Dotty Dimple at Play - Sophie May
_DOTTY DIMPLE STORIES_
DOTTY DIMPLE AT PLAY
BY SOPHIE MAY
AUTHOR OF "LITTLE PRUDY STORIES"
1868
_Illustrated_
TO THE _LITTLE "BLIND-EYED CHILDREN"_ IN THE ASYLUM FOR THE BLIND AT
INDIANAPOLIS.
[Illustration: DOTTY AND KATIE VISITING THE BLIND GIRLS.]
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER
I. "THE BLIND-EYED CHILDREN"
II. EMILY'S TRIALS
III. PLAYING SHIP
IV. A SPOILED DINNER
V. PLAYING TRUANT
VI. A STRANGE VISIT
VII. PLAYING PRISONER
VIII. PLAYING THIEF
IX. THANKSGIVING DAY
X. GRANDMA'S OLD TIMES
XI. THE CRYSTAL WEDDING
DOTTY DIMPLE AT PLAY.
CHAPTER I.
"THE BLIND-EYED CHILDREN."
"You is goin' off, Dotty Dimpwil."
"Yes, dear, and you must kiss me."
"No, not now; you isn't gone yet. You's goin' nex' day after this day."
Miss Dimple and Horace exchanged glances, for they had an important
secret between them.
"Dotty, does you want to hear me crow like Bantie? 'Cause," added Katie,
with a pitying glance at her cousin, "'cause you can't bear me bimeby,
when you didn't be to my house."
"That will do, you blessed little Topknot," cried Horace, as the shrill
crowing died on the air, and the pink bud of a mouth took its own shape
again. "Now I just mean to tell you something nice, for you might as well
know it and be happy a day longer: mother and you and I are going to
Indianapolis to-morrow with Dotty--going in the cars."
"O!" exclaimed the child, whirling about like a leaf in a breeze. "Going
to 'Naplis, yidin' in the cars! O my shole!"
"Yes, and you'll be good all day--won't you, darling, and not hide
mamma's spools?"
"Yes, I won't if I don't 'member. We for salt, salt, salt," sang Flyaway
(meaning mi, fa, sol). Then she ran to the bureau, perched herself before
it on an ottoman, and talked to herself in the glass.
"Now you be good gell all day, Katie Clifford--not dishbey your mamma,
not hide her freds o' spools, say fank you please. O my shole!"
So Katie was made happy for twenty-four hours.
"After we sleep one more time," said she, "then we shall go."
She wished to sleep that "one more time" with Dotty; but her little head
was so full of the journey that she aroused her bedfellow in the middle
of the night, calling out,--
"We's goin' to 'Naplis,--we for salt, salt, salt,--yidin' in the cars,
Dotty Dimpwil."
It was some time before Dotty could come out of dreamland, and understand
what Katie said.
"Won't you please to hush?" she whispered faintly, and turned away her
face, for the new moon was shining into her eyes.
"Let's we get up," cried Katie, shaking her by the shoulders; "don't you
see the sun's all corned up bwight?"
"O, that's nothing but just the moon, Katie Clifford."
"O ho! is um the moon? Who cutted im in two?" said Flyaway, and dropped
to sleep again.
Dotty was really sorry to leave aunt Maria's pleasant house, and the
charming novelties of Out West.
"Phebe," said she, with a quiver in her voice, when she received the
tomato pincushion, "I like you just as well as if you wasn't black. And,
Katinka, I like you just as well as if you wasn't Dutch. You can cook
better things than Norah, if your hair _isn't_ so nice."
This speech pleased Katinka so much that she patted the letter O's on
each side of her head with great satisfaction, and was very sorry she
had not made some chocolate cakes for Dotty to eat in the cars.
Uncle Henry did not like to part with his bright little niece. She had
been so docile and affectionate during her visit, that he began to
think her very lovely, and to wonder he had ever supposed she had a
wayward temper.
The ride to Indianapolis was a very pleasant one. Katie thought she had
the care of the whole party, and her little face was full of anxiety.
"Don't you tubble yourself, mamma," said She; "_I_'ll look out the
winner, and tell you when we get there."
"Don't let her fall out, Horace," said Mrs. Clifford; "I have a headache,
and you must watch her."
"Has you got a headache, mamma? I's solly. Lean 'gainst ME, mamma."
Horace wished the conductor had been in that car, so he could have seen
Miss Flyaway trying to prop her mother's head against her own morsel of a
shoulder--about as secure a resting-place as a piece of thistle-down.
"When _was_ it be dinner-time?" said she at last, growing very tired of
so much care, and beginning to think "'Naplis" was a long way off.
But they arrived there at last, and found Mr. Parlin waiting for them at
the depot. After they had all been refreshed by a nice dinner, and
Flyaway had caught a nap, which took her about as long as it takes a fly
to eat his breakfast, then Mr. Parlin suggested that they should visit
the Blind Asylum.
"Is it where they make blinds?" asked Dotty.
"O, no," replied Mr. Parlin; "it is a school where blind children
are taught."
"What is they when they is blind, uncle Eddard?"
"They don't see, my dear."
Flyaway shut her eyes, just to give herself an idea of their condition,
and ran against Horace, who saved her from falling.
"I was velly blind, then, Hollis," said she, "and that's what is it."
"I don't see," queried Dotty,--"I don't see how people that can't see can
see to read; so what's the use to go to school?"
"They read by the sense of feeling; the letters are raised," said Mr.
Parlin. "But here we are at the Institute."
They were in the pleasantest part of the city, standing before some
beautiful grounds which occupied an entire square, and were enclosed by
an iron fence. In front of the building grew trees and shrubs, and on
each side was a play-ground for the children.
"Why, that house has windows," cried Dotty. "I don't see what people want
of windows when they can't see."
"Nor me needer," echoed Katie. "What um wants winners, can't see out of?"
They went up a flight of stone steps, and were met at the door by a blind
waiting-girl, who ushered them into the visitors' parlor.
"Is _she_ blind-eyed?" whispered Flyaway, gazing at her earnestly. "Her
eyes isn't shut up; where is the _see_ gone to?"
Mrs. Clifford sent up her card, and the superintendent, who knew her
well, came down to meet her. He was also "blind-eyed," but the children
did not suspect it. They were much interested in the specimens of
bead-work which were to be seen In the show-cases. Mr. Parlin bought
some flowers, baskets, and other toys, to carry home to Susy and Prudy.
Horace said,--
"These beads are strung on wires, and it would be easy enough to do that
with one's eyes shut; but it always did puzzle me to see how blind people
can tell one color from another with the ends of their fingers."
The superintendent smiled.
"That would be strange indeed if it were true," said he; "but it is a
mistake. The colors are put into separate boxes, and that is the way the
children distinguish them."
"I suppose they are much happier for being busy," said Mr. Parlin. "It
is a beautiful thing that they can be made useful."
"So it is," said the superintendent. "I am blind myself, and I know how
necessary employment is to MY happiness."
The children looked up at the noble face of the speaker with surprise.
Was _he_ blind?
"Why does he wear glasses, then?" whispered Dotty. "Grandma wears 'em
because she can see a little, and wants to see more."
The superintendent was amused. As he could not see, Dotty had
unconsciously supposed his hearing must be rather dull; but, on the
contrary, it was very quick, and he had caught every word.
"I suppose, my child," remarked he, playfully, "these spectacles of mine
may be called the gravestones for my dead eyes."
Dotty did not understand this; but she was very sorry she had
spoken so loud.
After looking at the show-cases as long as they liked, the visitors went
across the hall into the little ones' school-room. This was a very
pleasant place, furnished with nice desks; and at one end were book-cases
containing "blind books" with raised letters. Horace soon discovered
that the Old Testament was in six volumes, each volume as large as a
family Bible.
In this cheerful room were twenty or thirty boys and girls. They looked
very much like other children, only they did not appear to notice that
any one was entering, and scarcely turned their heads as the door
softly opened.
Dotty had a great many new thoughts. These unfortunate little ones were
very neatly dressed, yet they had never seen themselves in the glass; and
how did they know whether their hair was rough or smooth, or parted in
the middle? How could they tell when they dropped grease-spots on those
nice clothes?
"I don't see," thought Dotty, "how they know when to go to bed! O, dear!
I should get up in the night and think 'twas morning; only I should
s'pose 'twas night all the whole time, and not any stars either! When my
father spoke to me, I should think it was my mother, and say, 'Yes'm.'
And p'rhaps I should think Prudy was a beggar-man with a wig on. And
never saw a flower nor a tree! O, dear!"
While she was musing in this way, and gazing about her with eager eyes
which saw everything, the children were reading aloud from their
odd-looking books. It was strange to see their small fingers fly so
rapidly over the pages. Horace said it was "a touching sight."
"I wonder," went on Dotty to herself, "if they should tease God very
hard, would he let their eyes come again? No, I s'pose not."
Then she reflected further that perhaps they were glad to be blind; she
hoped so. The teacher now called out a class in geography, and began to
ask questions.
"What can you tell me about the inhabitants of Utah?" said she.
"I know," spoke up a little boy with black hair, and eyes which would
have been bright if the lids had not shut them out of sight,--"I know;
Utah is inhabited by a religious INSECT called Mormons."
The superintendent and visitors knew that he meant _sect_ and they
laughed at the mistake; all but Dotty and Flyaway, who did not consider
it funny at all. Flyaway was seated in a chair, busily engaged in picking
dirt out of the heels of her boots with a pin.
Horace was much interested in the atlases and globes, upon the surface of
which the land rose up higher than the water, and the deserts were
powdered with sand. These blind children could travel all about the
world with their fingers as well as he could with eyes and a pointer.
The teacher--a kind-looking young lady--was quite pleased when Mr. Parlin
said to her,--
"I see very little difference between this and the Portland schools for
small children."
She wished, and so did the teachers in the other three divisions, to have
the pupils almost forget they were blind.
She allowed them to sing and recite poetry for the entertainment of their
visitors. Some of them had very sweet voices, and Mrs. Clifford listened
with tears. Their singing recalled to her mind the memory of beautiful
things, as music always does; and then she remembered that through their
whole lives these children must grope in darkness. She felt more
sorrowful for them than they felt for themselves. These dear little
souls, who would never see the sun, were very happy, and some of them
really supposed it was delightful to be blind.
Their teacher desired them to come forward, if they chose, and repeat
sentences of their own composing. Some things they said were very odd.
One bright little girl remarked very gravely,--
"Happy are the blind, for they see no ghosts."
This made her companions all laugh. "Yes, that's true," thought Dotty.
"If people should come in here with ever so many pumpkins and candles
inside, these blind children wouldn't know it; they couldn't be
frightened. I wonder where they ever heard of ghosts. There must have
been some naughty girl here, like Angeline."
CHAPTER II.
EMILY'S TRIALS.
At three o'clock the little blind girls all went out to play in one yard,
and the little blind boys in the other.
"Goin' out to take their air," said Katie. Then she and Dotty followed
the girls in respectful silence.
Almost every one had a particular friend; and it was wonderful to see how
certain any two friends were to find one another by the sense of feeling,
and walk off together, arm in arm. It was strange, too, that they could
move so fast without hitting things and falling down.
"When I am blindfolded," thought Dotty, "it makes me dizzy, and I don't
know where I am. When I think anything isn't there, the next I know I
come against it, and make my nose bleed."
She was not aware that while the most of these children were blind, there
were others who had a little glimmering of eyesight. The world was night
to some of them; to others, twilight.
They did not know Dotty and Katie were following them, and they chatted
away as if they were quite by themselves.
"Emily, have you seen my Lilly Viola?" said one little girl to another.
"Miss Percival has dressed her all over new with a red dressing-gown and
a black hat."
The speaker was a lovely little girl with curly hair; but her eyes were
closed, and Dotty wondered what made her talk of "seeing" a doll.
Emily took "Lilly Viola," and travelled all over her hat and dress and
kid boots with her fingers.
"Yes, Octavia," said she, "she is very pretty--ever so much prettier than
my Victoria Josephine."
Then both the little girls talked sweet nothings to their rag babies,
just like any other little girls.
"Is the dollies blind-eyed, too?" asked Katie, making a dash forward, and
peeping into the cloth face of a baby.
The little mamma, whose name was Octavia, smiled, and taking Katie by the
shoulders, began to touch her all over with her fingers.
"Dear little thing!" said she; "what soft hair!"
"Yes," replied Katie; "velly soft. Don't you wish, though, you could see
my new dress? It's got little blue yoses all over it."
[Illustration: DOTTY AND KATIE VISITING THE BLIND GIRLS.]
"I know your dress is pretty," said Octavia, gently, "and I know you are
pretty, too, your voice is so sweet."
"Well, I eat canny," said Katie, "and that makes my voice sweet. I'se got
'most a hunnerd bushels o' canny to my house."
"Have you truly?" asked the children, gathering about Flyaway, and
kissing her.
"Yes, and I'se got a sweet place in my neck, too; but my papa's kissed it
all out o' me."
"Isn't she a darling?" said Octavia, with delight.
"Yes," answered Dotty, very glad to say a word to such remarkable
children as these; "yes, she is a darling; and she has on a white dress
with blue spots, and a hat trimmed with blue; and her hair is straw
color. They call her Flyaway, because she can't keep still a minute."
"Yes, I does; I keeps still two, free, five, _all_ the minutes," cried
Katie; and to prove it, she flew across the yard, and began to pry into
one of the play-houses.
"She doesn't mean to be naughty; you must scuse her," spoke up Dotty,
very loud; for she still held unconsciously to the idea that blind people
must have dull ears. "She is a nice baby; but I s'pose you don't know
there are some play-houses in this yard, and she'll get into mischief if
I don't watch her."
"Why, all these play-houses are ours," said little curly-haired Emily;
"whose did you think they were?"
"Yours?" asked Dotty, in surprise; "can you play?"
Emily laughed merrily.
"Why not? Did you think we were sick?"
Dotty did not answer.
"I am Mrs. Holiday," added Emily; "that is, I generally am; but
sometimes I'm Jane. Didn't you ever read Rollo on the Atlantic?"
Dotty, who could only stammer over the First Reader at her mother's knee,
was obliged to confess that she had never made Rollo's acquaintance.
"We have books read to us," said Emily. "In the work-hour we go into
the sitting-room, and there we sit with the bead-boxes in our laps,
making baskets, and then our teacher reads to us out of a book, or
tells us a story."
"That is very nice," said Dotty; "people don't read to me much."
"No, of course not, because you can see. People are kinder to blind
children--didn't you know it? I'm glad I had my eyes put out, for if they
hadn't been put out I shouldn't have come here."
"Where should you have gone, then?"
"I shouldn't have gone anywhere; I should just have staid at home."
"Don't you like to stay at home?"
Emily shrugged her shoulders.
"My paw killed a man."
"I don't know what a paw is," said Dotty.
"O, Flyaway Clifford, you've broken a teapot!"
"No matter," said Emily, kindly; "'twas made out of a gone-to-seed poppy.
Don't you know what a paw is? Why, it's a _paw_"
In spite of this clear explanation, Dotty did not understand any better
than before.
"It was the man that married my maw, only maw died, and then there was
another one, and she scolded and shook me."
"O, I s'pose you mean a father 'n mother; now I know."
"I want to tell you," pursued Emily, who loved to talk to strangers.
"She didn't care if I was blind; she used to shake me just the same. And
my paw had fits."
The other children, who had often heard this story, did not listen to it
with great interest, but went on with their various plays, leaving Emily
and Dotty standing together before Emily's baby-house.
"Yes, my paw had fits. I knew when they were coming, for I could smell
them in the bottle."
"Fits in a bottle!"
"It was something he drank out of a bottle that made him have the fits.
You are so little that you couldn't understand. And then he was cross.
And once he killed a man; but he didn't go to."
"Then he was guilty," said Dotty, in a solemn tone. "Did they take him to
the court-house and hang him?"
"No, of course they wouldn't hang _him_. They said it was the third
degree, and they sent him to the State's Prison."
"O, is your father in the State's Prison?"
Dotty thought if her father were in such, a dreadful place, and she
herself were blind, she should not wish to live; but here was Emily
looking just as happy as anybody else. Indeed, the little girl was rather
proud of being the daughter of such a wicked man. She had been pitied so
much for her misfortunes that she had come to regard herself as quite a
remarkable person. She could not see the horror in Dotty's face, but she
could detect it in her voice; so she went on, well satisfied.
"There isn't any other little girl in this school that has had so much
trouble as I have. A lady told me it was because God wanted to make a
good woman of me, and that was why it was."
"Does it make people good to have trouble?" asked Dotty, trying to
remember what dreadful trials had happened to herself. "Our house was
burnt all up, and I felt dreadfully. I lost a tea-set, too, with gold
rims. I didn't know I was any better for that."
"O, you see, it isn't very awful to have a house burnt up," said Emily;
"not half so awful as it is to have your eyes put out."
"But then, Emily, I've been sick, and had the sore throat, and almost
drowned--and--and--the whooping-cough when I was a baby."
"What is your name?" asked Emily; "and how old are you?"
"My name is Alice Parlin, and I am six years old."
"Why, I am nine; and see--your head! only comes under my chin."
"Of course it doesn't," replied Dotty, with some spirit. "I wouldn't be
as tall as you are for anything, and me only six--going on seven."
"I suppose your paw is rich, and good to you, and you have everything you
want--don't you, Alice?"
"No, my father isn't rich at all, Emily, and I don't have many
things--no, indeed," replied Miss Dimple, with a desire to plume herself
on her poverty and privations. "My aunt 'Ria has two girls, but we don't,
only our Norah; and mother never lets me put any nightly-blue sirreup on
my hangerjif 'cept Sundays. I think we're pretty poor."
Dotty meant all she said. She had now become a traveller; had seen a
great many elegant things; and when she thought of her home in
Portland, it seemed to her plainer and less attractive than it had
ever seemed before.
"I don't know what you would think," said Emily, counting over her trials
on her fingers as if they had been so many diamond rings, "if you didn't
have anything to eat but brown bread and molasses. I guess you'd think
_that_ was pretty poor! And got the molasses all over your face, because
you couldn't see to put it in your mouth. And had that woman shake you
every time you spoke. And your paw in State's Prison because he killed a
man. O, no," repeated she, with triumph, "there isn't any other little
girl in this school that's had so much trouble as I have."
"No, I s'pose not," responded Dotty, giving up the attempt to compare
trials with such a wretched being; "but then I may be blind, some time,
too. P'rhaps a chicken will pick my eyes out. A cross hen flew right up
and did so to a boy."
Emily paid no attention to this foolish remark.
"My paw writes me letters," said she. "Here is one in my pocket; would
you like to read it?"
Dotty took the letter, which was badly written and worse spelled.
"Can you read it?" asked Emily, after Dotty had turned it over for some
moments in silence.
"No, I cannot," replied Dotty, very much ashamed; "but I'm going to
school by and by, and then I shall learn everything."
"O, no matter if you can't read it to me; my teacher has read it ever so
many times. At the end of it, it says, 'Your unhappy and unfortunate
paw.' That is what he always says at the end of all his letters; and he
wants me to go to the prison to see him."
"Why, you _couldn't_ see him."
"No," replied Emily, not understanding that Dotty referred to her
blindness; "no, I couldn't see him. The superintendent Wouldn't let me
go; he says it's no place for little girls."
"I shouldn't think it was," said Dotty, looking around for Flyaway, who
was riding in a lady's chair made by two admiring little girls.
"There was one thing I didn't tell," said Emily, who felt obliged to pour
her whole history into her new friend's ears; "I was sick last spring,
and had a fever. If it had been scarlet fever I should have died; but it
was _imitation_ of scarlet fever, and I got well."
"I'm glad you got well," said Dotty, rather tired of Emily's troubles;
"but don't you want to play with the other girls? I do."
"Yes; let us play Rollo on the Ocean," cried Octavia, who was Emily's
bosom friend, and was seldom away from her long at a time, but had just
now been devoting herself to Katie. "Here is the ship. All aboard!"
CHAPTER III.
PLAYING SHIP.
Now this ship was an old wagon-body, and had never been in water deeper
than a mud puddle. A dozen little girls climbed in with great bustle and
confusion, pretending they were walking a plank and climbing up some
steps. After they were fairly on board they waved their handkerchiefs for
a good by to their friends on shore. Then Octavia fired peas out of a
little popgun twice, and this was meant as a long farewell to the land.
Now they were fairly out on the ocean, and began to rock back and forth,
as if tossed by a heavy sea.
"See how the waves rise!" said Emily, and threw up her hands with an
undulating motion. "I can see them," she cried, an intent look coming
into her closed eyes; "they are green, with white bubbles like soap suds.
And the sun shines on them so! O, 'tis as beautiful as flowers!"
"Booful as flowers!" echoed Flyaway, who was one of the passengers; while
Dotty wondered how Octavia knew the difference between green and white.
She did not know; and what sort of a picture she painted in her mind of
the mysterious sea I am sure I cannot tell.
"Now," said Miriam Lake, the prettiest of the children, "it is time to
strike the bells."
So she struck a tea-bell with a stick eight times.
"That is eight bells," explained she to Dotty, "and it means four
o'clock. But, Jennie Holiday, where is the kitten? Why, we are not
half ready."
The children never thought they could play "ship" without a kitten, a
gray and white one which they put into a cage just as Jennie Holiday
did, when she and Rollo travelled by themselves from New York to
Liverpool. When the kitten had been brought, they had got as far as Long
Island Sound, and they said the kitten was sent by a ship of war which
had to be "spoken."
"This is a funny way to play," said Miriam. "Here we are at Halifax, and
nobody has heaved the log yet."
"No," said Octavia; "so we can't tell how many knots an hour we
are going."
"_I'm_ going a great many knocks," cried Katie, whose exertions in
rocking from side to side had thrown her overboard once.
"We never'll get to Liverpool in this world," said Emily, "unless Miss
Percival comes and steers the ship."
It happened at that very moment that Miss Percival came into the yard
with aunt Maria.
"If you will excuse me, Mrs. Clifford," said she, laughing, "I will take
command of this ship."
"No apologies are necessary," replied Mrs. Clifford. "I should be very
glad to watch your proceedings. Is it possible, Miss Percival, that you
are capable of guiding a vessel across the Atlantic?"
"I have often tried it," said Miss Percival, going on board; "but we
sometimes have a shipwreck."
"Emily," said she, "you may heave the log." So Emily rose, and taking a
large spool of crochet-cotton which Miss Percival gave her, held it
above her head, turning it slowly, till a tatting shuttle, which was
fastened at the end of the thread, fell to the ground. This was supposed
to be the "log;" and Octavia, with one or two other girls, pretended to
tug with much force in order to draw it in, for the ship was going so
fast that the friction against the cord was very great. Knots had been
made in the cotton, over which Emily ran her quick fingers.