"No," rejoined Wallace, "I don't think that you do; that is I don't think that you do so more than other boys of your age. But to show you exactly what I mean, I will give you some cases. Perhaps they are true and perhaps they are imaginary. It makes no difference which they are. "Once there was a boy," continued Wallace, "who came down early one winter morning, and after warming himself a moment by the sitting-room fire, he went out in the kitchen. It happened to be ironing day, and the girl was engaged in ironing at a great table by the kitchen fire. We will call the girl's name Dorothy. "The boy seeing Dorothy at this work, wished to iron something, himself. So Dorothy gave him a flat-iron and also something to iron." "What was it that she gave him to iron?" said Phonny. "A towel," said Wallace. "Well," said Phonny, "go on." "The boy took the flat-iron and went to work," continued Wallace. "Presently, however, he thought he would go out into the shed and see if the snow had blown in, during the night. He found that it had, and so he stopped to play with the drift a few minutes. At last he came back into the kitchen, and he found, when he came in, that Dorothy had finished ironing his towel and had put it away. He began to complain of her for doing this, and then, in order to punish her, as he said, he took two of her flat-irons and ran off with them, and put them into the snow drift." "Yes," said Phonny, "that was me. But then I only did it for fun." "Was the fun for yourself or for Dorothy?" asked Wallace. "Why, for me," said Phonny. "And it made only trouble for Dorothy," said Wallace. "Yes," said Phonny, "I suppose it did." "That is the kind of boyishness I mean," said Wallace, "getting fun for yourself at other people's expense; and so making them dislike you, and feel sorry when they see you coming, and glad when you go away." Phonny was silent. He saw the folly of such a course of proceeding, and had nothing to say. "There is another case," said Wallace. "Once I knew a boy, and his name was--I'll call him Johnny." "What was his other name?" asked Phonny. "No matter for that, now," said Wallace. "He went out into the barn, and he wanted something to do, and so the boy who lived there, gave him a certain corner to take charge of, and keep in order." "What was that boy's name?" asked Phonny. "Why, I will call him Hazelnut," said Wallace. "Ah!" exclaimed Phonny, "now I know you are going to tell some story about me and Beechnut." Here Phonny threw back his head and laughed aloud. He repeated the words Johnny and Hazelnut, and then laughed again, until he made the woods ring with his merriment. Wallace smiled, and went on with his story.