We and the World, Part I | Page 5

of what I was
doing; for I had been severely stung that week myself, and knew what
it felt like, and how little good powder-blue does.
With attending to the bees I had not heard the parson say, "Second
Commandment?" and as he was rather deaf he did not hear what I said.
But of course he knew it was not long enough for the right answer, and
he said, "Speak up, my boy," and Jem tried to start me by whispering,
"Thou shalt not make to thyself"--but the three bees went on sitting on
Master Isaac's hand, and though I began the Second Commandment, I
could not take my eyes off them, and when Master Isaac saw this he
smiled and nodded his white head, and said, "Never you mind me, sir.
They won't sting the old bee-keeper." This assertion so completely
turned my head that every other idea went out of it, and after saying "or
in the earth beneath" three times, and getting no further, the parson
called out, "Third Commandment?" and I was passed over--"out of
respect to the family," as I was reminded for a twelvemonth
afterwards--and Jem pinched my leg to comfort me, and my mother
sank down on the seat, and did not take her face out of her
pocket-handkerchief till the workhouse boys were saying "the
sacraments."

My mother was our only teacher till Jem was nine and I was eight years
old. We had a thin, soft-backed reading book, bound in black cloth, on
the cover of which in gold letters was its name, _Chick-seed without
Chick-weed_; and in this book she wrote our names, and the date at the
end of each lesson we conned fairly through. I had got into
Part II.,
which was "in words of four letters," and had the chapter about the
Ship in it, before Jem's name figured at the end of the chapter about the
Dog in
Part I.
My mother was very glad that this chapter seemed to please Jem, and
that he learned to read it quickly, for, good-natured as he was, Jem was
too fond of fighting and laying about him: and though it was only "in
words of three letters," this brief chapter contained a terrible story, and
an excellent moral, which I remember well even now.
It was called "The Dog."
"Why do you cry? The Dog has bit my leg. Why did he do so? I had my
bat and I hit him as he lay on the mat, so he ran at me and bit my leg.
Ah, you may not use the bat if you hit the Dog. It is a hot day, and the
Dog may go mad. One day a Dog bit a boy in the arm, and the boy had
his arm cut off, for the Dog was mad. And did the boy die? Yes, he did
die in a day or two. It is not fit to hit a Dog if he lie on the mat and is
not a bad Dog. Do not hit a Dog, or a cat, or a boy."
Jem not only got through this lesson much better than usual, but he
lingered at my mother's knees, to point with his own little stumpy
forefinger to each recurrence of the words "hit a Dog," and read them
all by himself.
"Very good boy," said Mother, who was much pleased. "And now read
this last sentence once more, and very nicely."

"Do--not--hit--a--dog--or--a--cat--or--a--boy," read Jem in a high
sing-song, and with a face of blank indifference, and then with a hasty
dog's-ear he turned back to the previous page, and spelled out, "I had
my bat and I hit him as he lay on the mat" so well, that my mother
caught him to her bosom and covered him with kisses.
"He'll be as good a scholar as Jack yet!" she exclaimed. "But don't
forget, my darling, that my Jem must never 'hit a dog, or a cat, or a
boy.' Now, love, you may put the book away."
Jem stuck out his lips and looked down, and hesitated. He seemed
almost disposed to go on with his lessons. But he changed his mind,
and shutting the book with a bang, he scampered off. As he passed the
ottoman near the door, he saw Kitty, our old tortoise-shell puss, lying
on it, and (moved perhaps by the occurrence of the word cat in the last
sentence of the lesson) he gave her such a whack with the flat side of
Chick-seed that she bounced up into the air like a sky-rocket, Jem
crying out as he did so, "I had my bat, and I hit him as he lay on the
mat."
It was seldom enough that Jem got anything by heart,