"The doctor has ordered it because I have bruised my foot."
"Oh, my poor Pinocchio!"
"Oh, my poor Lamp-Wick!"
An embarrassingly long silence followed these words, during which time the two friends looked at each other in a mocking way.
Finally the Marionette, in a voice sweet as honey and soft as a flute, said to his companion:
"Tell me, Lamp-Wick, dear friend, have you ever suffered from an earache?"
"Never! And you?"
"Never! Still, since this morning my ear has been torturing me."
"So has mine."
"Yours, too? And which ear is it?"
"Both of them. And yours?"
"Both of them, too. I wonder if it could be the same sickness."
"I'm afraid it is."
"Will you do me a favor, Lamp-Wick?"
"Gladly! With my whole heart."
"Will you let me see your ears?"
"Why not? But before I show you mine, I want to see yours, dear Pinocchio."
"No. You must show yours first."
"No, my dear! Yours first, then mine."
"Well, then," said the Marionette, "let us make a contract."
"Let's hear the contract!"
"Let us take off our caps together. All right?"
"All right."
"Ready then!"
Pinocchio began to count, "One! Two! Three!"
At the word "Three!" the two boys pulled off their caps and threw them high in air.
And then a scene took place which is hard to believe, but it is all too true. The Marionette and his friend, Lamp-Wick, when they saw each other both stricken by the same misfortune, instead of feeling sorrowful and ashamed, began to poke fun at each other, and after much nonsense, they ended by bursting out into hearty laughter.
They laughed and laughed, and laughed again-laughed till they ached-laughed till they cried.
But all of a sudden Lamp-Wick stopped laughing. He tottered and almost fell. Pale as a ghost, he turned to Pinocchio and said:
"Help, help, Pinocchio!"
"What is the matter?"
"Oh, help me! I can no longer stand up."
"I can't either," cried Pinocchio; and his laughter turned to tears as he stumbled about helplessly.
They had hardly finished speaking, when both of them fell on all fours and began running and jumping around the room. As they ran, their arms turned into legs, their faces lengthened into snouts and their backs became covered with long gray hairs.
This was humiliation enough, but the most horrible moment was the one in which the two poor creatures felt their tails appear. Overcome with shame and grief, they tried to cry and bemoan their fate.
But what is done can't be undone! Instead of moans and cries, they burst forth into loud donkey brays, which sounded very much like, "Haw! Haw! Haw!"
At that moment, a loud knocking was heard at the door and a voice called to them:
"Open! I am the Little Man, the driver of the wagon which brought you here. Open, I say, or beware!"
Pinocchio, having become a Donkey, is bought by the owner of a Circus, who wants to teach him to do tricks. The Donkey becomes lame and is sold to a man who wants to use his skin for a drumhead.
Very sad and downcast were the two poor little fellows as they stood and looked at each other. Outside the room, the Little
