His attention reverted instantly to the babyish sorceress at his knee, who with an untiring repetition and an unfailing delight in the exercises would rise from her chair and gently touch his hand or brow crying out, with a joyous voice full of laughter, “Kin you-uns feel my hand!” Then he would pinch her rosy cheeks and retort in a gruff undertone, “Kin you-uns feel my hand!” They all behaved, Ike thought, as if they had found something choice and of rare value. And if the truth must be known, he watched the scene with somewhat the same sentiments which animated the old dogs. He shared their sense of supersedure, and he noticed how they whined and could take comfort in no spot about the hearth; how they would walk around three times and lie down with a sigh of renunciation, to get up suddenly with an afflicted wheeze, and hunt about for another place where the distemper of their jealous hearts might let them find rest for their lazy bones. They all sought to intrude themselves upon notice. One of them crept to aunt Jemima and humbly licked her foot, only to have that stout and decided member deal him a prompt rebuke upon the nose, eliciting a yelp altogether out of proportion to the twinge inflicted; for the dog, since he was not going to be petted, was glad to have some grievance to howl about, as he might thus more potently appeal to her sympathy. The hound that was accustomed to lead the blind man was even more insistent in his manifestations. He went and rested his head on his master’s knee, while the little girl sat close in her chair on the opposite side, and he wagged his tail and looked imploringly up in the sightless face. But Rosamondy leaned across and patted the dog on the head, and let him take her hand between his teeth, and jovially pulled his ears, and finally caught him by both, when they lost their balance and went over on the hearth together in a wild scramble, about to be “scorched an’ scarified ter death,” as aunt Jemima said snappishly when she rescued the little girl, who was a very red rose now, and with a tender shake deposited her once more in her chair. Then the old dog left his master, and ran and sat by her and sought to incite more gambols.