Watch Yourself Go By | Page 2

gravel at a pace that
soon brought her within reach of the prey pursued--a boy of four years,
in flapping pantalets and gingham frock.
The "boy" was headed for the family well as fast as his toddling legs
could carry him. Forbidden, punished, guarded, the child lost no
opportunity to climb to the top of the square enclosure and wonderingly
peer down into the depths of the well. To prevent his falling headlong
to his death--a calamity frequently predicted--was the principal concern
of all the family.
As the women folks were more often in the big kitchen than elsewhere,
it became, as a matter of convenience, the daily prison of the First Born.

The board, across the open doorway, and the eternal vigilance of his
guards, did not prevent his starting several times daily on a pilgrimage
towards the old well. The turning of a head, the absence of the guards
from the kitchen for a moment, were the looked-for
opportunities--crawling under or over the wooden bar, and starting in
childish glee for the old well.
Previous to the time of this narrative, the race invariably resulted in the
capture of "young hopeful" ere the well was reached. The shrill cry:
"Al-f-u-r-d!" "Al-f-u-r-d!" always closely followed by the young
woman who did the scouting for the other guards, brought him to a halt.
He was lifted bodily, thrown high into the air, caught in strong, loving
arms as he came down, roughly hugged and good-naturedly spanked,
and carried triumphantly back to his prison--the kitchen. Here, seated
upon the floor, he was roundly lectured by three women, who in turn
charged one another with his escape. It was never his fault. Someone
had turned a head to look at the clock, or the browning bread in the
oven, turning to look at the cause of the controversy, not infrequently
he was found astride the prison bar, or scampering down the path.
That old well, or its counterpart, was surely the inspiration of "The Old
Oaken Bucket." However, their author was never imbued with
fascination as alluring as that which influenced the First Born in his
desire to solve the, to him, mystery of the old well.
The more his elders coaxed, bribed and threatened, the more vividly
they depicted its dangers, the more determined he became to explore its
darkened depths. The old well became a part of the child's life. He
talked of it by day and dreamed of it by night. The big windlass, with
its coil of seemingly never-ending chain, winding and unwinding,
lowering and raising the old, oaken bucket green with age, full and
flowing; the cooling water oozing between the age-warped staves,
nurturing the green grasses growing about the box-like enclosure. How
cooling the grass was to his feet as on tip-toes peeking over the top of
the enclosure down into that which seemed to his childish imagination
a fathomless abyss, so deep that ray of sun or glint of moon never
penetrated to the surface of the water. The clanging of the chain, the

grinding of the heavy bucket bumping against the walled circle as it
descended, and the splash as it struck the water, were uncanny sounds
to the boy's ears. The desire to look down, down into the old well's
hidden secrets became to him almost a frenzy. The echoes coming up
from its shadowy depths were as those of a haunted glen.
He reasoned that all men and women were created to guard the well
and that it was his only duty in life to thwart them.
Balmy spring, with its song birds, buzzing bees and sweet-smelling
blossoms, coaxed every living thing out of doors; everything, except
the First Born and his guards.
Such was the situation when the bees swarmed. The guards "pricked up
their ears," then, with eyes looking heavenward, and snatching up tin
pans which they beat with spoons, sleigh-bells and other objects, they
rushed from the kitchen to work the usual charm of the country folk in
settling the swarming bees.
Thus unguarded, the little prisoner, carrying a three-legged stool that
aided him in surmounting the bar across the kitchen door, trekked for
the old well. Planting the stool at one side of the square enclosure, he
looked down into the cavernous depths; leaning far over, reached for
the chain, with the intention of lowering the bucket, as he had often
seen his elders do.
"Al-f-u-r-d!" "Al-f-u-r-d!"
And the sound of hurrying feet only urged the boy on. He had caught
hold of the bucket and was leaning far over the dark opening when he
felt a heavy hand upon his shoulders, and himself lifted from his high
perch, only to be dropped sprawling on the ground with a shower of tin
pans rattling about his devoted head. Then the