"It seems to me I was dreaming it all night," said Sam, "but I believe I
can tell it in less than five minutes: I thought I was going along, and
a little black dog was following me. As long as I kept walking on
straight ahead he trotted on behind me like a lamb, but every time I got
out of the path, and tried to cross the fields, he barked and snapped at
me till I came back to the path.

"I got tired staying in the path, so I dashed out on one side presently,
but the doggie barked so furiously that I got scared and climbed a
little tree. Just as I got to the top, the tree broke off at the roots
and 'down came Sammy, tree top and all.' The fall woke me, and I found I
had rolled out of bed. Wasn't that a funny dream?"

"Sam," said his mother, who had been much interested in his dream,
"don't you wish you had a little dog to go around with you and bark when
you went out of the right way?"

"I don't know, mother," answered Sam, doubtfully; "maybe I don't."

"I hoped you would say you did," said mother, looking disappointed, "and
I was going to tell you that conscience was that very little dog, and if
you tried to get away from conscience's barks, either up a tree or
elsewhere, you would certainly fall and come to grief. Time's up, little
boy; hie off to the bathroom."

--_Selected._