HEEDLESS HARRY."
There was many a roguish, laughing look cast at Harry as this strange story was being read; and when it was finished, George exclaimed, eagerly—"Oh, mamma! what a pity Aunt Fanny did not know about Harry, and the old black cook, and the dishcloth! Wouldn't she have laughed?"
"Tell us about it, Harry, do! do!" cried all the brothers and sisters.
The children knew the story as well as Harry, but they delighted to watch the sparkle of his eyes, and his animated gestures, for to tell the truth, he did enjoy mischief beyond words to describe.
"Well," cried Harry, jumping up, "you see I would go down in the kitchen and teaze the cook; and she could never touch me with the broomstick, because I ran full tilt; and she was very fat, you know, always trod on her dress, and sometimes came down flat on her nose.
"Well, one day she said—'If you come in the kitchen again, I'll pin the dishcloth fast to your jacket!' I came right back. 'Pin it!' said I, 'that's all I want.' So she pinned it, and I stood very, very still till it was done. Then I made one jump in the air, and gave one tremendous shout, and put square up stairs for mother's room, the cook after me; but I ran fastest, she was so fat. I got in the room first, tore off the dishcloth—her best dishcloth—bran new, and threw it into the very middle of the fire; and she had the pleasure of seeing the last of her new dishcloth blazing up the chimney. So that's what a cook gets when she pins her dishcloth on a boy."
The children clapped their hands, and screamed with laughter at this story; and they laughed still harder, when Harry put on a comical, half-provoked look, and added, "But you know mother made me take the very money I was going to buy a new ball with, and buy a yard of crash to make another dishcloth for the cook; that crashed me, so I don't think I shall burn any more for the present."
And now the children, bidding each other "good night," went skipping and dancing to bed, delighted with the evening's entertainment, wondering who would have the next story from Aunt Fanny.