Little House in the Big Woods (Little House 1)

And so are you.

Laura’s said only:

Sweets to the sweet.

The pieces of candy were exactly the same size. Laura’s printing was larger than Mary’s.

They all went back through the sand to the wagon on the lake shore. Pa fed the horses, on the bottom of the wagon box, some oats he had brought for their dinner. Ma opened the picnic box.

They all sat on the warm sand near the wagon and ate bread and butter and cheese, hard-boiled eggs and cookies. The waves of Lake Pepin curled up on the shore at their feet and slid back with the smallest hissing sound.

After dinner, Pa went back to the store to talk awhile with other men. Ma sat holding Carrie quietly until she went to sleep. But Laura and Mary ran along the lake shore, picking up pretty pebbles that had been rolled back and forth by the waves until they were polished smooth.

There were no pebbles like that in the Big Woods.

When she found a pretty one, Laura put it in her pocket, and there were so many, each prettier than the last, that she filled her pocket full. Then Pa called, and they ran back to the wagon, for the horses were hitched up and it was time to go home.

Laura was so happy, when she ran through the sand to Pa, with all those beautiful pebbles in her pocket. But when Pa picked her up and tossed her into the wagon, a dreadful thing happened.

The heavy pebbles tore her pocket right out of her dress. The pocket fell, and the pebbles rolled all over the bottom of the wagon box.

Laura cried because she had torn her best dress.

Ma gave Carrie to Pa and came quickly to look at the torn place. Then she said it was all right.

“Stop crying, Laura,” she said. “I can fix it.” She showed Laura that the dress was not torn at all, nor the pocket. The pocket was a little bag, sewed into the seam of the dress skirt, and hanging under it. Only the seams had ripped. Ma could sew the pocket in again, as good as new.

“Pick up the pretty pebbles, Laura,” Ma said. “And another time, don’t be so greedy.”

So Laura gathered up the pebbles, put them in the pocket, and carried the pocket in her lap. She did not mind very much when Pa laughed at her for being such a greedy little girl that she took more than she could carry away.

Nothing like that ever happened to Mary. Mary was a good little girl who always kept her dress clean and neat and minded her manners. Mary had lovely golden curls, and her candy heart had a poem on it.

Mary looked very good and sweet, unrumpled and clean, sitting on the board beside Laura. Laura did not think it was fair.

But it had been a wonderful day, the most wonderful day in her whole life. She thought about the beautiful lake, and the town she had seen, and the big store full of so many things. She held the pebbles carefully in her lap, and her candy heart wrapped carefully in her handkerchief until she got home and could put it away to keep always. It was too pretty to eat.

The wagon jolted along on the homeward road through the Big Woods. The sun set, and the woods grew darker, but before the last of the twilight was gone the moon rose. And they were safe, because Pa had his gun.

The soft moonlight came down through the treetops and made patches of light and shade on the road ahead. The horses’ hoofs made a cheerful clippety-clop.

Laura and Mary did not say anything because they were very tired, and Ma sat silently holding Baby Carrie, sleeping in her arms. But Pa sang softly:

“Mid pleasures and palaces, though we may roam,

Be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home.”

Chapter 10

Summertime

Now it was summertime, and people went visiting. Sometimes Uncle Henry, or Uncle George, or Grandpa, came riding out of the Big Woods to see Pa. Ma would come to the door and ask how all the folks were, and she would say:

“Charles is in the clearing.”

Then she would cook more dinner than usual, and dinner time would be longer. Pa and Ma and the visitor would sit talking a little while before they went back to work.

Sometimes Ma let Laura and Mary go across the road and down the hill, to see Mrs. Peterson. The Petersons had just moved in. Their house was new, and always very neat, because Mrs. Peterson had no little girls to muss it up. She was a Swede and she let Laura and Mary look at the pretty things she had brought from Sweden—laces, and colored embroideries, and china.