Do you sugar ?" "Do I sugar, sir ?" I said vacantly.

"Yes, I like sugar, sir." "Bless the lad!" he said, laughing.

"I mean sugar the trees.

Smear them with thick sugar and water or treacle, and then go round at night with a lantern; that's the way to catch the best moths." I was delighted with the idea and was not long before I tried it, and as luck would have it, there was an old bull's-eye lantern in the tool-house that Mr Solomon used when he went round to the furnaces of a night.
I remember well one evening, just at leaving-off time, taking my bottle of thick syrup and brush from the tool-house shelf, and slipping down the garden and into the pear-plantation where the choice late fruit was waiting and asking daily to be picked.
Mr Solomon was very proud of his pears, and certainly some of them grew to a magnificent size.
I was noticing how beautiful and tawny and golden some of them were growing to be as I smeared the trunk of one and then of another with my sweet stuff, and as it was a deliciously warm still evening, I was full of expectation of a good take.
I had just finished when all at once I heard a curious noise, which made me think of lying in the dark in the sand-cave listening to Shock's hard breathing; and I gave quite a shudder as I looked round, and then turned hot and angry.
I knew what the noise was, and had not to look far to find Ike lying under a large tree right away from the path fast asleep, and every now and then uttering a few words and giving a snort.
"Ike!" I said, shaking him.

"Ike! wake up and go home." But the more I tried the more stupid he seemed to grow, and I stood at last wondering what I had better do, not liking the idea of Mr Solomon hearing, for it was certain to mean a very severe reprimand.