Page:Wiggin--Mother Carey's chickens.djvu/173

 You git your piece o' life an' you make what you can of it;—that's the idee! Now the other day I got some nice soft wood that was prime for whittlin'; jest the right color an' grain an' all, an' I started in to make a little statue o' the Duke o' Wellington. Well, when I got to shapin' him out, I found my piece o' wood would n't be long enough to give him his height; so I says, 'Well, I don't care, I'll cut the Duke right down and make Napoleon Bonaparte.' I'd 'a' been all right if I'd cal'lated better, but I cut my block off too short, and I could n't make Napoleon nohow; so I says, 'Well, Isaac Watts was an awful short man, so I guess I'll make him!' But this time my wood split right in two. Some men would 'a' been discouraged, but I was n't, not a mite; I jest said, 'I never did fancy Ike Watts, an' there's one thing this blamed chip will make, an' that's a button for the barn door!'"

Osh not only whittled and papered and painted, but did anything whatsoever that needed to be done on the premises. If the pump refused to draw water, or the sink drain was stopped, or the gutters needed cleaning, or the grass had to be mowed, he was the man ordained by Providence and his own versatility to do the work. While he was papering the front hall the entire Carey family lived on the stairs between