And so I began thus: "Little Lazy Larkin laughed and leaped, or longed
and lounged the livelong day, and loved not labor, but liked leisure."
"Ha! ha!" cried the Wee Chick; "that sounds so funny!"
"It's got so many l's, that's the reason," said Fairy.
"Tell it right," said Sunbeam.
"Well, then," I said, "Larkin was an indolent juvenile, fond of
mirthfulness and cachinatory and saltatory exercises--"
"I don't know what you mean!" said Fairy, just ready to get angry.
"Sech awful big words!" cried the Little Pullet; "they is as big--as
big as punkins!"
"I guess that's what they call hifalutin," said Sunbeam; "now do tell it
right."
And so I told it "right."
Larkin was an idle fellow, and was so utterly good-for-nothing, that he
came to be called "Lazy Larkin." It is a dreadful thing to get a bad name
when you are young. It sticks to you like a sand burr. Larkin would
neither work nor study. He did not even like good, hearty play, for any
great length of time, but was very fond of the play that boys call
_mumble-the-peg_, because, as he said, you could sit down to play it. He
fished a little, but if the fish did not bite at the first place, he sat
down; he would not move, but just sat and waited for them to come to him.
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