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Some folks thought he was silly, and Mrs. Hamm, riding by in a buggy, on the road below, said to Mr. Hamm,–

“There’s that good-for-nothing Frank Clark again, hollerin’ like a wild Injun with all those children.”

“Yes, Maria,” agreed her husband. “I’d send him to the work’us if I was on the Township Committee.”

But the Hamms, like many other people, were very stupid. Was the Toyman worth while? You just ask Jehosophat and Marmaduke and Hepzebiah and Wienerwurst, and hear what they have to say.

Once during that long and glorious afternoon they had trouble. Fatty Hamm started it. It was the only thing he was good at–trouble and eating. And, of course, Reddy Toms and Dicky Means had to help him. Anyway, Fatty pushed Hepzebiah into a deep snowdrift–when he thought the Toyman wasn’t looking. And Hepzebiah fell into the snowdrift head first so that only her legs could be seen, and they were kicking wildly in the air. Now the Toyman was busy untangling the rope, which had gotten mixed with the steering-gear, and he hadn’t noticed Fatty and Reddy at their old tricks. But her two brothers pulled her out of the drift by her little kicking legs, and brushed her off and dried her tears. Then they went for Reddy and Fatty. Reddy ran away, but Fatty stood his ground, for he was much bigger than they. They had their fists clenched, and were going to punch him, very hard, I guess, when the Toyman looked up from his work and called,–

“What’s the trouble, son?”

The boys explained it, but they kept their fists clenched just the same. They were rather excited, you see, and as soon as they were through telling the Toyman all about it, they wanted to pitch into “that ole Fatty.”

But Fatty tried to lie out of it.

“She just fell herself,” he said, half scared.

“She didn’t, either,” Jehosophat yelled, “he pushed her in.” And he started to rush for the fat boy when the Toyman called,–

“Hold on there, let me settle it.”

He came over, and squinted his eyes thoughtfully like a judge, while Fatty twisted and squirmed and squirmed and twisted.

“I wouldn’t hit him,” said the Toyman, “Fatty’s so fat it wouldn’t do any good anyway. Your fists would only sink into him like dough. So I guess you’d better wash his face in the snow–hard now.”

So they did–very hard, as the Toyman had told them.

“Why, he’s actually blubbering, the great big booby,” said Jehosophat, “shame!”

Now there’s no word in the language in which boys and girls join more readily than this same word “Shame.” So they all took up the chorus, everybody on that hill. You know that chorus, and your parents know it, and your grandparents, and great grandparents, too, sang it, long, long before you were born.

“Shame, shame, puddin’ an’ tame.
Everybody knows your name.”

What pudding has to do with it probably none in the whole world knows. But it is a very effective song, and they one and all shouted it, dancing around Fatty and Reddy, and laughing at them; and the fat boy started to run away, yelling at the top of his lungs. But he stumbled over the bobsled, and the tangled ropes caught his feet and started him rolling down the hill. He didn’t exactly roll, either, for he was so fat that he seemed to bounce like a rubber ball; and little Wienerwurst, who thought it all very fine sport, ran after him, nosing and snapping at him all the way down that hill. Then, when he reached the bottom, coward Fatty picked himself up and “made tracks” for home.

It was to–be sure, an odd sort of punishment that the Toyman ordered for Fatty. It was just such things that made Mr. and Mrs. Hamm and all the neighbors shake their heads over the Toyman and say he was crazy. But Jehosophat, who had heard it said that Solomon was a wonderful judge, knew one that could beat Solomon–and he was the Toyman.

Perhaps he was right. At all events, the children were ever so happy, as they coasted down, down the hill on that big bobsled, which they did till the stars came out, and, far over the fields, the supper bell sounded.