"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 to a dinner-party that I really enjoyed. And Bruno
tossed his head, and said, in a rather offended tone, that I might do
as I pleased--there were many he knew that would give their ears to go.

"Have you ever been yourself, Bruno?"

"They invited me once last year," Bruno said, very gravely. "It was to
wash up the soup-plates--no, the cheese-plates I mean--that was g'and
enough. But the g'andest thing of all was, _I_ fetched the Duke of
Dandelion a glass of cider!"

"That _was_ grand!" I said, biting my lip to keep myself from laughing.

"Wasn't it!" said Bruno, very earnestly. "You know it isn't every one
that's had such an honor as _that_!"

This set me thinking of the various queer things we call "an honor" in
this world, which, after all, haven't a bit more honor in them than
what the dear little Bruno enjoyed (by the way, I hope you're beginning
to like him a little, naughty as he was?) when he took the Duke of
Dandelion a glass of cider.