Sammy was silent for a minute.

“They don’t know much,” he said at last.

David looked round quickly.

“Now who told you that?” said he.  “In the first place, if ignorance were any excuse for tormenting a poor creature, I might make you wretched for an hour or two.  Fortunately for you, it isn’t.  We don’t have to stop and ask what you know before we can be kind to you.  But you make a mistake if you think frogs are stupid.  See how well they dive and swim!  I have been trying all summer, and I can’t dive like that.  They don’t ever go down on their shoulders and stick their heads in the mud.  I taught a frog to come and eat out of my hand.  That was a brave thing for him to do.  He knew as well as you know what some boys would have done to him.”

Sammy was beginning to look ashamed.

“There’s just one thing more,” said David.  “When you have to kill anything, kill it as quickly as you can.  Don’t let it suffer pain.  There isn’t any excuse for half the suffering there is in this world.  Did you ever hear the story of Theodore Parker and the frogs?”

“No,” said Sammy; “I should like to.”

“When he was a little boy, perhaps less than four years old, he had to go home alone by a frog-pond where he had seen boys stoning frogs.  He raised his hand to throw a stone at a frog, when he heard a voice say, ‘Don’t.’  He looked all around but could see no one, and he raised his hand again to stone the frog.  Again he heard a voice say, ‘Don’t.’  Still he could see no one.  He was frightened, and running, home to his mother he told her about it, and asked who it was that said, ‘Don’t.’  She took him on her knee and told him that it was the voice of God speaking in his heart, and that if he would always listen to it he would grow up to be a good man.”

“Will you take me fishing this afternoon?” said Sammy, after a long pause.

“No, I will not,” said David with emphasis.  “I don’t go fishing for fun, and I have here all that I need.”

“May I go swimming with you then?” persisted Sammy.

“Of course you may,” said David cordially.  “We’ll see if we can swim any better than the frogs.  I haven’t much hope of it, but we can try.”

“All right,” said Sammy as he rose to go.  He had gone not more than thirty feet before he stopped.  “I won’t stone them any more, David,” he called back over his shoulder.  Then he went on into the woods.

I would not enter on my list of friends,
Though graced with polished manners and fine sense
Yet wanting sensibility, the man
Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm. 

          
                                                            Cowper.

SOME READY HELPERS.

We often fail to understand some of our best friends in the animal world.  We know so little about them that we think they are useless and uninteresting.  Frogs, and especially toads, are often the objects of unjust dislike, yet their lives are very useful and full of interest.