Page:Maud Howe - Atlanta in the South.djvu/235

 was the best one, and then take it back from me the first chance you got,—just like girls!"

"I like the black one best," interposed Robert. "Black dogs are better for grown people than white, or even spotted ones."

The little girl smiled through her tears and laid the ugly black creature in Robert's hand. The boy looked somewhat sceptical, but he did not quite dare to question Mr. Feuardent's last statement; and the puppy being carefully laid in a small basket packed with straw, a game of romps ensued, which rivalled the antics of the most playful of puppies. Bedtime came all too soon, and the playfellows parted regretfully, Robert joining the elders at the main house, carrying his basket on his arm. The gifts of children are very serious matters to them, and Robert was too tender-hearted to refuse the ugly little creature yelping in its straw nest.

He found the missionary in an excellent vein. He was recounting to Madame Bienveillance some of the incidents of the forty years passed among the Louisiana Indians, and Robert, seating himself, listened to the stories, some of which were already known to him. He had been for years so familiar with the life of this solitary old man that he had perhaps sometimes ignored its beauty and its pathos. The outlines of things at which we look too closely are sometimes