The Porter's Son Page #2

								

sentries presented arms to him, one of the most beautiful girls
presented arms to him, and became the General's lady, and in time they
had a pretty, charming child, that seemed as if it had dropped from
heaven, it was so pretty; and the porter's son danced before it in the
courtyard, as soon as it could understand it, and gave her all his
colored pictures, and little Emily looked at them, and was pleased,
and tore them to pieces. She was pretty and delicate indeed.

"My little Roseleaf!" cried the General's lady, "thou art born
to wed a prince."

The prince was already at the door, but they knew nothing of it;
people don't see far beyond the threshold.

"The day before yesterday our boy divided his bread and butter
with her!" said the porter's wife. There was neither cheese nor
meat upon it, but she liked it as well as if it had been roast beef.
There would have been a fine noise if the General and his wife had
seen the feast, but they did not see it.

George had divided his bread and butter with little Emily, and
he would have divided his heart with her, if it would have pleased
her. He was a good boy, brisk and clever, and he went to the night
school in the Academy now, to learn to draw properly. Little Emily was
getting on with her education too, for she spoke French with her
"bonne," and had a dancing master.


"George will be confirmed at Easter," said the porter's wife;
for George had got so far as this.

"It would be the best thing, now, to make an apprentice of him,"
said his father. "It must be to some good calling--and then he would
be out of the house."

"He would have to sleep out of the house," said George's mother.
"It is not easy to find a master who has room for him at night, and we
shall have to provide him with clothes too. The little bit of eating
that he wants can be managed for him, for he's quite happy with a
few boiled potatoes; and he gets taught for nothing. Let the boy go
his own way. You will say that he will be our joy some day, and the
Professor says so too."

The confirmation suit was ready. The mother had worked it herself;
but the tailor who did repairs had cut them out, and a capital
cutter-out he was.

"If he had had a better position, and been able to keep a workshop
and journeymen," the porter's wife said, "he might have been a court
tailor."

The clothes were ready, and the candidate for confirmation was
ready. On his confirmation day, George received a great pinchbeck
watch from his godfather, the old iron monger's shopman, the richest
of his godfathers. The watch was an old and tried servant. It always
went too fast, but that is better than to be lagging behind. That
was a costly present. And from the General's apartment there arrived a
hymn-book bound in morocco, sent by the little lady to whom George had
given pictures. At the beginning of the book his name was written, and
her name, as "his gracious patroness." These words had been written at
the dictation of the General's lady, and the General had read the
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