In Camp With A Tin Soldier

"That's it! that's it!" cried the colonel. "And don't you remember,

'There's not a thing he will not eat,
From pie to sealing-wax,
Although he shows a preference for
Red bricks and carpet tacks'?"

"Yes, I remember that very well now," said Jimmieboy. "Wasn't there a verse about his color, too? Didn't it say:

'His color is a fearful one —
A combination hue
Of yellow, green, and purple, mixed
With solferino blue'?"

"No; that was the Parallelogram," replied the colonel. "A Parallelopipedon is six times as bad as a Parallelogram. His color has a verse about it, though, that says:

'His hue is the most terrible
That ever man has seen;
'Tis pink and saffron, blue and red,
Mixed up with apple green'."

"Dear me!" cried Jimmieboy. "And do you mean to say he's really got away?"

"I do, indeed," returned the colonel. "Got away, and Noah is glad of it, because he doesn't have to feed him any more. But it'll never do to let him stay loose; he will do too much damage. Why, Jimmieboy, suppose he should overeat himself and die? He's the only one in the world, and we can't afford to lose an animal like that; besides, after he has ruined all the country around the turn, it's just as like as not he'll begin on the rest of the picture, and eat it all up, frame and all."

"My!" cried the little boy. "That would be terrible, wouldn't it! You are right – he must be captured. I have half a mind to go along with you and help."

"Half a mind isn't enough," retorted the colonel, shaking his head. "You can't go into the soldier business unless you have a whole mind – so good-by, Jimmieboy. I must be running along; and should I not return, as the poet says,

'Pray do not weep for me, my boy,
But, as the years slip by,
Drop all your pennies in a bank —
Brave soldiers never die;
And some day I'll turn up again,
Exalted, high in rank,
And possibly I'll find some use
For that small sum in bank.'"

"I'm not going to stay here while you are fighting," said Jimmieboy, with a determined shake of his head. "I've got a whole mind to go with you, and a uniform to wear as well. But tell me, can I get up there on the road?"

"Certainly," said the colonel. "I'll show you how, only put on your uniform first. They won't let you go unless you are suitably dressed. Little boys, with striped trousers like yours, would be out of place, but with a uniform such as yours is, with real gold on the cap and brass buttons on the coat – well, I'm not sure but what they'll elect you water-carrier, or general, or something equally important."

So Jimmieboy hurried to his clothes-closet and quickly donned his military suit, and grasping his sword firmly by the hilt, cried out:

"Ready!"

"All right," said the colonel. "They are waiting for us. Close your eyes."

Jimmieboy did as he was told.

"One – two – three – eyes open!" cried the colonel.

Again Jimmieboy did as he was ordered, although he couldn't see why he should obey the colonel, who up to this afternoon had been entirely subject to his orders. He opened his eyes at the command, and, much to his surprise, found himself standing in the middle of that wooded road in the picture, beneath the arching trees, the leaves of which rustled softly as a sweet perfumed breeze blew through the branches. About him on every side were groups of tin soldiers talking excitedly about the escape of the devastating Parallelopipedon, every man of them armed to the teeth and eager for the colonel's command to start off on the search expedition. The band was playing merrily under the trees up the road near the little brook, and back in the direction from which he had come, through the heavy gilt frame, Jimmieboy could see the nursery just as he had left it, while before him lay the turn at the end of the wood and the unknown country now soon to be explored.

CHAPTER II.

JIMMIEBOY RECEIVES HIS ORDERS

FOR a few moments Jimmieboy was so overcome by the extreme novelty of his position that he could do nothing but wander in and out among the trees, wondering if he really was himself, and whether the soldiers by whom he was surrounded were tin or creatures of flesh and blood. They certainly looked and acted like human beings, and they talked in a manner entirely different from what Jimmieboy was accustomed to expect from the little pieces of painted tin he had so often played with on the nursery floor, but he very soon learned that they were tin, and not made up, like himself, of bone and sinew.

The manner of his discovery was this: One of the soldiers, in a very rash and fool-hardy fashion, tried to pick up a stone from the road to throw at a poor little zinc robin that was whistling in the trees above his head, and in bending over after the stone and then straightening himself up to take aim, he snapped himself into two distinct pieces – as indeed would any other tin soldier, however strong and well made, and of course Jimmieboy was then able to see that the band with whom he had for the moment cast his fortunes were nothing more nor less than bits of brittle tin, to whom in some mysterious way had come life. The boy was pained to note the destruction of the little man who had tried to throw the stone at the robin, because he was always sorry for everybody upon whom trouble had come, but he was not, on the whole, surprised at the soldier's plight, for the simple reason that he had been taught that boys who threw stones at the harmless little birds in the trees were naughty and worthy of punishment, and he could not see why a tin soldier should not be punished for doing what a small boy of right feelings would disdain to do.

After he had made up his mind that his companions were really of tin, he became a bit fearful as to his own make-up, and the question that he now asked himself was, "Am I tin, too, or what?" He was not long in answering this question to his own satisfaction, for after bending his little fingers to and fro a dozen or more times, he was relieved to discover that he had not changed. The fingers did not snap off, as he had feared they might, and he was glad.

Barely had Jimmieboy satisfied himself on this point when a handsomely dressed soldier, on a blue lead horse, came galloping up, and cried out so loud that his voice echoed through the tall trees of the forest:

"Is General Jimmieboy here?"

"Jimmieboy is here," answered the little fellow. "I'm Jimmieboy, but I am no general."

"But you have on a general's uniform," said the soldier.

"Have I?" queried Jimmieboy, with a glance at his clothes. "Well, if I have, it's because they are the only soldier clothes I own."

"Well, I am very sorry," said the soldier on horseback, "but if you wear those clothes you've got to be general. It's a hard position to occupy, and of course you'd rather be a high-private or a member of the band, but as it is, there is no way out of it. If the clothes would fit any one else here, you might exchange with him; but they won't, I can tell that by looking at the yellow stripes on your trousers. The stripes alone are wider than any of our legs."

"Oh!" responded Jimmieboy, "I don't mind being general. I'd just as lief be a general as not; I know how to wave a sword and march ahead of the procession."

At this there was a roar of laughter from the soldiers.

"How queer!" said one.

"What an absurd idea!" cried another.

"Where did he ever get such notions as that?" said a third.

And then they all laughed again.

"I am afraid," said the soldier on horseback, with a kindly smile which won Jimmieboy's heart, "that you do not understand what the duties of a general are in this country. We aren't bound down by the notions of you nursery people, who seem to think that all a general is good for is to be stood up in front of a cannon loaded with beans, and knocked over half a dozen times in the course of a battle. Have you ever read those lines of High-private Tinsel in his little book, 'Poems in Pewter,' in which he tells of the trials of a general of the tin soldiers?"

"Of course I haven't," said Jimmieboy. "I can't read."

"Just the man for a general, if he can't read," said one of the soldiers. "He'll never know what the newspapers say of him."

"Well, I'll tell you the story," said the horseman, dismounting, and standing on a stump by the road-side to give better effect to the poem, which he recited as follows:

"THE TIN SOLDIER GENERAL

I walked one day
Along the way