“How you look!” cried Jasper, considering it better to rail at him.
Whereupon Pickering found his way to the long mirror. “I never was a beauty,” he said.
“And now you are less,” laughed Jasper.
“But I'm good,” said Pickering solemnly, and flinging himself down to his books.
“You can't study with such eyes,” cried Jasper, tugging at the book.
“I'm not going. Pick, your eyes aren't much bigger than pins.”
“But they're sharp—just as pins are. Leave me alone.” Pickering squirmed all over his chair, but Jasper had the book.
“Never mind, I'll fly at my history, then,” said Pickering, possessing himself of another book; “that's the beauty of it. I'm as backward in all of my lessons as I am in one. I can strike in anywhere.”
“You are not backward in any now,” cried Jasper in glee, and performing an Indian war dance around the table. “Forward is the word henceforth,” he brought up dramatically with another lunge at Pickering.