The Catholic World, Vol. 25, April 1877 to September 1877Various
Religion
The Catholic World, Vol. 25, April 1877 to September 1877
Various
Catholic Church -- Periodicals
night and pull up the newly-planted flowers. 'Don’t you think,’ said
Mark one day to his friend and patron, 'that your little cousin, the
new boy [Prince Hohenzollern], might as well have that garden?’ 'I
don’t see why he should not, if he wants it,’ replied William, by no
means deep enough to understand what his faithful fag was driving
at. 'It will be so nice for Louis, don’t you see, to have William to
keep him in check on one side, and William’s little cousin to watch
him on the other side,’ observed Mark innocently. 'Ah! to be sure,’
exclaimed William, beginning to wake up, 'so it will; very nice
indeed. Mark, you are a sly dog.’ 'I should say, if you paid Louis
the compliment to propose it, that it is such a delicate little
attention as he would never forget—even if you withdrew the proposal
afterwards.’ 'Just so, my boy; and then we shall have to fight.’
'But look here, won’t the other chaps say that I provoked the
quarrel?’ 'Not if we manage properly,’ was the reply. 'They are sure
to fix the cause of dispute on Louis rather than on you. You are
such a peaceable boy, you know; and he has always been fond of a
shindy.’ So Dame Europa was asked to assign the vacant garden to
William’s little cousin. 'Well,’ said she, 'if Louis does not
object, who will be his nearest neighbor, he may have it.’ 'But I do
object, ma’am,’ cried Louis. 'I very particularly object. I don’t
want to be hemmed in on all sides by William and his cousins. They
will be walking through my garden to pay each other visits, and
perhaps throwing balls to one another right across my lawn.’ 'Oh!
but you might be sure that I should do nothing unfair,’ said William
reproachfully. 'I have never attacked anybody.’ 'That’s all my eye,’
said Louis. 'I don’t believe in your piety. Come, take your dear
little relation off, and give him one of the snug corners that you
bagged the other day from poor Christian.’ 'Come, come,’ interposed
the Dame, 'I can’t listen to such angry words. You five monitors
must settle the matter quietly among yourselves; but no fighting,
mind. The day for that sort of thing is quite gone by.’ _And the old
lady toddled off_ and left the boys alone. 'I wouldn’t press it,
Bill, if I were you,’ said John, in his deep, gruff voice, looking
out of his shop-window on the other side of the water. 'I think it’s
rather hard lines for Louis—I do indeed.’ 'Always ready to oblige
you, my dear John,’ said William; and so the new boy’s claim to the
garden was withdrawn. 'What shall I do now, Mark?’ asked William,
turning to his friend. 'It seems to me that there is an end of it
all.’ 'Not a bit,’ was the reply. 'Louis is still as savage as a
bear. He’ll break out directly; you see if he don’t.’ 'I have been
grossly insulted,’ began Louis at last, in a towering passion, 'and
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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