped down. 

"I think you'd better tell me your name, " he said. "I like to know thenames of my friends. "

"My name is David, " the little boy answered. 

"And mine is Jonathan, " said the foreman quickly. "Think of that! Now, Davie, come with me and let's see how the other men are getting on. "

So David put his little hand into the foreman's big one, and theystarted; and David saw some men putting up a great, tall beam on oneof the corners. 

Two men were holding it, and another man reached up as high as hecould and nailed a board to it, and the other end of the board wasfastened down low, so that the tall beam shouldn't fall over when themen let go. 

"What are those men doing?" David asked. "That sticks up like mykitty's tail, doesn't it?"

"So it does, " the foreman said. "There'll be more of them presently, sticking up all along every side. "

"Will there? How many of those sticks will there be?"

"Oh, I don't know; more than fifty, I should think. "

"A cat with fifty tails. " And the little boy laughed. "Did you eversee a kitty with fifty tails?"

"All sticking straight up in the air!" said the foreman. "That _would_be funny. She'd look like a porcupine. "

"What _is_ a porcupine?" David asked. "Did I ever see one?"

"I guess not, " the foreman answered. "Anyway, I never did. It's alittle animal all covered with sharp things. It's just as if yourkitty's fur was about three or four times as long as it is, and everyhair was stiff and sharp. There's a great rattling as they walk, I'mtold. The Indians used to sew the quills--the sharp things--on theirsoft leather slippers, because they looked pretty. "

"Tell me some more about them, " said David. 

"I don't know any more. See, Davie, the men are putting up anotherstick. "

So David watched the men put up that stick, and he forgot about theporcupine, which was what the foreman wanted. 

And then he watched them put up another, and then another. 

"They look as if they were the bones of the house, " he said. 

"So they do, Davie, " the foreman said, "and so they are. And the wholeframe, before it's boarded in--before any boards are nailed on--lookslike the skeleton of a house, and so it is. They'll have pretty nearthe whole frame up by the time you eat your supper; or to-morrowmorning, at any rate. Then you look and see. It's much the same waythat your body's made: your ribs and the other bones are the frame, and inside you there are a lot of rooms, and it's all covered withsoft skin instead of boards. "

"Am I? What are my ribs?"

"These bones. " And the foreman stooped and ran his finger quickly downDavid's ribs, and David shrieked with laughter. 

"Tickles, " said David. "Show me my ribs again. "

"It isn't good for little boys to be tickled too much, " said theforeman. "Now we'll go over to the sand-pile for a while. I don't wantto take you into the house until they get the frame all up and somefloors down. It isn't safe. "

So they turned around and went to the sand-pile, and the foremanstayed there a little while and played in the sand. 

Then he had to go away; and the mortar man had gone away, and nobodywas there but David and his cat. 

And David thought that he would help the mortar man, so he filled hiscart with sand and dragged it over to the mortar box and shoveled itin. 

Then he took up the handle of his cart, and he called his cat, and hewalked along to his house, dragging his cart. 

And his shovel rattled in the bottom of it, and his cat ran on beforehim. 

But he had forgotten his hoe. It was in the pile of sand. 

And that's all of this story. 

V

THE WATER-MEN STORY

Once upon a time there was a little boy and he was almost five yearsold. And there weren't any other children near for him to play with, so he used to play happily all by himself. 

He had his cat and his cart and his shovel and his hoe, and he alwayswore his overalls when he was playing. And his name was David. 

They were building a house in a field near David's house; and, onemorning, he heard a curious sound, and he wondered what they weredoing, and he asked his mother. 

"Mother, " he said, "what are they doing? What are they? It sounds asif they were pickaxing the dirt. "

His mother laughed. "Well, " she answered, "perhaps they are. I don'tknow what they are doing. I think you'll have to go and see. "

"Think I'll have to go and see, " David repeated; "but I'll have mybreakfast first. "

So he had his breakfast first, and he hurried a little because hewanted to know what the noise was. 

And when he was through his breakfast he took off his napkin andslipped down from his chair and went around to kiss his mother. 

His father had gone off to town in the early train. 

"Good-bye, " said David. 

"Good-bye, dear, " said his mother. "Be very careful. "

He nodded. "Yes, I will. " He was going out, but he stopped. "I don'thear it now, mother. I don't hear the noise. Do you suppose they'vestopped doing it?"

"If you go right along over there, I think you'll find out about it. "

So the little boy went out, and he picked up his shovel, but hecouldn't find his hoe. 

And he put his shovel into his cart, and took up the handle of thecart, and his cat came running, and he went toward the new house, dragging his cart behind him with his shovel rattling in the bottom ofit. His cat ran on ahead. 

Long before he got as far as the house, he saw some men's heads bob upin the middle of the road; heads without any bodies to them. 

And he went nearer, and he saw that the men were in a trench that theyhad dug in the road, as far as the new house. 

Some long iron pipes were in the gutter. The pipes were big enough forhis kitty to crawl through. 

He wanted to ask somebody about them, but there was nobody thereexcept the two men in the trench, so he walked along until he came tothe mortar box. 

The mortar man wasn't there. He had gone into the house with a hod ofmortar. 

So David looked all about for somebody. 

He saw the pile of sand with his hoe sticking out of it, but he didn'tpay any attention to it, for he wasn't thinking about hoes then. 

And he saw the bones of the house almost all up, so that they made apretty good skeleton, and the carpenters were putting up the rafters:the beams that hold up the roof. 

And other carpenters had just begun nailing boards on to the outsideof the up-and-down beams, and there was a great noise of hammering. 

At last he saw the foreman. 

"Hello!" David called. 

There was such a noise, with the carpenters all hammering, that theforeman didn't hear him. 

"Hello!" called David again, louder. 

Still the foreman didn't hear. 

"Hello!" David shouted as loud as he could shout. "_Hello, Jonathan!_"

The foreman heard, that time, and he looked around and laughed. 

"Ho, Davie!" he said in a big round voice. "Just wait a minute andI'll be down there. "

So David waited a minute, then two, then five minutes, and the foremancame. Then David asked his question. 

"What are the men doing in the road?"

"They're digging a trench. When they get it done, they'll lay waterpipes in it. And the water will come all the way from the reservoir onthe hill, and it will go through pipes that are already laid under thestreets, and it will come to this street, and it will turn into thisstreet and go along, and some will go into your house, and some willkeep on to this house and go in through a pipe that will be under theground just the other side of the sand-pile. 

"That pipe will go through the cellar wall, and to all the faucets inthe house, so that when the little boy who will live here wants towash his hands or take a bath, he will turn a faucet and the waterwill come running. There, now. "

"Oh, " said David, "will a little boy live here?"

"I don't know who will live here, Davie, " the foreman answered. "Theremost generally is a little boy or so in any family that lives in thistown. "

"Oh, " said David; and he nodded his head, and he saw a faucet that wasnailed to a board. 

And the faucet was on the end of a pipe which stuck up from the groundnear the mortar box. 

"Why, " he said, "there's a faucet, and water will come. I've seen themortar man get it there. "

"Yes, " said the foreman. "We had to have water to use. It comesthrough this pipe that lies on top of the ground all the way to yourhouse. See?"

And the foreman showed David the pipe. It was hidden by the long grass. 

"They're going to lay the pipes now, Davie. Do you want to see them doit?"

So David put his little hand into the foreman's big one, and they wenttogether to where the men were. 

The men had got up out of the trench, and they were going to take upone of the iron pipes that lay in the gutter. 

Just as they began to lift it, out of one end of it popped David'skitty. She scurried around and popped into the end of another pipe, and all the men laughed. 

"Funny kitty, " said David. 

Then the men took hold of the pipe that the cat had been in at first, and they lifted it, one at each end, and they carried it and put itdown beside the trench. 

[Illustration: OUT POPPED DAVID'S KITTY]

Then they got into the trench again, and they took hold of the pipeand lowered it to the bottom. 

David couldn't see what the men were doing then, and he went to theedge of the trench and squatted there and watched. 

He saw the end of a pipe sticking out of the ground into the trench. It looked as if it had been in the ground a long time. 

"What is that?" he asked the foreman. 

The foreman said it was the end of the old pipe, and there was a placenear his house where they could put a long iron thing into the ground, down as far as the pipes, and turn it and let the water into thispipe. The long iron thing was like a clock-key. 

"And Davie, " he said, "you see that one end of each pipe flares outbigger than the other end. The men put the small end of one pipe intothe flaring end of the next. You'll see. "

So David looked and the men fitted the small end of the new pipe intothe flaring end of the old one, and they blocked the new pipe up withdirt and stones until it was just right. 

Then one of the men took some things that were in the trench. All thatDavid saw was what looked like some old frazzled-out rope, and he laidthe things he had taken up around the new pipe in the joint, and hehammered them in tight with a kind of a dull chisel. That was so thatthe water shouldn't leak through. 

When the men had the old frazzled-out rope all hammered in tight, theother man came and brought him something that looked all snaky, and itwas shiny like the lead of a pencil, and it waved about as if it wereheavy and it seemed to be all moist like mud. 

And the man took this snaky, wavy thing, and he wrapped it around thepipe, and he drove it into the joint until it looked like a part ofthe pipe. 

Then he felt it all over carefully, and he stood up and looked at it. 

And he made up his mind that it was all right, and the other man beganto shovel dirt down into the trench, and they punched the dirt untilit was all hard under the pipe and at the sides. 

Then they went to the gutter and picked up another pipe. 

The foreman couldn't wait any longer. 

"I've got to go now, Davie. "

"Where have you got to go?" David asked. "Can I go with you?"

"I've got to go into the house. I can't take you in there yet. I'mafraid you'd get hurt. In a day or two you can go in. "

David nodded. He was thinking about those pipes. 

"Will the men keep on putting those pipes together until they come tothe house?" he asked. "And how will they get the pipe into the house?They'll have to put it through a window. "

"No, " the foreman answered, "they won't have to put it through awindow. They'll lay the pipes straight past the house, and they'llplug up the end until there are some more houses built on this road. 

"Then they'll fit a little pipe into the side of the big pipe and runit through a hole in the cellar wall. 

"The little pipe is not much bigger than that pipe that the faucet ison, over by the mortar box. What'll you do now, Davie?--play in thesand?"

David nodded again. "Good-bye, " he said. 

"Good-bye. " And the foreman went into the house. 

And David dug in the sand for a while, and then he looked for his cat, but he didn't see her; so he put his shovel and his hoe into the cart, and walked off, dragging the cart, with the shovel and the hoerattling in the bottom of it. 

And when he got to the pipes, the cat popped out of the end of one ofthem, and she ran ahead of David, with her bushy tail stickingstraight up in the air, and David walked along to his house. 

And that's all. 

VI

THE SHINGLE AND CLAPBOARD STORY

Once upon a time there was a little boy, and he was almost five yearsold, and his name was David. And there weren't any other children nearfor him to play with, so he used to play happily all by himself. 

He had his cat and his cart and his shovel and his hoe, and he alwayswore his overalls when he was playing. 

One day he wandered up to the corner of the road that he lived on. 

He wasn't allowed to go beyond that corner, and his mother didn't liketo have him go so far as the corner. 

But he was pretending, and he didn't know how far he had come. 

He played in the gravel of the gutter for a long time, and he wastalking nearly all the time. 

His cat was there, taking little runs away, with her bushy tailsticking straight up in the air. Then she would lie down on her backand play with the air, and then she always jumped up in a great hurryand ran back to David and rubbed against him. 

But David wasn't talking to his cat, and he wasn't talking to himself. 

He was talking to the pretend child who was his playmate and who hadcome there holding to the other handle of his cart and helping himdrag it. 

And he was so busy that he didn't notice the great wagon that was justabout to turn the corner. 

The driver called to him. 

"Hey, little boy! Don't get run over. "

David scrambled up on the sidewalk before he even looked, for heremembered to be careful. 

Then he looked, and he saw a big wagon that was drawn by two horses, and the wagon was loaded with short, shiny boards, tied together inbundles, and on top of the bundles of short, shiny boards were bundlesof shingles, a great many of them. 

David knew what shingles looked like when they came in bundles, but hewondered what the shiny, short boards were. 

But he didn't ask, because the horses were almost trotting, they werewalking so fast, and the driver seemed to be pretty busy. 

He supposed that the shingles and things were going to the new house, and he watched the wagon until it stopped there. 

Then he took up the handle of his cart, and he walked off with it asfast as he could walk, and then he began to run, and his shovel andhis hoe rattled so that you would have thought they would rattle out. 

The pretend child didn't go with David, for he had forgotten all abouther. 

Sometimes the child was a girl and sometimes it was a boy; but it wasa girl that morning. She was left in the gutter at the corner. 

And David didn't call his cat, and the cat stayed at the corner for awhile, and first she looked at the pretend little girl and then shelooked after David, and she didn't know which to go with. 

But at last she went running after David, and she caught up with him, and she ran on ahead, with her bushy tail sticking straight up in theair. 

When David got to the house, he found the wagon there, and the horseswere standing still, and the driver was throwing off the bundles ofshingles and another man was piling them up. 

They had got almost to the shiny, short boards. 

And the foreman was there, and he was putting something down with avery short pencil in a little old book. 

"Hello, " said David. "What are--"

But the foreman interrupted him. 

"Just wait a minute, Davie, until I get these checked up. "

So David waited a long time, but the wagon was unloaded at last, andthe little book put in the foreman's pocket. 

"Now, Davie, " the foreman said, "what was it that you were asking me?"

"I was asking what are these, " said David, putting his hand on abundle of the shiny boards. 

"Those are clapboards, Davie. "

The foreman stooped down and pointed to the house. 

"You see they have begun to put them on the outside of the walls ofthe house, but we had to have some more. You see that one edge of aclapboard is thin and the other edge is thick. "

He pulled one of the clapboards from a bundle and showed David. 

"The thick edges go over the thin edges, very much like shingles, andthey keep the rain and the wind out. You know about shingles?"

David nodded doubtfully. 

"I don't know whether I do or not. "

"Well, " the foreman said, "you ought to know about them. Those two menhave just begun to shingle the piazza roof. If you can wait a fewminutes, I'll take you up there. You aren't very busy this morning, are you?"

David smiled and shook his head. 

The foreman smiled too. 

"You wait right here, and I'll come and get you pretty soon. "

So David waited, and while he was waiting he watched the men puttingon clapboards. 

They had begun at the top and had got about halfway down that side. 

The side of the house was all covered with red stuff which lookedsomething like cloth and something like thick paper. It was paper, andit rippled and waved in the wind. 

The men were putting the clapboards on outside of that red paper. 

A man had a pile of clapboards beside him, and he took one up and helifted the edge of the one above, and he tucked the thin edge of theclapboard that he held in his hand under the edge that he had lifted;and he gave it little taps with his hammer until it was in the rightplace, and then he drove fine nails through the thick edge that he hadlifted, and through the thin edge of the clapboard beneath, and intothe wall of the house. 

Then he took up another clapboard and put it close up to the one thathe had just fastened, with its thin edge tucked under the thick edgeof the one above. 

The men put on clapboards very fast, and David was so interested inseeing them do it that he forgot that the foreman had not come backfor him. 

He had gone up nearer, so as to see just how the clapboards went on, when he heard the foreman's voice behind him. 

"Well, Davie, " said the foreman, "do you think you could put onclapboards as fast as that?"

David shook his head. 

"No, I couldn't. "

"Perhaps not. But come on, and we'll see what you can do withshingles. "

And the foreman took David's small hand in his big one, and they wentto where a ladder stood leaning against the edge of the piazza roof. 

A little way below the edge of the roof there was a rough sort of aplatform, made of two boards laid on some other boards that werenailed to the posts of the piazza and to long sticks which went up anddown and had their ends resting on the ground. 

This was what the carpenters called a staging or scaffolding, and whenthey got through their work, they would take it down. 

"Now, Davie, " said the foreman, "you take hold of the rungs and climbup. It's a pretty long stretch for little legs, but I'll hold you, andI won't let you fall. Don't look down. Look up. "

So David took hold of a rung and stretched his leg as high as it wouldgo, and he managed to get his foot on the first rung. 

Then he pulled himself up and reached up with one hand and took holdof the next rung; and then he put his other hand up, and he stretchedhis leg up as high as it would go, and he stepped up another rung. 

The rungs of a ladder are the little round sticks that go across thatyou put your feet on. 

David climbed very slowly, and he was rather scared at first; but hefelt the foreman's arm around him, and the foreman kept just behindhim, so that he stopped being scared. 

And he climbed a little faster, and he came to the platform. 

"Now, what shall I do?" he asked. 

"Now you hold your breath, " the foreman said, "and I'll put you overon to the staging. "

So Davie held his breath and one of the shingle men came and held himby the arms when the foreman had set him down upon the boards. 

Then the foreman stepped upon the staging and put his arm around Davidagain. 

"There!" said the foreman. "You've climbed your first ladder. Nowwe'll see about the shingling. "

There was a whole bundle of shingles on the staging, and anotherbundle that had been opened, and the shingle men had thrown a goodmany of these shingles up on the roof, so that they would be handy. 

And David saw that there were three rows of shingles on already, andthat a string was stretched tight across the last row; and the stringwas chalky-looking, and blue. 

"They're just going to mark another row, " the foreman said. "Youwatch. "

Then one of the shingle men lifted the stretched string between histhumb and his forefinger, and he let it go, and it snapped down hardupon the shingles. 

And they took the string away, and there was a blue line all along therow of shingles. 

"What is that?" David asked. 

"Chalk, Davie. They put chalk on the string by rubbing a lump of chalkon it. That line shows where the edge of the next row of shingles goes. 

"And they lay the shingles on so that each crack in the row beneath iscovered. The shingles are different widths, you see, and they canalways find one that fits up close to the next one and covers a crack. 

"If the cracks were not covered, the rain would get through and theroof would leak. 

"Now let's see if you can lay shingles. Pick out one that you thinkwill be right to cover the crack in the row beneath, and lay it downclose up to the last one and with its thick edge to that blue line. "

David was rather excited at the thought that he was to lay theshingles. 

"Shall I?" he asked. 

The foreman nodded, and he pointed to a shingle. 

"Try that one. "

So David took the one that the foreman pointed at, and he laid it downas well as he could, close up to the last one which the shingle manhad put on, and with its thick edge at the blue line. 

It took him some time, because he had never laid shingles before; butthe shingle man had only to change it a tiny bit, and then he drove intwo nails about halfway up toward the thin edge. 

And David took another shingle which the foreman pointed at, and hefitted it in its place a little more quickly, and the shingle mandidn't have to change that one at all, but drove the nails with hardlymore than two blows of his hammer. 

So David kept on laying shingles, and the shingle man nailed them. 

At first the foreman pointed to the right shingles; but, after a while, he didn't point, but David chose them himself. 

And they finished that row, and they began the next. 

"I'm afraid, Davie, " the foreman said, "that we'll have to go downnow. Aren't you ready to go?"

David was getting a little bit tired, for the shingle man nailed hisshingles before he could wink, and he felt hurried all the time. 

So he said that he was ready, and the foreman took him under his armand carried him down the ladder that way. 

"Good-bye, " he called to the shingle men as he was going down. 

"Good-bye, " the shingle men called to David. "We're much obliged. "

"You're welcome, " David called back to the shingle men. 

Then he was set down on the ground, and he was rather glad to feel theground again. 

And his cat came running, with her bushy tail straight up in the air, and David started off. 

"Where are you going so fast?" the foreman asked. 

David stopped for a moment. 

"I've got to go home now. "

"To tell your mother that you've been shingling?"

David nodded, and he smiled shyly. 

"Well, good-bye, Davie, " the foreman said. 

"Good-bye, " said David. 

And he turned again and ran to his cart, and he took up the handle. 

And he started walking as fast as he could, dragging his cart, withhis shovel and his hoe rattling in the bottom, and his cat ran onahead; and she ran right up the front steps and in at the door, andDavid came after. 

But he left his cart in the path. 

And that's all of the shingle story. 

VII

THE PLUMBER STORY

Once upon a time there was a little boy, and he was almost five yearsold, and his name was David. And there weren't any other children nearfor him to play with, so he used to play happily all by himself. 

He had his cat and his cart and his shovel and his hoe, and he alwayswore his overalls when he was playing. 

They were building a new house in the field next to David's house, andit was all done on the outside, but it wasn't painted. 

And the men were working inside, for David could hear the hammering, and sometimes he could hear them sawing. 

One morning, after breakfast, David went to his mother and said thatthe foreman wanted him to come to the new house that morning, for theplumbers would be there. 

He didn't know what plumbers were. 

"What are plumbers, mother?"

"They are men who mend the pipes, dear, " his mother answered. 

"What pipes?" he asked. "Are the pipes broken?"

His mother laughed. "Well, I suppose they put in the water pipes, andthe bathtubs and the basins and the hot-water boiler and all thosethings. "

David nodded, and let his mother kiss him, and then he went out. 

And his cat was there, waiting for him, and his cart was there, withhis shovel and his hoe in the bottom of it. And he stooped down andtook hold of the handle of his cart, and he trudged to the new house, dragging his cart. 

The mortar man had gone some time before, and there wasn't anysand-pile, but the foreman saw him coming. 

"Hello, Davie, " he called. 

"Hello, " David called back. 

"You're just in time to go into the house with me, " the foreman said. 

So David dropped the handle of his cart and the foreman took hold ofhis hand, and they went up the steps and into the house. 

The partition walls between the rooms weren't all done, and Davidcould see right through them in some places into the next room. 

And the foreman and David went through the place that would be thefront hall when it was done, with the front stairs going up out of it;and some carpenters were working there now and there was a great mess. 

"What are the carpenters doing?" David asked. 

"They're nailing on laths, Davie, " the foreman answered. "Laths, yousee, are the little thin sticks that go on the up-and-down sticks ofthe walls, and the plaster goes on them and squeezes between them. Then, when it hardens, the part that is between the laths holds therest of the plaster up and against the wall. "

David nodded, but they were in the back hall now, with the back stairsgoing up out of it, and he forgot the carpenters and the laths. 

Under the back stairs were some stairs that went down to the cellar, and the foreman started down. 

"Be careful of the steps, Davie, " said the foreman. "They have to havethese rough boards on them now, while the workmen are here, so thatthe real steps won't get all dirty and worn. When the men are almostthrough, about the last thing they do is to lay floors and put niceboards on the stairs. "

David couldn't see very well, but he could feel that the boards of thestairs were uneven and rough, and some of them were small; but he wascareful, and he went slowly, and at last he was on the cellar floor. 

Far off in the very end of the cellar he saw a lantern lighted, and aflickering light which moved about, high up. 

Then, as he got used to the darkness, he saw the legs of two men; andthey had great wrenches and were doing something to long pipes, andthey had a candle which they held close up to the pipes, so that theycould see. 

And the pipes went along close to the beams overhead, so that the menwere all the time bumping their heads and knocking their elbows on thebeams, and they didn't have room enough to work. 

That was the reason why David had seen only their legs when he firstcame down. 

It wasn't a very convenient way to work, but the men didn't seem tomind. Perhaps they were used to it. 

"Are those the pipes that the water goes through?" David asked. 

"Yes, Davie, " the foreman said. "It comes in through the wall there, close down to the floor, from that pipe that you saw the men laying inthe street. 

"Then it goes up and through these pipes to the back of the cellar, and then up again to the kitchen and the pantry and the bathrooms. 

"It isn't much fun being down here, is it?"

"No, " David said, "it isn't. "

The foreman laughed. 

"Well, you wait a half a jiffy and we'll go up. "

So David waited while the foreman took a paper out of his pocket. 

And first he looked at the paper and then he looked at the pipes, andthen he looked at the paper again. 

Then he folded the paper and put it into his pocket, and he tookDavid's hand and they went up the cellar stairs, and through a doorinto the kitchen. 

There David saw the legs of two other men who were lying down underthe sink. 

They had a stump of a candle, too, for David could see its flickeringlight. 

And there was a kind of a lamp out on the floor beyond, and it burnedwith a sputtering and a hissing and a roaring, and it threw a bigbluish kind of a flame straight out, like water out of a hose. 

David watched the men for nearly a minute without saying anything, buthe couldn't guess what they were up to. 

"What are they doing?" he asked at last. 

"They're putting in the waste pipe and the trap, " said the foreman;"but you don't know what that is, of course. They're putting in thepipe that the water runs through when it runs out of the sink. "

"Oh, I know, " David cried. "It's for the dirty water that the pots andpans have been washed in; the soapy water. "

"That's just right, Davie. "

"Well, " David said, "why do they have to be lying down to do it? Ishould think they'd rather do it standing up or sitting down. "

At that, one of the men poked his head out and smiled at David. 

"You got that just right, too, " he said; "but here's where it has togo, and there's no other way that I know of. "

"The pipe has to be under the sink, Davie, for the water to run intoit, " the foreman said. "Now come on, and we'll go upstairs again. "

So the foreman and David went up the back stairs very slowly andcarefully, for there were rough boards on those stairs, too; and theywent through a door and through the upstairs hall, and through anotherdoor into a small square room. 

The foreman said that that room would be the bathroom. No plaster wason the walls yet, but the laths were all on. And there wasn't anybathtub yet, nor any basin; only some pipes sticking up out of thefloor. 

And David saw the bodies and the legs of two more men. 

These men had their heads and shoulders through a great square hole inthe floor, and their bodies and their legs were lying on the floor andsticking out straight. 

David laughed. "Water-pipe men are funny men, " he said. 

One of the men lifted his head out of the hole in the floor and smiledat David, but he didn't say anything. 

"They're putting in the waste pipe and the trap, " the foreman said;"that is, the pipe that the water will run through when it runs out ofthe bathtub. A tub will be here Davie, after the floor is laid. "

David nodded. 

"Would you like to be a plumber, Davie?" the foreman asked, smiling. 

David shook his head. 

"I think I'd better go now, " he said. "My kitty won't know where I am. "

So the foreman laughed, and he tucked David under his arm and carriedhim downstairs and out of the front door, and he set him down on theground. 

"Good-bye, Davie, " said the foreman. 

"Good-bye, " said David. 

And he took hold of the handle of his cart, and walked home as fast ashe could, dragging his cart, and his shovel and his hoe rattled in thebottom of it. 

When he got home, there was his cat waiting for him. 

David dropped the handle of his cart, and ran around to the back ofthe house and got an old grocery box that he used to play with. 

He kept all his things at the back of the house: old broken groceryboxes and old tin cans and rows of bottles, some of them filled withwater and some filled with thin mud and some empty, and nails andpieces of iron and sticks; but not his toys. 

And David dragged the old grocery box around to the front, and put itopposite the end of a step. 

Not all of the boards which had been nailed on for a cover were takenoff, so that the inside of the box was hard to get at, and it wasrather dark. 

Then he picked up two short sticks and put them on the step. 

David hurried to do all these things, and when he had them done, hehurried into the house and into the dining-room, and he climbed up ina chair and took a short candle out of one of the candlesticks whichthey used on the table. 

Then he pushed the chair over near where the matches were, and heclimbed up again and got three matches. And then he hurried out again. 

He scratched one of the matches on the piazza floor and managed to getthe candle lighted with that first match. 

So he dropped the other two matches, he didn't know where, and hecarried his candle to the grocery box, very carefully, so that itshouldn't blow out, and he reached in and put it in a corner. 

Then he lay down on the step and put his head and shoulders and hisarms inside the box, and he took the two short sticks in his hands. 

David's mother had heard the chair scraping on the dining-room floor, when he pushed it over to get the matches, and she thought that, aslikely as not, that was David, and she thought that she had better seewhat he was doing. 

She didn't think there was any great hurry about it, and so she camedownstairs in a few minutes, and she went out upon the piazza. 

There she saw David's body and his fat little legs sticking outstraight on the step, but his head and his arms were in the box, soshe couldn't see them. 

[Illustration: PLAYING PLUMBER]

And there was a light flickering inside the box, and there was a noiseof scraping and knocking, once in a while. 

But she wasn't surprised. 

"What in the world are you doing, dear?" she asked. 

David drew his head out of the box so that he could see his mother andanswer her. His face was pretty red. 

"I'm a plumber, mother, " he said, "and I'm doing the work in thebathroom. Plumbers _always_ do it this way. "

David's mother laughed. 

"So they do, dear, pretty nearly, " she said. "Be very careful of thecandle, and don't burn yourself or set the box afire, and be sure toblow it out when you are through. "

And David nodded and put his head back in the box, and his mother wentin, smiling. 

And his cat came and stood on the cover boards that had been left on, and she put her head down and peered into the box, but she didn't getin. 

And that's all of the plumber story. 

VIII

THE PAINTER STORY

Once upon a time there was a little boy, and he was almost five yearsold, and his name was David. And there weren't any other children nearfor him to play with, so he used to play happily all by himself. 

He had his cat and his cart and his shovel and his hoe, and he alwayswore his overalls when he was playing. 

They were building a new house in the field next to David's house, andthe masons were through their work, and the bricklayers were through, and the water men were through, and the plumbers were through, and thegas men were through, and the plasterers were through, and thecarpenters were almost through, for they were laying nice clean boardson the floors, and they had the floors almost done. 

David had watched them do it, and had seen how they put one board downafter another, and gave the last board whacks with a hammer, to driveit close up against the next board, and nailed it through the edge, sothat the nails shouldn't show. 

But they always put a piece of a board against the floor board, andwhacked the hammer on that, because they wanted the floor to be allsmooth and shiny and not to show any marks of a hammer. 

And now the house had to be painted. 

So, one morning, a great big wagon came to the new house. 

And on the wagon were ladders, some of them very tall, and they stuckout far beyond the ends of the wagon; and there were great enormoushooks, and boards that were all painty; and a great many pots of paint, some dark green for the blinds, and some a lemon-yellow for thecorners of the house and what the painters call the trimmings. 

But most of the paint was white. 

There were two kinds of white paint, one kind for the outside of thehouse and another for the inside. 

And there were all the kinds of brushes that the painters would need, and there were great bundles of cloth, which the painters would spreadover the floors, so that the nice clean floors shouldn't get allspattered with paint; and there were some odds and ends besides. 

And the painters came, and they took the things all off the wagon. 

Of course, the carpenters had some ladders that would reach, but thosewere the carpenters' ladders, not the painters'; and the carpentershad some boards, but those were the carpenters' boards, not thepainters'. 

That is why the painters had brought boards and ladders. 

David had gone on the train with his father and his mother, thatmorning, but the painters didn't know about him, so they kept right onwith their work. 

The foreman was there, and he was sorry that David wasn't there to seewhat the painters were doing, but he knew that David would see thembefore they were through with their work. 

The wagon was unloaded, and some of the painters went inside the house, to paint the parts that had to be painted in there; and some of thepainters got ready to paint the outside of the house. 

And they took thick pieces of board, and bored a hole in the middle, and they nailed those pieces of board on the roof, near the edge. 

And they put the great enormous hooks up there, with the pointed endsin the holes in the boards, and the other ends hanging over the edgeof the roof, over the gutter and the eaves. 

The ends of the hooks which hung over had pulleys in them, and throughthe pulleys ran long ropes which hung down to the ground. 

And the painters fastened the end of one of the ropes to one end of aladder, and the end of another rope to the other end of the ladder. 

Then they put some of the painty boards along over the rungs, so thatthe men shouldn't fall through or drop their pots of paint through, and they had made a sort of a staging which could be highered orlowered by the ropes. 

And they tried the ropes, to see that it was all right, and twopainters got on it, with their pots of paint and their brushes andeverything they needed. 

And one man sat at each end, and they pulled on the ropes, and hoistedthe staging, with themselves sitting on it, up off the ground. 

And the staging, with the two men on it, and their pots of paint, wentslowly higher and higher, until it was as high as it could go, and themen could reach the highest board that they had to paint. 

Then they fastened the ropes carefully, and they stirred up the paint, and they took up the brushes and they dipped the brushes in the paint, and they knocked them gently against the side of the paint-pot, _plop_, _plop_, _plop_, and they began to move them quickly over the boards, _swish_, _swish_, _swish_, first one side of the brush, and then backagain on the other side. 

And the first thing you knew they had all those boards painted, andthey had to lower the staging so that they could reach the boardslower down. 

"Hello!" called a little clear voice, and the painters looked down. 

The foreman was standing there, watching the painters; and he looked, and there was David, all dressed in his go-to-town clothes. 

And the foreman looked again, and there was David's mother, standingby her gate and waiting for David. 

And she had on her go-to-town clothes, too. 

"Hello, Davie, " the foreman called. "You're all dressed up, aren'tyou? You'd better go and get into your overalls, quick, and then comeback. "

David's mother had heard what the foreman said, and she nodded andsmiled to thank him, because she would have to call very loud, indeed, to make him hear, and she didn't like to. 

And David nodded, and he ran back to his mother. 

"Mother, " he said, "the foreman said to get into my overalls. What didhe mean, mother? Does that mean to put them on?"

"Yes, dear, " his mother said, smiling. 

So David paid no attention to his cat, who was coming to meet him andto rub against him, but he hurried to change his clothes and to put onhis overalls. 

And when he had his clothes changed and his overalls on, he ran out, and there was his cat waiting for him. 

And he took up the handle of his cart, and he walked off as fast as hecould, dragging his cart, and his shovel and his hoe rattled in thebottom of it; and his cat ran on ahead, with her bushy tail stickingup in the air. 

I don't know why David took his cart that time, for there wasn't anymortar man, and there wasn't any sand-pile. He almost always took hiscart. 

When David got to the house, there was the foreman standing in almostthe same place, but the painters had lowered the staging some more. 

And David didn't say anything, but he dropped the handle of his cart, and he went to the foreman and reached up for the foreman's hand. 

And the foreman's big hand closed over David's little one, and theforeman smiled, but he didn't say anything, either. He waited forDavid to speak. 

David watched the painters for some time. 

"What color are they painting it?" he asked at last. "It looks likewhite on the brushes, but sort of watery when they put it on, just asmy paints look when I put a great deal of water with them. Have theygot a great deal of water with their paint?"

"Not water, Davie, " the foreman answered, "but oil. This is the firstcoat of paint, you see, put right on the bare wood, and the wood soaksthe oil out of the paint at a great rate. They won't put so much oilin the second and third coats. "

"Oh, " said David, "will they paint it three times?"

"Three times for new wood, " the foreman said. 

[Illustration: PAINTING]

He didn't say any more then, but he watched and so did David while thepainters dipped their brushes and patted them against the sides oftheir paint-pots and brushed them quickly back and forth over the newclapboards. 

"Come with me, Davie, " the foreman said at last, "and let's see if wecan't scare up something else that's interesting. "

And so David went with the foreman, and they went around by the cellardoor. 

And there they saw a great pile of shutters or blinds which were to goon the outside of all the windows of the house. 

These blinds were leaning, one against another, and they had alreadybeen painted a kind of bluish gray, and each one had whole rows oflittle slats that you could turn back and forth. 

And beyond the pile of bluish gray blinds was a smaller pile of darkgreen blinds, and the dark green blinds glistened with fresh paint, and they were leaning, one against another. 

And between the pile of bluish gray blinds and the pile of dark greenblinds were two painters, painting for dear life, and they werepainting the bluish gray blinds dark green. 

David watched them for a few minutes. It seemed to be a good deal oftrouble to get the slats well painted. 

"These, " said the foreman, putting his hand on the bluish gray blinds, "are just as they come from the mill--the factory where they are made. This first coat of paint is put on there. Then our painters paint themwhatever color is wanted. "

David nodded, but he didn't say anything, for he didn't understand whythe carpenters didn't make the blinds. 

Pretty soon he pulled at the foreman's hand. 

"I want to go back, " he said. 

So they went back to the painters who were painting the side of thehouse. 

They had lowered the staging so low that the foreman could reach it. 

"I'll tell you what, Davie, " the foreman said. "Do you suppose youcould paint a clapboard?"

"Oh, " cried David, "will they let me?"

"I guess so, " the foreman answered. "You ask them. "

David looked up at the painters, and the painters looked down at David, and they were smiling. 

David started to speak, but he couldn't ask what he wanted to. And thepainters saw what was the matter, and one of them spoke. 

"Want to paint a board?" he asked. "Well, come on up here. "

So the foreman put his hands under David's arms, and he lifted Davidright up, over the staging, and set him down with his feet hangingover. And the painter dipped his brush into the paint, and patted itgently against the side of the paint-pot, _plop_, _plop_, _plop_, andhe handed the brush to David. 

"Oh, " David said, "it's heavy!"

"So it is, " the painter said. "The paint is mostly lead, that's why. Now, you move the brush away from you as if you were sweeping thefloor or dusting the board. Then, when it has gone as far as you canreach, you bring it back on the other side. "

David tried, but he didn't do it very well and the paint squeezed outof the brush and ran down and dripped from the edge of the clapboard. 

"Not that way, " the painter said. "I'll show you. "

Then he took hold of David's wrist, but he left the brush in David'shand, and he moved it the way it ought to go, and he swept up all thelittle rivers of paint and all the little drips, and spread itsmoothly over the clapboard. 

"There!" said the painter. "Now, do you see?"

David nodded, and he tried again. 

This time he did better, but the paint was all gone from the brush, and he held it out to the painter for more. 

So the painter dipped it again, and David took it, and painted somemore. 

And each time he did better than he had done the last time, and hehitched along on the staging, and that clapboard was all paintedbefore he knew it. 

And David sighed and started to get up on his feet. 

But the other painter called to him. 

"Hey, David!" he called. "Aren't you going to do any painting for me?That isn't fair. You come over and do a board for me. "

David smiled with pleasure. "Yes, I will, " he said. 

So he crawled on his hands and knees along the staging, and theforeman walked along on the ground beside him. 

And he painted a clapboard for that other painter, but a great drop ofthe paint got on the leg of his overalls. 

"Oh, " he said, "I got some paint on my overalls. "

"Gracious!" said the painter. "That's nothing. Look at my overalls. "

The painter's overalls were made of strong white cloth, and they wereall splashed up with paint, all colors. But he had painted a greatdeal more than David had. 

So David finished the clapboard, and then he got up on his feet, andthe foreman took him and lifted him down to the ground. 

"Thank you, " said the painter. 

"Thank you, " said the other painter. 

"You're welcome, " David said. "Good-bye. "

"Good-bye, " said both the painters. 

And David began to run to his cart. 

"Good-bye, Davie, " the foreman said. 

David stopped a moment and looked around. 

"Good-bye, " he said. 

Then his cat came running to meet him, and he grabbed up the handle ofhis cart, and he kept on running, dragging his cart, and his shoveland his hoe rattled away like everything in the bottom of it. 

And when he got to his house, he didn't stop running, but just droppedthe handle of the cart, and he climbed up the steps as fast as hecould and ran into the house. 

"Mother, " he called, "I painted two boards and I got some paint on myoveralls. But you ought to see the painter's overalls. They're _awful_painty. "

And that's all. 

IX

THE TREE-MEN STORY

Once upon a time there was a little boy, and he was almost five yearsold, and his name was David. And there weren't any other children nearfor him to play with, so he used to play happily all by himself. 

He had his cat and his cart and his shovel and his hoe, and he alwayswore his overalls when he was playing. 

Behind David's house were some thin woods. And in those woods were oaktrees, several kinds, but he didn't know the difference between thekinds. 

And there were cedar trees and chestnut trees and birch trees of threekinds; and there were white pine trees and pitch pine trees, and thepitch pine trees were sticky all over. 

David knew the pitch pine trees, because he had got his clothes allcovered with their stickiness. 

And there were a few great sycamore trees, and some ash trees, andsome beech trees, and a lot of other kinds that I can't remember thenames of. 

All summer there were lots of birds in these woods and about the edgeof them; and in the winter, when all those summer birds had gone away, other birds came. 

And four blue jays stayed there all the year, and the crows stayed, ofcourse, but they didn't live in those woods especially. 

And there were chickadees and juncos, which are one kind of snowbird;and there were a lot of little birds which looked like sparrows, andthere were red-polled linnets, and occasionally a flock of cedar-birdswould cover the cedars like gray snowflakes, and once David's mothercalled him to come quick and see the pine grosbeaks. 

And when David came, he saw a great flock of birds which looked gray, but three of them had the most beautiful rose-colored feathers ontheir breasts and shoulders and heads, making them look as if they hadtied rose-colored aprons about their necks. David watched them untilthey flew away. 

All these birds were very busy feeding on the seeds of weeds or theberries of the trees, and some of them dug insects out of the bark. 

And there were gray squirrels which raced along the branches of thetrees, and jumped from one branch to another, and poked about on theground and opened the chestnut-burs which had just fallen from thetrees, and ate the chestnuts, or scampered over the roof just aboveDavid's head, and made a great racket. 

They were great fat fellows with warm, thick fur, not much like thesquirrels on Boston Common, but they got almost as tame with David, although he never could get quite near enough to one to pat it. Thatwas better, for the squirrel might have bitten David. 

David used to try to get near them, but he always told his cat to stayat home when he was going after them, for the squirrels were afraid ofhis cat. 

One morning in the fall David had gone after the squirrels. There werea great many squirrels about, for the chestnuts had begun to fall, andthe squirrels were very busy. 

And David had got farther and farther from his house, but he was wherehe could see the road. 

And he heard the rattle of a wagon, and he looked and saw a veryspick-and-span new wagon, painted red, with yellow and black stripeson it, and the wheels were flashing in the sun as they turned. 

On the wagon were ladders and long slender poles, and four men wereriding on it. 

The wagon stopped, and the men got off. One of the men took a halterout of the wagon and tied the horse to a tree, while the others tookoff the ladders. 

Then each man took one of the long, slender poles, and a big can and alittle can. And they took the ladders on their shoulders and held themwith one hand, and the poles in the other hand, and the handles of thecans in that other hand, too, and they began to walk right to whereDavid was. 

[Illustration: THE TREE-MEN]

And all the squirrels heard them coming, and they stopped eatingchestnuts, and each squirrel scurried to a tree, with his chestnut inhis mouth, and he scrambled up the tree, on the opposite side of thetrunk from the men, so that the men couldn't see him. 

They scrambled up the trunks very fast, until they came to a branch;and each squirrel sat on his branch, next to the trunk, and made asort of a scolding, barking noise, and every time he made the noisehis tail gave a queer little jerk. 

David was watching them, and he heard their noises, and he couldn'thelp laughing to see their tails jerk. 

And then the men were there, and they saw David laughing. 

"Hello, " said one of the men. "What's so funny?"

"I was laughing at the squirrels, " David said; "they make their tailsgo. "

"Yes, " said the man, "I hear them, and I see some of them. How they doscold! But we wouldn't hurt them. "

He put his cans down, and he leaned his pole against a tree, and hestood the ladder against the tree. 

David looked in the cans. There wasn't anything in the little can, butthe big can was full of something that was about as thick as molassesand almost as black as ink, only it was brownish black. 

"What is it?" he asked. "Is it molasses? It smells horrid. "

The man laughed. 

"No, " he answered, "it isn't molasses or anything good to eat. It'screosote. That's a poisonous kind of stuff. We put it on these things. "

He pointed to a place on a tree. It looked as if somebody had daubeddirt on the trunk, and the place was about the size of David's thumb, and it was rounded out a little at the middle. 

"I guess you never noticed those places, " the man said. "Inside ofthat are the eggs of a moth that eats things up and does a great dealof harm. Those eggs would hatch when it gets warm enough, and littleworms would come out, and they would begin to eat, and the worms wouldchange into moths later on, and the moths would lay more eggs. We aretrying to get rid of them, so we paint some creosote on every bunch ofeggs we can find, and that kills them. 

"If you look carefully you can see a good many places just like this, all over the trunks of the trees and on the under sides of branches. Some trees have a good many on them, and some don't have any. There'sa lot on this tree. "

David looked and saw the little mud spots farther up the trunk, andthen he looked higher and he saw some of the spots on the under sidesof the branches, as the man had said. 

He nodded. 

"You paint some now, " he said, going nearer, "with that stuff. "

The man laughed. 

"You want to see me do it right off, do you?" he asked. 

So he took a stubby paint brush from his belt, and he dipped it intothe big can, and he wiped it over as many of the spots as he couldreach. The spots looked as if they had been painted with tar. 

"Now, " he said, "I am going to walk right up that tree. "

He pointed to his legs, and David saw that a long iron thing wasstrapped to each leg, and the iron thing had a sharp point which stuckdown about as far as the soles of his shoes. 

"Those are climbers, or spurs. We can walk right up any tree thatisn't too large around, and you see that those points are bent in alittle so that they will stick into the trunk of the tree on eachside. You watch. "

So the man poured some of the stuff from the big can into the littlecan, and he hung the little can from his belt, and he stuck the stubbypaint brush in his belt. 

Then he went to the tree, and he put his hands half-around the trunk, and he lifted up one foot and jabbed it down, so that he jabbed thespur into the tree. Then he lifted the other foot and jabbed that spurin; and he walked right up the tree. 

And when he had got to other spots that had been too high for him toreach, he stopped and held on with one hand, while he took the paintbrush and painted those egg bunches with stuff from the little can. 

But there were some egg bunches left on branches that were too littlefor the man to go on. 

So the man put one leg over a branch, and he took his pole, which wasleaning against a twig just beside him, and he fixed the paint brushin the end of the pole, in a place that was meant for it, and hereached out with the pole and painted all those egg bunches on thesmall branches. 

Then he put the pole back, leaning against the twig, and he cameslowly down to the ground. 

"There!" he said. "Did you see how I did it? Do you think that youcould paint some?"

David's eyes glistened. 

"Oh, could I? But I couldn't walk up the tree. "

The man smiled. 

"I'm afraid you couldn't, but you can paint as far as you can reachwith the pole. "

The other men were busy on trees near, and they watched while Davidpainted the mud spots on another tree which the man found for him. 

He wasn't very tall and there were only two spots which he could reachwhile he stood on the ground. 

But the man held him up in his arms as high as he could, and when hehad painted all those spots, the man fixed the paint brush in the endof the pole. 

It was pretty heavy for such a little boy to manage, and the end wouldwave around so that he couldn't make the brush paint where he wantedit to. 

So the man helped David to hold the pole steady and paint as far as itcould reach. 

Just then David heard his mother calling him. 

"I've got to go now, " he said to the man. "I think my mother wants me. "

"Well, good-bye, " the man said. "We're much obliged. "

"You're welcome, " David said. "Good-bye. "

And he turned around and went galloping through the woods to his house. 

And his cat met him, and then his mother met him. 

"Where were you, dear?" his mother asked. 

"I was helping the tree-men paint egg-spots. How big are moth-eggs, mother?"

But his mother didn't know. 

And that's all. 

X

THE CLEARING-UP STORY

Once upon a time there was a little boy, and he was almost five yearsold, and his name was David. And there weren't any other children nearfor him to play with, so he used to play happily all by himself. 

He had his cat and his cart and his shovel and his hoe, and he alwayswore his overalls when he was playing. 

They had been building a new house in the field next to David's house, and it was all done. Even the last coat of paint was dry. 

David knew, because he had tried it with his finger to see. He hadtried it three times, and the first two times it wasn't dry, but thelast time it was. 

And the carpenters had gone, and the painters had gone, but they hadleft great messes and piles of stuff that had been swept out of thehouse, and heaps of the sawed-off ends of boards, and some good boards, and piles of broken laths and plaster and the little pieces that theyhad sawed off the laths, and some broken saw-horses, and a lot ofother rubbish. 

One morning David heard the rattle of a wagon; and he looked and saw awagon stop at the new house, and he saw the nice foreman that he knew, and there were two other men. 

And the men jumped out, and the foreman jumped out, and David hurriedto go over there. He hurried so fast that he forgot to take his cart, and he forgot to call his cat, but his cat came just the same, and sheran on ahead, with her bushy tail sticking straight up in the air. 

And when the foreman saw the cat, he knew that David couldn't be faroff, and he looked up and he saw him. 

"Hello, Davie, " he said. "I'm glad to see you. "

"Hello, " David said. "What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to sort of clear up the place, Davie. Don't you think itneeds it? And I'm going to have all this rubbish carried off or burnedup. "

David nodded, but he didn't say anything; and he reached up, and heput his little hand into the foreman's big one. 

Then the two men who had come with the foreman began to pick out theboards that were good. 

There were some great heavy planks which were covered with plaster andspattered with paint, but they were good planks and could be usedagain. 

The men took these planks, one man at each end, and they brought themto the wagon and they put them in. 

When they had brought all the planks, they separated the long boardsfrom the little short ends of boards, and they brought the long boardsto the wagon and they put them on top of the planks. 

Then they piled the little short ends of boards near the cellar door. It was a great pile of wood that the people who moved into the housecould have to burn. 

Then they found a couple of saw-horses that were pretty good, and theyput them on top of the boards in the wagon, and the wagon was loadedwith as much as one horse ought to pull. 

So the foreman told one of them to go along with that load, and tohurry back, and he would stay there and help the other man do a littleclearing up. 

And the man climbed into the seat, and drove off. 

"Now, Davie, " the foreman said, "I've got to help my man, and I can'tstay here with you and do nothing, although I should like to. "

"What are you going to do?" David asked. 

"Oh, we're going to put all the rubbish that will burn over there onthe bare spot, where it can't set anything afire. All the stuff thatwe can't burn we'll rake up into piles, and when the wagon comes back, we'll take it away. And there's a little gravel over there that ishardly worth taking, and we'll leave it for the graders to use. "

"What are the graders?" asked David. "What do they do?"

"Oh, the graders are sort of rough gardeners. They spread the dirtaround where it is wanted, and they make it the right height all alongthe foundation, and smooth it off, and they make the walks up to thefront door and the back door, and they spread gravel on the walks. Sometimes they make terraces or banks, but they won't do that here. Itwill be a nice slope from the house down to the field, all around. "

David looked at the house, which stood high on its foundation, and hesaw that there was a great hole between the ground and the frontsteps. He supposed that the graders would fill up that hole. 

He nodded. 

"I'll get my cart, " he said, "and then I'll help you. "

So he ran all the way home, and his cat saw him running and she rantoo, faster than David ran, and she ran right up on to the piazza. 

But David didn't go there. He took up the handle of his cart, and heran back again. 

And his cat saw that she had made a mistake, and she ran faster thanever; and she passed David, and she was running so fast that her bushytail didn't stick up in the air at all, but straight out behind. 

And David came where the foreman was standing, waiting for him, andthe foreman showed him where he wanted the rubbish piled to be burned, far from the house. 

And the foreman and David worked together, and they piled the rubbishinto the cart; and when it was full, they dragged the cart over to theplace, and they emptied the rubbish out of it. 

Then the foreman took a match out of his pocket, and he scratched thematch on his trousers-leg, and he lighted the pile of rubbish. 

And a little thin column of smoke went up, and then it blazed, andthen it crackled, and the foreman and David went back for another load. 

The foreman and David worked for a long time, getting loads of rubbish, and dragging them over to the fire. 

[Illustration: BURNING RUBBISH]

Then the foreman would take up the cart, all filled with little oddsand ends of sticks and with shavings and with twigs and the ends oflaths, and he would turn the cart upside down over the fire, and emptyall that stuff out. 

Then David would drag the cart back. 

The other man was working with a rake all this long time, raking overthe places where the foreman and David had been, and he raked thepieces of plaster and the other stuff that wouldn't burn into littleheaps. 

Suddenly they heard the rattle of the wagon, and they all looked up. And the wagon stopped, and the man who had been driving jumped off, and the horse just stood where he had stopped, and he breathed hardand looked after the man, and he pricked his ears forward. 

Then the foreman told the men to get all that stuff into the wagon, and he waved his hand toward the heaps of rubbish that had been rakedup. 

So the man held out his hand toward the horse, and he whistled, andthe horse came, and he followed the men to the farthest pile ofrubbish. 

And the men took shovels and shoveled the stuff into the wagon in notime. Then they walked along to the next heap, and the horse cameafter. 

And they shoveled that stuff into the wagon, and they walked along tothe next heap, and the horse came after. 

And so they did until they had shoveled in the last heap; and thehorse walked into the road, dragging the wagon after him, and there hestopped. 

The foreman and David had picked up all the little odds and ends ofthings which would burn, and had put them on the fire. 

The fire had been blazing up high, but now it wasn't blazing so high, and it was almost burned out. 

And the two men stood still, leaning on their shovels, and looked allabout. 

And the foreman stood still, and he looked all about. 

And David stood still, leaning on the handle of his cart, and helooked all about, because he saw the others looking; but he didn't seeanything in particular. 

The foreman turned to David and sighed. 

"Well, Davie, " he said, "I guess that'll be about all. "

David nodded and looked over to the fire, which was not much more thana heap of red coals and white ashes. 

The foreman saw where he was looking. 

"The fire'll be all right, " he said. "It's about out. Now I'll takejust one more look around. "

So the foreman walked all around the house, slowly, and he lookedcarefully to make sure that he had not forgotten anything. 

And he looked at the cellar door and at the places where the heaps ofrubbish had been, and all around the foundations of the house, and atthe great hole under the front steps where the steps didn't come downto the ground, and at the fire last of all. 

The fire had all burned out to white ashes, and every swirl of thewind made the ashes fly about. 

Then the foreman came where David was. 

"Now we're going, Davie, " he said. "We'll come back some day to buildanother house next to this one. Will you help us then?"

"Yes, " said David, "I'll help you as much as I can. When are you goingto build it?"

"Oh, I don't know, " the foreman said, "but I should think it would bebefore long. Somebody's going to move into this house in a few days. We're much obliged to you for helping us build this. "

"You're welcome, " said David. 

Then the foreman shook David's hand. 

"Good-bye, Davie, " he said. "Don't forget us. "

"Good-bye, " said David. 

Then the foreman climbed up to the seat of the wagon. The other menwere up there already. 

And all the men waved their hands, and the horse started. 

David stood and watched them until they turned the corner. 

Then he picked up his shovel and his hoe and threw them into his cart, and began to walk home, dragging his cart, with his shovel and his hoerattling in the bottom of it. 

And his cat came running, and she ran ahead, with her bushy tailsticking straight up in the air. 

And that's all of this story. 

XI

THE SETTING-OUT STORY

Once upon a time there was a little boy, and he was almost five yearsold, and his name was David. And there weren't any other children nearfor him to play with, so he used to play happily all by himself. 

He had his cat and his cart and his shovel and his hoe, and he alwayswore his overalls when he was playing. 

One morning he was playing in the thin woods behind his house. 

He had his cart and his shovel and his hoe, and he was walking slowlyalong, kicking the dead leaves and looking up at the leaves on thetrees. 

Not nearly all the leaves had fallen from the trees yet, but thoseleaves that were still on the trees had turned to all kinds of prettycolors: red and yellow and a great many pretty browns which lookedalive. And some leaves were red and yellow together, and some werestill green with red and yellow spots on them, and some leaves had notchanged their color at all, but were green all over. 

And the squirrels were very busy hunting chestnuts and they didn't paymuch attention to David. 

Suddenly there was a great scurrying, and every squirrel went racingup the nearest tree, and David's cat came running, with her bushy tailsticking straight up in the air, and she ran a little way ahead ofDavid, and she flopped over on her back in a little pile of leaves, and she began playing with the leaves. 

David laughed at her. "Funny kitty!" he said. 

Then he turned and went on talking, but he wasn't talking to his catand he wasn't talking to himself. 

His pretend playmate had come, and it was the boy, this time, and hehad brought the cat. 

So David and that pretend little boy played together for a long time. 

Sometimes they dragged the cart together, and sometimes they stoppedand hunted for chestnuts, and they put into the cart the chestnutsthat they found. 

And after a while they came into that part of the woods which wasbehind the new house. 

And David heard some men talking together up at the new house, and helooked and saw them squatting down beside the house, and two of themen had shovels. 

So David and the pretend little boy hurried to go to the new house, tosee what the men were doing, and they dragged the cart, and the shoveland the hoe and the chestnuts all rattled about together in the bottomof it; and the cat went running on ahead. 

But, when David got there, the pretend little boy had gone, for Davidhad forgotten about him. 

And David stopped a little way from the men, and looked about. 

The grading men must have got their work all finished, for the groundall about didn't look at all as it had when the foreman and David hadleft it. 

There weren't any signs of the rubbish, and the dirt was up higher onthe foundation in a nice straight line, and it sloped down to thefield all around, and it had been made all smooth. 

David wondered about the great hole that was under the front steps, and he went around there and looked, and the hole wasn't there anymore, but the ground came up to the steps, and a man was raking gravelsmooth, to make a front walk like the one that went into David's house. 

David didn't say anything, and the man didn't say anything either, butkept on raking. 

So David went back to the place where the men were, with the shovels. 

Those men were digging a round hole in the ground, about big enoughfor David to sit in and stretch his legs out straight. 

And when they had the hole dug, another man came, carrying a littletree. 

There were a whole pile of little trees out near the road, and theyall had their roots tied up in bagging, or a kind of coarse cloth. 

The tree which the man was carrying was a little Christmas tree. Hehad taken the cloth off of the roots, and he was cutting off, with hisknife, some of the ends of roots. 

Then he put it in the hole, carefully, and the men spread the rootsout all around in the bottom of the hole, and they sifted somedark-colored dirt all about them, and they worked it in between thefine roots with their fingers, and they pressed it down hard. 

The man who had put the tree in was holding on to it all the time, sothat it should grow up straight. 

And when the roots were all right and the dirt was pressed down hard, he let go of the tree and took up the end of a hose that was lying onthe ground, right behind him. 

David hadn't noticed the hose before. It came from a shiny hose-faucet, and the hose-faucet stuck out of the house just above the foundation, halfway along the side. 

The man let water run from the hose into the dirt that had just beenput around the roots of the tree, and he let it run for a long time. 

And when the top of the hole was just a puddle of mud, he stopped thewater and dropped the hose, and the men scattered a littledark-colored dirt that was dry over the top of it. 

That dark-colored dirt is called loam, and it is the best kind of dirtto make things grow. 

David saw that from the house down to where the path would be to theback door was already covered with the same dark-colored dirt. 

The other side of the path was nice and smooth, but it looked sort ofraw and the dirt was a yellow color. 

Just beside the road was a great pile of dark-colored dirt, and therewas a two-wheeled cart backed up to the pile, and a man was shovelingthe dirt into the cart. 

When the cart was filled, the man tossed his shovel on top of the dirtand started walking along. 

"Come along, Jack, " he said. 

The horse had had his ears pricked forward, and when the man said that, he started and followed the man to the end of the yellow dirt. 

There he stopped, and the man took his shovel off the cart and threwit on the ground. And he took the backboard out of the cart, and heput his knee on the cart, and the top tipped back and slid all thatdirt out in a heap on the ground. 

Then the horse walked along two steps, and the man took his shovel andscraped out what was left in the cart, and he tipped the top of thecart back again and he put the backboard in. 

And he got up into the cart, and the horse turned around and walkedback to the pile to get another load. 

David wanted to ask somebody some questions about the dirt, but hedidn't know any of the men, and they all seemed to be very busy. 

So he just watched; and he saw another man come, and he had a shovel, and he spread around the dirt in the heap that the cart had justdumped until it was pretty even and smooth. 

And the horse came, bringing another load, and that was dumped, andthe man spread that around with his shovel. 

David went nearer, and the man saw him. 

"Are you going to plant some little trees?" David asked. 

"We're going to sow grass seed here, " the man answered, "when this isall covered with loam. "

Then another load of loam came, and he was busy with his shovel, andDavid went back to watch the other men plant trees. 

They were planting more little Christmas trees near that first one, five trees in a kind of a clump, and David watched them dig the holesand put the trees in, and spread the roots about, and put dirt on them, and stamp the dirt down hard, and put the water in. 

And when the Christmas trees were all planted, they put another kindat the back corner of the house. 

Then they went to the front corner of the house, and one of them saidthat there was the place for the lilac bushes. 

And he got the lilac bushes and cut off a part of the roots while theother men were digging the holes, and they planted the lilac bushes inthe holes, but they didn't do it so carefully as they had with theother kinds of trees. 

And when they had the holes filled up and the water turned off, andthe planting of lilac bushes all finished, they stopped and leaned ontheir shovels and looked around, to see what else they had to do. 

The loam was all over the yellow dirt, and the last load was justbeing spread around. 

So some of the men went to get the grass seed. That grass seed was ingreen bags. 

And they took up bags of grass seed and began walking slowly alongover the ground, and they took up handfuls of the grass seed andscattered it in the air so that it fell evenly over the ground. 

And they sowed the seed all among the trees they had just planted, andall over the smooth dirt, and wherever they wanted the grass to grow;but they didn't sow it in the paths. 

Then two other men came, and they were dragging a great heavy stoneroller behind them. 

It was so heavy that the two men had to walk very slowly, eachdragging it by one handle. 

And they went to and fro over the ground where the grass seed had beensown, and they rolled it down smooth and hard and shiny. 

Before the roller men had got through, the others had gone and put ontheir coats and gathered up their tools; and David knew that they werethrough their work. 

So he went where he had left his cart, and he looked for the pretendlittle boy, but he had gone away, and David couldn't find him. And helooked for his cat, and he couldn't see her either. 

So he took up the handle of his cart, and he walked along to his house, dragging his cart, with his shovel and his hoe and the chestnuts allrattling together in the bottom of it. 

And that's all. 

XII

THE POLE-MEN STORY

Once upon a time there was a little boy, and he was almost five yearsold, and his name was David. And there weren't any other children nearfor him to play with, so he used to play happily all by himself. 

He had his cat and his cart and his shovel and his hoe, and he alwayswore his overalls when he was playing. 

One morning he had just started to wander along the road toward thecorner of the next street. 

He wasn't allowed to go beyond that corner, but he could look and seewhat was coming, and perhaps he could see the postman and the blackdog. 

His cat was walking along beside him, looking up into his face, and hewas dragging his cart, with his shovel and his hoe rattling in thebottom of it, for he might want to play in the sand of the gutter. 

But before he got more than halfway to the corner, he heard a greatrattling and shouting, and two horses came around the corner. 

They made a very wide turn, because they were dragging a wagon, andbehind that came two great logs which looked like trees, except thatthey were all smoothed off. 

And David wondered where the other ends of the logs were, for hecouldn't see anything but logs coming around the corner. 

Then came a pair of strong wheels that the logs rested upon, andpresently there were the other ends of the logs, and David knew thatthe logs were either telephone poles or electric light poles, for hehad seen a great many of both kinds. 

There was a man driving, and two other men, and they had some othersmaller poles and some shovels in the wagon. 

David stopped short, and his cat stopped, and they watched the wagon, with the poles behind it, go slowly down the road until it had got alittle way beyond his house. 

Then it stopped, and the men jumped out, and they began to look up inthe air. 

David wondered why they were doing that. He wondered so much that hewalked along, with his cat walking beside him and his cart comingafter, to ask the men. 

But before he got near enough to them to ask, they had stopped lookingup in the air, and they talked to each other, and David knew by whatthey said that they had been looking to see where the telephone lineto his house stopped. 

Then they started the horses, and the men walked beside them, and theywalked about as far as a big boy could throw a stone, and there theystopped. 

And the men undid the ropes from the long logs, and they rolled one ofthem to one side and tipped it so that its big end was on the ground, and they tied the ropes on to the other log again. 

Then they got two of the smaller poles from the wagon, and they heldup the small end of the log with the small poles; and the wagonstarted and the wheels went out from under the log and left it. 

Then the men took away the small poles and the log fell upon theground, and it made a big booming noise as it fell. 

The other log was unloaded in the same way not far from the corner ofthe new house, and they led the horses to a tree and tied them; andthey took the shovels and all the little poles and the other thingsout of the wagon. 

The shovels were strange-looking things, with long, straight handlesand queer blades, more like long mustard-spoons than shovels; and thelittle poles had sharp spikes in the ends, and some of the poles werenot much longer than clothes-poles, and some were a great deal longer;and there were two sharp-pointed iron bars. 

The men took all their things to the place where the first pole lay onthe ground, and two of them took bars and the other took one of theshovels. 

And the men with the bars stuck them into the ground and loosened thedirt, and the other man scooped out the dirt with his bigmustard-spoon. Then some more dirt was loosened and that was scoopedout with the shovel. 

The hole that they were digging was not much bigger around than theend of the pole which would go into it. 

The hole kept getting deeper, so that a common shovel wouldn't havegot up any dirt at all; but the man with the mustard-spoon shovel justgave it a little twist, and lifted it out with dirt in it. 

Pretty soon they had the hole dug deep enough. 

It was so deep that, if a man could have stood on the bottom of it, hecould have just seen out, if he stood on his tiptoes. 

But only a slim man could have got into the hole. A fat man would havestuck fast as soon as his legs were in. 

Then the men put down their bars and the shovel, and got the littlepoles, and went where the long log lay. 

And they rolled it over with bars which were something like tongs, except that they had only one handle; and they rolled it until the bigend of the log was just over the hole. 

Then they took the shortest small poles with spikes in the ends, andthey put them where they could reach them quickly. 

And they all took hold of the end of the log and lifted it as high asthey could reach; and one of the men reached out quickly for his spikepole, while the other two men held the log, and he jabbed the spikehard into the log and held it while another man got his spike pole andjabbed the spike hard into the log. 

Then the third man jabbed the spike of his pole in, and they alllifted together, and the butt end of the log slipped a little way intothe hole. 

It couldn't go all the way to the bottom, because the big pole wasn'tup far enough yet, and the butt end struck the side of the hole. 

Then they got longer spike poles, one man at a time, and they liftedagain, and the big pole slipped a little farther down into the hole. 

And one of the men jabbed his spike pole in at another place, and thenthe other men did, and they lifted again, and the big pole went_thump!_ on the bottom of the hole. 

And the men left their spike poles sticking in, all around, and jammedthe other ends into the ground to hold the big pole up straight whilethey filled in the dirt around it. 

David had been watching the men all the time, but he was careful notto get near, because he had seen how the big pole bounced around whenit was unloaded. 

His cat was not so careful, and she was almost hit by one of the spikepoles when the man threw it down, and she scampered home as fast asshe could go. 

But David didn't pay any attention to her, and the men were too busyto notice. 

When the dirt was pounded hard around the pole, the men took up theirthings, and walked along to the place where they had unloaded theother pole; and David walked along, too, dragging his cart. 

He would have liked to take some of the things in his cart, but theywere all too big, for he asked one of the men. 

And the man looked at his cart, and he looked at David, and he laughedand shook his head. 

"But you be very careful not to get too near, " he said. "If the poleshould get away from us, there's no knowing what it would do. "

"Yes, " said David. "I was careful. "

"So you were, " the man said. "You do the same way while we set thispole. "

So the men set the other pole, and David stood a long way off. 

He stood so far off that he couldn't see very well, and when the menhad the pole straight up in the air, he wandered over to the wagon andtried to see if anything else was in it. 

The backboard was up and he couldn't see inside at all, but he saw thewheels that the poles had come on, and he thought he would try to shinup on them and look in. 

So he put his arms around the axle and tried to get one leg over; butas soon as he took his foot off the ground, the wheels began to go. Heput his foot down again and made the wheels go faster, hanging on tothe axle with his arms and paddling on the ground with his feet, forthe ground sloped a little. 

And when the wheels had rolled gently down to the lowest part of theroad, they stopped and David couldn't make them go any more, even whenhe pushed as hard as he could. 

But the men had got through setting the pole, and they were going overto the wagon when David rolled down the road and couldn't get back. 

And they all went where he was, and one of them pushed on the axle, and David pushed, and the wheels rolled back again to the wagon. 

[Illustration: THE WHEELS BEGAN TO GO]

And the men let down the backboard, and they put in all their things:all their poles and the bars and the shovel. 

Then they took out a big coil of something that looked like rubbertubing which was wound on a great wooden spool. 

The spool was as big around as David's body, and the stuff that lookedlike rubber tubing looked all twisty, as if there were two piecestwisted together. 

David wanted very much to know what it was. He didn't like to ask, butthe man who had it saw that he was looking at it very hard. 

"Do you know what that is?" he asked, smiling at David. 

David shook his head. 

"Is it a little hose?"

"No, it's wire, and the wire is covered with that black rubbery stuff. See, here are the ends. "

He found the ends of the wire and showed them to David. There were twobright ends of copper wire, and they peeped out of the black rubbercovering. 

"There are two of them, you see, and they are twisted together. "

David nodded, but he didn't say anything. 

The other men were buckling on to their legs some iron spurs, orclimbers, just like those the tree men had. 

And when they had their climbers buckled on, they took a little coilof rope and some queer little wooden things and a big hammer, and theywent to the nearest pole. 

One of the men walked right up this pole, and when he got nearly tothe top, he put a big strap around his waist and around the pole, andbuckled it, so that it held him to the pole, not tight up against it, but loosely so that he could use his hands. 

Then he took one of the wooden things that was sticking out of hispocket, and he took his hammer from his belt, and he nailed the woodenthing to the pole. And the coil of rope was hanging at his belt; andhe took it off, and he undid it, and let one end drop down to theground. 

The man who was standing there tied on a big lump of glass, and theman on the pole pulled it up, and untied it, and screwed it on the topof the wooden pin that he had just nailed on. Then he dropped his ropeand came down the pole. 

And he walked along until he came to the pole in front of David'shouse, and he walked right up that pole. 

[Illustration: HE WALKED RIGHT UP THAT POLE]

Then he let down one end of his rope, and the man on the ground tiedit to the end of the twisted wires, and the man on the pole pulledthem up, and the spool turned over and the wires unwound as the endswent up the pole. 

David couldn't see what the man on the pole did with the ends of thewires, but he fastened them somehow to the wires that were therealready, and then he came down. 

And the man on the ground put a short stick through the hole in themiddle of the spool, and he took hold of one end of the stick and theman who had just come down from the pole took hold of the other end, and they walked along, and the hanging wire began to get tight, andthe spool began to turn around as they walked, and the wire lay on theground behind them. 

And they walked past the two new poles and to the corner of the newhouse; and they put the spool down on the ground. 

Almost all the wire had unwound from the spool. 

The other man had been doing what had to be done at the second pole:nailing on the wooden thing and putting the glass on. 

Then he had taken a ladder to the corner of the house, and he hadfastened some things for the wire to go through, up the corner of thehouse to the eaves. 

Then he came down the ladder, and all the men walked back together. 

The first man walked up his pole again and waited. 

And the second man walked up his pole, and let down the end of therope. 

And the man on the ground tied it to the wire, and the man on the polepulled it up, and the wire hung in the air between him and David'shouse. 

Then the man on the ground walked along to the next pole, and he tiedthe man's rope to the wire and _he_ pulled it up. 

And the man on the ground walked along to the corner of the new house, and he took hold of the wire there, and went up the ladder with it, and the wire was hanging in the air all the way from the new house toDavid's house, but it rested on the two poles between. 

Then the men all pulled the wire as tight as it ought to be, and theyfastened it to the poles and to the house, just the way it belonged, and they made it go down the corner of the house, and they cut it offat the bottom and left the ends sticking out. 

Some other men would come and put wires inside the house, and thoseother men would put the telephone in so that people could talk witheach other when they were far apart. 

Then the pole men came down from their poles and the ladder, and theygathered up all their things and put them into the wagon. 

And they took off their climbers and put them into the wagon, and theytied the wheels on behind, so that they would drag after the wagon. 

And they untied the horses and they all got in, and they drove away, with all their six wheels rattling, and they left David looking afterthem. 

But before they had got far one of the men turned and saw Davidlooking after them, and he saw his cat; and he waved his hand to David, and he waved it to his cat. 

Of course, the cat couldn't wave her hand, but David could, and he did, and then the wagon turned the corner, and the wheels rattled after. 

And David looked to see where his cart was, for he had forgotten it;and he went to the cart, and took up the handle and walked slowly home. 

And that's all. 

XIII

THE MOVING-MEN STORY

Once upon a time there was a little boy, and he was almost five yearsold, and his name was David. And there weren't any other children nearfor him to play with, so he used to play happily all by himself. 

He had his cat and his cart and his shovel and his hoe, and he alwayswore his overalls when he was playing. 

They had been building a new house in the field next to David's house, and it was all done, and all ready to be lived in. 

It had electric lights and a range which would burn either coal or gas;and in cold weather they would burn coal in the range, and in warmweather they would use the gas part. 

And the telephone was all in, for the inside-telephone-men had comeand put it in. 

David hadn't seen them do their work, because they had been inside thehouse all the time, and there wasn't any nice foreman, like Jonathan, who knew him, and who took pains to show him everything there was toshow. 

But he had seen them go in, carrying the telephone, and he had seenthem come out without it, and he had asked them if they had it allfixed so that people could talk, and they had said that they had fixedit, and that it was all right. 

Then six great wagons had come. Three of the wagons brought furnacecoal and two of them brought range coal, and one brought a load ofwood to burn in the fireplaces. 

And the furnace coal went in at one cellar window, and the range coalwent in at another cellar window, and the wood went in at the cellardoor, in a man's arms. 

All these different things were being done at once, and there was atremendous racket with all the coal going down through iron chutes, and all the men had been very busy. 

Then the racket had stopped, and the men had taken their chutes andthrown them into the wagons, and they had climbed up into their seats, and they had rattled off, in a procession, but they had left thecellar windows flapping. 

Coal men never do fasten the cellar windows unless there is somebodyright there to remind them of it. And, in a few minutes, David saw aman come out of the house and lock the door, and walk up the road andturn the corner. 

The next day, David watched the new house for a long time, but nothinghappened, and he couldn't see that there was anybody there, so hewandered into the thin woods behind his house. 

His cat started with him, but two crows came and flew at the cat, andshe was frightened and ran home as fast as she could go, with herbushy tail sticking straight out behind her. 

David laughed to see her running away from the crows, and he walkedalong slowly, and he came where were some crusts of bread and otherthings which the maid at his house had taken out there for the birds. 

David's mother had the maid throw out crusts of bread and tie lumps offat on the trees all winter, because when the snow is on the ground itis sometimes hard for the birds to find things enough to eat. 

There was a plenty of things for the birds to eat now, and they wereeasy enough to get, but some birds were picking at the scraps. 

Suddenly the birds flew up into a tree and two gray squirrels came andgnawed at the bread crusts, when the two crows that had chased David'scat came flapping down and tried to get at the scraps. 

But the squirrels stopped eating and chased the crows savagely; andthe crows didn't fight back, but they just flew up a little bit of away and hovered there until the squirrels began to eat again. 

Then they flapped down on the ground and began to sneak up toward thescraps; and the squirrels darted at them and chased them again. 

[Illustration: THE SQUIRRELS CHASED THE CROWS]

David wasn't very near, and he had watched the squirrels and the crowsfor some time. 

Then he just happened to look up, and he saw a maid come out of thecellar door of the new house and get some wood from the pile that thecarpenters had left. 

And she picked out the little pieces and put them in her apron andwent in; and, almost as soon as she was in, smoke began to come out ofthe chimney, and David thought he had better go there and see what wasgoing on. 

He walked up past his house, and stopped and got his cart and calledhis cat. And his cat came running, and he walked along, dragging hiscart, with his shovel and his hoe rattling in the bottom of it. 

But when he got to the road he looked up to the corner to see if therewas anything coming, and he saw what he thought must be the circusjust turning the corner. 

First there came three great horses, harnessed abreast, and theirharness was glittering with chains and little brass things and withivory rings; and the horses were dragging a great big shiny van whichseemed almost as big as a house. 

The driver's seat was up high, and the top of the van stuck over andmade a little roof for it; and on the side of the van was a picture oftwo lions, and the lions in the picture were about as big as reallions. 

And behind that van came another three-horse van like the first, withlions painted on the side. 

And behind that came a smaller van drawn by two horses, and that hadlions painted on the side, and a little dog trotted under thetwo-horse van, and his tongue was hanging out because he had trotted along way and he was thirsty. 

When these three vans had turned the corner, no more came, althoughDavid watched for as much as half a minute. 

By that time the first van was past him and his cat had caught sightof the little dog and the little dog had caught sight of the cat. 

But the cat didn't do anything, and the little dog was too tired tochase her. So he pretended that he didn't see her, and he trottedalong under the van as far as the new house. 

All the vans stopped at the new house, and the horses backed them upside by side in the gutter. There wasn't any curbstone, and thesidewalk was a new one of gravel, and there would be a border of grasswhen the grass had time to grow. 

As soon as the vans had stopped, the little dog trotted out from underthe two-horse one, and went around the house looking for some water. 

And he came to the faucet where they screw on the hose, and he sawthat there was a drop of water hanging on the bottom of the faucet. Sohe licked that up and waited until another drop came, and he lickedthat up. 

Then one of the moving-men saw him. 

"Poor little Dick!" said the moving-man. 

And he went to the faucet and the little dog wagged his stump of atail and backed away a step and waited. 

Then the moving-man turned the handle of the faucet so that a littlethin stream of water ran out, and the little dog came up and lappedout of the little thin stream, wagging his stump of a tail very fast. He wagged and he lapped until he had had enough. 

[Illustration: HE LICKED UP THE DROPS OF WATER]

And the moving-man turned the handle of the faucet the other way, andthe water stopped running. 

Then the little dog licked the man's hand, and he trotted back to thevan, and he went under and curled up and slumped down, and he put hishead on his paws, and he drew two or three long breaths, and he wentto sleep. 

There were three men with each three-horse van and two men with thetwo-horse van; and they had all got down and taken off their coats, and they had unlocked the great tall doors at the back of each van, and they had opened the doors, and had taken some of the things out. 

The things were covered with a great many old soft cloths: old coarseburlaps, and old quilts and comforters. These soft cloths belonged tothe moving-men, and they kept them to use in that way, so that thethings which they moved shouldn't get scratched or broken. 

When they took anything out of a van, they took off the cloths andthrew them in a pile on the sidewalk, and they put the things in asort of a clump, along the front walk of the new house. 

David had come up close, dragging his cart, but his cat had run offinto the field. 

Then the moving-men noticed David standing there. 

"Hello, " said one of the men. He seemed to be a kind of a foreman. "Doyou live around here?"

David pointed to his house. 

"I live in that house. Do you know whether there are any little boyscoming to live in this house?"

"I think likely, " said the moving-man, "but I don't know for certain. "

"Well, are you going to take all these things into the house?" Davidasked again, pointing at the things. 

There were a hat-rack, and two waste-baskets filled with little thingsdone up in newspaper, and a little table, and a paste-board box filledwith hats, and two mirrors about as tall as David, and a maid'swash-stand, and a bundle of pictures tied up in newspapers, and awooden box full of rubbers, and some crockery things, and a barrel ofkitchen things, and a great enormous paste-board box tied up with tape, and another great paste-board box with the side broken in, and threekitchen chairs, and a chamber chair, and a bundle of magazines, andsome other things; and they were all spread out on the walk. 

These things were all the things that had been left over and put inlast in packing the vans, or little things which filled up chinks. 

"We are going to take them in as soon as somebody comes to tell uswhere to put them, " the moving-man answered. "And we want to take insome of the big things first, such as beds and dining-room table andheavy things like those. They are all packed in the bottom of thevans. "

David nodded his head. 

Just then one of the men took out of a van a little upholsteredarmchair. 

"Hello!" said the moving-man. "That looks as if there was a youngsterof some kind coming, either a boy or a girl. "

Then another man came with a box of toys, and set it down beside thearmchair. 

David saw it and smiled. 

"That looks so, too, doesn't it now?" said the moving-man. He lookedup. "And here he is, I guess. "

David turned around, and he saw a very pleasant-looking man comingalong, and, holding by his hand, there was a little boy who looked asif he might be almost five years old. 

They came near, and David looked at the little boy, but he didn't sayanything, and the little boy looked at David, and he didn't sayanything either, but he held to his father's hand tighter than ever. 

"Well, here we are. You have not been waiting long, I judge. Now I'llgo in and you can come along with the things as fast as you like. Whatwill you do, Dick?"

At the sound of his name, the little dog raised his head and waggedhis stump of a tail and was all ready to get up; but nobody saw him, for the little boy was whispering to his father, who turned to David. 

"I guess that your name is David, " he said; and David nodded. "I knowyour father, David. How would you like it if Dick stayed out here withyou? You two can play anywhere that you are used to, David, or you canstay and watch as long as you like. "

[Illustration: THEY WATCHED THE MEN]

David thought that that would be nice, and he turned his cart aroundand took out the backboard, and he told Dick that he might sit in itif he wanted to, or he could sit in the little armchair. 

Dick chose the cart to sit in, and David sat in the armchair, and theywatched the men, who were beginning to carry in the things. 

They had taken some more things out of one of the vans, and they hadcome to the heavy things. 

One man was in the van, unpacking the things and pushing them to theback, where the other men could reach them. 

And a man would take as much as he could carry under his arms, andmarch into the house with it; and another man would come and get hisload, and he would march in with it. 

There was a procession of men going in with their loads and coming outwithout any, and Dick's father stood just inside the front door andtold each man where to leave his load, and the man went to that roomand left it, and came out again. 

But when they had all the parts of a bed in the room where the bed wasto be, they put the bed together, so that it was all ready to be madeup. 

Two men carried in the dining-table, and the library table, and theice-chest, and each bureau, and each dressing-table, and each bookcase, and the tall clock, and each sofa, and each of the washstands, andeverything that was either too big or too heavy for one man. 

They had come to a lot of boxes, all just alike, each box just about aload for one man. The men were taking them up as fast as they could, and going in, and piling them up in the hall, and they joked aboutthem, they were so heavy. 

David was curious about the boxes, and he asked Dick what was in them;and Dick said that books were in them, and his mother and his fatherpacked them, and it took them a long time, for they had to wrap everybook in newspaper and stuff newspapers in all the cracks. Then hisfather had screwed the tops on with a screwer. 

And David said it was funny how heavy books were, because they weremade of paper, and paper was one of the lightest things there was, andhis kitty liked to play with pieces of newspaper, out of doors, wherethe wind blew them. 

Then he got up and called his cat, but she didn't come. 

"I'll tell you, " David said; "let's go and find her. "

So Dick and David each took hold of one handle of the cart, and walkedalong to David's house, and David called his cat again, but she didn'tcome. 

Then he thought that she must be in the woods, and they would go thereand find her. 

But first he went into his house and asked the maid to give him andDick some cookies, and the maid gave him three for Dick and three forhimself. 

And he gave Dick his three, and the two little boys wandered on intothe woods, eating their cookies and dragging the cart behind them, andDavid thought how much better a real little boy was than a pretendlittle boy. 

And David told Dick about the squirrels and the crows and the otherbirds that were there, and he showed him where there were somechestnuts; and they picked up some chestnuts and got them out of theburs and put them into the cart. 

Then suddenly there was David's cat walking along, with her bushy tailsticking straight up in the air; and she went to David and rubbedagainst him, and she went to Dick and rubbed against him, and she wentto the cart and rubbed against that. 

Then she ran on ahead, and they came after, and they went to the placewhere the squirrels and the crows had been. 

But no squirrels were there. 

So the two little boys wandered on through the thin woods, looking forsquirrels, and sometimes the cat was with them and sometimes shewasn't, and at last they were just behind Dickie's house, for the newhouse was his house now. 

And they looked up and saw the vans just starting away, and the horseswere trotting. 

They watched until they couldn't see the vans any longer, and theyheard them turn the corner. 

"I guess I've got to go, " said Dickie then. 

"Why have you got to go?" David asked. "Aren't you going to live inthat house?"

"Yes, " Dick said, "I am, but we're going back for to-night. To-morrowthe maids will have it all ready, and we'll come and bring my motherand my baby sister. "

"Oh, " said David. 

That was the first time Dick had told him that he had a baby sister. 

Dick had already started up to his house, but he stopped and turnedaround. 

"Good-bye, David, " he said. 

"Good-bye, Dick, " said David. 

And Dick turned again and hurried to the new house, but David stood, holding the handle of his cart and looking after him. 

And he saw Dick's father come around the corner of the house and takeDick by the hand. 

Then Dick's father stood for a minute looking at the house, as if hewas afraid that he had forgotten something. 

But he couldn't think of anything, and he and Dick began to walk away, and Dick was talking to his father and his father was smiling. 

David stood still, watching them, until he couldn't see them anylonger. 

Then he began to gallop along toward his house, dragging his cart, andhis shovel and his hoe rattled like everything in the bottom of it;and his cat ran on ahead, with her bushy tail sticking straight up inthe air. 

And that's the end of this book. 

THE END