RAY AND HIS KITE. Ray was a silly boy. You will think so too when you have read this story. Ray liked to play with the boys at school well enough; but he liked to be alone under the shade of some tree reading a fairy tale or dreaming daydreams better. There was one activity that he liked as well as his companions; that was flying a kite. One day when he was flying his kite, he said to himself, "I wonder if anybody ever tried to fly a kite at night. It seems to me it would be nice. But then, if it is dark, the kite cannot be seen. What if I should fasten a light to it, though? That would makeit show. I'll try it tonight."As soon as it was dark, without saying a word to anybody, he took his kite and lantern and went to a large, openlot a distance from his home. "Well," thought he, "this is strange. How lonely and still it seems without any other boys around! I am going to fly my kite anyway."So he tied the lantern, which was made of tin punched full of small holes, to the tail of his kite. Then he pitched the kite, and, after several attempts, succeeded in making it rise. Up it went, higher and higher, as Ray let out the string. When the string was all unwound, he tied it to a fence, and then he stood and gazed at his kite as it floated high up in the air. While Ray was enjoying his kite, some people who were out on the street in the village saw a strange light in the sky. They gathered in groups to watch it. Now it was still for a few seconds; then it seemed to be jumping up and down; then it made long sweeps back and forth through the air. "What can it be?" asked one person. "How strange," said another. "It cannot be a comet because comets have tails," said a third. "Perhaps it's a big firefly,"said another. At last some of the men decided to find out what this strange light was—whether it was a hobgoblin dancing in the air, or something dropping from the sky. So off they started to get as close to it as they could. While this was taking place, Ray, who had gotten tired of standing and was sitting on a fence behind a tree. He could see the men as they approached, but they did not see him. When they were directly under the light, and saw what it was, they looked at each other and said while laughing, "This is some boy's trick, and it has fooled us nicely.Let us keep the secret and have our share of the joke."Then they laughed again and went back to the village. Some of the people there had not yet found out what that strange light was. When the men had gone, Ray thought it was time for him to go, so hewound up his string, picked up his kite and lantern, and went home. His mother had been wondering where he was. When she heard what he had been doing, she hardly knew whether to laugh or scold, but I think she laughed and told him that it was time for himto go to bed.
1.How is Ray able to fly his kite at night? // 2.What do some of the people think Ray's kite is when they see it? // 3.Why do you think the men watching the kite didn't go and tell the rest of the villagers about it? // 4.How might people's feelings about Ray change by the end of the story?
