Cheaper by the Dozen

that Martha?"
    "You mean to say you think I can't tell one child from another?"
    "I don't mean to say anything, except if that isn't Martha we've made a horrible mistake."
    "We?" Dad squealed. "We? I've made no mistake. And I hope I'm wrong in imagining the sort of a mistake you've made."
    "You see, all I know them by is their tonsils," said Dr. Burton. "I thought these tonsils were Martha. They were the only pair that didn't have to come out."
    "No," moaned Dad."Oh, no!" Then growing indignant: "Do you mean to tell me you knocked my little girl unconscious for no reason at all?"
    "It looks as if I did just that, Gilbreth. I'm sorry, but it's done. It was damned careless. But you do have an uncommon lot of them, and they all look just alike to me."
    "All right, Burton," Dad said. "Sorry I lost my temper. What do we do?"
    "I'm going to take them out anyway. They'd have to come out eventually at any rate, and the worst part of an operation is dreading it before hand. She's done her dreading, and there's no use to make her do it twice."
    As Dr. Burton leaned over Ernestine, some reflex caused her to knee him in the mouth.
    "Okay, Ernestine, if that's really your name," he muttered. "I guess I deserved that."
    As it turned out, Ernestine's tonsils were recessed and bigger than the doctor had expected. It was a little messy to get at them, and Mr. Coggin, the movie cameraman, was sick in a waste basket.
    "Don't stop cranking," Dad shouted at him, "or your tonsils will be next. I'll pull them out by the roots, myself. Crank, by jingo, crank."
    Mr. Coggin cranked. When the operation was over, Dad and the nurse carried Ernestine upstairs.
    When Dad came in the parlor to get Frank, he told Mother to send someone over to Aunt Anne's for Martha.
    "Apple pie, doughnuts or not, she's going to have her tonsils out," he said. "I'm not going to go through another day like this one again in a hurry."
    Frank, Bill, and Lillian had their tonsils out, in that order. Then Martha arrived, bawling, kicking, and full of pie and doughnuts.
    "You said I didn't have to have my tonsils out, and I'm not going to have my tonsils out," she screamed at the doctor. Before he could get her on the desk which served as the operating table, she kicked him in the stomach.
    "The next time I come to your house," he said to Dad as soon as he could get his breath, "I'm going to wear a chest protector and a catcher's mask." Then to the nurse: "Give some ether to Martha, if that's really her name."
    "Yes, I'm Martha," she yelled through the towel. "You're making a mistake."
    "I told you she was Martha," Dad said triumphantly. "I know," Dr. Burton said. "Let's not go into that again. She's Martha, but I've named her tonsils Ernestine. Open your month, Martha, you sweet child, and let me get Ernestine's tonsils. Crank on Mr. Coggin. Your film may be the first photographic record of a man slowly going berserk."
    All of us felt terribly side that afternoon, but Martha was in agony.
    "It's a shame," Grandma kept telling Martha, who was named for her and was her especial pet. "They shouldn't have let you eat all that stuff and then brought you back here for the butchering. I don't care whether it was the doctor's fault or your father's fault. I'd like to skin them both alive and then scalp them like red Indians."
    While we were recuperating, Dad spent considerable time with us, but minimized our discomforts, and kept telling us we were just looking for sympathy.
    "Don't tell me," he said. "I saw the operations, didn't I? Why there's only the little, tiniest cut at the back of your throat. I don't understand how you can do all that complaining. Don't you remember the story about the Spartan boy who kept his mouth shut while the fox was chewing on his vitals?"
    It was partly because of our complaining, and the desire to show us how the Spartan boy would have had his tonsils out, that Dad decided to have only a local anesthetic for his operation. Mother, Grandma, and Dr. Burton all advised against it.
    But Dad wouldn't listen.
    "Why does everyone want to make a mountain out of a molehill over such a minor operation?" he said. "I want to keep an eye on Burton and see that he doesn't mess up the job."
    The first day that we children were well enough to get up, Dad and Mother set out in the car for Dr. Burton's office. Mother had urged Dad to call a taxi. She didn't know how to drive, and she said Dad probably wouldn't feel like doing the driving on the way home. But Dad