And she opened her eyes and shut them again, quite
dazzled; but she thought she saw papa and mamma standing beside her bed,
and the room was all on fire it was so bright to two, poor, sleepy, baby
eyes, and papa's voice seemed to say, a great way off:
"Poor, little, sleepy Tot."
It was such a queer dream, but not half so queer as what followed; for,
after a while, she woke up and went right on dreaming just the same.
That was very strange. How could it be anything else than a dream, to be
taken up by gaslight and dressed all in her little street coat and hat
before breakfast, to be made to drink milk and eat when she wasn't
hungry, to be petted and cried over and half crushed in mamma's arms, to
be taken by papa out into the cool, clear dawning, with the sky just
beginning to flush like a sea shell and a waking bird or two to twitter
about getting up, to be put into a coach that rolled and rumbled, to be
put into something else that rolled and rumbled a thousand times worse;
nothing had ever happened anything like this in any of Tot's waking
hours before.
After the sun had climbed up a little way into the sky, grown blue and
bluer, Tot began to accept the situation a little, and lay very still in
papa's arms (the fresh morning breeze tapping her cheek and lifting her
long crimped hair with cool, gentle fingers), watching the fences
running away like mad, the trees gliding gracefully by in long endless
procession, little white cottages and funny little hovels, and pretty
little villages hopping suddenly in and then as suddenly out of the
scene, a glimpse into shady depths of woods, a glint of a blue,
nestling, lily-pad-speckled pond, an emerald gleam of peaceful meadows,
a sight at a snowy tethered goat, of dappled grazing cows, a roll and
rush and roar through riven, dripping rocks.
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