Little Prudy's Dotty Dimple

Alice was the youngest of the Parlin family. When Grandma Read called the children into the kitchen, and told them about their new little sister, Susy danced for joy; and Prudy, in her delight, opened the cellar door, and fell down the whole length of the stairs. However, she rolled as softly as a pincushion, and was not seriously hurt.

"But you can't go into mother's room," said Susy, "you're crying so hard."

"Poh!" replied three-years-old Prudy, twinkling off the tears; "yes, I can neither. I won't go crying in! I didn't hurt me velly bad. I'm weller now!"

So she had the first peep at the wee dot of a baby in the nurse's arms.

"O, dear, dear," said she, "what shall I do? I are so glad! I wish I could jump clear up to the sky of this room! How do you do, little sister?"

The baby made no reply.

"Why! don't you love me? This is me: my name's Prudy. I've got a red pocket dress;-Santa Claw bringed it."

Still the little stranger paid no heed,-only winked her small, bright eyes, and at last closed them entirely.

"O, my stars! she don't hear the leastest thing," sobbed Prudy, glad of an excuse to cry again. "She can't hear the leastest mite of a thing! Where's the holes in her ears gone to? O, dear, dear!"

It seemed to Susy that this was the happiest day of her life. She stole up to her mother and kissed her. "O, mamma," said she, "wasn't God good to send this little sister?-Why, I'm crying," added Susy, greatly surprised: "what do you suppose makes me cry, when I'm happy all over-clear to the ends of my fingers?"

"Yes, your eyes are sprinklin' down tears, but you're laughing all over your face; and so 'm I," said little Prudy, delighted to see some one else as foolish as herself.

"Susan, I hope thee'll receive this new sister as a gift from God," said grandma Read, wiping her spectacles.

"It seems so funny," said Susy, gently stroking the baby's face; "so funny for me to have a new sister."

"Now you've tolled a story, Susy Parlin; she was sended to me,-isn't I the littlest?" cried bruised and battered Prudy, shaking with another tempest of tears, and kissing the baby violently.

"O, mamma! O, grandma," said Susy, clasping her hands in alarm, "don't let her kiss that soft baby so hard! She'll draw the blood right through her cheeks."

The nurse who was a smiling woman, with a wart on her nose, began to frown a little, and grandma Read, patting Prudy's head, whispered to her that if she did not stop crying she must leave the room, as the noise she made disturbed her mother.

"Then I'll-I'll be-just as good as a lady, and I won't kiss her no more," replied little Prudy between her sobs, at the same time prying open baby's mouth with her busy fingers.

"Why, where's her teef? When you goin' to put in her teef?"

"O," said Susy, in an ecstasy, "isn't she such a velvet darling? What cunning little footsie-tootsies! Shaped just like a flatiron! But I haven't seen her eyes yet."

"There, look now," said Prudy, puffing in the baby's face; "her eyes has came! I've blowed 'em open."

"O, fie, Miss Prudy," said the nurse, biting her lips; "now you'll certainly have to leave the room. It's not safe for you to come near this tiny bit of a baby. Nobody ever knows what you are likely to do next."

Little Prudy hung her head in great dismay.

"Then, if she goes, I'll have to go too, or there'll be a fuss," sighed Susy, stroking the baby's hair, which was as soft as a mouse's fur.

Both children cast a lingering look at the bewitching little figure, so daintily wrapped in a fleecy blanket. Prudy felt tempted to snatch her up and give her a good hugging, but stood in mortal fear of the nurse. There was something awful about Mrs. Fling: Prudy presumed it was the wart on her nose.

When the children were outside the door, and grandma had closed it gently, they seated themselves on the upper step of the staircase, and began to talk over this strange affair.

"Don't you know what made me cry in there?" said Prudy. "The baby isn't only a girl, and that's why I cried."

For the moment Prudy fancied she was telling the truth.

Susy laughed. "Just to think of our keeping a boy in this house, Prudy Parlin!"

"O, no! course not!" returned her little sister, quickly; "we wouldn't keep a boy."

"You see," argued Susy, "it's boys that fires all the popguns, and whistle in your ears, and frighten you. Why, if this was a brother, we couldn't but just live! What made you cry for a brother, Prudy?"

"Poh, I didn't! I wouldn't have him for nothin' in my world! I'm glad God sended a girl, and that's what made me laugh."

"It seems so queer to think of it Prudy, I don't know what to do with myself, I declare."

"Well, I know what I'm goin' to do. I'll give her my red pocket-dress. She's come clear down from God's house, and this is a drefful cold world."

Susy knew that little Prudy's heart must be overflowing with sisterly love to the baby, or she would not be willing to give her the pocket-dress.

"She can tuck her candy in it," pursued Prudy; "'tisn't a believe-make, you know; there's a hole clear through. She can tuck her candy in, and her pyunes and pfigs, and teenty apples. Oho!"

"'Twill be as mother says about giving her your dress, Prudy; but we shall be glad to see you kind to the new sister," said Susy, who was fond of giving small lectures to Prudy. "We ought to be kind to her, for God sent her down on purpose. Of course it will be me that will take the most care of her; but maybe they'll let you watch her sometimes when she's asleep. Don't blow open her eyes any more, Prudy; that's very naughty. If we do just as we ought to, and are kind to her, she'll be a comfort, and grow up a lady!"

"O, will she?" asked Prudy, a little sadly. "I thought when she growed up she'd be a gemplum, like papa."

"What an idea! But that's just as much sense as you little bits o' children have! When you don't know about anything, Prudy, you may come and ask me; I'm most six."

The new baby was very wonderful indeed. The first thing she did was to cry; the next was to sneeze. Prudy wished "all the people down street, and all the ladies that lived in the whole o' the houses, could see the new sister." Her heart swelled with pride when admiring ladies took the unconscious little creature in their arms, saying, "Really, it is a remarkably pretty child. What starry eyes! What graceful little fingers! Isn't her mouth shaped like Prudy's?"

Mrs. Parlin did not approve of cradles, and the nurse had a fashion of rolling the baby in a blanket and laying her down in all sorts of places. One day little Prudy flung herself into the big rocking chair, not noticing the small bundle which lay there, under a silk handkerchief.

It was feared at first that the baby was crushed to death; but when she was heard to cry, Mrs. Parlin said, "We have great cause for thankfulness. So far as I can judge, it is only her nose that is broken!"

But the doctor pronounced the baby's bones as sound as ever.

"It is only little Miss Prudy whose nose is out of joint," added he.

Prudy ran to look in the glass, but could not see anything the matter with her nose, or anything that looked like "a joint." But after this she was as careful as a child of her heedless age can be, not to injure her tender sister. She never again saw a silk handkerchief without shaking it to make sure there was not a baby under it.

It was a long while before the friends could decide upon a name for this beautiful stranger.

"For my part I have no choice," said Mr. Parlin, "and only one remark to make; call the child by her right name, whatever it may be, for I am very much opposed to pet names, of all sorts."

After every one else had spoken, Mrs. Parlin suggested that she would like to call the baby Alice Barrow, in honor of a dear friend, now in heaven.

She grew to be a fair, fat baby; and while her teeth were pricking through, like little pointed pearls, Susy's front teeth were dropping out. Then she grew to be a toddling child; and while she was learning to walk, Prudy was beginning to sew patchwork. For time does not stand still; it passed, minute by minute, over the heads of Susy, Prudy, and Alice, as well as all the rest of the world. And soon it brought an end to Alice's babyhood.

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