lly
ought to begin to talk."

"He will talk, before long," her husband said, carelessly. "Many
children do not talk till they are eighteen months old, some not
till they are two years. Besides, you say he does begin, already."

"Yes, Robert, but not quite plainly."

"No, indeed, not plainly at all," her husband laughed. "Don't
trouble, my dear, he will talk soon enough; and if he only talks as
loud as he roars, sometimes, you will regret the hurry you have
been in about it."

"Oh, Robert, how can you talk so? I am sure he does not cry more
than other children. Nurse says he is the best child she ever
knew."

"Of course she does, my dear; nurses always do. But I don't say he
roars more than other children. I only say he roars, and that
loudly; so you need not be afraid of there being anything the
matter with his tongue, or his lungs.

"What fidgets you young mothers are, to be sure!"

"And what heartless things you young fathers are, to be sure!" his
wife retorted, laughing. "Men don't deserve to have children. They
do not appreciate them, one bit."

"We appreciate them, in our way, little woman; but it is not a
fussy way. We are content with them as they are, and are not in any
hurry for them to run, or to walk, or to cut their first teeth. Tom
is a fine little chap, and I am very fond of him, in his
way--principally, perhaps, because he is your Tom--but I cannot see
that he is a prodigy."

"He is a prodigy," Mrs. Ripon said, with a little toss of her head,
"and I shall go up to the nursery, to admire him."

So saying, she walked off with dignity; and Captain Ripon went out
to look at his horses, and thought to himself what a wonderful
dispensation of providence it was, that mothers were so fond of
their babies.

"I don't know what the poor little beggars would do," he muttered,
"if they had only their fathers to look after them; but I suppose
we should take to it, just as the old goose in the yard has taken
to that brood of chickens, whose mother was carried off by the fox.

"By the way, I must order some wire netting. I forgot to write for
it, yesterday."

Another two months. It was June, and now even Captain Ripon allowed
that Tom could say "Pa," and "Ma," with tolerable distinctness; but
as yet he had got no farther. He could now run about sturdily and,
as the season was warm and bright, and Mrs. Ripon believed in fresh
air, the child spent a considerable portion of his time in the
garden.

One