DOT AND THE LEMONS.

Dot's father is a funny man. One night, he brought home some lemons for mamma,—twelve long, fat, yellow lemons, in a bag. Dot was sitting at the piano with mamma when his father came in, and did not run, as usual, to greet him with a kiss. So Dot's father opened the bag, and let the lemons drop one by one, and roll all over the floor.

Then Dot looked around, and cried, "Lemons, lemons! Get down; Dot get down!" And he ran and picked up the lemons one by one, and put them all together in the great black arm-chair. As he picked them up, he counted them: "One, two, three, five, six, seven, nine, ten!"

When Dot got tired of seeing them on the chair, he began to put them on the floor again, one at a time, and all in one spot. While he was doing this, his father stooped down, and when the little boy's back was turned, took the lemons, slily from the spot where Dot was placing them, and put them behind his own back,—some behind his right foot, and some behind his left.

He took only a few of them at first, so that Dot should not miss them. But, when Dot came to put the last lemon on the floor, he could not see any thing of the others, and was very much surprised. Then mamma, grandmamma, and grandpapa all burst out laughing. His father stepped aside, and there Dot saw the lemons in two rows.

Then father said, "That was only a joke. Now, Dot, put them back again on the chair—quick!" And Dot ran and began to take away the lemons from the first row, and lay them on the black cushion of grandpapa's great arm-chair, one by one. One—two—three—four—five: he had only one more lemon to pick up from the first row; but when he came for it—my! there were two.

Well, to tell the truth, Dot didn't notice this at first. He picked up one of the two, and thought to himself, "Only one left, Dot." But, I declare! there were two left when he came back. "This is a long row," thought Dot. And every time he left one, he found two, till papa had quite used up the second row, from which he had been filling up the first.

At last Dot did see the last lemon, and then again he didn't see it, for when he looked for it, it wasn't two, as before, it wasn't there at all!

"O papa! you have it behind you; and Dot will pull at your hand till you give up the lemon; and then you can't play any more tricks with your bright little boy."

But Dot will go up to bed with Alice, and in the middle of the night mamma will hear him saying in his sleep, "Five, six, nine, 'lemon!" For Dot always says 'lemon, when he means eleven.