ing like that--and I shan't tell you any more."

"Indeed and indeed, Bruno, I didn't mean to grin. See, I'm quite grave
again now."

But Bruno only folded his arms and said, "Don't tell _me_. I see a
little twinkle in one of your eyes--just like the moon."

"Am _I_ like the moon, Bruno?" I asked.

"Your face is large and round like the moon," Bruno answered, looking
at me thoughtfully. "It doesn't shine quite so bright--but it's
cleaner."

I couldn't help smiling at this. "You know I wash _my_ face, Bruno. The
moon never does that."

"Oh, doesn't she though!" cried Bruno; and he leaned forward and added
in a solemn whisper, "The moon's face gets dirtier and dirtier every
night, till it's black all ac'oss. And then, when it's dirty all
over--_so_--" (he passed his hand across his own rosy cheeks as he
spoke) "then she washes it."

"And then it's all clean again, isn't it?"

"Not all in a moment," said Bruno. "What a deal of teaching you want!
She washes it little by little--only she begins at the other edge."

By this time he was sitting quietly on the mouse, with his arms folded,
and the weeding wasn't getting on a bit. So I was obliged to say:

"Work first and pleasure afterward; no more talking till that bed's
finished."

After that we had a few minutes of silence, while I sorted out the
pebbles, and amused myself with watching Bruno's plan of gardening. It
was quite a new plan to me: he always measured each bed before he
weeded it, as if he was afraid the weeding would make it shrink; and
once, when it came out longer than he wished, he set to work to thump
the mouse with his tiny fist, crying out, "There now! It's all 'ong
again! Why don't you keep your tail st'aight when I tell you!"

"I'll tell you what I'll do," Bruno said in a half-whisper, as we
worked: "I'll get you an invitation to the king's dinner-party. I know
one of the head-waiters."

I couldn't help laughing at this idea. "Do the waiters invite the
guests?" I asked.

"Oh, not _to sit down_!" Bruno hastily replied. "But to help, you know.
You'd like that, wouldn't you? To hand about plates, and so on."

"Well, but that's not so nice as sitting at the table, is it?"

"Of course it isn't," Bruno said, in a tone as if he rather pitied my
ignorance; "but if you're not even Sir Anything, you can't expect to be
allowed to sit at the table, you know."

I said, as meekly as I could, that I didn't expect it, but it was the
only way of going