The clergyman was calling, when the youthful son and heir approached his
mother proudly, and exhibited a dead rat. As she shrank in repugnance,
he attempted to reassure her:
"Oh, it's dead all right, mama. We beat it and beat it and beat it, and
it's deader 'n dead."
His eyes fell on the clergyman, and he felt that something more was due
to that reverend presence. So he continued in a tone of solemnity:
"Yes, we beat it and beat it until--until God called it home!"