Tomasine was a strong, long-suffering woman, but she became thin and nervous. She hoped that things would improve as he grew bigger, and waited till he should be a year old; but still had to wait, for the stronger he grew the more persistently he screamed. Some new method must be adopted. The specialists did not touch on this, or else she had not understood them. She consulted experienced people, and was advised to keep him continually amused. That answered for a while. He was quiet when he saw anything new, but he would not look at the same thing more than twice at the outside. If she forgot this, he became so furious that the very newest thing in the world would not pacify him. Some one else advised her to let the child scream as much as he liked. Eternal Powers, how he yelled! If he had been chosen as the representative of all the sorrow and trouble in the town he could not have done better. "No," thought Tomasine, "that will torture the life out of both him and me." So she turned to the exactly opposite course, and tried to guess his thoughts before he had formed them, and indulged him in everything. This helped, but if she guessed wrong, there was no use in guessing right afterwards. At last his maternal retainer and slave, like many before her, was brought to such a state of distress and despair, that she determined to revolt. The little despot must be dethroned. The revolution broke out with six slaps on his little person. All the horrors of a civil war at once showed themselves. But six, seven, eight to twelve slaps followed. To give up one's power before one's life, is hard even for a not-two-years-old tyrant, so the battle lasted several hours until--he gave in? No, that he would not do, but he fell asleep. Tomasine was so worn out by months of worry, anxiety, and sleepless nights, and finally by the fight itself, that she was trembling and bathed in perspiration. She stood over him as he slept, as David is said to have stood over Saul. She grieved for his fallen greatness. She heard him sob as he lay there in his helplessness. She saw the last tear dry on his cheek, the convulsive movements of his chubby hands, and the twitching of the thin skin of his head. Who should be good to him if not she? How she longed for his waking, that she might let him see her face with its gentlest expression, and caress him, and practise all those small arts which are the delight of every mother! More than all, she longed to make him screw up his mouth for a kiss. When he did that, he was irresistible. At last he began to move and to rub his hand over his nose. In her impatience she put her hands under him, and laid her face down to his head, to breathe the warm fragrance from it. He screwed up his mouth for a grimace; despair rose darker and darker in his eyes, and at last he gave a shriek, a frightful and frightening shriek, while he thrust himself away from her, with hands, head, and body.