rrelling.

Indeed, there was a kind of snapping even less near to a dispute than
in the cases just mentioned. The little Skratdjs, like some other
children, were under the unfortunate delusion that it sounds clever to
hear little boys and girls snap each other up with smart sayings, and
old and rather vulgar play upon words, such as:

"I'll give you a Christmas box. Which ear will you have it on?"

"I won't stand it."

"Pray take a chair."

"You shall have it to-morrow."

"To-morrow never comes."

And so if a visitor kindly began to talk to one of the children,
another was sure to draw near and "take up" all the first child's
answers, with smart comments, and catches that sounded as silly as
they were tiresome and impertinent.

And ill-mannered as this was, Mr. and Mrs. Skratdj never put a stop to
it. Indeed, it was only a caricature of what they did themselves. But
they often said, "We can't think how it is the children are always
squabbling!"

THE SKRATDJ'S DOG AND THE HOT-TEMPERED GENTLEMAN.

It is wonderful how the state of mind of a whole household is
influenced by the heads of it. Mr. Skratdj was a very kind master, and
Mrs. Skratdj was a very kind mistress, and yet their servants lived in
a perpetual fever of irritability that fell just short of discontent.
They jostled each other on the back stairs, said sharp things in the
pantry, and kept up a perennial warfare on the subject of the duty of
the sexes with the general man-servant. They gave warning on the
slightest provocation.

The very dog was infected by the snapping mania. He was not a brave
dog, he was not a vicious dog, and no high-breeding sanctioned his
pretensions to arrogance. But like his owners, he had contracted a bad
habit, a trick, which made him the pest of all timid visitors, and
indeed of all visitors whatsoever.

The moment anyone approached the house, on certain occasions when he
was spoken to, and often in no traceable connection with any cause at
all, Snap the mongrel would rush out, and bark in his little sharp
voice--"Yap! yap! yap!" If the visitor made a stand, he would bound
away sideways on his four little legs; but the moment the visitor went
on his way again, Snap was at his heels--"Yap! yap! yap!" He barked at
the milkman, the butcher's boy, and the baker, though he saw them
every day. He never got used to the washerwoman, and she never got
used to him. She said he "put her in mind of that there black dog in
the Pi