“You have often reproved me for being greedy,” grunted Reginald as the colt harvested a luscious bunch a yard from where he sat, “yet I have never tried to eat up the whole pasture between sunrise and noon.”
“Don’t give me any of your impudence,” retorted Clarence, with his mouth full, “or I’ll shut my teeth on one of your ridiculous, flapping ears.”
“If you gave milk,” commented Mrs. Cowslip, “you would understand the necessity of a stomach filled with something better than artichokes.”
“Ha! ha!” laughed the pig, with his mouth wide open. “The sides of your son bulge like the sides of the barrel in which Gabe keeps your breakfast of bran. Ha! ha! does Gustavius give milk?”
“Let me at him, mother,” said the bull-calf, waving his tail aloft and lowering his horns. “I’ll teach him!”
“No, you don’t,” said the pig, showing surprising agility. “You greedy fellows annoy me; I’m going to the house and get that red-headed girl to scratch my back.”
So intensely satisfied with himself that the kink in his tail tightened to the verge of discomfort, Reginald scampered across the lawn and up the steps leading to the veranda. With his forefeet on the top step he halted at a gruff challenge from Napoleon. The bull-terrier, with teeth unpleasantly visible, barred his way to the door.
“My goodness,” said the pig, with easy assurance, “how you startled me! You were always such a joker.” And Reginald got his forefeet on the veranda floor.
“Now, that’s the limit,” growled Napoleon. “One step farther, and I’ll have your ears in ribbons.”
“You don’t know how handsome you are when you put on that fierce look,” said the pig in flattering tones. “Any stranger would believe you in earnest. But you and I know each other.”