At the breakfast table Toddie wept again, because I insisted on beginning operations before Budge came. Then neither boy knew exactly what he wanted. Then Budge managed to upset the contents of his plate into his lap, and while I was helping him to clear away the débris, Toddie improved the opportunity to pour his milk upon his fish and put several spoonfuls of oatmeal porridge into my coffee-cup. I made an early excuse to leave the table and turn the children over to Maggie. I felt as tired as if I had done a hard day’s work, and was somewhat appalled at realizing that the day had barely begun. I lit a cigar and sat down to Helen’s piano. I am not a musician, but even the chords of a hand-organ would have seemed sweet music to me on that morning. The music-book nearest to my hand was a church hymn-book, and the first air my eye struck was “Greenville.” I lived once in a town, where, on a single day, a peddler disposed of thirty-eight accordions, each with an instruction-book in which this same air, under its original name, was the only air. For years after, a single bar of this air awakened the most melancholy reflections in my mind, but now I forgave all my musical tormentors as the familiar strains came comfortingly from the piano-keys. But suddenly I heard an accompaniment—a sort of reedy sound—and looking round, I saw Toddie again in tears. I stopped abruptly and asked:— “What’s the matter _now_, Toddie?” “Don’t want dat old tune; wantsh dancin’ tune, so I can dance.” [Illustration: “WANTSH DANCIN’ TUNE”] I promptly played “Yankee Doodle,” and Toddie began to trot around the room with the expression of a man who intended to do his whole duty. Then Budge appeared, hugging a bound volume of “St. Nicholas.” The moment that Toddie espied this he stopped dancing and devoted himself anew to the task of weeping. “Toddie!” I shouted, springing from the piano stool, “what do you mean by crying at everything? I shall have to put you to bed again if you’re going to be such a baby.” “That’s the way he _always_ does, rainy days,” exclaimed Budge. “Wantsh to see the whay-al what fwallowed Djonah,” sobbed Toddie. “Can’t you demand something that’s within the range of possibility, Toddie?” I mildly asked. “The whale Toddie means is in this big red book; I’ll find it for you,” said Budge, turning over the leaves. Suddenly a rejoicing squeal from Toddie announced that leviathan had been found, and I hastened to gaze. He was certainly a dreadful-looking animal, but he had an enormous mouth, which Toddie caressed with his pudgy little hand, and kissed with tenderness, murmuring as he did so:— “_Dee_ old whay-al, I loves you. Is Djonah all goneded out of you ’tomach, whay-al? I finks ’twas weal mean in Djonah to get froed up when you hadn’t noffin’ else to eat, _poor_ old whay-al.”