thought to be very fortunate in having such a son.

Little Ben lived to the ripe age of six years without doing anything
that was worthy to be told in history. But one summer afternoon, in his
seventh year, his mother put a fan into his hand and bade him keep the
flies away from the face of a little babe who lay fast asleep in the
cradle. She then left the room.

The boy waved the fan to and fro and drove away the buzzing flies
whenever they had the impertinence to come near the baby's face. When
they had all flown out of the window or into distant parts of the room,
he bent over the cradle and delighted himself with gazing at the
sleeping infant. It was, indeed, a very pretty sight. The little
personage in the cradle slumbered peacefully, with its waxen hands under
its chin, looking as full of blissful quiet as if angels were singing
lullabies in its ear. Indeed, it must have been dreaming about heaven;
for, while Ben stooped over the cradle, the little baby smiled.

"How beautiful she looks!" said Ben to himself. "What a pity it is that
such a pretty smile should not last forever!"

Now Ben, at this period of his life, had never heard of that wonderful
art by which a look, that appears and vanishes in a moment, may be made
to last for hundreds of years. But, though nobody had told him of such
an art, he may be said to have invented it for himself. On a table near
at hand there were pens and paper, and ink of two colors, black and red.
The boy seized a pen and sheet of paper, and, kneeling down beside the
cradle, began to draw a likeness of the infant. While he was busied in
this manner he heard his mother's step approaching, and hastily tried to
conceal the paper.