The Bishop and the Boogerman

Adelaide and I have come to the conclusion that if you can't believe anything at all, not even the things that are as plain as the nose on your face—if you can't enjoy what is put here to be enjoyed—if you are going to turn up your nose at everything we tell you, and deny things that we know to be truly-ann-true, just because we haven't given you the cross-my-heart-and-hope-to-die sign—then it's your own fault if we don't reply when you try to give the wipple-wappling call. And more than that, if you know so much that you don't know anything, or less than anything, you will have to go somewhere else to be amused and entertained; you will have to find other play-fellows. You might persuade us to play with you if you had something nicer than peppermint candy, and sweeter than taffy, and then Adelaide would show you things that you never so much as dreamed of before, and tell you things you never heard of. Adelaide! Doesn't the very sound of the name make you feel a little bit better than you were feeling awhile ago? Doesn't it remind you of the softest blue eyes in the world, and of long curly hair, spun from summer sunbeams that were left over from last season's growing? If all these things don't flash in your mind, like magic pictures on a white background, then you had better turn your head away, and not bother about the things I am saying. And another thing: Don't imagine that I am writing of the Right-Now time, for, one day when Adelaide and I were playing in the garden, we found Eighteen-Hundred-and-Sixty-Eight hiding under a honeysuckle vine, where it had gone to die. Adelaide picked the poor thing up and put it in the warm place in her apron that she keeps for all the weaklings; and now when we want to remember a great many things, both good and bad, we go back to the poor thing we found under the honeysuckle vine. It was a very good thing that old Jonas Whipple, of Shady Dale, had a sister who married and went to Atlanta, because Adelaide was in Atlanta, and nowhere else; it was the only place where she could have been found. Old Jonas's sister had been in Atlanta not longer than a year, if that long, when, one day, she found Adelaide, and appeared to be very fond of her. At that time, Adelaide had hardly been aroused from her dreams. She may have opened her eyes sometimes, but she seemed sleepy; and when she snored, as the majority of people will, when they are not put to bed right, everybody said she was crying. It was so ridiculous that she sometimes smiled in her sleep. But the most mysterious thing about it, was that old Jonas's sister knew she was named Adelaide almost as soon as she found her. Now, how did old Jonas's sister know that? Adelaide and I have often tried to figure it out when we were playing in the garden, but no matter how many figures we made in the sand, there was always something or other in the top row that stood for No-Time, and we didn't know how to add that up.