"Henry," said she, "how nice you look when you are not crying. Why, now you're smiling, and you look like a darling!"
He laughed.
"There! laugh again. I want to tell you something, Henry. You'd be a great deal happier if you didn't cry so much; do you know it?"
"Well, Miss Dunlee,"—Kyzie liked extremely to be called Miss Dunlee,—"well, Miss Dunlee, you see, the boys keep a-plaguing me. And when they plague me I have to cry."
"Oh, fie, don't you do it! If I were a little black-eyed boy about your age I'd laugh, and I'd say to those boys: 'You needn't try to plague me; you just can't do it. The more you try, the more I'll laugh.'"
Henry's eyes opened wide in surprise, and he laughed before he knew it.
"There! that's the way, Henry. If you do that they'll stop right off. There's no fun in plaguing a little boy that laughs."
Henry laughed again and threw back his shoulders. Why, this was something new. This wasn't the way his mamma talked to him. She always said, "Mamma's boy is sick and mustn't be plagued."
"Another thing," went on the little girl, pleased to see that her words had had some effect; "whatever else you may do, Henry, don't 'run and tell,' Do you suppose George Washington ever crept along to his teacher, rubbing his eyes this way on his jacket sleeve, and said 'Miss Dunlee—ah, the boys have been a-making fun of me—ah! They called me names, they did!'"
Henry dropped his chin into his neck.