Part 1

Produced by Al Haines.

_LITTLE PRUDY SERIES_

*LITTLE PRUDY'S CAPTAIN HORACE*

*BY SOPHIE MAY*

THE SAALFIELD PUBLISHING CO. CHICAGO -- AKRON, OHIO -- NEW YORK

1919

LITTLE PRUDY SERIES

LITTLE PRUDY LITTLE PRUDY'S STORY BOOK LITTLE PRUDY'S COUSIN GRACE LITTLE PRUDY'S CAPTAIN HORACE LITTLE PRUDY'S SISTER SUSIE LITTLE PRUDY'S DOTTY DIMPLE

*Contents*

I. Making Candy II. Camping Out III. Taking a Journey IV. At Grandpa Parlin's V. Captain of a Company VI. Susie and Prudy VII. In the Woods VIII. Captain Clifford IX. The Blue Book X. Trying to get Rich XI. The Little Indian XII. A Pleasant Surprise

*CAPTAIN HORACE*

*CHAPTER I*

*MAKING CANDY*

Grace and Horace Clifford lived in Indiana, and so were called "Hoosiers."

Their home, with its charming grounds, was a little way out of town, and from the front windows of the house you could look out on the broad Ohio, a river which would be very beautiful if its yellow waters were only once settled. As far as the eye could see, the earth was one vast plain, and, in order to touch it, the sky seemed to stoop very low; whereas, in New England, the gray-headed mountains appear to go up part way to meet the sky.

One fine evening in May, brown-eyed Horace and blue-eyed Grace stood on the balcony, leaning against the iron railing, watching the stars, and chatting together.

One thing is very sure: they never dreamed that from this evening their sayings and doings--particularly Horace's--were to be printed in a book. If anyone had whispered such a thing how dumb Horace would have grown, his chin snuggling down into a hollow place in his neck! and how nervously Grace would have laughed! walking about very fast, and saying,--

"O, it's too bad to put Horace and me in a book! I say it's too bad! Tell them to wait till my hair is curled, and I have my new pink dress on! And tell them to make Horace talk better! He plays so much with the Dutch boys. O, Horace isn't fit to print!"

This is what she might have said if she had thought of being "put in a book;" but as she knew nothing at all about it, she only stood very quietly leaning against the balcony-railing, and looking up at the evening sky, merry with stars.

"What a shiny night, Horace! What do the stars look like? Is it diamond rings?"

"I'll tell you, Gracie; it's cigars they look like--just the ends of cigars when somebody is smoking."

At that moment the cluster called the "Seven Sisters" was drowned in a soft, white cloud.

"Look," said Grace; "there are some little twinkles gone to sleep, all tucked up in a coverlet. I don't see what makes you think of dirty cigars! They look to me like little specks of gold harps ever so far off, so you can't hear the music. O, Horace, don't you want to be an angel, and play on a beautiful harp?"

"I don't know," said her brother, knitting his brows, and thinking a moment; "when I can't live any longer, you know, then I'd like to go up to heaven; but now, I'd a heap sooner be a soldier!"

"O, Horace, you'd ought to rather be an angel! Besides, you're too little for a _soldier_!"

"But I grow. Just look at my hands; they're bigger than yours, this minute!"

"Why, Horace Clifford, what makes them so black?"

"O, _that's_ no account! I did it climbin' trees. Barby tried to scour it off, but it sticks. I don't care--soldiers' hands ain't white, are they, Pincher?"

The pretty dog at Horace's feet shook his ears, meaning to say,--

"I should think not, little master; soldiers have very dirty hands, if you say so."

"Come," said Grace, who was tired of gazing at the far-off star-land; "let's go down and see if Barbara hasn't made that candy: she said she'd be ready in half an hour."

They went into the library, which opened upon the balcony, through the passage, down the front stairs, and into the kitchen, Pincher following close at their heels.

It was a very tidy kitchen, whose white floor was scoured every day with a scrubbing-brush. Bright tin pans were shining upon the walls, and in one corner stood a highly polished cooking-stove, over which Barbara Kinckle, a rosy-cheeked German girl, was stooping to watch a kettle of boiling molasses. Every now and then she raised the spoon with which she was stirring it, and let the half-made candy drip back into the kettle in ropy streams. It looked very tempting, and gave out a delicious odor. Perhaps it was not strange that the children thought they were kept waiting a long while.

"Look here, Grace," muttered Horace, loud enough for Barbara to hear; "don't you think she's just the slowest kind?"

"It'll sugar off," said Grace, calmly, as if she had made up her mind for the worst; "don't you know how it sugared off once when ma was making it, and let the fire go 'most out'?"

"Now just hear them childers," said good-natured Barbara; "where's the little boy and girl that wasn't to speak to me one word, if I biled 'em some candies?"

"There, now, Barby, I wasn't speaking to you," said Horace; "I mean I wasn't talking to _her_, Grace. Look here: I've heard you spell, but you didn't ask me my Joggerphy."

"_Geography_, you mean, Horace."

"Well, Geography, then. Here's the book: we begin at the Mohammedan."

Horace could pronounce that long name very well, though he had no idea what it meant. He knew there was a book called the Koran, and would have told you Mr. Mohammed wrote it; but so had Mr. Colburn written an Arithmetic, and whether both these gentlemen were alive, or both dead, was more than he could say.

"Hold up your head," said Grace, with dignity, and looking as much as possible like tall Miss Allen, her teacher. "Please repeat your verse."

The first sentence read, "They consider Moses and Christ as true prophets, but Mohammed as the greatest and last."

"I'll tell you," said Horace: "they think that Christ and Moses was good enough prophets, but Mohammed was a heap better."

"Why, Horace, it doesn't say any such thing in the book! it begins, '_They consider_.'"

"I don't care," said the boy, "Miss Jordan tells us to get the sense of it. Ma, mustn't I get the sense of it?" he added, as Mrs. Clifford entered the kitchen.

"But, mamma," broke in Grace, eagerly, "our teacher wants us to commit the verses: she says a great deal about committing the verses."

"If you would give me time to answer," said Mrs. Clifford, smiling, "I should say both your teachers are quite right. You should 'get the sense of it,' as Horace says, and after that commit the verses."

"But, ma, do you think Horace should say 'heap,' and 'no account,' and such words?"

"It would certainly please me," said Mrs. Clifford "if he would try to speak more correctly. My little boy knows how much I dislike some of his expressions."

"There, Horace," cried Grace, triumphantly, "I always said you talked just like the Dutch boys; and it's very, very improper!"

But just then it became evident that the molasses was boiled enough, for Barbara poured it into a large buttered platter, and set it out of doors to cool. After this, the children could do nothing but watch the candy till it was ready to pull.

Then there was quite a bustle to find an apron for Horace, and to make sure that his little stained hands were "spandy clean," and "fluffed" all over with flour, from his wrists to the tips of his fingers. Grace said she wished it wasn't so much trouble to attend to boys; and, after all, Horace only pulled a small piece of the candy, and dropped half of that on the nice white floor.

Barbara did the most of the pulling. She was quite a sculptor when she had plastic candy in her hands. Some of it she cut into sticks, and some she twisted into curious images, supposed to be boys and girls, horses and sheep.

After Grace and Horace had eaten several of the "boys and girls," to say nothing of "handled baskets," and "gentlemen's slippers," Barbara thought it high time they were "sound abed and asleep."

So now, as they go upstairs, we will wish them a good night and pleasant dreams.

*CHAPTER II*

*CAMPING OUT*

"What is the matter with my little son?" said Mr. Clifford, one morning at breakfast; for Horace sat up very stiffly in his chair, and refused both eggs and muffins, choosing instead a slice of dry toast and a glass of water.

"Are you sick, Horace?" asked his mother, tenderly.

"No, ma'am," replied the boy, blushing; "but I want to get to be a soldier!"

Mr. Clifford and his wife looked at each other across the table, and smiled.

"O, papa," said Grace, "I shouldn't want to be a soldier if I couldn't have anything nice to eat. Can't they get pies and canned peaches and things? Will they go without buckwheat cakes and sirup in the winter?"

"Ah! my little daughter, men who love their country are willing to make greater sacrifices than merely nice food."

Horace put on one of his lofty looks, for he somehow felt that his father was praising _him_.

"Pa," said Grace, "please tell me what's a sacrifice, anyhow?"

"A sacrifice, my daughter, is the giving up of a dear or pleasant thing for the sake of duty: that is very nearly what it means. For instance, if your mamma consents to let me go to the war, because she thinks I ought to go, she will make what is called a sacrifice."

"Do not let us speak of it now, Henry," said Mrs. Clifford, looking quite pale.

"O, my dear papa," cried Grace, bursting into tears, "we couldn't live if you went to the war!"

Horace looked at the acorn on the lid of the coffee-urn, but said nothing. It cost his little heart a pang even to think of parting from his beloved father; but then wouldn't it be a glorious thing to hear him called General Clifford? And if he should really go away, wasn't it likely that the oldest boy, Horace, would take his place at the head of the table?

Yes, they should miss papa terribly; but he would only stay away till he "got a general;" and for that little while it would be pleasant for Horace to sit in the arm-chair and help the others to the butter, the toast, and the meat.

"Horace," said Mr. Clifford, smiling, "it will be some years before you can be a soldier: why do you begin now to eat dry bread?"

"I want to get used to it, sir."

"That indeed!" said Mr. Clifford, with a good-natured laugh, which made Horace wince a little. "But the eating of dry bread is only a small part of the soldier's tough times, my boy. Soldiers have to sleep on the hard ground, with knapsacks for pillows; they have to march, through wet and dry, with heavy muskets, which make their arms ache."

"Look here, Barby," said Horace, that evening; "I want a knapsack, to learn to be a soldier with. If I have 'tough times' now, I'll get used to it. Can't you find me a carpet-bag, Barby?"

"Carpet-bag? And what for a thing is that?" said Barbara, rousing from a nap, and beginning to click her knitting-needles. "Here I was asleep again. Now, if I did keep working in the kitchen, I could sit up just what time I wants to; but when I sits down, I goes to sleep right off."

And Barbara went on knitting, putting the yarn over the needle with her left hand, after the German fashion.

"But the carpet-bag, Barby: there's a black one 'some place,' in the trunk-closet or up-attic. Now, Barby, you know I helped pick those quails yesterday."

"Yes, yes, dear, when I gets my eyes open."

"I would sleep out doors, but ma says I'd get cold; so I'll lie on the floor in the bathing-room. O, Barby, I'll sleep like a trooper!"

But Horace was a little mistaken. A hard, unyielding floor makes a poor bed; and when, at the same time, one's neck is almost put out of joint by a carpet-bag stuffed with newspaper, it is not easy to go to sleep.

In a short time the little boy began to feel tired of "camping out;" and I am sorry to say that he employed some of the moonlight hours in studying the workmanship of his mother's watch, which had been left, by accident, hanging on a nail in the bathing-room.

He felt very guilty all the while; and when, at last, a _chirr-chirr_ from the watch told that mischief had been done, his heart gave a quick throb of fright, and he stole off to his chamber, undressed, and went to bed in the dark.

Next morning he did not awake as early as usual, and, to his great dismay, came very near being late to breakfast.

"Good-morning, little buzzard-lark," said his sister, coming into his room just as he was thrusting his arms into his jacket.

"Ho, Gracie! why didn't you wake me up?"

"I spoke to you seven times, Horace."

"Well, why didn't you pinch me, or shake me awake, or something?"

"Why, Horace, then you'd have been cross, and said, 'Gracie Clifford, let me alone!' You know you would, Horace."

The little boy stood by the looking-glass finishing his toilet, and made no reply.

"Don't you mean to behave?" said he, talking to his hair. "There, now, you've parted in the middle! Do you s'pose I'm going to look like a girl? Part the way you ought to, and lie down smooth! We'll see which will beat!"

"Why, what in the world is this?" exclaimed Grace, as something heavy dropped at her feet.

It was her mother's watch, which had fallen out of Horace's pocket.

"Where did you get this watch?"

No answer.

"Why, Horace, it doesn't tick: have you been playing with it?"

Still no answer.

"Now, that's just like you, Horace, to shut your mouth right up tight, and not speak a word when you're spoken to. I never saw such a boy! I'm going downstairs, this very minute, to tell my mother you've been hurting her beautiful gold watch!"

"Stop!" cried the boy, suddenly finding his voice; "I reckon I can fix it! I was meaning to tell ma! I only wanted to see that little thing inside that ticks. I'll bet I'll fix it. I didn't go to hurt it, Grace!"

"O, yes, you feel like you could mend watches, and fire guns, and be soldiers and generals," said Grace, shaking her ringlets; "but I'm going right down to tell ma!"

Horace's lips curled with scorn.

"That's right, Gracie; run and _tell_!"

"But, Horace, I ought to tell," said Grace, meekly; "it's my duty! Isn't there a little voice at your heart, and don't it say, you've done wicked?"

"There's a voice there," replied the boy, pertly; "but it don't say what you think it does. It says, 'If your pa finds out about the watch, won't you catch it?'"

To do Horace justice, he did mean to tell his mother. He had been taught to speak the truth, and the whole truth, cost what it might. He knew that his parents could forgive almost anything sooner than a falsehood, or a cowardly concealment. Words cannot tell how Mr. Clifford hated deceit.

"When a _lie_ tempts you, Horace," said he, "scorn it, if it looks ever so white! Put your foot on it, and crush it like a snake!"

Horace ate dry toast again this morning, but no one seemed to notice it. If he had dared look up, he could have seen that his father and mother wore sorrowful faces.

After breakfast, Mr. Clifford called him into the library. In the first place, he took to pieces the mangled watch, and showed him how it had been injured.

"Have you any right to meddle with things which belong to other people, my son?" he said soberly.

Horace's chin snuggled down into the hollow place in his neck, and he made no reply.

"Answer me, Horace."

"No, sir."

"It will cost several dollars to pay for repairing this watch: don't you think the little boy who did the mischief should give part of the money?"

Horace looked distressed; his face began to twist itself out of shape.

"This very boy has a good many pieces of silver which were given him to buy fire-crackers. So you see, if he is truly sorry for his fault, he knows the way to atone for it."

Horace's conscience told him, by a twinge, that it would be no more than just for him to pay what he could for mending the watch.

"Have you nothing to say to me, my child?"

For, instead of speaking, the boy was working his features into as many shapes as if they had been made of gutta percha. This was a bad habit of his, though when he was doing it, he had no idea of "making up faces."

His father told him he would let him have the whole day to decide whether he ought to give up any of his money. A tear trembled in each of Horace's eyes, but, before they could fall, he caught them on his thumb and forefinger.

"Now," continued Mr. Clifford, "I have something to tell you. I decided last night to enter the army."

"O, pa," cried Horace, springing up, eagerly; "mayn't I go, too?"

"You, my little son?"

"Yes, pa," replied Horace, clinging to his father's knee. "Boys go to wait on the generals and things! I can wait on you. I can comb your hair, and bring your slippers. If I could be a waiter, I'd go a flying."

"Poor child," laughed Mr. Clifford, stroking Horace's head, "you're such a very little boy, only eight years old!"

"I'm going on nine. I'll be nine next New Year's Gift-day," stammered Horace, the bright flush dying out of his cheeks. "O, pa, I don't want you to go if I can't go too!"

Mr. Clifford's lips trembled. He took the little boy on his knee, and told him how the country was in danger, and needed all its brave men.

"I should feel a great deal easier about leaving my dear little family," said he, "if Horace never disobeyed his mother; if he did not so often fall into mischief; if he was always sure to _remember_."

The boy's neck was twisted around till his father could only see the back of his head.

"Look here, pa," said he, at last, throwing out the words one at a time, as if every one weighed a whole pound; "I'll give ma that money; I'll do it to-day."

"That's right, my boy! that's honest! You have given me pleasure. Remember, when you injure the property of another, you should always make amends for it as well as you can. If you do not, you're unjust and dishonest."

I will not repeat all that Mr. Clifford said to his little son. Horace thought then he should never forget his father's good advice, nor his own promises. We shall see whether he did or not.

He was a restless, often a very naughty boy; but when you looked at his broad forehead and truthful eyes, you felt that, back of all his faults, there was nobleness in his boyish soul. His father often said, "He will either make something or nothing," and his mother answered, "Yes, there never will be any half-way place for Horace."

Now that Mr. Clifford had really enlisted, everybody looked sad. Grace was often in tears, and said,--

"We can't any of us live, if pa goes to the war."

But when Horace could not help crying, he always said it was because he "had the earache;" and perhaps he thought it was.

Mrs. Clifford tried to be cheerful, for she was a patriotic woman; but she could not trust her voice to talk a great deal, or sing much to the baby.

As for Barbara Kinckle, she scrubbed the floors, and scoured the tins harder than ever, looking all the while as if every one of her friends was dead and buried. The family were to break up housekeeping and Barbara was very sorry. Now she would have to go to her home a little way back in the country, and work in the fields, as many German girls do every summer.

"O, my heart is sore," said she, "every time I thinks of it. They will in the cars go off, and whenever again I'll see the kliny (little) childers I knows not."

It was a sad day when Mr. Clifford bade good-by to his family. His last words to Horace were these: "Always obey your mother, my boy, and remember that God sees all you do."

He was now "Captain Clifford," and went away at the head of his company, looking like, what he really was, a brave and noble gentleman.

Grace wondered if he ever thought of the bright new buttons on his coat; and Horace walked about among his school-fellows with quite an air, very proud of being the son of a man who either was now, or was going to be, the greatest officer in Indiana!

If anybody else had shown as much self-esteem as Horace did, the boys would have said he had "the _big_ head." When Yankee children think a playmate conceited, they call him "stuck up;" but Hoosier children say he has "the _big_ head." No one spoke in this way of Horace, however, for there was something about him which made everybody like him, in spite of his faults.

He loved his play-fellows, and they loved him, and were sorry enough to have him go away; though, perhaps, they did not shed so many tears as Grace's little mates, who said, "they never'd have any more good times: they didn't mean to try."

Mrs. Clifford, too, left many warm friends, and it is safe to say that on the morning the family started for the East, there were a great many people "crying their hearts out of their eyes." Still, I believe no one sorrowed more sincerely than faithful Barbara Kinckle.

*CHAPTER III*

*TAKING A JOURNEY*

It was a great effort for Mrs. Clifford to take a journey to Maine with three children; but she needed the bracing air of New England, and so did Grace and the baby.

To be sure they had the company of a gentleman who was going to Boston; but he was a very young man indeed, who thought a great deal more of his new mustache than he did of trunks and checks, and tickets.

Twenty times a day Mrs. Clifford wished her husband could have gone with her before he enlisted, for she hardly knew what to do with restless little Horace. As for sitting still, it was more than the boy could do. He would keep jerking his inquisitive little head out of the window, for he never remembered a caution five minutes. He delighted to run up and down the narrow aisle and, putting his hands on the arms of the seats, swing backward and forward with all his might. He became acquainted with every lozenge-boy and every newspaper-boy on the route, and seemed to be in a high state of merriment from morning till night.

Grace, who was always proper and well-behaved, was not a little mortified by Horace's rough manners.

"He means no harm," Mrs. Clifford would say, with a smile and a sigh; "but Mr. Lazelle, if you will be so kind as to watch him a little, I will be greatly obliged."

Mr. Lazelle would reply, "O, certainly, madam; be quite easy about the child; he is not out of my sight for a moment!"

So saying, perhaps he would go in search of him, and find him under a seat playing with Pincher, his clothes covered with dust, and his cap lying between somebody's feet.

At such times Mr. Lazelle always said,--

"Upon my word, you're a pretty little fellow!" and looked as if he would like to shake him, if it were not for soiling his gloves.

Horace laughed when Mr. Lazelle called him "a pretty little fellow," and thought it a fine joke. He laughed, too, when the young man told him to "come out," for there was something in the pettish tone of his voice which Horace considered very amusing.

"I'll wait till he gets through scolding, and goes to coaxing," thought the boy: "he's a smart man! can't make such a little fellow mind!"

Mr. Lazelle was very much vexed with Horace, and firmly resolved that he would never again take charge of a lady traveling with children. At one time he flew into a passion, and boxed the boy's ears. Horace felt very much like a wounded wasp. He knew Mr. Lazelle would not have dared strike him before his mother, and from that moment he despised him as a "sneak."

Whenever Mr. Lazelle was looking for him in great haste, he was very likely to be missing; and when that sorely tried young gentleman was almost in despair, a saucy little head would appear at the car-window, and a small voice would shout,--

"Ho, Mr. Lazelle! why don't you come ahead? I beat you _in_!"

"Horace," said Mrs. Clifford, wearily, "you don't know how you tire me! Here is this dear baby that I have to hold in my arms; isn't it enough that I should have the care of him, without being all the while anxious about you?"