"But after all," she added, with a smile flitting over her frowning
little face, "after all, you poor dear, you _are_ only a cow, and
I don't suppose you know." And then she hugged Imogen, and blew a
little into one of her ears, to make her wink it, and the two were
very friendly again.

"Perhaps you would like to know, Imogen," said Star, confidentially,
seating herself once more on the ground, "_why_ I am so fond of Willum
Shakespeare. So I will tell you. It is really part of _my_ story,
but Daddy Captain didn't get as far as that last night, so I think
I will tell it to you. Well!" she drew a long breath of enjoyment,
and, clasping her hands round her knees, settled herself for a "good
talk."

"Well, Imogen: you see, at first I was a little baby, and didn't know
anything at all. But by and by I began to grow big, and then Daddy
Captain said to himself, 'Here's a child,' he says, 'and a child of
gentlefolks, and she mustn't grow up in ignorance, and me doing my
duty by her poor pa and ma,' he says. So he rows over to the town,
and he goes to the minister (the same minister who came over here
before), and he says, 'Good morning, Minister!' and the minister
shakes him by the hand hearty, and says, 'Why, Captain January!' he
says, 'I'm amazing glad to see you. And how is the child?' And Daddy
says, 'The child is a-growing with the flowers,' he says; 'and she's
a-growing like the flowers. Show me a rose that's as sweet and as
well growed as that child,' he says, 'and I'll give you my head,
Minister.' That's the way Daddy talks, you know, Imogen. And then
he told the minister how he didn't want the child (that was me, of
course) to grow up in ignorance, and how he wanted to teach me. And
the minister asked him was he qualified to teach. 'Not yet, I ain't!'