This accomplished, we played
"Master Rider," in which a small urchin capered about on a hobby
horse, going through a variety of adventures, and finally returning
with presents to wife and children. This in turn became a matter of
natural experience, and we moved towards our grand _coup d'etat._
Once a week we had dolls' day, when all the children who owned them
brought their dolls, and the exercises were ordered with the single
view of amusing and edifying them. The picture of that circle of
ragged children comes before me now and dims my eyes with its pathetic
suggestions.
Such dolls! Five-cent, ten-cent dolls; dolls with soiled clothes and
dolls in a highly indecorous state of nudity; dolls whose ruddy hues
of health had been absorbed into their mothers' systems; dolls made
of rags, dolls made of carrots, and dolls made of towels; but all
dispensing odors of garlic in the common air. Maternal affection,
however, pardoned all limitations, and they were clasped as fondly to
maternal bosoms as if they had been imported from Paris.
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