Peter, who was not accustomed to gazing at the sky with his feet in the
air. But he fell smack into the kettle, head foremost. It had been
decreed, however, that all should come out right with him, that day; the
fire had died out, the water was cold, and the kettle awry, so that he
got off with nothing worse than a scratched forehead, a peeled nose, and
two well scraped cheeks, and, thank Heaven! nothing was broken but the
saucepan.

When his better half entered the kitchen, she found Master Graybeard
looking very sheepish and bloody.

'Well! well!' said she, planting her arms akimbo and her two fists on
her haunches: 'who's the best housekeeper, pray? I have mowed and
reaped, and here I am as good as I was yesterday, while you, _you_,
Mister Cook, Mister Stay-at-home, Mr. Nurse, where is the butter,
where's the sow, where's the cow, and where's our dinner? If our little
one's alive yet, no thanks to you. Poor little fellow!--what would
become of it without kind and careful mamma?'

Whereupon, Mrs. Peter begins to snivel and sob. Indeed, she has need to,
for is not sensibility woman's field of triumph, and are not tears the
triumph of sensibility?

Peter bore the storm in silence, and did well, for resignation is the
virtue of great souls!


PART V.

There, you have my story exactly as it is related, on winter evenings,