The News-Herald. [volume] (Hillsboro, Highland Co., Ohio) 1886-1973, 1893-10-19

such pleasure in mounting. While
doing 50 his attention was for the first
time drawn to the condition of the
carpet. LII
swell, II really Is dirty. And no one
can say ever liked dirt Why. it looks
as though some one had been throwing
lot of wool and feathers under my bed.
I'll give It a sweep to-day. undertook
to do my own sweeping l suppose
folks think boys can't sweep"
Fred put all his strength into the
welding of the broom. 1t had been q
rainy week, and Susan's careful hands
had not supplemented her morning care
Of the room by gathering with brush
and dust-pan of the mud which his
careless feet brought in. 1t was now
dried and ground into the carpet, to be
raised in clouds of dust by his vigorous
sweeping
''Phew." Glad enough was he, hav-
ing at length finished, to get into the
open air, burdened with few doubts
as to whether, after all, he SO very
much enjoyed the new order of things.
81 don't really believe boys were
made to be housemaids," he concluded.
''But it's only an experiment There
won't be any trouble in getting back
to mothers dear, careful ways con-
scious of an unexpressed yet decidedly
increasing respect for his mothers
ways.
Late in the day Fred rushed back to
his room to make ready for an evening
to be spent in company which he held
III high esteem. Freds slovenliness did
not, as general thing, extend to the
care of his person, his mother having
often had occasion to wonder at the
neat appearance with which he con-
trived to emerge from the chaos of his
room.
''Thunder!" Fred stood for a mo-
ment at his room door, finding the situa-
tion worthy of his strongest expletive.
The dust from which he had fled lay
thickly upon everything, adding dis
mally to the prevailing disorder.
81 forgot all about the things mother
spreads over things when she sweeps.
How hate dust on books. WE'LL" seiz-
ing towel and hastily whisking it
about Il haven't time to do much dust
ing now. Jack Harper will call for me
in quarter of an hour.
Buttons off? ! forgot to take my
best suit to mother. And there's lit.
tie rip near the coat cuff, but 1 can ink
that"
Setting the ink on the bureau, he
carefully darkened the white streak,
but as he turned from study of the ef-
feet, his brow took on a deeper cloud.
my white tie in the backing box!"
He snatched it up. "The last one
have left! And all these" tumbling
over a number which were mixed in
with other things thrown on the table,
'are covered with dust. Perhaps this
one will do; but there's spot on it."
Selling towel, he carefully rubbed
the front of the lightest-colored tie he
could find. But it was the towel which
had already done duty as duster, and
was streaked with the sooty dust which
prevails in house in which bitumin-
GUS coal is used.
AS the tie soon looked rather worse
than better, Fred threw both towel
and tie from him with an angry excla-
nation. They struck something on the
bureau, which went with them to the
floor.
"Oh, that ink! And all over those
books l left there! What shall l.
Mother! mother!"
Mother, quickly appearing in answer
to his loud cry of distress, could not for
bear a smile at the mixture of express
sions on Fred's face. Despair, mortifi-
cation and a comical sense of the ludi-
crous seemed striving for the mastery.
so mother" he said, after she had
done her best to arrest any further mis-
chief from the ink, will you take me
back?"
'Take you back?" she asked, not
quite understanding what he meant.
"Yes, me and my room. I've given
up. I'll take all you have to say on
the subject of boys and tidiness If only
you'll wind me up and then keep
me running. But first will you please
go down and tell Jack Harper can't
60 to-night?"
"Why can't you, dear9 Thought you
were SO anxious to CO."
$50 was; but look at me. Buttons
of. Rips. can't find clean collar
in that muddle, and my white ties
spoiled"
"I'll ask Jack to wait for you a few
minutes. think we can manage things
yet"
Most boys who have mothers can
imagine the quickness with which her
hands few from one thing to another
In making that particular boy look as
boy should look. From hidden
depths of her own stores tie was un-
earthed. Buttons went on and rips
hid themselves from sight. At the end
of quarter Of an hour Fred joined his
friends wiser and happier boy.
Some hours later he turned the
light high for satisfied gaze about his
room.
''This is jolly! Everything clean. ev-
erything in place. Well, it's rather
mean in me If can't cooperate with