"This country would probably be bankrupt if there were no corn
crop, and you'd be digging hard for a living, instead of being
a lazy schoolboy," retorted Reade, with an indulgent smile. "Let
me see; how many hundred million dollars did Old Dut tell us the
annual corn crop brings in wealth to this country?"

All of the other boys, save Dave, glanced at Tom, but all shook
their heads. Statistics do not mix well in a Grammar School boy's
head.

"Oh, well, it was a lot of money, anyway," Tom pursued his subject.
"I wouldn't mind having all the money that the American corn
crop brings."

"So you could buy the fanciest kinds of food, I suppose?" jeered
Dave Darrin.

"Never mind, Darry; if I had a lot of money I'd buy you the biggest
and softest mattress I could find, so that you'd have nothing
to do but lie off by yourself, look up at the green leaves and
dream your summers away. That lying on your back and looking
up at the sky is what you call reverie, isn't it?"

"Quit your kidding!" ordered Dave.

"Is it reverie?" asked Harry Hazelton, "or just plain laziness
that ails Dave?"

"Laziness, of course," laughed Tom. "Dave, I guess Harry has
more sense in naming things than any of us. Yes; that's it!