gnawed half through the board already. Espy ought to have tinned his trap.” So saying, Phonny stooped down and peeped into the trap again, through the crack under the lid.
“Who is Espy?” asked Wallace.
“Espy Ransom,” said Phonny. “He lives down by the mill. He is always setting traps for squirrels. I suppose that this road goes down to the mill, and that he came up here and set his trap. But it won’t do to leave the squirrel here,” continued Phonny, looking at Wallace in a very earnest manner. “It never will do in the world.”
“What shall we do, then?” asked Wallace.
“Couldn’t we carry him down to Espy?” said Phonny.
“I don’t think that we have any right to carry him away. It is not our squirrel, and it may be that it is not Espy’s.”
Phonny seemed perplexed. After a moment’s pause he added, “Couldn’t we go down and tell Espy that there is a squirrel in his trap?”
“Yes,” said Wallace, “that we can do.”
Phonny stooped down and peeped into the trap again.
“The rogue,” said he. “The moment that I am gone, he will go to gnawing again, I suppose, and so get out and run away. What a little fool he is.”
“Do you think he is a fool for trying to gnaw out of that trap?” asked Wallace.
“Why no,” – said Phonny, “but I wish he wouldn’t do it. We will go down quick and tell Espy.”
So Phonny came back to the place where Wallace had remained in the road, holding the horses. Phonny let down the bars, and Wallace went through with the horses. Phonny immediately put the bars up again, took the bridle of his own horse from Wallace’s hands, threw it up over the horse’s head, and then by the help of a large log which lay by the side of the road, he mounted. He did all this in a hurried manner, and ended with saying:
“Now, Cousin Wallace, let’s push on. I don’t think it’s more than half a mile to the mill.”
Chapter III
The Plowing
While Wallace and Phonny were taking their ride, as described in the last chapter, Stuyvesant and Beechnut were plowing.
Beechnut told Stuyvesant that he was ready to yoke up, as he called it, as soon as the horses had gone.
“Well,” said Stuyvesant, “I will come. I have got to go up to my room a minute first.”
So Stuyvesant went up to his room, feeling in his pockets as he ascended the stairs, to find the keys of his trunk. When he reached his room, he kneeled down before his trunk and unlocked it.
He raised the lid and began to take out the things. He took them out very carefully, and laid them in order upon a table which was near the trunk. There were clothes of various kinds, some books, and several parcels, put up neatly in paper. Stuyvesant stopped at one of these parcels, which seemed to be of an irregular shape, and began to feel of what it contained through the paper.
“What is this?” said he to himself. “I wonder what it can be. Oh, I remember now, it is my watch-compass.”
What Stuyvesant called his watch-compass, was a small pocket-compass made in the form of a watch. It was in a very pretty brass case, about as large as a lady’s watch, and it had a little handle at the side, to fasten a watch-ribbon to. Stuyvesant’s uncle had given him this compass a great many years before. Stuyvesant had kept it very carefully in his drawer at home, intending when he should go into the country to take it with him, supposing that it would be useful to him in the woods. His sister had given him a black ribbon to fasten to the handle. The ribbon was long enough to go round Stuyvesant’s neck, while the compass was in his waistcoat pocket.
Stuyvesant untied the string, which was around the paper that contained his compass, and took it off. He then wound up this string into a neat sort of coil, somewhat in the manner in which fishing-lines are put up when for sale in shops. He put this coil of twine, together with the paper, upon the table. He looked at the compass a moment to see which was north in his chamber, and then putting the compass itself in his pocket, he passed the ribbon round his neck, and afterward went on taking the things out of his trunk.
When he came pretty near to the bottom of his trunk, he said to himself,
“Ah! here it is.”
At the same moment he took out a garment, which seemed to be a sort of frock. It was made of brown linen. He laid it aside upon a chair, and then began to put the things back into his trunk again. He laid them all in very carefully, each in its own place. When all were in, he shut down the lid of the trunk, locked it, and put the key in his pocket. Then he took the frock from the chair, and opening it, put it on.
It was made somewhat like a cartman’s frock. Stuyvesant had had it made by the seamstress at his mother’s house, in New York, before he came away. He was a very neat and tidy boy about his dress, and always felt uncomfortable if his clothes were soiled or torn. He concluded, therefore, that if he had a good, strong, serviceable frock to put on over his other clothes, it would be very convenient for him at Franconia.
As soon as his frock was on, he hastened down stairs and went out to the barn in search of Beechnut. He found him yoking up the cattle.
“Why, Stuyvesant,” said Beechnut, when he saw him, “that is a capital frock that you have got. How much did it cost?”
“I don’t know,” said Stuyvesant; “Mary made it for me.”
“Who is Mary?” asked Beechnut.
“She is the seamstress,” said Stuyvesant. “She lives at our house in New York.”
“Do you have a seamstress there all the time?” said Beechnut.
“Yes,” said Stuyvesant.
“And her name is Mary,” said Beechnut.
“Yes,” said Stuyvesant.
“Well, I wish she would take it into her head to make me such a frock as that,” said Beechnut.
During this conversation, Beechnut had been busily employed in yoking up the oxen. Stuyvesant looked on, watching the operations carefully, in order to see how the work of yoking up was done. He wished to see whether the process was such that he could learn to yoke up oxen himself; or whether any thing that was required was beyond his strength.
“Can boys yoke up cattle?” said Stuyvesant at length.
“It takes a pretty stout boy,” said Beechnut.
“Could a boy as stout as I am do it?” asked Stuyvesant.
“It would be rather hard work for you,” said Beechnut, “the yoke is pretty heavy.”
The yoke was indeed quite heavy, and it was necessary to lift it – one end at a time – over the necks of the oxen. Stuyvesant observed that the oxen were fastened to the yoke, by means of bows shaped like the letter U. These bows were passed up under the necks of the oxen. The ends of them came up through the yokes and were fastened there by little pegs, which Beechnut called keys. There was a ring in the middle of the yoke on the under side to fasten the chain to, by which the
