My mother was very glad that this chapter seemed to please Jem, and that
he learned to read it quickly, for, good-natured as he was, Jem was too
fond of fighting and laying about him: and though it was only "in words
of three letters," this brief chapter contained a terrible story, and an
excellent moral, which I remember well even now.

It was called "The Dog."

"Why do you cry? The Dog has bit my leg. Why did he do so? I had my bat
and I hit him as he lay on the mat, so he ran at me and bit my leg. Ah,
you may not use the bat if you hit the Dog. It is a hot day, and the Dog
may go mad. One day a Dog bit a boy in the arm, and the boy had his arm
cut off, for the Dog was mad. And did the boy die? Yes, he did die in a
day or two. It is not fit to hit a Dog if he lie on the mat and is not a
bad Dog. Do not hit a Dog, or a cat, or a boy."

Jem not only got through this lesson much better than usual, but he
lingered at my mother's knees, to point with his own little stumpy
forefinger to each recurrence of the words "hit a Dog," and read them
all by himself.

"_Very_ good boy," said Mother, who was much pleased. "And now read this
last sentence once more, and very nicely."

"Do--not--hit--a--dog--or--a--cat--or--a--boy," read Jem in a high
sing-song, and with a face of blank indifference, and then with a hasty
dog's-ear he turned back to the previous page, and spelled out, "I had
my bat and I hit him as he lay on the mat" so well, that my mother
caught him to her bosom and covered him with kisses.