Daddy Takes Us Skating - Howard R. Garis
DADDY TAKES US SKATING
By
HOWARD R. GARIS
1914
CHAPTER I
A COLD NIGHT
"Oh, how red your nose is!" cried little Mabel Blake, one day, as her
brother Hal came running out of the school yard, where he had been
playing with some other boys. Mabel was waiting for him to walk home
with her as he had promised.
"So's your's red, too, Mab!" Harry said. "It's as red--as red as some
of the crabs we boiled at our seashore cottage this summer."
"Is my nose red?" asked Mab of some of her girl friends.
"It surely is!" replied Jennie Bruce. "All our noses are red!" she
went on. "It's the cold that makes 'em so. It's very cold to-day, and
soon it will be winter, with lots of snow and ice! Oh! I just love
winter!"
"Come on, Hal!" called Mab. "Let's hurry home before it gets any
colder!"
"Let's run!" suggested Hal. "When you run you get warm, and you don't
mind the cold."
"What makes us get warm when we run?" his sister inquired, as she took
hold of his hand and raced along beside him.
"I don't know," Hal answered, "but we'll ask Daddy when we get home.
He can tell us everything."
"Huh! Not everything!" cried Sammie Jones, one of the nice boys with
whom Hal played, "Your father doesn't know everything."
"Yes he does, too!" exclaimed Hal. Doesn't he, Mab?"
"Yep!" answered the little girl, shaking her head from side to side so
fast that you could hardly tell which were her curls and which was her
hair ribbon.
"Huh! Does your father know what makes a steam engine go?" asked
Sammie.
"Sure he does!" said Hal. "And he told us about it once, too; didn't
he, Mab?"
"Yes, he did," the little girl answered. "I know, too. It's hot water
in the boiler that makes it go. The hot water swells up, and turns
into steam, and the steam pushes on the wheels, and that makes the
engine go."
"And our Daddy knows what makes an automobile go, too," went on Hal.
"He knows everything."
"Huh! Well, I guess mine does then, too!" spoke Sammie. I'm going to
ask him what--what--makes it lightning!"
"And then will you tell us?" asked Mab, for she and Hal wanted to know
about everything they saw.
"Yes, I'll tell you," promised Sammie. "And we'll ask Daddy Blake what
makes us warm inside when we run," went on Hal, "and then we'll tell
you that, Sammie."
The children ran home from school, and, thought it was cold, for it
was almost winter now, they did not mind it. Their noses got more and
more red, it is true, but they knew when they were in the house, near
the warm fire, the red would all fade out.
Hal and Mab said good-bye to Sammie, as he turned down his street,
and then the little Blake boy and girl, hand in hand, ran on to their
house.
As they reached it they saw their mamma and their Aunt Lolly out in
the front yard, bringing in pots of flowers and vines.
"Quick, children!" called Mamma Blake, "You are just in time! Here,
Hal, you and Mab put down your books" and help us to carry in the
flowers. Take only the small pots, and don't drop them, or get any
dirt on your clothes."
"Oh, I'm sure something will happen if you let the children carry any
of the flowers!" cried Aunt Lolly, who was a dear, fussy little old
lady. "They'll drop them on their toes, or spill the dirt on the
floor--or something."
"Oh, I guess not," laughed Mamma Blake. "Anyhow we need help to get
all the plants in before dark. There is going to be a very heavy
frost, and everything will freeze hard to-night. It will be very
cold!"
"Is that why you are bringing in the plants, mamma?" asked Mab.
"Yes, so they will not freeze and die," Mrs. Blake answered. "Flowers
freeze very easily."
The children were glad to help their mother and Aunt Lolly. Roly-Poly,
the fat little white poodle dog, tried to help, too, but he upset more
plants than he carried in, though he did manage to drag one pot to the
steps.
Besides, Roly-Poly was always running off to look for a clothespin,
or something like that, to bury under the earth, making believe, I
suppose, that it was a bone.
"The ground will soon be frozen too hard for you to dig in it with
your paws, Roly-Poly," said Mamma Blake, when it was nearly dark, and
all the plants had been brought into the warm kitchen. "Come, now
children," she called. "Wash your hands, and supper will soon be
ready. Then Daddy will be here, and he will shake down the furnace
fire, and make it hot, for it is going to be a very cold night."
A little later, when supper was almost ready, a step was heard in the
front hall.
"Oh, here comes Daddy now!" cried Mab, making a rush for the door.
"Let's ask him what makes the cold," exclaimed Hal, "and why we get
warm inside when we run." Hal was very curious.
"Ah, here we are!" cried Mr. Blake, with a jolly laugh, as he came in
rubbing his ears. He caught Hal up in one arm, and Mab in the other.
"Oh, how cold your cheeks are, Daddy!" cried Mab as she kissed him.
"Yes, it is going to be a frosty night, and freeze," he said. "And if
it freezes enough I will tell you a secret I have been keeping for
some time."
"Oh Daddy! Another secret!" cried Mab. "Tell us what it is, please!"
"Wait until we see if it freezes hard enough to-night," replied her
papa.
CHAPTER II
THE ICE IN THE BOTTLE
Hal and Mab were so excited at hearing their father speak about a new
secret, that they could hardly eat their supper. There were so many
questions they wanted to ask. But they managed to clear their plates,
and then, when Mr. Blake had on his slippers, and had put plenty of
coal on the furnace, Hal climbed up on one knee, and Mab on the other.
"Now, Daddy, please tell us the secret," begged the little girl.
"And tell us what makes water freeze, and how it gets cold, and what
makes us warm when we run," added Hal. "Sammie Jones is going to ask
his father what makes it lightning in a thunder storm."
"My goodness me sakes alive, and some peanut candy!" cried Daddy Blake
with a laugh. "What a lot of questions!"
"But the secret first, please," begged Mab.
"Well, let me see if it is going to be cold enough for me to tell
you," said Mr. Blake. "It must be freezing cold, or the secret will be
of no use."
Daddy Blake went to the door, outside of which hung an instrument
called a thermometer. I guess you have seen them often enough. A
thermometer is a glass tube, fastened to a piece of wood or perhaps
tin, and inside is a thin, shiny column. This column is mercury, or
quicksilver. Some thermometers have, instead of mercury, alcohol,
colored red, so it can easily be seen.
You see mercury, or alcohol, will not freeze, except in much colder
weather than you ever have where you live, unless you live at the
North Pole. Up there it gets so cold that sometimes alcohol will
became as thick as molasses, and then it is not of any use in a
thermometer. But mercury will not freeze, even at the North Pole.
The word thermometer means something by which heat can be measured.
"Thermos" is a Greek word, meaning heat, and "Meter" means to measure.
Though of course a thermometer will measure cold as well as heat.
"Is it cold enough?" asked Hal, as Daddy Blake came back from looking
at the thermometer.
"Not quite," his father answered. "But the mercury is going down the
tube."
"What makes it go down?" asked Mab.
"Well, let me think a minute, and I'll see if I can make it simple
enough so you can understand," said Daddy Blake.
Those of you who have read the other "Daddy" books know how many
things Mr. Blake told his children, and what good times Hal and Mab
had with him. He was always taking them somewhere, and often one or
the other of the children would call out:
"Oh, Daddy is going to take us walking!"
Sometimes perhaps it might not be for a walk. It might be for a trip
in the steam cars. But, wherever it was, Hal and Mab were always ready
to go with their father.
In the first book I told you how Daddy Blake took Hal and Mab camping.
They went to live in the woods in a white tent and had lots of fun.
Once they were frightened in the night, but it was only because
Roly-Poly, their poodle dog--
But there, I'm not going to spoil it by telling you, when you might
want to read the book for yourself.
In the second volume, called "Daddy Takes Us Fishing," I made up a
story about how Hal and Mab went to the seashore cottage, and learned
to catch different kinds of fish; even the queer, pinching crabs, that
turned red when you boiled them.
Once Mab fell overboard, and the children nearly drifted out to sea,
but they got safely back. After that they went to the big animal show.
And in the book "Daddy Takes Us to the Circus," I told you how Hal and
Mab were accidentally taken away in one of the circus wagons, and how
they traveled all night. And the next day they rode on the elephant's
back, and also on a camel's and they went in the big parade. Oh! it
was just wonderful the adventures they had!
Hal and Mab lived with their papa and mamma, and Aunt Lolly, in a fine
house in the city. But they often went to the country and to other
places where they had good times. In the family was also Uncle
Pennywait. That wasn't his real name, but the children called him that
because he so often said:
"Wait a minute and I'll give you a penny."
Hal and Mab used to buy lollypops with the pennies their uncle gave
them. And then--Oh, yes, I mustn't forget Roly-Poly, the funny, fat,
poodle dog who was always hiding things in holes in the ground,
thinking they were bones, I guess. Sometimes he would even hide Aunt
Lolly's spectacles and she would have the hardest work finding them.
Oh, such hard work!
"Well, Daddy," asked Mab, after Mr. Blake had sat silent for some
time, "have you thought of a way to tell us what makes the shiny stuff
in the--in the--in the--Oh! I can't say that big word!" she finished
with a sigh.
"The mercury in the thermometer!" laughed Daddy Blake. "You want to
know what makes it go down? Well, it's the cold. You see cold makes
anything get smaller and shrink, and heat makes things swell up, and
get larger. That's why the steam from hot water swells up and makes
the engine go, and pull the cars.
"And in hot weather the mercury swells, puffs itself out and creeps
up inside the little glass tube. In winter the mercury gets cold, and
shrinks down, just as it is doing to-night."
"But will it get cold enough so you can tell us the secret?" Hal
wanted to know, most anxiously.
"Perhaps," said his father. "We will try it and see. I will fill a
bottle with water, and we will set it out on the back porch to freeze.
If it freezes by morning I will know that I can tell you the secret."
"Oh, do we have to wait until morning?" cried Mab, in disappointed
tones.
"That won't be long," laughed her father. "You can hardly keep your
eyes open now. I guess the sand man has been here. Go to bed, and it
will soon be morning. Then, if there is ice in the bottle, I'll tell
you the secret."
Daddy Blake took a bottle, and filled it with water. He put the cork
in tightly, and then twisted some wires over the top.
"What are the wires for?" asked Hal.
"So the ice, that I think will freeze inside the bottle, will not push
out the cork," explained Daddy Blake. "Now off to bed with you!"
You may be sure Hal and Mab did not want to go to bed, even if they
were sleepy. They wanted to stay up and watch the water in the bottle
freeze. But Mamma Blake soon had them tucked snugly under the covers.
Then Daddy Blake fixed the furnace fire for the night, as it was
getting colder and colder. Next he opened a package he had brought
home with him. Something inside jingled and clanked, and shone in the
lamplight as brightly as silver.
"What have you there?" asked Aunt Lolly.
"That's the children's secret," answered Daddy Blake, as he wrapped
the package up again.
Hal was up first in the morning, but Mab soon followed him.
"Daddy, where is the bottle?" called Hal.
"May we get it?" asked Mab.
"Oh, it is much too cold for you to go out until you are warmly
dressed!" cried Daddy. "I'll bring the bottle in so you can see it."
He went out on the porch in his bath robe and slippers, and quickly
brought in the bottle of water he had set out the night before.
"Oh, look!" cried Hal.
For the bottle was broken into several pieces, and standing up on the
board on which it had been set, was a solid, clear piece of ice, just
the shape of the glass bottle itself.
"Oh, somebody broke our bottle!" cried Mab. "Now we can't hear the
secret!"
CHAPTER III
THE NEW SKATES
Daddy Blake laughed when Mab said that.
"Yes, the bottle is broken," he said, "but it was the ice that broke
it."
"How could it?" Hal wanted to know.
"I told you last night," said Daddy Blake, when the children were at
breakfast table a little later, "that heat made things get larger, and
that cold made them get smaller. That was true, but sometimes, as you
see now, freezing cold makes water get larger. That is when it is cold
enough to make ice.
"As long as there was only water in the bottle it was all right, the
glass was not broken. But in the night it got colder and colder. All
the warmth was drawn off into the cold air. Then the water froze, and
swelled up. The ice tried to push the cork out of the bottle, just as
you would try to push up the lid of a box if you were shut up inside
one."
"I guess the wires over the cork wouldn't let the ice push it out,"
spoke Hal.
"That's it," Daddy Blake answered. "And so, as the ice could not lift
out the cork, it swelled to the sides, instead of to the top, and
pushing out as hard as it could, it broke the bottle. The glass fell
away, and left a little statue of ice, just the shape of the bottle,
standing in its place.
"How wonderful!" cried Mab, her blue eyes open wide.
"Yes, the freezing of ice is very wonderful," Daddy Blake said, as he
passed Hal his third slice of bread and jam. "If the cracks in a great
rock became filled with water, and the water froze, the swelling of
the ice would split the great, strong stone.
"There is scarcely anything that can stand against the swelling of
freezing ice. If you filled a big, hollow cannon ball with water, and
let it freeze, the ice would burst the iron."
"It burst our milk bottle once, I know," said Aunt Lolly.
"Yes," spoke Daddy Blake. "That is why, on cold mornings, the milkman
raises the tin top on the bottle. That gives the frozen milk a chance
to swell up out of the top, and saves the bottle from cracking."
"One morning last winter," said Mamma Blake, "when we had milk bottles
with the pasteboard tops, the milk froze and there was a round bit of
frozen milk sticking up out of the bottle, with the round pasteboard
cover on top, like a hat."
"And that's what saved the bottle from breaking," said Daddy Blake,
"If I had not wired down the cork of our bottle the water would have
pushed itself up, after it was frozen, and would have stuck out of the
bottle neck, like a round icicle."
"But what about our secret?" asked Hal. "Is it cold enough for you to
tell us about it?"
"I think so," answered Daddy Blake, with a queer little twinkle in his
eyes. "As long as the water in the bottle was frozen, the pond will
soon be covered with ice," he said. "And we need ice to make use of
the secret."
"Oh, I just wonder what it is?" cried Mab, clapping her hands.
"I think I can guess," spoke Hal.
Daddy Blake went out in the hall, and came back with two paper
bundles. He placed one at Mab's place, and gave the other to Hal.
"I want something, so I can cut the string!" Hal cried, and he laid
his package down on the floor, while he searched through his pockets
for his knife.
Just then Roly-Poly came into the breakfast room, barking. He saw
Hal's package on the floor, and, thinking, I suppose, that it must be
meant for him to play with, the little poodle dog at once began to
drag it away. Though, as the ground was frozen, I don't know how he
was going to bury it, if that was what he intended to do.
"Hi there, Roly!" cried Hal. "Come back with that, if you please,
sir!"
"Bow-wow!" barked the little poodle dog, and I suppose he was saying:
"Oh, can't I have it a little while?"
By this time Mab had her package open.
"Oh!" she cried. "It's skates! Ice skates! Oh, I've always wanted a
pair!"
"Ha! That's what I thought they were, when Daddy talked so much about
ice and freezing," said Hal.
He had managed, in the meanwhile, to get his bundle away from
Roly-Poly.
Opening it, Hal found in the package a pair of shining ice skates,
just like those Mab was trying on her shoes.
"Oh, thank you, Daddy!" Hal cried.
"And I thank you, too!" added Mab. I'd get up and kiss you, only my
mouth is all jam. I'll kiss you twice as soon as I've washed."
"That will do," laughed her father. "Do you like your skates,
children?"
"Oh, do we?" they cried, and by the way they said it you could easily
tell that they did.
"And Daddy's going to take us skating; aren't you?" asked Hal as he
measured his skates on his shoes to see if they would fit. They did.
Oh! Daddy Blake knew just how to buy things to have them right, I tell
you.
"Yes, I'll take you skating, and show you how to stand up on the
ice--that is as soon as it is thick enough on the pond to make it
safe, and hold us up," promised the children's father.
Just then Mamma Blake came running up from down the cellar. She was
much excited.
"Oh, come quickly!" she called to her husband. "Something has happened
to the stationary wash-tubs. The water is spurting all over the
cellar. Oh, do hurry!"
CHAPTER IV
THE FROZEN POND
Daddy Blake hurried down cellar. Hal and Mab carefully putting away
their new skates, followed their father. Roly-Poly, the little fat
poodle dog looked around to see if he could find anything to drag
off and hide, but, seeing nothing, he went down cellar also, barking
loudly at each step.
"Hal! Mab!" called Aunt Lolly. "Come back here, dears!"
"We want to see what has happened!" answered Hal.
"Oh, you'll get hurt! I'm sure you will!" exclaimed the dear, little,
fussy old lady aunt.
"No, it isn't anything serious!" called Daddy Blake when he saw what
had happened. "Only one of the water pipes has burst. We must send for
the plumber. Wait, children, until I shut off the water, and then you
can come down. It is like a shower-bath now."
Daddy Blake found the faucet, by which he could shut off the water at
the stationary wash-tubs, and then, when it had stopped spurting from
the burst pipe, he called to Hal and Mab:
"Now you may come and see how strong ice is. Not only does it burst
glass bottles, but it will even crack an iron pipe."
"Just like it cracked a cannon ball!" cried Hal, and he was in such a
hurry to get down the cellar steps that he jumped two at a time.
That might have been all right, only Roly-Poly, the little fat poodle
dog, did the same thing. He became tangled up in Hal's legs, and,
a moment later, the little boy and the dog were rolling toward the
bottom of the steps, over and over just like a pumpkin.
"Oh!" cried Mab, holding fast to the handrail, a little frightened.
"Oh my!" exclaimed Mamma Blake at the top of the cellar steps. "What
has happened?"
"Oh my goodness me sakes alive and some orange pudding!" exclaimed
Aunt Lolly. "I just knew _something_ would happen!"
But nothing much did, after all, for Daddy Blake, as soon as he heard
Hal falling, ran to the foot of the stairs, and there he caught his
little boy before Hal had bounced down many steps.
"There you are!" cried Daddy Blake, as he set Hal upright on his feet.
"Not hurt a bit; are you?"
"N-n-n-n-no!" stammered Hal, as he caught his breath, which had almost
gotten away from him. "I'm not hurt. Is Roly-Poly?"
Roly was whirling about, barking and trying to catch his tail, so I
guess he was not much hurt. The truth was that both Hal and Roly were
so fat and plump, that falling down a few cellar steps did not hurt
them in the least.
"Well, now we'll look at the burst water pipe," said Daddy Blake,
when the excitement was over. The water had stopped spurting out now,
though there was quite a puddle of it on the cellar floor by the tubs.
Mr. Blake lifted Hal across this, and showed him where there was a big
crack in the water pipe. Then he showed Mab, also lifting her across
the little pond in the cellar.
"You see the pipe was full of water," Mr. Blake explained, "and in the
night it got so cold down cellar that the water froze, just as it did
in the glass bottle out on the back porch.
"Then the ice swelled up, and it was so strong that it burst the
strong iron pipe, splitting it right down the side."
"But why didn't the water spurt out when I came down cellar earlier
this morning?" asked Mamma Blake. "It did not leak then."
"I suppose it was still frozen," answered her husband. "But when the
furnace fire became hotter it melted the ice in the pipe and that let
the water spurt out. But the plumber will soon fix it."
Hal and Mab watched the plumber, to whom their papa telephoned. He had
to take out the broken pipe, and put in a new piece. Afterward Hal
looked at the pipe that had been split by the ice.
"Why it's just as if gun-powder blew it up," he said, for once he had
seen a toy cannon that had burst on Fourth of July, from having too
much powder in it.
"Yes, freezing ice is just as strong as gunpowder, only it works more
slowly," said Daddy Blake with a smile. "Powder goes off with a puff,
a flash and a roar, but ice freezes slowly."
"Oh, but when are we going skating?" asked Mab, as she and her brother
started for school, a little later that morning.
"As soon as I can find a frozen pond," said Daddy Blake with a smile.
Well wrapped up, and wearing warm gloves, Hal and Mab went to their
lessons. It was so cold that wintry day, though there was no snow,
that they ran instead of walking. Running made them warm.
"Is my nose red?" asked Mab, when they were near the school.
"Oh, it's awful red!" cried Hal. "Is mine?"
"As red as a boiled lobster!" laughed Mab. "Let's run faster!"
So they ran, and soon they were in a glow of warmth.
"Oh!" cried Mab, as she and her brother entered the school-yard, "we
forgot to ask Daddy why we get warm when we run."
When the two children reached their house, after lessons were over for
the day, they found their father waiting for them. He had his skates
over his shoulder, dangling from a strap, and he had Hal's and Mab's
in his hand.
"Come, we are going to look for the frozen pond!" he said.
Then Hal and Mab forgot all about asking why they became warm when
they ran. They cried out joyfully:
"Oh, Daddy is going to take us skating! Daddy is going to take us
skating!"
Across the fields they went, and in a little while they came to a
place where was a pond, in which they used to fish during the summer.
But now as they looked down on the water, from the top of a small
hill, they saw that the pond was all frozen over. A sheet of ice
covered it from edge to edge.
"Oh, now we can skate!" cried Hal in delight, "Now we can try our new
skates."
CHAPTER V
POOR ROLY-POLY
"Come on!" cried Mab, as she started to run down the slope of the hill
toward the frozen pond. "Come on, Hal!"
"Hold on!" called Daddy Blake. "Wait a minute, Mab! Don't go on the
ice yet!"
Mab stopped at once. So did Hal, who had just begun to run. You see
the children had gotten into the habit of stopping when their uncle
called: "Wait a minute and I'll give you a penny," so it was not hard
for them to do so when their father called.
"Why can't I go on the ice?" asked Mab,
"I must first see how thick it is," answered Daddy Blake.
"What difference does that make?" Hal wanted to know.
"Oh, a whole lot," said Mr. Blake. "If the ice is too thin you will
break through, and go into the cold water. We must be very careful, I
will see if it is thick enough."
Mab waited for her father and Hal to come to where she was standing.
Roly-Poly did not wait, however. Down he rushed to the frozen pond.
"Oh, come back! Come back!" cried Mab. "You'll go through the ice,
Roly!"
But Roly-Poly paid no attention. Out on the slippery ice he ran,
and then he turned around and, looking at Daddy Blake and the two
children, he barked as loudly as he could.
Roly-Poly was a queer dog that way. Sometimes he would mind Mab, and
then, again, he would not.
"I guess the ice is thick enough to hold up Roly," said Mr. Blake. "It
doesn't need to be very strong for that, as Roly is so little."
"How thick must it be to hold us up?" Hal wanted to know.
"Well, on a small pond, ice an inch thick might hold up a little boy
or girl," explained Mr. Blake. "But not very many children at a time.
On a large pond the ice should be from six to eight inches thick to
hold up a crowd of skaters."
"Oh, does ice ever get as thick as that?" asked Hal.
"Oh, yes, and much thicker. On big lakes it gets over two feet thick
in cold weather," Mr. Blake said. "Then it will hold up a whole
regiment of soldiers, and cannon too. Ice is very strong when once it
is well frozen. But always be sure it is thick enough before going
on."