Ned, the son of Webb: What he did.. Stoddard William Osborn
a long list of things. He even went so far as to condemn the entire Anglo-Saxon race, English and American together.
"Look at it, Ned!" he said, with energy. "Not only do both of these wretched nations come down to this new state of things, themselves, including the newspapers and the magazines and the floods of books, but they are clubbing together to force innovations upon all the rest of the world. They are a partnership concern now, and which of them is the meanest I don't know. The British are choking their inventions down the throats of China, India, Africa, and a lot of other unlucky continents and islands. We Americans are working in the same way with Cuba and Porto Rico and the Philippines and Magatapatanglew."
"Where on earth is that?" asked Ned.
"Where is it?" sadly responded his uncle, shaking his head. "I really don't know. Nobody else knows where half of these new places are, with long-tail names. I've a kind of notion it's near the junction."
"What junction?" inquired his nephew.
"Why!" exclaimed Uncle Jack. "The junction? You don't know? It is at the corner where the Congo River crosses the Ganges. It is very near the point where the Ural Mountains pour down into the Red Sea."
Ned was not entirely caught and mystified, this time, for he promptly replied: "Oh, I know where that is! I've been to Grammar School Sixty-eight. I know! It's down near the custom house."
"I declare!" said his uncle. "Boys know too much, anyhow, nowadays. You would learn a great deal more, though, if you'd take an army and a steamer, and go and conquer England. Your mother has dozens of cousins there, too. But you had better buy return excursion tickets before you start. That's what I did, and it helped me to get back home. Let's go to dinner."
"It's about dinner-time," said Ned; and his uncle talked along as they went.
"I like the English for one thing," he said. "They cook good dinners. I hate 'em for another thing, though: if you go to an English dinner-party, you have to wait till the last man gets there before they will give you anything to eat. I conquered them a little on that, anyhow, for I always went two hours late, myself. So I generally had to wait only about half an hour or so."
Ned studied that matter until he thought he understood it. Afterward, however, he was glad to be an American, when his own dinner came to the table exactly on time. So did he and his uncle.
A long walk, and sightseeing, combined with plans for the conquest of England, will surely prepare a healthy sixteen-year-old boy for his dinner, especially if he is somewhat tall for his age and burly in build. Ned was not quite prepared, nevertheless, for some things which were coming upon him. He could not have expected, reasonably, that his entire family would set him up for a mark and shoot at him. That is what they did, and they fired at him from all around the table, hitting him.
"Ned," began Uncle Jack, "I heard you! Where on earth did you learn to speak Norwegian? Not at the grammar school."
"Why," said Ned, "I got it from old Erica. She has been in the house since before I was born. She began with me when I was doing my first words of any kind."
"Oh," said Uncle Jack, "that's it! I suppose even the Norway babies catch it that way."
"I see," said his father. "It is about the same way with your Latin. I used to talk Latin at you when you wore frocks. You are pretty well up in it, for a boy only just graduated from a public school. Perhaps it may be of use to you, some day; but I am afraid that your Norwegian never will."
"Not unless he should go there, if he ever travels," said his mother. "What he needs to do now is to get out into the country. He has been cooped up in the city and held down over his books long enough."
"He must spend a few weeks at his grandfather's house," remarked his Aunt Maria, with a severe expression. "He must go fishing. His health requires it."
So said his sisters and his older brothers, and then Uncle Jack gave him away entirely, telling of Ned's dealings with the Kentucky, and with the other wonders they had seen that morning.
"You don't say so!" exclaimed his father. "He wishes to conquer England! I know some English boys that could make him wish he were hiding on board the Kentucky."
"Well," responded Ned, rebelliously, "I'm not so sure about that! I'm captain of the baseball nine. I'm in on football, too. I can fence first-rate, and I've had Pat McCool for a boxing master."
"Oh!" remarked Aunt Maria. "Now I know! That is why you came home limping so horridly, a week ago Saturday. You had a pair of black eyes, too – "
"That's nothing, Aunt Maria," interrupted Ned. "That was Jimmy Finley. We were boxing barehanded. He got it as bad as I did, too."
"Edward," exclaimed his mother, "that is shocking! It is like fighting! And you have been talking slang, too!"
"Well, mother," said Ned, respectfully, "I didn't mean to; but Jim is a regular rusher to hit."
"Edward!" said his father. "Slang again? I must take you in hand, myself."
"He is dreadful!" whispered one of his sisters. "He called Sallie Hemans a bricktop. Her hair is red – "
"I see how it is," continued his father. "The sooner you are out in the country, the better. Football, indeed! Baseball, fencing, boxing! All that sort of thing! What you need is exercise. Fishing, I should say, and plenty of good, fresh country air. Something beside books and school."
"I'll tell you what, then," responded Ned. "I'll be glad enough to get there. All the colts I rode last summer'll be a year older now. I'm going to try 'em, and see if they can send me to grass, like they did then."
"Edward! What grammar!" groaned his aunt. "His Grandmother Webb will attend to that."
"I have my serious doubts," remarked Uncle Jack. "She has not altogether reformed her own neighbourhood. The country is the place for him, however. If he isn't sent away he may stir up a war with England, and it would be expensive."
From that the table talk drifted back to the terrible battle-ships and the new inventions.
"It is dreadful!" remarked Uncle Jack. "I used to think I knew, generally, what I was eating, but I have given it up. They have invented artificial eggs. The butter we get is a mystery; they make almost anything out of corn. The newspapers are printed on stuff that's made of cord-wood, and this new imitation silver is nothing but potter's clay, boiled down, somehow. It tires me out to think of it all."
"I don't care," said Ned. "Hurrah for the country, and for the colts, and for some fishing!"
CHAPTER II.
NED WEBB'S OUTING
"Your grandmother is right, Edward. I agree with her entirely. She thinks that too much of your vacation time ought not to be spent in the woods, and it must not be. I wish, however, to say something more. Your education must continue without too great an interruption. There are ideas which I intend you to obtain while under my care."
"Why, grandfather!" exclaimed Ned, with a somewhat puzzled look on his face. "I think so, too. I don't care to be all the while in the woods. I want to do some fishing."
"Exactly," said his grandfather. "We both approve of that. You may have all the rods and lines you need, but you must not forget the wise saying of the immortal Franklin, that going fishing means only a rod and line with a worm at each end of it. There is not much to be caught in Green Lake."
"Well," said Ned, "I guess I'll pull in something better'n suckers and bullheads. There are trout and perch and bass and pickerel."
"Eels, too," suggested his grandfather. "What I mean is, practically, that you are to employ a part of each day among your books. I especially wish you to acquire a rudimentary acquaintance with the history of the world you live in."
"Yes, sir, I know what that is," said Ned. "They bored us with it, awfully, at School Number Sixty-eight. I had to be examined on it, too, and I didn't get turned down."
Ned had safely reached his grandfather's house in the country. It was a large and handsome mansion. They two were now in the library, on the morning after his arrival. One glance at the ranges of bookcases was enough to afford an indication