ing and
snore like a gaby disturbing his mother and father and brother and all
a-boring their ears with his snoring snoring snoring for himself and no
other for himself in particular wake up baby sit up perpendicular hark
to the gushing hark to the rushing where the sheep are the woolliest and
the lambs the unruliest and their tails the whitest and their eyes the
brightest and baby's the bonniest and baby's the funniest and baby's the
shiniest and baby's the tiniest and baby's the merriest and baby's
the worriest of all the lambs that plague their dams and mother's
the whitest of all the dams that feed the lambs that go crop-cropping
without stop-stopping and father's the best of all the swallows that
build their nest out of the shining shallows and he has the merriest
children that's baby and Diamond and Diamond and baby and baby and
Diamond and Diamond and baby--

Here Diamond's knees went off in a wild dance which tossed the baby
about and shook the laughter out of him in immoderate peals. His mother
had been listening at the door to the last few lines of his song, and
came in with the tears in her eyes. She took the baby from him, gave him
a kiss, and told him to run to his father.

By the time Diamond got into the yard, the horse was between the shafts,
and his father was looping the traces on. Diamond went round to look at
the horse. The sight of him made him feel very queer. He did not know
much about different horses, and all other horses than their own were
very much the same to him. But he could not make it out. This was
Diamond and it wasn't Diamond. Diamond didn't hang his head like that;
yet the head that was hanging was very like the one that Diamond used
to hold so high. Diamond's bones didn't show through his skin like that;
but the skin they pushed out of shape so was very like Diamond's skin;
and the bones might be Diamond's bones, for he had never seen the shape
of them. But when he came round in front of the old horse, and he put
out his long neck, and began sniffing at him and rubbing his upper lip
and his nose on him, then Diamond saw it could be no other than old
Diamond, and he did just as his father had done before--put his arms
round his neck and cried--but not much.

"Ain't it jolly, father?" he said. "Was there ever anybody so lucky as
me? Dear old Diamond!"

And he hugged the horse again, and kissed both his big hairy cheeks. He
could only manage one at a time, however--the other cheek