"You should have been there to have heard him howl and tear his hair at something A.O.told him about me.

And I sat there with a perfectly straight face through the whole of it, while she made up dreadful things about me.

I'm going away off in the pasture to-morrow and practise that bray all by myself till I can do it to perfection.
Then when A.O.begins to sing his praises again, I won't say a word.
I'll just give her Jimmy's laugh.

Won't she be astonished?
She's bound to recognize it, for it's the only one of its kind in the world.

I shall keep her guessing until after Christmas, where I heard it." "Don't _you_ tell her till then!" she exclaimed, sitting up on the side of the bed.