go out, I shall make preserves all the morning. I shall make plum
preserves and orange marmalade, and we will have some for supper
to-night.”
And his Auntie said, “I shall sew all the morning; yes, I will make
myself a nice new dress.”
Topsy and Bingo and Jane did not say anything. But they all three lay
down on hearth rug and went to sleep. They had decided that, as it was
such a disagreeable, rainy day that they could not go out and play,
they would sleep all the morning, and, maybe, dream a nice dream about
playing in the fields in the country.
As for Charlie--_he_ did not know _what_ to do. He stood at the window
and he looked out at the rain pattering on the ledge and against the
window pane--and he said, “I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what
to do!” And he said it again and again.
His Auntie said to him, “The very idea, Charlie, you have _heaps_ of
things to do! Why don’t you play with your toys--with your train and
with your blocks?”
But Charlie shook his head. “It’s no fun playing with my train--it just
goes round and round, and I have built everything with my blocks that
I know how to build. I want something _new_ to play! Something I have
never played before.”
His Auntie thought hard for two whole minutes. Then she said, “Look
here, Charlie, I have a splendid idea! You run up to my room and bring
me a pile of typewriting paper that you will find on my desk. Also
bring a paper of pins out of my top bureau drawer, and I will show you
something new to play with.”
So Charlie ran upstairs and brought down these things. Then his Auntie
told him to get his own scissors with the rounded tops and his box of
colored chalks.
Charlie began to feel very interested and excited. He wondered _what in
the world_ his Auntie was going to do.
Well, when he had brought his scissors and his crayons, his Auntie sat
down at the table and she took a piece of typewriting paper and folded
it this way and that way. Then she colored one part of it red with
the red chalk, and she made three little green strokes with the green
chalk, and with the scissors she cut along the creases, and folded it
some more; _then_ she pinched it here and pinched it there, and she
stuck a pin in at the back, and--there was a beautiful little white
house with a red roof and green shutters, and a door that opened and
shut!
Charlie was delighted. He said, “Oh, oh! _How beautiful!_ Show me how
to make it. _Please_, Auntie, show _me_ how to make a little house.”
[Illustration]
So his Auntie showed him _ex-act-ly_ how to make the little house--and
you will see in the picture on this page _ex-act-ly_ how Charlie’s
Auntie cut the paper, and where she painted it red for the roof, and
where she put the windows with the green shutters, and where she cut
the door so that it could open and shut, and where she put the pin
in at the back to keep it together. Yes, Charlie’s Auntie used a pin
instead of paste, because paste does not always stick very well and it
often makes things look messy unless you are very skillful.
Well, after Charlie had tried several times and his Auntie had showed
him every time where he had gone wrong, he _ac-tu-al-ly_ succeeded in
making a paper house all by himself! And it was a beautiful house.
When his Auntie saw that Charlie could make paper houses just as well
as she could, she said, “Now I must go upstairs and sew my dress, and
_you_, Charlie, can make a whole, big village of little houses, and I
am sure that you will think of some nice game to play with them.”
Well, Charlie did go on making his houses until he had made a whole lot
of them--yes, he had made a _tre-men-dous_ number of houses; maybe he
had made _fifteen_ houses out of paper, with red roofs and green doors
and shutters. Then he thought that he had made enough and that he would
like to play with them--and so he did.
I will tell you how Charlie played with the houses. First he went over
to a corner of the room where there was no furniture to get in the way
and there he set up some of his houses and made a village of them. Then
he had a _grand_ idea--and the idea was that he would like to have some
trees in his village, and he knew _ex-act-ly_ how to make them!
He ran into the kitchen where his Mother was making delicious preserves
and he said, “Oh, Mother, I want some branches off the bush near the
back door--and it is _very important_. Can I go out just for a minute
and pick some?”
And his Mother said, “Yes. If you put on your rubber boots and your
slicker and your sou’wester, you can go out for just a minute, even
though it is raining, and pick the branches you want, but you must not
be long.”
So Charlie did so--he put on his rubber boots and his sou’wester and
his slicker and he picked all the branches that he wanted. When he
brought them into the house he had to shake them over the sink because
they were so wet.
Now I suppose you will wonder how Charlie made those branches stand
upright on the floor to make them look like trees?
I will tell you. Charlie went to his box, where he kept the old toys
that he used to play with when he was a very little boy, and there he
found a whole lot of spools. When he was a baby he used to like to
string spools together and his Mother and his Auntie always gave him
their spools of thread when they were bare, so Charlie had _dozens_ of
spools and he sometimes let Bingo and Topsy play with them.
Well, Charlie got these spools and he stuck a small branch in the end
of one of them and stood it upright. It made a beautiful tree! So he
made a dozen trees and set them all along the streets of the village.
[Illustration: _Charlie Made Three Villages_]
But there were no people in the village. Charlie thought hard for two
whole minutes--then he went and found his old Noah’s ark and his box
of lead soldiers. Of course, Noah and his wife and his family were the
people who lived in the village, and so were some of the soldiers. The
animals of the ark he stood up in the fields behind the houses and he
pretended that they were all cows--yes, he pretended that the elephants
and the giraffes and the lions and the tigers were all cows.
When Charlie had finished making one village, he started right away and
made two more, so that he had _three_ villages, and each village had a
railway station. Then he arranged his railroad track so that it went
between the different villages, and he made his train run up and down
between them. He put some of the lead soldiers in the coaches. And
every time that his train came to a station Charlie blew his whistle
and called out, “All out for Stony Hollow! All out for Pine Hill! All
out for Ford’s Crossing!” and some of the soldiers got out at every
station and others got in.
My goodness! but Charlie did have a good time playing with his train
and with his villages. He had such a good time that the morning only
seemed five minutes long!
When his Mother and his Auntie came in to see what he had been doing
with himself all the morning, and to tell him that it was time to get
ready for dinner, they _were_ surprised and de-light-ed when they saw
the beautiful villages that Charlie had made.
Well, the very minute that Charlie had finished his dinner he went back
to his villages, because he had thought of several new ideas while he
was eating his dinner.
Yes, he remembered a little tiny horse and wagon that his Mother had
given him. When his Mother had given it to him there was some candy
tied to the wagon, and of course Charlie had eaten the candy long ago;
but he had kept the horse and wagon because it was so cunning and
little, though he thought that it was too little to play with. But now
Charlie was going to use it for his village.
I wonder if you can guess what he was going to use it for? I will tell
you. Charlie decided that the little wagon should be the stage, and he
put a lead soldier in it and pretended that he was the stage driver.
Then he loaded the stage with little parcels made out of paper which he
pretended were sacks of apples that the farmers of the villages were
sending to the city; and he loaded them on to the train, and blew his
whistle--and off it started!
Charlie played all the afternoon with his train and his stage and
his villages; he played with them for hours and hours. The rain had
stopped and the sun was shining but Charlie did not notice that--until
he heard a little hoarse “Wow-wow!” outside the door.
It was Bingo. Yes, Bingo had wakened and wanted Charlie to come and
play with him. So he opened the door and Bingo came jumping into the
room, and the very first thing he did was to knock over three houses in
Charlie’s village. And Topsy came chasing after Bingo and _he_ knocked
over four more with his tail. They would have knocked all the houses
over if Charlie had not stopped them. But Charlie took Bingo and Topsy
out of the room and he shut the door behind him so that they should not
spoil his village.
Then Charlie’s Mother called to him and she said, “Why don’t you and
Topsy and Bingo run out and play in the yard? The sun is shining, but
you must put on your rubber boots, as the grass is still wet.”
Charlie thought that it would be fun to run around a little as he had
been so busy all day. He called Topsy and Bingo, and they had a grand
time chasing each other around the garden and in and out of Charlie’s
little house that he had built of the bricks that the builders had
given him. Sometimes Charlie would catch Bingo, and, when Bingo was
caught, _always_ he rolled over on his back and stuck his four legs in
the air--so that he looked ridiculous!
But Charlie never _could_ catch Topsy. Whenever he nearly caught him,
Topsy would just climb up a tree, and he’d climb _way_ up and peek down
at Charlie through the branches.
So Charlie and Topsy and Bingo played together in the garden till
Charlie’s Daddy came home. Then, of course, Charlie had to show his
Daddy the beautiful villages he had made, and the way each one had a
railway station, and how his train ran up and down the line between
the stations, just like a real train, and carried packages and mail and
passengers.
His Daddy was _most_ interested and de-light-ed. He was _so_ interested
and _de-light-ed_ that he sat straight down on the floor, and began to
play with the villages himself. But Bingo and Topsy had to be left in
the garden while Charlie and his Daddy were playing with the villages,
because they wanted to play also, and _their_ idea of playing with the
villages was to knock down _all_ the houses and _all_ the trees!
Well, Charlie and his Daddy played together till supper was ready.
Then Charlie’s Mother said, “I have been making preserves all day,
and now we will eat some for supper. I have made plum jam and orange
marmalade.” Charlie and his Daddy tasted the plum jam and the orange
marmalade--and they both were _delicious_.
And what do you think? Charlie’s Auntie had finished her new dress and
she wore it down to supper--and it _did_ look beautiful.
So Charlie and his Mother and his Auntie all had a nice day after all,
even though it was such a rainy, disagreeable kind of a day. And Topsy
and Bingo and Jane had enjoyed the day too!
[Illustration]
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:
Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.
Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.
Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.