it,
you will not hurt yourself.

You can trundle a hoop, you say; and jump over a stick. O, I forgot!--and
march like the men in the red coats, when papa plays a pretty tune on the
fiddle.

LESSON XI.

WHAT, you think that you shall soon be able to dress yourself entirely? I
am glad of it: I have something else to do. You may go, and look for your
frock in the drawer; but I will tie it, till you are stronger. Betty will
tie it, when I am busy.

I button my gown myself: I do not want a maid to assist me, when I am
dressing. But you have not yet got sense enough to do it properly, and
must beg somebody to help you, till you are older.

Children grow older and wiser at the same time. William is not able to
take a piece of meat, because he has not got the sense which would make
him think that, without teeth, meat would do him harm. He cannot tell
what is good for him.

The sense of children grows with them. You know much more than William,
now you walk alone, and talk; but you do not know as much as the boys and
girls you see playing yonder, who are half as tall again as you; and they
do not know half as much as their fathers and mothers, who are men and
women grown. Papa and I were children, like you; and men and women took
care of us. I carry William, because he is too weak to walk. I lift you
over a stile, and over the gutter, when you cannot jump over it.

You know already, that potatoes will not do you any harm: but I must
pluck the fruit for you, till you are wise enough to know the ripe apples
and pears. The hard ones would make you sick, and then you must take
physic. You do not love physic: I do not love it any more than you. But I
have more sense than you; therefore I take care not to eat unripe fruit,
or any thing else that would make my stomach ache, or bring out ugly red
spots on my face.

When I was a child, my mamma chose the fruit for me, to prevent my making
myself sick. I was just like you; I used to ask for what I saw, without
knowing whether it was good or bad. Now I have lived a long time, I know
what is good; I do not want any body to tell me.

LESSON XII.

LOOK at those two dogs. The old one brings the ball to me in a moment;
the young one does not know how. He must be taught.

I can cut your shift in a proper shape. You would not know how to begin.
You would spoil it; but you will learn.

John digs in the garden, and knows when to put the seed in the ground.
You cannot tell wheth