"Oh, yes, sir. I'll go and do it," he nodded, getting cheerfully
to his feet.

"But I told you to do it before."

David's eyes grew puzzled again.

"I know, sir, and I started to," he answered, with the obvious
patience of one who finds himself obliged to explain what should
be a self-evident fact; "but I saw so many beautiful things, one
after another, and when I found these funny little flower-people
I just had to play them. Don't you see?"

"No, I can't say that I do, when I'd already told you to fill the
woodbox," rejoined the man, with uncompromising coldness.

"You mean--even then that I ought to have filled the woodbox
first?"

"I certainly do."

David's eyes flew wide open again.

"But my song--I'd have lost it!" he exclaimed. "And father said
always when a song came to me to play it at once. Songs are like
the mists of the morning and the rainbows, you know, and they
don't stay with you long. You just have to catch them quick,
before they go. Now, don't you see?"

But Simeon Holly, with a despairingly scornful gesture, had