Oh! the cupperty-buts! and oh! the cupperty-buts! out in the meadow,
shining under the trees, and sparkling over the lawn, millions and
millions of them, each one a bit of purest gold from Mother Nature's
mint. Jessy stood at the window, looking out at them, and thinking, as
she often had thought before, that there were no flowers so beautiful.
"Cupperty-buts," she had been used to call them, when she was a wee
baby-girl and could not speak without tumbling over her words and
mixing them up in the queerest fashion; and now that she was a very
great girl, actually six years old, they were still cupperty-buts to
her, and would never be anything else, she said. There was nothing
she liked better than to watch the lovely golden things, and nod to
them as they nodded to her; but this morning her little face looked
anxious and troubled, and she gazed at the flowers with an intent and
inquiring look, as if she had expected them to reply to her unspoken
thoughts. What these thoughts were I am going to tell you.
Half an hour before, she had called to her mother, who was just going
out, and begged her to come and look at the cupperty-buts.
"They are brighter than ever, Mamma! Do just come and look at them!
golden, golden, golden! There must be fifteen thousand million
dollars' worth of gold just on the lawn, I should think."