Kitty isn’t drowned. I’ve got ever so many new dolls. My grandmother
went to town, not the same day my kitty did that, but the next day, and
she brought me home a new doll, and that same day she went there my
father went to Boston, and he brought me home a very big one,----no, not
very, but quite big,----and Aunt Phebe went a visiting to somebody’s
house that very day, and she brought me home a doll, and while she was
gone away Hannah Jane dressed over one of Matilda’s old ones new, and
none of the folks knew that the others were going to give me a doll, and
then Uncle J. said that if it was the family custom to give Georgianna a
doll, he would give Georgianna a doll, and he went to the field and
catched the colt, and tackled him up into the riding wagon on purpose,
and then he started off to town, and when he rode up to our back door
there was a great dolly, the biggest one I had, and she was sitting down
on the seat, just like a live one. And she had a waterfall, and she had
things to take off and on. Then Uncle J. asked me what I should do with
my old dollies that were ’most worn out. And I said I didn’t know what I
should. And then Uncle J. said that he would take the lot, for
twenty-five cents a head, to put up in his garden, for scarecrows, and
he asked me if I would sell, and I said I would. And he put the little
ones on little poles and the big ones on tall poles, with their arms
stretched out, and the one with a long veil looked the funniest, and so
did the one dressed up like a sailor boy, but one arm was broke off of
him, and a good many of their noses too. The one that had on old woman’s
clothes Uncle J. put a pipe in her mouth. And the one that had a pink
gauze dress, but ’t is all faded out now, and a long train, but the
train was torn very much, that one has a great bunch of
flowers----paper----pinned on to her, and another in her hand, and the
puppy he barks at ’em like everything. My pullet lays, little ones, you
know. I hope she won’t do like Lucy Maria’s Leghorn hen. That one flies
into the bedroom window every morning, and lays eggs on the bedroom bed.
For maybe ’t would come in before I got up. My class has begun to learn
geography, and my father has bought me a new geography. But I guess I
sha’ n’t like to learn it very much if the backside is hard as the
foreside is. Uncle J. says no need to worry your mind any about that old
fowl, for he’s so tough he couldn’t be killed. I wish you would tell me
how long he could live if it wasn’t killed, for Uncle J. says they grow
tougher every year, and if you should let one live too long, then he
can’t die. But I guess he’s funning, do you? Our hens scratched and
scratched up some of my flowers, and so did the rain wash some up that
night it came down so hard, but one pretty one bloomed out this morning,
but it has budded back again now. Aunt Phebe says she sends her love to
you, tied up with this pretty piece of blue ribbon. She says, if you
want to, you can take the ribbon and wear it for a neck bow. Grandmother
says how do you know but that sailor that went to your school in Old
Wonder Boy’s uncle’s vessel is that big boy, that bad one that ran away,
you called Tom Cush?
Father laughs to hear about Old Wonder Boy, and he says a bragger ought
to be laughed at, and bragging is a bad thing. But he don’t want you to
pick out all the bad things about a boy to send home in your letters;
says next time you must send home a good thing about him, because he
thinks every boy you see has some good things as well as some bad
things.
A dear little baby has moved in the house next to our house. It lets me
hold her, and its mother lets me drag her out. It’s got little bits of
toes, and it’s got a little bit of a nose, and it says “Da da! da da! da
da!” And when I was dragging her out, the wheel went over a poor little
butterfly, but I guess it was dead before. O, its wings were just as
soft! and ’t was a yellow one. And I buried it up in the ground close to
where I buried up my little birdie, side of the spring.
Your affectionate sister,