The Camden journal. [volume] (Camden, S.C.) 1866-1891, 1890-12-11
de Stael of doll, wno would discourse
etcfics like a travelling missionary.

prominent nose and retreating chin
advancing brisEly and asked what he
wanted. Mr.. Burnham said he would
like to see some of the talking dolls that
he might interview them.
The beautiful puppets were lying on
their backs in showcase, laid out as If
this were an undertaker's establishment
for dolls. The clerk extracted one ex-
quisitely pretty doll with fluffy golden
hair, round staring eyes, and complex
ion that put rose leaf to shame. 1t
was dressed in a beautiful lace frock
with pale blue ribbons strung through it.
The clerk seized it, wound up some
apparatus Ii its back and then held it
perpendlcularly. At the same time Mr..
Burnham heard strident voice, like a
lusty dwarf's, say with almost painful
precision:
Jack-and-Jill- ll-went-up -the-hill--
Observation-Disclosures ;.
Jack-fell - down 49, and - broke - his
CROWN
-tumbling--after."
This was what this golden-haired doll
had to say. Somehow this brief history
of Jack and Jill seemed to lack moral,
because the contemporaneity, 50 to
speak, of their adversely, did not really
have lesson in it.
He turned to some of the others. Each
doll had square printed label setting
forth the extent of her loquacity. But
the taking dolls really seemed to have a
strange liking for Mother Goose
melodies. One frivolous thing said:
"Now I lay me down to sleep" etc. but
the accents of her speech did not seem
revercntial enough to Mr.. Burnham.
There was actually no more tenderness
in her tones than if she were reciting the
multiplication table.
Then S1r. Burnham's mind went
through another convolution, and the
result of it was that he determined to go
to the man that made the dolls, and have
some little sentiments of his own,
directed to Nina's improvement, injected
into the dolls powers of speech.
The result was that one day he came
home with very beautiful doll. He
wound it up, and then gravely placed it
on his knee, while Nina looked hungrily
at it in an ecstasy of delight over its lace
gown and fluffy hair.
Suddenly her blue eyes dilated andher
little mouth expanded as if it were q
blossom about to bloom. She heard in
her papa's voice these words: "Now I
wouldn't do that Do you think it nicel
How do persons who act that way turn
out2 Be good, and you'll be happy, and
papa will be proud of his little girl"
Nina shrank away from the uncanny
thing. It's glitering eyes and tight little
pink lips were perfectly motionless, and
yet it was talking in her papa'svoice. She
had glanced quickly up at his mouth
when she heard the first words, but it was
as set as the dolly's, and had almost as
sweet smile on it.
She was just about to cry when Mr..
Burnham carefully explained to her that
it was only little bit of machinery in
the dolls breast that talked that way.
Gradually, the child got to like it and
would wind up the machinery and hear
the doll say with dignifed precision and
great JUNCTION: "Now wouldn't do that |!
Do you think it is nice3" and the rest of
it.
She set it off several times during the
day, and Dir. Burnham felt that be had
hit on a very ingenious scheme for watch
ing over his little girl when he was away.
Of course he had to take chances that,
as a rule, the doll would dissuade Nina,
from doing something that was not right;
but he felt that there was corrective
sound in the words, and that there was
no danger of her being prevented from
doing what little girl ought to by the
dolls speech. But if she were doing any,
thing he would not wish her to, the sound
of her papa's voice coming from the talk
ing doll would have peculiar force, in its
combination with the small voice of her
conscience. He told Nina that the dolls
name was Recta. Mr.. Burnham knew
Latin, and Reeta means "Right' in that
language.
That night Nina had become such
friends with Recta that she wished to
take her into her little bed with her, and
her papa, after cautioning her against
kissing it for fear the paint would come
off on her mouth, allowed her to do SO.
So Recta was laid with her fluffy
head of hair on the same pillow where
Nina's rested, and they went to sleep
together.
1t was about one o'clock, when the
house was all in slumber and quite dark,
that two bold, bad men came in at the
rear door. They had not been invited,
and they would not have been welcome
had they been seen, for they moved in
quite different circles of society from Mr..
Burnham and his little girl.
Knowing they were not looked for, the
two young gentlemen let themselves in
and made as little noise as possible so as
not to disturb anybody. They even had
some consideration for the policeman,
who might be taking little nap in some
area way, and tried not to disturb him
either.
They were burglars, and they pro-
posed to collect Mr.. Buruham's plate and
any little things that might look pretty
in their own apartments over ou the East
side.
They got several pieces of silver which
they put in bag so as to carry them
conveniently, and then they stole up
stairs, leaving the nag at the foot of
them till they should come down.
Nina's room was next to her papa's,