Ernest looked up from his book.

“Why, yes,” he said decidedly; “the horses of Achilles talked, don’t you remember?”

“Well, that was a kind of fable,” said Jack.  “Our horses never talked.  Bruno comes near it sometimes.  But, Hester, don’t you think fables are tiresome?  They always have a moral tagged on!” he continued, appealing to his older sister; for Ernest proved a poor listener, and was deep in his book again.

“I will tell you a fable about a boy,” said Hester, sitting down with her work, “and you shall see.”

“But don’t let the beasts speak,” said Jack, “and don’t let the boy give advice!”

“He won’t even think of it,” said Hester; and she went on.

“Once there was a boy, and his name was Oscar, and he went to a very good school, where he learned to spell and read very well, and do a few sums.  But when he had learned about as much as that, he took up a new accomplishment.  This was to fling up balls, two at a time, and catch them in his hands.  This he could do wonderfully well; but then a great many other boys could.  He, however, did it at home; he did it on the sidewalk; he could do it sitting on the very top of a board fence; but he was most proud of doing it in school hours while the teacher was not looking.  This grew to be his great ambition.  He succeeded once or twice, when she was very busy with a younger class, and once while her back was turned, and she was at the door receiving a visitor.

“But that did not satisfy him:  he wanted to be able to do it when she was sitting on her regular seat in front of the platform; and every day he practised, sometimes with one ball and sometimes with another.  It took a great deal of his time and all of his attention; and often some of the other boys were marked for laughing when he succeeded.  And he had succeeded so well that the teacher had not the slightest idea what they were laughing at.

“All this was very satisfactory to him; but it was not so well for him at the end of the year, because it turned out he was behind-hand in all his studies, and he had to be put down into a lower room.  But coming into another room with a fresh teacher, he had to learn his favorite accomplishment all over again.  It was difficult, for she was a very rigid teacher, and seemed to have eyes in every hair of her head; and he sat at the other side of the room, so that he had to change hands somehow in throwing the balls and getting them into his desk quick without being seen.  But there were a number of younger boys in the room who enjoyed it all very much, so that he was a real hero, and felt himself quite a favorite.  He did manage to keep up better in his arithmetic, too, in spite of his having so little time for his books.  Perhaps from having to watch the teacher so much, he did learn the things that he heard her repeat over and over again; and then he picked up some knowledge from the other boys.  Still, all through his school term, he was sent about more or less from one room to another.  The teachers could not quite understand why such a bright-looking boy, who seemed to be always busy with his lessons, was not farther on in his studies.