"Pshaw, it's no use to try and deceive me," added the doctor, sternly. "Here it is in the basin."
With a groan of pain, the child commenced vomiting again.
"I should really like to know how much he ate," said the physician, pointing to pieces of the indigested food.
"I gave him money yesterday, to buy a top," gravely remarked Mr. Saunders. "He must have spent it for this."
"I didn't!" cried Joseph. "I didn't eat any!"
After administering a simple quietive, Dr. Long turned away, and, motioning the father from the room, said, abruptly,—
"Your boy will end his days on the gallows, if you don't correct his habit of lying."
As soon as Joseph was well, his father, having ascertained from the grocer that he had bought a cocoanut at his store, gave him a more severe punishing than he had ever received in his life, to make up for which Aunt Clarissa ordered the cook to bake him a nice little loaf of frosted cake, richly filled with raisins and citron.
The room where Joseph attended school was situated on one of the principal streets, just opposite a druggist's store. The front windows with their immense panes of cut glass, behind which were large jars filled with colored liquid presented a most attractive appearance, and Joseph, in common with his other companions, often paused in front of them.
The only objection Miss Sanborn had to her schoolroom was, that there was no yard adjoining, where the pupils could exercise at recess; and thus they were obliged to play in the street. Throwing ball was strictly forbidden, and rolling hoop was inconvenient to passengers, so that it required considerable invention to devise plays which would not be objectionable.