conventional ideas and restraints, and indulge in a bit of homely
healthy sentiment, we may fall back on such utterances as the
following, from Dicken's Cricket on the Hearth:

"Now it was, you observe, that the Kettle began to spend the
evening. Now it was, that the Kettle, growing mellow and musical,
began to have irrepressible gurglings in its throat, and to
indulge in short vocal snorts, which it checked in the bud, as if
it hadn't quite made up its mind yet, to be good company. Now it
was, that after two or three such vain attempts to stifle its
convivial sentiments, it threw off all moroseness, all reserve,
and burst into a stream of song so cosy and hilarious as never
maudlin nightingale yet formed the least idea of." . . .

"So plain, too! Bless you, you might have understood it like a
book--better than some books you and I could name, perhaps. With
its warm breath gushing forth in a light cloud which merrily and
gracefully ascended a few feet, then hung about the chimney-
corner as its own domestic Heaven, it trolled its song with that
strong energy of cheerfulness, that its iron body hummed and
stirred upon the fire, and the lid itself, the recently
rebellious lid--such is the influence of a bright example--
performed a sort of jig, and clattered like a deaf and dumb young
cymbal that had never known the use of its twin brother." . . .

"And here, if you like, the Cricket DID chime in! with a
Chirrup, Chirrup, Chirrup of such magnitude, by the way of
chorus, with a voice so astoundingly disproportionate to its
size, as compared with the Kettle, (size! you couldn't see it!)
that if it had then and there burst itself like an overcharged