"Does dogs frost-bite?" queried Jimmieboy, looking around the room for a stick with which to beat the dog that had done the biting, if perchance it was a dog that was responsible.
"No, indeed," said papa. "It wasn't a dog; it was Jack Frost, and nobody else. He ought to be muzzled."
"Who is Jack Frost, papa?" Jimmieboy asked, so much interested in Jack that he for a moment forgot his suffering small brother.
"Jack? Why, Jack is a man named Frost, who deals in cold, and he goes around in winter biting people. He's a sort of ice-man, only he's retired from trade, and gives things away, to people who don't want 'em. It would be better if he'd go into business, and sell his favors to people who do want 'em."
"Well, he's a naughty man," said Jimmieboy.
"Yes, indeed, he is," said papa. "Why, he's the man who withered all your mamma's plants, and painted our nice green lawn white; and then, when we wanted to dig holes for the fence posts, he came along and made the ground so hard it took all the edge off the spade, and made the hired man so tired that he overslept himself that night and let the furnace go out."
"Can't somebody catch him, and put him into prism?" asked Jimmieboy.
"Oh, he's been in prism lots of times," said papa, with a laugh at Jimmieboy's droll word; "but he manages to get out again."
"Where does he live, papa?" asked the boy.