The Swiss Twins | Page 6

of reach;
"you'll spill the baby's supper!" And Bello, thinking she meant that he
should beg for it, sat up on his hind legs with his front paws crossed
and barked three times, as Fritz had taught him to do.
"He must have a bite or he'll forget his manners," laughed Fritz, and
Leneli broke off a crumb of bread and tossed it to him. Bello caught it
before it fell, swallowed it at one gulp, and begged for more.
"No, no," said Leneli, "good old Bello, go now with Fritz and help him
drive the goats to the milking-shed, and by and by you shall have your
supper."
Fritz whistled, and instantly Bello was off like a shot after Nanni, the
brown goat, who was already on her way to the garden to eat the young
green carrot-tops she saw peeping out of the ground.
"It's time that child was in bed," said the cuckoo to himself, and out he
came from his little house and called "cuckoo" seven times so
reproachfully that Leneli hastened upstairs with the baby and put her
down in her crib at once.
Baby Roseli did not agree with the cuckoo. She wanted to stay up and
play with Bello, and hear the robin sing, but Leneli sat down beside the
crib, and while Mother Adolf milked the goats she sang over and over
again an old song.
"Sleep, baby, sleep!
Thy father watches the sheep,
Thy mother is shaking the dreamland tree
And down falls a little dream on thee.

Sleep, baby, sleep!"
"Sleep, baby, sleep!
The large stars are the sheep,
The little stars are the lambs, I guess,
And the silver moon is the shepherdess.
Sleep, baby, sleep!"
Over and over she sang it, until at last the heavy lids closed over the
blue eyes. Then she crept quietly down the creaking stairs in the dark,
and ate her bread and cheese and drank her soup by candle-light with
her father and mother, Seppi and Fritz, all seated about the kitchen
table.
By nine o'clock the room was once more silent and deserted, the little
mouse was creeping quietly from his hole in the wall, and Bello lay by
the door asleep with his nose on his paws. High over Mt. Pilatus the
moon sailed through the star-lit sky, bathing the old gray farm-house in
silver light and playing hide and seek with shadows on the
snow-capped peaks.
"Cuckoo," called the tiny wooden cuckoo nine times, and at once the
bells in the village steeple answered him. "That's as it should be,"
ticked the cuckoo. "That church-bell is really very intelligent. Let me
see; to-morrow morning I must wake the roosters at three, and the sun
at four, and the family must be up by five. I'll just turn in and get a
wink of sleep myself while I can," and he popped into the clock ones
more and shut the door.
II. THE TWINS LEARN A NEW TRADE
THE TWINS LEARN A NEW TRADE
At five o'clock the next morning Father and Mother Adolf were already
up, and the cuckoo woke Fritz, but though he shouted five times with
all his might and main, neither Seppi nor Leneli stirred in their sleep.
"Fritz, go wake the Twins," said Mother Adolf, when he came to the
door of the shed where she was milking the goats. "Only don't wake the
baby. I want her to sleep as long as she will."
"Yes, Mother," said Fritz dutifully, and he was off at once, leaping up
the creaky stairs three steps at a time.
He went first to Leneli's bed and tickled her toes. She drew up her
knees and slept on. Then he went to Seppi's bed, and when shaking and
rolling over failed to rouse him, he took him by one leg and pulled him

out of bed. Seppi woke up with a roar and cast himself upon Fritz, and
in a moment the two boys were rolling about on the floor, yelling like
Indians. The uproar woke Leneli, and the baby too, and Mother Adolf,
hearing the noise, came running from the goat-shed just in time to find
Seppi sitting on top of Fritz beating time on his stomach to a tune
which he was singing at the top of his lungs. The baby was crowing
with delight as she watched the scuffle from Leneli's arms.
Mother Adolf gazed upon this lively scene with dismay. Then she
picked Seppi off Fritz's stomach and gazed sternly at her oldest son.
"Fritz," said she, "I told you to be quiet and not wake the baby."
"I was quiet," said Fritz, sitting up. "I was just as quiet as I could be,
but they wouldn't wake up that way, so I had to pull Seppi