BACK HOME

By Eugene Wood

 TO THE SAINTED MEMORY OF HER WHOM, IN THE DAYS BACK HOME, I KNEW AS "MY MA MAG" AND WHO WAS MORE TO ME THAN I CAN TELL, EVEN IF MY TARDY WORDS COULD REACH HER THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED

 "That she who is an angel now Might sometimes think of me"

CONTENTS

 INTRODUCTION THE OLD RED SCHOOL-HOUSE THE SABBATH-SCHOOL THE REVOLVING YEAR THE SWIMMING-HOLE THE FIREMEN'S TOURNAMENT THE DEVOURING ELEMENT CIRCUS DAY THE COUNTY FAIR CHRISTMAS BACK HOME

INTRODUCTION

GENTLE READER:--Let me make you acquainted with my book, "Back Home. "(Your right hand, Book, your right hand. Pity's sakes! How many timeshave I got to tell you that? Chest up and forward, shoulders back anddown, and turn your toes out more. )

It is a little book, Gentle Reader, but please don't let that prejudiceyou against it. The General Public, I know, likes to feel heft in itshand when it buys a book, but I had hoped that you were a peg or twoabove the General Public. That mythical being goes on a reading spreeabout every so often, and it selects a book which will probably last outthe craving, a book which "it will be impossible to lay down, after itis once begun, until it is finished. " (I quote from the standard booknotice). A few hours later the following dialogue ensues:

"Henry!"

"Yes, dear. "

"Aren't you 'most done reading?"

"Just as soon as I finish this chapter. " A sigh and a long wait. 

"Henry!"

"Yes, dear. "

"Did you lock the side-door?" No answer. 

"Henry! Did you?"

"Did I what?"

"Did you lock the side-door?"

"In a minute now. "

"Yes, but did you?"

"M-hm. I guess so. "

"'Guess so!' Did you lock that side-door? They got in at Hilliard'snight before last and stole a bag of clothes-pins. "

"M. "

"Oh, put down that book, and go and lock the side-door. I'll not get awink of sleep this blessed night unless you do. "

"In a minute now. Just wait till I finish this... "

"Go do it now. "

Mr. General Public has a card on his desk that says, "Do it Now, " and sohe lays down his book with a patient sigh, and comes back to it with apatent grouch. 

"Oh, so it is, " says the voice from the bedroom. "I remember now, Ilocked it myself when I put the milk-bottles out.... I'm going to stoptaking of that man unless there's more cream on the top than there hasbeen here lately. "

"M. "

"Henry!"

"Oh, what is it?"

"Aren't you 'most done reading?"

"In a minute, just as soon as I finish this chapter. "

"How long is that chapter, for mercy's sakes?"

"I began another. "

"Henry!"

"What?"

"Aren't you coming to bed pretty soon? You know I can't go to sleep whenyou are sitting up. "

"Oh, hush up for one minute, can't ye? It's a funny thing if I can'tread a little once in a while. "

"It's a funny thing if I've got to be broke of my rest this way. As muchas I have to look after. I'd hate to be so selfish.... Henry! Won't youplease put the book down and come to bed?"

"Oh, for goodness sake! Turn over and go to sleep. You make me tired. "

Every two or three hours Mrs. General Public wakes up and announces thatshe can't get a wink of sleep, not a wink; she wishes he hadn't broughtthe plagued old book home; he hasn't the least bit of consideration forher; please, please, won't he put the book away and come to bed?

He reaches "THE END" at 2:30A. M. , turns off the gas, and creeps intobed, his stomach all upset from smoking so much without eating anything, his eyes feeling like two burnt holes in a blanket, and wishing thathe had the sense he was born with. He'll have to be up at 6:05, and heknows how he will feel. He also knows how he will feel along about threeo'clock in the afternoon. Smithers is coming then to close up that deal. Smithers is as sharp as tacks, as slippery as an eel, and as crooked asa dog's hind leg. Always looking for the best of it. You need allyour wits when you deal with Smithers. Why didn't he take Mrs. GeneralPublic's advice, and get to bed instead of sitting up fuddling himselfwith that fool love-story?

That's how a book should be to be a great popular success, and onethat all the typewriter girls will have on their desks. I am guiltilyconscious that "Back Home" is not up to standard either in avoirdupoisheft or the power to unfit a man for business. 

Here's a book. Is it long? No. Is it exciting? No. Any lost diamondsin it? Nup. Mysterious murders? No. Whopping big fortune, now teeteringthis way, and now teetering that, tipping over on the Hero at the lastand smothering him in an avalanche of fifty-dollar bills? No. Does Sheget Him? Isn't even that. No "heart interest" at all. What's the use ofputting out good money to make such a book; to have a cover design forit; to get a man like A. B. Frost to draw illustrations for it, when hecosts so like the mischief, when there's nothing in the book to make aman sit up till 'way past bedtime? Why print it at all?

You may search me. I suppose it's all right, but if it was my money, I'll bet I could make a better investment of it. If worst came to worst, I could do like the fellow in the story who went to the gambling-houseand found it closed up, so he shoved the money under the door and wentaway. He'd done his part. 

And yet, on the other hand, I can see how some sort of a case can bemade out for this book of mine. I suppose I am wrong-I generally am inregard to everything--but it seems to me that quite a large part of thepopulation of this country must be grown-up people. If I am rightin this contention, then this large part of the population is beingunjustly discriminated against. I believe in doing a reasonable amountfor the aid and comfort of the young things that are just beginning toturn their hair up under, or who rub a stealthy forefinger over theirupper lips to feel the pleasant rasp, but I don't believe in theirmonopolizing everything. I don't think it 's fair. All the booksprinted--except, of course, those containing valuable information; wedon't buy those books, but go to the public library for them--all thebooks printed are concerned with the problem of How She can get Him, andHe can get Her. 

Well, now. It was either yesterday morning or the day before that youlooked in the glass and beheld there The First Gray Hair. You smiled asmile that was not all pure pleasure, a smile that petered out into asigh, but nevertheless a smile, I will contend. What do you thinkabout it? You're still on earth, aren't you? You'll last the month out, anyhow, won't you? Not at all ready to be laid on the shelf? What do youthink of the relative importance of Love, Courtship, and Marriage? Oneor two other things in life just about as interesting, aren't there?Take getting a living, for instance. That 's worthy of one's attention, to a certain extent. When our young ones ask us: "Pop, what did you sayto Mom when you courted her?" they feel provoked at us for taking it solightly and so frivolously. It vexes them for us to reply: "Law, child!I don't remember. Why, I says to her: 'Will you have me?' And she says:'Why, yes, and jump at the chance. ' What difference does it make whatwe said, or whether we said anything at all? Why should we charge ourmemories with the recollections of those few and foolish months of mereinstinctive sex-attraction when all that really counts came after, the years wherein low passion blossomed into lofty Love, the dearcompanionship in joy and sorrow, and in that which is more, far morethan either joy or sorrow, 'the daily round, the common task?'" All thatis wonderful to think of in our courtship is the marvel, for whichwe should never cease to thank the Almighty God, that with so littlejudgment at our disposal we should have chosen so wisely. 

If you, Gentle Reader, found your first gray hair day before yesterdaymorning, if you can remember, 'way, 'way back ten or fifteen yearsago... Er... Er... Or more, come with me. Let us go "Back Home. " Here'syour transportation, all made out to you, and in your hand. It is no usemy reminding you that no railroad goes to the old home place. It isn'tthere any more, even in outward seeming. Cummins's woods, where you hadyour robbers' cave, is all cleared off and cut up into building lots. The cool and echoing covered bridge, plastered with notices of dead andforgotten Strawberry Festivals and Public Vendues, has long ago beentorn down to be replaced by a smart, red iron bridge. The VolunteerFiremen's Engine-house, whose brick wall used to flutter with the gayrags of circus-bills, is gone as if it never were at all. Where theUnion Schoolhouse was is all torn up now. They are putting up a newmagnificent structure, with all the modern improvements, exposedplumbing, and spankless discipline. The quiet leafy streets echo to thehissing snarl of trolley cars, and the power-house is right by theOld Swimming-hole above the dam. The meeting-house, where we attendedSabbath-school, and marveled at the Greek temple frescoed on the wallbehind the pulpit, is now a church with a big organ, and stained-glasswindows, and folding opera-chairs on a slanting floor. There isn't any"Amen Corner, " any more, and in these calm and well-bred times nobodyever gets "shouting happy. "

But even when "the loved spots that our infancy knew" are physically thesame, a change has come upon them more saddening than words can tell. They have shrunken and grown shabbier. They are not nearly so spaciousand so splendid as once they were. 

Some one comes up to you and calls you by your name. His voice echoes inthe chambers of your memory. You hold his hand in yours and try to peerthrough the false-face he has on, the mask of a beard or spectacles, ora changed expression of the countenance. He says he is So-and-so. Why, he used to sit with you in Miss Crutcher's room, don't you remember?There was a time when you and he walked together, your arms upon eachother's shoulders. But this is some other one than he. The boy you knewhad freckles, and could spit between his teeth, ever and ever so far. 

They don't have the same things to eat they used to have, or, if theydo, it all tastes different. Do you remember the old well, with thewindlass and the chain fastened to the rope just above the bucket, thechain that used to cluck-cluck when the dripping bucket came withinreach to be swung upon the well-curb? How cold the water used to be, right out of the northwest corner of the well! It made the roof of yourmouth ache when you drank. Everybody said it was such splendid water. Itisn't so very cold these days, and I think it has a sort of funny tasteto it. 

Ah, Gentle Reader, this is not really "Back Home" we gaze upon whenwe go there by the train. It is a last year's bird's nest. The nest isthere; the birds are flown, the birds of youth, and noisy health, andravenous appetite, and inexperience. You cannot go "Back Home" by train, but here is the magic wishing-carpet, and here is your transportation inyour hand all made out to you. You and I will make the journey together. Let us in heart and mind thither ascend. 

I went to the Old Red School-house with you. Don't you remember me? Iwas learning to swim when you could go clear across the river withoutonce "letting down. " I saw you at the County Fair, and bought a slabof ice-cream candy just before you did. I was in the infant-class inSabbath-school when you spoke in the dialogue at the monthly concert. Look again. Don't you remember me? I used to stub my toe so; you oughtto recollect me by that. I know plenty of people that you know. I maynot always get their names just right, but then it's been a good whileago. You Il recognize them, though; you'll know them in a minute. 

EUGENE WOOD. 

BACK HOME

THE OLD RED SCHOOL-HOUSE

 Oh, the little old red school-house on the hill, (2d bass: On the hill. ) Oh, the little old red school-house on the hill, (2d bass: On the hi-hi-hi-yull) And my heart with joy o'erflows, Like the dew-drop in the rose, * Thinking of the old red SCHOOL-HOUSE I o-o-on the hill, (2d tenor and 1st bass: The hill, the hill. )

 THE MALE QUARTET'S COMPENDIUM. 

 * I call your attention to the chaste beauty of this line, and the imperative necessity of the chord of the diminished seventh for the word "rose. " Also "school-house" in the last line must be very loud and staccato. Snap it off. 

If the audience will kindly come forward and occupy the vacant seatsin the front of the hall, the entertainment will now begin. The malequartet will first render an appropriate selection and then.... Can'tyou see them from where you are? Let me assist you in the visualization. 

The first tenor, the gentleman on the extreme left, is a stocky littleman, with a large chest and short legs conspicuously curving inward. Hehas plenty of white teeth, ash-blonde hair, and goes smooth-shaven forpurely personal reasons. His round, dough-colored face will never lookolder (from a distance) than it did when he was nine. The flight ofyears adds only deeper creases in the multitude of fine wrinkles, andincreasing difficulty in hoisting his tiny, patent-leather foot up onhis plump knee. 

The second tenor leans toward him in a way to make another man anxiousabout his watch, but the second tenor is as honest as the day. He isonly "blending the voices. " He works in the bank. He is going to bemarried in June sometime. Don't look around right away, but she's theone in the pink shirt-waist, the second one from the aisle, the one... Two... Three... The sixth row back. See her? Say, they've got it bad, those two. What d' ye think? She goes down by the bank every day atnoon, so as to walk up with him to luncheon. She lives across thestreet, and as soon as ever she has finished her luncheon, there she is, out on the front porch hallooing: "Oo-hoo!" How about that? And if he somuch as looks at another girl--m-M!

The first bass is one of these fellows with a flutter in his voice. No, I don't mean a vibrato. It's a flutter, like a goat's tail. It isconsidered real operatic. 

The second bass has a great, big Adam's apple that slides up and downhis throat like a toy-monkey on a stick. He is tall, and has eyebrowslike clothes-brushes, and he scowls fit to make you run and hide underthe bed. He is really a good-hearted fellow, though. Pity he has thedyspepsia so bad. Oh, my, yes! Suffers everything with it, poor man. He generally sings that song about "Drink-ing! DRINK-ang! Drink-awng!"though he's strictly temperate himself. When he takes that last lownote, you hold on to your chair for fear you'll fall in too. 

But why bring in the male quartet?

Because "The Little Old Red School-house" is more than a merecollocation of words, accurately descriptive. It is what Mat King wouldcall a "symblem, " and as such requires the music's dying fall to lulland enervate a too meticulous and stringent tendency to recollect thatit wasn't little, or old, or red, or on a hill. It might have beenbig and new, and built of yellow brick, right next to the SecondPresbyterian, and hence close to the "branch, " so that the springfreshets flooded the playground, and the water lapped the base of thebig rock on which we played "King on the Castle, "--the big rock sopitifully dwindled of late years. No matter what he facts are. Sing 'of"The Little Old Red Schoolhouse On the Hill" and in everybody's hearta chord trembles in unison. As we hear its witching strains, we are alllodge brethren, from Maine to California and far across the Western Sea;we are all lodge brethren, and the air is "Auld Lang Syne, " and we areclasping hands across, knitted together into one living solidarity;and this, if we but sensed it, is the real Union, of which the federalcompact is but the outward seeming. It is a Union in which they haveneither art nor part whose parents sent them to private schools, so asnot to have them associate with "that class of people. " It is thetrue democracy which batters down the walls that separate us from eachother--the walls of caste distinction, and color prejudice, and nationalhatred, and religious contempt, all the petty, anti-social meannessesthat quarrel with

 "The Union of hearts, the Union of hands, And the flag of our Union forever. "

Old Glory has floated victoriously on many a gallant fight by seaand land, but never do its silver stars glitter more bravely or itsblood-red stripes curve more proudly on the fawning breeze than when itfloats above the school-house, over the daily battle against ignoranceand prejudice (which is ignorance of our fellows), for freedom and forequal rights. It is no mere pretty sentimentality that puts the flagthere, but the serious recognition of the bed-rock principle of ourUnion: That we are all of one blood, one bounden duty; that all theseanti-social prejudices are just as shameful as illiteracy, and that theymust disappear as soon as ever we shall come to know each other well. Knowledge is power. That is true. And it is also true: A house dividedagainst itself cannot stand. 

"The Flag of our Union forever!" is our prayer, our heart's desire forus and for our children after us. Heroes have died to give us that, heroes that with glazing eyes beheld the tattered ensign and spent theirlatest breath to cheer it as it passed on to triumph. "We who are aboutto die salute thee!" The heart swells to think of it. But it swells, too, to think that, day by day, thousands upon thousands of littlechildren stretch out their hands toward that Flag and pledge allegianceto it. "We who are about to LIVE salute thee!"

It is no mere chance affair that all our federal buildings should be sougly and so begrudged, and that our school-houses should be so beautifularchitecturally--the one nearest my house is built from plans that tookthe first prize at the Paris Exposition, in competition with thewhole world--so well-appointed, and so far from being grudged that thecomplaint is, that there are not enough of them. 

That So-and-so should be the President, and such-and-such a partyhave control is but a game we play at, amateurs and professionals; theserious business is, that in this country no child, how poor soever itmay be, shall have the slightest let or hindrance in the equal chancewith every other child to learn to read, and write, and cipher, and doraffia-work. 

It is a new thing with us to have splendid school-houses. After all, thenorm, as you might say, is still "The Old Red School-house. " You mustrecollect how hard the struggle is for the poor farmer, with wheat onlya dollar a bushel, and eggs only six for a quarter; with every yearor so taxes of three and sometimes four dollars on an eighty-acre farmgrinding him to earth. It were folly to expect more in rural districtsthan a tight box, with benches and a stove in it. Never-the-less, it isthe thing signified more than its outward seeming that catches and holdsthe eye upon the country school-house as you drive past it. You countyourself fortunate if, mingled with the creaking of the buggy-springs, you hear the hum of recitation; yet more fortunate if it is recess time, and you can see the children out at play, the little girls holding toone another's dress-tails as they solemnly circle to the chant:

 "H-yar way gow rand tha malbarry bosh, Tha malbarry bosh, tha malbarry bosh, H-yar way gow rand tha malbarry bosh On a cay-um and frasty marneng. "

The boys are at marbles, if it is muddy enough, or one-old-cat, orpom-pom-peel-away, with the normal percentage of them in reboanttears--that is to say, one in three. 

But even this is not the moment of illumination, when it comes upon youlike a flood how glorious is the land we live in, upon what sure andcertain footing are its institutions, when we know by spiritual insightthat whatsoever be the trial that awaits us, the people of these UnitedStates, we shall be able for it! Yes. We shall be able for it. 

If you would learn the secret of our nation's greatness, take your standsome winter's morning just before nine o'clock, where you can overlook acircle of some two or three miles' radius, the center being the Old RedSchool-house. You will see little figures picking their way along themiry roads, or ploughing through the deep drifts, cutting across thefields, all drawing to the school-house, Bub in his wammus and hiscowhide boots, his cap with ear-laps, a knitted comforter about hisneck, and his hands glowing in scarlet mittens; and little Sis, in athick shawl, trudging along behind him, stepping in his tracks. Theychirrup, "Good-morning, sir!" As far as you can see them you have towatch them, and something rises in your throat. Lord love 'em! Lord lovethe children!

And then it comes to you, and it makes you catch your breath to think ofit, that every two or three miles all over this land, wherever there arechildren at all, there is the Old Red Schoolhouse. At this very hour aliving tide, upbearing the hopes and prayers of God alone knows how manyloving hearts, the tide on which all of our longed-for ships are to comein, is setting to the school-house. Oh, what is martial glory, what isconquest of an empire, what is state-craft alongside of this? Happy isthe people that is in such a case!

The city schools are now the pattern for the country schools: but inmy day, although a little they were pouring the new wine of frothingeducational reform into the old bottles, they had not quite attained thefull distention of this present. We still had some kind of a goodtime, but nothing like the good times they had out at the school neargrandpap's, where I sometimes visited. There you could whisper! Yes, sir, you could whisper. So long as you didn't talk out loud, it was allright. And there was no rising at the tap of the bell, forming in lineand walking in lock-step. Seemingly it never entered the school-board'sheads that anybody would ever be sent to state's prison. They left thescholars unprepared for any such career. They have remedied all that incity schools. Now, when a boy grows up and goes to Sing Sing, he knowsexactly what to do and how to behave. It all comes back to him. 

But what I call the finest part of going to school in the country was, that you didn't go home to dinner. Grandma had a boy only a few yearsolder than I was, and when I went a-visiting, she fixed us up a "piece. "They call it "luncheon" now, I think--a foolish, hybrid mongrel of aword, made up of "lump, " a piece of bread, and "noon, " and "shenk, "a pouring or drink. But the right name is "piece. " What made thisparticular "piece" taste so wonderfully good was that it was in around-bottomed basket woven of splints dyed blue, and black and red, and all in such a funny pattern. It was an Indian basket. My grandma'smother, when she was a little girl, got that from the squaw of old ChiefWiping-Stick. 

The "piece" had bread-and-butter (my grandma used to let me churnfor her sometimes, when I went out there), and some of the slices hadapple-butter on them. (One time she let me stir the cider, when it wasboiling down in the big kettle over the chunk-fire out in the yard. Thesmoke got in my eyes. ) Sometimes there was honey from the hives over bythe gooseberry bushes--the gooseberries had stickers on them--and we hadslices of cold, fried ham. (I was out at grandpap's one time when theybutchered. They had a chunk-fire then, too, to heat the water to scaldthe hogs. And say! Did your grandma ever roast pig's tails in the ashesfor you?) And there were crullers. No, I don't mean "doughnuts. " I meancrullers, all twisted up. They go good with cider. (Sometimes my grandmacut out thin, pallid little men of cruller dough, and dropped them intothe hot lard for my Uncle Jimmy and me. And when she fished them out, they were all swelled up and "pussy, " and golden brown). 

And there was pie. Neither at the school nooning nor at the table didone put a piece of pie upon a plate and haggle at it with a fork. Youtook the piece of pie up in your hand and pointed the sharp end towardyou, and gently crowded it into your face. It didn't require muchpressure either. 

And there were always apples, real apples. I think they must make applesin factories nowadays. They taste like it. These were real ones, pickedoff the trees. Out at grandpap's they had bellflowers, and winesaps, andseek-no-furthers, and, I think, sheep-noses, and one kind of apple thatI can't find any more, though I have sought it carefully. It was thefinest apple I ever set a tooth in. It was the juiciest and the spiciestapple. It had sort of a rollicking flavor to it, if you know what Imean. It certainly was the ne plus ultra of an apple. And the name of itwas the rambo. Dear me, how good it was! think I'd sooner have one rightnow than great riches. And all these apples they kept in the apple-hole. You went out and uncovered the earth and there they were, all in a bignest of straw; and such a gush of perfume distilled from that pile ofthem that just to recollect it makes my mouth all wet. 

They had a big red apple in those days that I forget the name of. Oh, itwas a whopper! You'd nibble at it and nibble at it before you couldget a purchase on it. Then, after you got your teeth in, you'd pull andpull, and all of a sudden the apple would go "tock!" and your head wouldfly back from the recoil, and you had a bite about the size of yourhand. You "chomped" on it, with your cheek all bulged out, and blamenear drowned yourself with the juice of it. 

Noon-time the girls used to count the seeds:

 "One I love, two I love, three my love I see; Four I love with all my heart, and five I cast away. Six he loves; seven she loves; eight... Eight... "

I forget what eight is, and all that follows after. And then the otherswould tease her with, "Aw, Jennie!" knowing who it was she had namedthe apple for, Wes. Rinehart, or 'Lonzo Curl, or whoever. And you'dbe standing there by the stove, kind of grinning and not thinking ofanything in particular when somebody would hit you a clout on your backthat just about broke you in two, and would tell you "to pass it on, "and you'd pass it on, and the next thing was you'd think the house wascoming down. Such a chasing around and over benches, and upsetting thewater-bucket, and tearing up Jack generally that teacher would say, "Boys! boys! If you can't play quietly, you'll have to go out of doors!"Play quietly! Why, the idea! What kind of play is it when you are rightstill?

Outdoors in the country, you can whoop and holler, and carry on, andnobody complains to the board of health. And there are so many thingsyou can do. If there is just the least little fall of snow you can makea big wheel, with spokes in it, by your tracking. I remember that it wascalled "fox and geese, " but that's all I can remember about it. If therewas a little more snow you tried to wash the girls' faces in it, andsometimes got yours washed. If there was a good deal of wet snow you hada snowball fight, which is great fun, unless you get one right smack dabin your ear--oh, but I can't begin to tell you all the fun there is atthe noon hour in the country school, that the town children don't knowanything about. And when it was time for school to "take up, " therewasn't any forming in line, with a monitor to run tell teacher whosnatched off Joseph Humphreys' cap and flung it far away, so he had toget out of the line, and who did this, and who did that--no penitentiarybusiness at all. Teacher tapped on the window with a ruler, and the boysand girls came in, red-faced and puffing, careering through the aisles, knocking things off the desks with many a burlesque, "oh, exCUSE me!"and falling into their seats, bursting into sniggers, they didn't knowwhat at. They had an hour and a half nooning. Counting that it took fiveminutes to shovel down even grandma's beautiful "piece, " that left anhour and twenty-five minutes for roaring, romping play. If you want toknow, I think that is fully as educational and a far better preparationfor life than sitting still with your nose stuck in a book. 

In the city schools they don't think so. Even the stingy fifteenminutes' recess, morning and afternoon, has been stolen from thechildren. Instead is given the inspiriting physical culture, all makingsilly motions together in a nice, warm room, full of second-hand air. Is it any wonder that one in every three that die between fifteen andtwenty-five, dies of consumption?

You must have noticed that almost everybody that amounts to anythingspent his early life in the country. The city schools have greateducational advantages; they have all the up-to-date methods, but theoutput of the Old Red Schoolhouse compares very favorably with that ofthe city schools for all that. The two-mile walk, morning and evening, had something to do with it, not only because it and the long nooningwere good exercise, but because it impressed upon the mind that whatcost so much effort to get must surely be worth having. But I think Iknow another reason. 

If the city child goes through the arithmetic once, it is as much asever. In the Old Red School-house those who hadn't gone through thearithmetic at least six times, were little thought of. In town, the lastsubject in the book was "Permutation, " to which you gave the mere lookits essentially frivolous nature deserved. It was: "End of the line. Allout!" But in the country a very important department followed. It wascalled "Problems. " They were twisters, able to make "How old is Ann?"look like a last year's bird's nest. They make a big fuss about thepsychology of the child's mind nowadays. Well, I tell you they couldn'tteach the man that got up that arithmetic a thing about the operation ofthe child's mind. He knew what was what. He didn't put down the answers. He knew that if he did, weak, erring human nature, tortured by suspense, determined to have the agony over, would multiply by four and divide bythirteen, and subtract 127--didn't, either. I didn't say "substract. " Iguess I know they'd get the answer somehow, it didn't matter much how. 

In the country they ciphered through this part, and handed in their sumsto Teacher, who said she'd take 'em home and look 'em over; she didn'thave time just then. As if that fooled anybody! She had a key! And whenyou had done the very last one on the very last page, and there wasn'tanything more except the blank pages, where you had written, "Joe Geigerloves Molly Meyers, " and, "If my name you wish to see, look on page103, " and all such stuff, then you turned over to the beginning, whereit says, "Arithmetic is the science of numbers, and the art of computingby them, " and once more considered, "Ann had four apples and her brothergave her two more. How many did she then have?" There were the fourapples in a row, and the two apples, and you that had worried overmeadows so long and so wide, and men mowing them in so many days anda half, had to think how many apples Ann really did have. Some of thefellows with forked hairs on their chins and uncertain voices--the bigfellows in the back seats, where the apple-cores and the spit-balls comefrom knew every example in the book by heart. 

And there is yet another reason why the country school has brought forthmen of whom we do well to be proud. At the county-seat, every so often, the school commissioners held an examination. Thither resorted many, forthe most part anxious to determine if they really knew as much as theythought they did. If you took that examination and got a "stiff kit"for eighteen months, you had good cause to hold your head up and stepas high as a blind horse. A "stiff kit" for eighteen months is no smallthing, let me tell you. I don't know if there is anything correspondingto a doctor's hood for such as win a certificate to teach school fortwo years hand-running; but there ought to be. A fellow ought not tobe obliged to resort to such tactics as taking out a folded paper andperusing it in the hope that some one will ask him: "What you got there, Calvin?" so as to give you a chance to say, carelessly, "Oh, jist a'stiff-kit' for two years. "

(When you get as far along as that, you simply have to take a term inthe junior Prep. Department at college, not because there is anythingleft for you to learn, but for the sake of putting a gloss on youreducation, finishing it off neatly. )

And then if you were going to read law with Mr. Parker, or studymedicine with old Doc. Harbaugh, and you kind of run out of clothes, youtook that certificate and hunted up a school and taught it. Sometimesthey paid you as high as $20 a month and board, lots of board, realbuckwheat cakes ("riz" buckwheat, not the prepared kind), and real maplesyrup, and real sausage, the kind that has sage in it; the kind that youcan't coax your butcher to sell you. The pale, tasteless stuff he givesyou for sausage I wouldn't throw out to the chickens. Twenty dollars amonth and board! That's $4 a month more than a hired man gets. 

But it wasn't alone the demonstration that, strange as it might seem, it was possible for a man to get his living by his wits (though thathas done much to produce great men) as it was the actual exercise ofteaching. Remember the big boys on the back seats, where the apple-coresand the spit-balls come from. The school-director that hired you gaveyou a searching look-over and said: "M-well-l-l, I'm afraid you hainthardly qualified for our school--oh, that's all right, sir; that's allright. Your 'stiff-kit' is first-rate, and you got good recommends, goodrecommends; but I was thinkin'--well, I tell you. Might's well out withit first as last. I d' know's I ort to say so, but this here districtNo. 34 is a poot' tol'able hard school to teach. Ya-uss. A poot-tytol'able hard school to teach. Now, that's jist the plumb facts in thematter. We've had four try it this winter a'ready. One of 'em stuck itout four weeks--I jimminy! he had grit, that feller had. The balance of'em didn't take so long to make up their minds. Well, now, if you're amind to try it--I was goin' to say you didn't look to me like you hadthe heft. Like to have you the worst way. Now, if you want to backout.... Well, all right. Monday mornin', eh? Well, you got mysympathies. "

I believe that some have tried to figure out that St. Martin of Tours, ought to be the patron saint of the United States. One of his feast-daysfalls on July 4, and his colors are red, white and blue. But I ratherprefer, myself, the Boanerges, the two sons of Zebedee. When asked: "Areye able to drink of this cup?" they answered: "We are able. " They didn'tin the least know what it was; but they knew they were able for anythingthat anybody else was, and, perhaps, able for a little more. At anyrate, they were willing to chance it. That's the United States ofAmerica, clear to the bone and back again to the skin. 

You ask any really great man: "Have you ever taught a winter term in acountry school?" If he says he hasn't, then depend upon it he isn'ta really great man. People only think he is. The winter term breedsBoanerges--sons of thunder. Yes, and of lightning, too. Something struckthe big boys in the back seats, as sure as you're a foot high; and if itwasn't lightning, what was it? Brute strength for brute strength, theywere more than a match for Teacher. It was up to him. It was eitherprove himself the superior power, or slink off home and crawl under theporch. 

The curriculum of the Old Red School-house, which was, until lately, theuniversal curriculum, consisted in reading, writing, and arithmetic orciphering. I like the word "ciphering, " because it makes me think ofslates--slates that were always falling on the floor with a rousingclatter, so that almost always at least one corner was cracked. Somemitigation of the noise was gained by binding the frame with strips ofred flannel, thus adding warmth and brightness to the color scheme. Justas some fertile brain conceived the notion of applying a knob of rubberto each corner, slates went out, and I suppose only doctors buy themnowadays to hang on the doors of their offices. Maybe the teacher'snerves were too highly strung to endure the squeaking of gritty pencils, but I think the real reason for their banishment is, that slates invitedtoo strongly the game of noughts and crosses, or tit-tat-toe, three ina row, the champion of indoor sports, and one entirely inimical to thestudy of the joggerfy lesson. But if slates favored tit-tat-toe, theyalso favored ciphering, and nothing but good can come from that. Paperis now so cheap that you need not rub out mistakes, but paper and pencilcan never surely ground one in "the science of numbers and the art ofcomputing by them. " What is written is written, and returns to plaguethe memory, but if you made a mistake on the slate, you could spit on itand rub it out with your sleeve and leave no trace of the error, eitheron the writing surface or the tables of the memory. What does the hymnsay?

 "Forget the steps already trod, And onward urge thy way. "

The girls used to keep a little sponge and some water in a discardedpatchouli bottle with a glass stopper, to wash their slates with; but italways seemed to me that the human and whole-hearted way was otherwise. 

Reading, writing, and arithmetic, --these three; and the greatest ofthese three is arithmetic. Over against it stands grammar, which may besaid to be derived from reading and writing. Show me a man that, asa boy at school, excelled in arithmetic and I will show you a usefulcitizen, a boss in his own business, a leader of men; show me the boythat preferred grammar, that read expressively, that wrote abeautiful hand and curled his capital S's till their tails looked likemainsprings, and I will show you a dreamer and a sentimentalist--a manthat works for other people. While I have breath in me, I will maintainthe supereminence of arithmetic. There is no room for disputation inarithmetic, no exceptions to the rule. Twice two is four, and that'sall there is about it: but whether there be pronunciations, they shallcease; whether there be rules of grammar, they shall vanish away. Why, look here. It's a rule of grammar, isn't it, that the subject of asentence must be put in the nominative case? Let it kick and bite, andhang on to the desks all it wants to, in it goes and the door is slammedon it. You think so? What is the word "you?" Second person, pluralnumber, objective case. Oh, no; the nominative form is "ye. "

Don't you remember it says: "Woe unto you, ye lawyers"? Those who fightagainst: "Him and me went down town, " fight against the stars intheir courses, for the objective case in every language is bound anddetermined to be The Whole Thing. Arithmetic alone is founded on a rock. All else is fleeting, all else is futile, chaotic--a waste of time. Whatis reading but a rival of morphine? There are probably as many men inprison, sent there by Reading, as by Rum. 

"Oh, not good Reading!" says the publisher. 

"Not good Rum, either, " says the publican. 

Fight it out. It's an even thing between the two of you; Literature andLiquor, Books and Booze, which can take a man's mind off his businessmost effectually. 

Still, merely as a matter of taste, I will defend the quality ofMcGuffey's School Readers against all comers. I don't know who McGuffeywas; but certainly he formed the greatest intellects of our age, present company not excepted. The true test of literature is its eternalmodernity. A thing of beauty is a joy forever. It always seems of theage in which it is read. Now, almost the earliest lection in McGuffey'sFirst Reader goes directly to the heart of one of the greatest of modernproblems. It does not palter or beat about the bush. It asks right out, plump and plain: "Ann, how old are you?"

Year by year, until we reached the dizzy height of the Sixth Reader, were presented to us samples of the best English ever written. If youcan find, up in the garret, a worn and frayed old Reader, take itdown and turn its pages over. See if anything in these degenerate dayscompares in vital strength and beauty with the story of the boy thatclimbed the Natural Bridge, carving his steps in the soft limestone withhis pocket knife. You cannot read it without a thrill. The same inspiredhand wrote "The Blind Preacher, " and who that ever can read it canforget the climax reached in that sublime line: "Socrates died like aphilosopher, but Jesus Christ like a god!"

Not long ago I walked among the graves in that spot opposite where WallStreet slants away from Broadway, and my feet trod on ground worth, inthe market, more than the twenty-dollar gold pieces that would coverit. My eye lighted upon a flaking brownstone slab, that told me CaptainMichael Cresap rested there. Captain Michael Cresap! The interveningyears all fled away before me, and once again my boyish heart thrilledwith that incomparable oration in McGuffey's Reader, "Who is thereto mourn for Logan? Not one. " Captain Cresap was the man that led themassacre of Logan's family. 

And there was more than good literature in those Readers. There was onepiece that told about a little boy alone upon a country road atnight. The black trees groaned and waved their skinny arms at him. The wind-torn clouds fitfully let a pale and watery moonlight streama little through. It was very lonely. Over his shoulder the boy sawindistinct shapes that followed after, and hid themselves whenever helooked squarely at them. Then, suddenly, he saw before him in the gloom, a gaunt white specter waiting for him--waiting to get him, its armsspread wide out in menace. He was of our breed, though, this boy. He didnot turn and run. With God knows what terror knocking at his ribs, hetrudged ahead to meet his fate, and lo! the grisly specter proved to bea friendly guide-post to show the way that he should walk in. Brother(for you are my kin that went with me to public school), in the lifethat you have lived since you first read the story of Harry and theGuide-post, has it been an idle tale, or have you, too, found that whatwe dreaded most, what seemed to us so terrible in the future has, afterall, been a friendly guide-post, showing us the way that we should walkin?

McGuffey had a Speller, too. It began with simple words in common use, like a-b ab, and e-b eb, and i-b, ib, proceeding by gradual, if not byeasy stages to honorificatudinibility and disproportionableness, witha department at the back devoted to twisters like phthisic, andmullein-stalk, and diphtheria, and gneiss. We used to have a fine oldsport on Friday afternoons, called "choose-up-and-spell-down. " I don'tknow if you ever played it. It was a survival, pure and simple, from theOld Red School-house. There was where it really lived. There waswhere it flourished as a gladiatorial spectacle. The crack spellers ofDistrict Number 34 would challenge the crack spellers of the SinkingSpring School. The whole countryside came to the school-house in wagonsat early candle-lighting time, and watched them fight it out. Theinterest grew as the contest narrowed down, until at last there were thetwo captains left--big John Rice for District Number 34, and that wiry, nervous, black-haired girl of 'Lias Hoover's, Polly Ann. She marrieda man by the name of Brubaker. I guess you didn't know him. His folksmoved here from Clarke County. Polly Ann's eyes glittered like asnake's, and she kept putting her knuckles up to the red spots in hercheeks that burned like fire. Old John, he didn't seem to care a cent. And what do you think Polly Ann missed on? "Feoffment. " A simple littleword like "feoffment!" She hadn't got further than "pheph--" when sheknew that she was wrong, but Teacher had said "Next!" and big John tookit and spelled it right. She had a fit of nervous crying, and some werefor giving her the victory, after all, because she was a lady. But bigJohn said: "She missed, didn't she? Well. And I spelled it right, didn'tI? Well. She took her chances same as the rest of us. 'Taint me you gotto consider, it's District Number 34. And furthermore. AND FURTHERMORE. Next time somebuddy asts her to go home with him from singin'-school, mebby she won't snigger right in his face, and say 'No! 's' loud 'ateverybuddy kin hear it. "

It's quite a thing to be a good speller, but there are people who canspell any word that ever was, and yet if you should ask them right quickhow much is seven times eight, they'd hem and haw and say: "Seven tumseight? Why--ah, lemme see now. Seven tums--what was it you said? Oh, seven tums eight. Why--ah, seven tums eight is sixty-three--fifty-six Imean. " There's nothing really to spelling. It's just an idiosyncrasy. If there was really anything useful in it, you could do it bymachinery--just the same as you can add by machinery, or write with atypewriter, or play the piano with one of these things with cut paperin it. Spelling is an old-fashioned, hand-powered process, and as suchdoomed to disappear with the march of improvement. 

One Friday afternoon we chose up and spelled down, and the next Fridayafternoon we spoke pieces. Doubtless this accounts for our being anation of orators. I am far from implying or seeming to imply that thisis anything to brag of. Anybody that can be influenced by a man with abig mouth, a loud voice, and a rush of words to the face--well, I've gotmy opinion of all such. 

Oratory and poetry--all foolishness, I say. Better far aredrawing-lessons, and raffia-work, and clay-modeling than: "I come nothere to talk, " and "A soldier of the Legion lay dying at Algiers, " and"Old Ironsides at anchor lay. " (I observe that these lines are more orless familiar to you, and that you are eager to add selections to thelist, all of them known to me as well as you. ) That children, especiallyboys, loathe to speak a piece is a fact profoundly significant. Theyknow it is nothing in the world but foolishness; and if there is onething above another that a child hates, it is to be made a fool inpublic. That's what makes them work their fingers so, and gulp, andstammer, and tremble at the knees. That is what sends them to theirseats, after all is over, mad as hornets. This is something that I knowabout. It happened that, instead of getting funny pieces to recite as Iwanted to, discerning that one silly turn deserves another, my parents, well-meaning in their way, taught me solemn things about: "O manimmortal, live for something!" and all such, and I had to humiliatemyself by disgorging them in public. The consequence was, that not onlyon Friday afternoons but whenever anybody came to visit the school, Iwas butchered to make a Roman holiday. Teacher was so proud of me, andthe visitors let on that they were tickled half to death, but I knewbetter. I could see the other scholars look at one another, as muchas to say: "Well, if you'll tell me why!" Even in my shame and angerI could see that. But there is one happy memory of a Friday afternoon. Determined to show my friends and fellow-citizens that I, too, was bornin Arcadia, and was a living, human boy, I announced to Teacher: "I gotanother piece. "

"Oh, have you?" cried she, sure of an extra O-man-immortal intellectualtreat. "Let us hear it, by all means. "

Whereupon I marched up to the platform and declaimed that deathlesslyric:

"When I was a boy, I was a bold one. My mammy made me a new shirt out o'dad's old one. "

All of it? Certainly. Isn't that enough? That was the only distinctlypopular platform effort I ever made. I am proud of it now. I was proudof it then. But the news of my triumph was coldly received at home. 

I don't know whether it has since gone out of date, but in my dayand time a very telling feature of school exhibitions was reading inconcert. The room was packed as full of everybody's ma as it could be, and yet not mash the children out of shape, and a whole lot of youngones would read a piece together. Fine? Finest thing you ever heard. Iremember one time teacher must have calculated a leetle mite too close, or else one girl more was in the class than she had reckoned on; but onthe day, the two end girls just managed to stand upon the platform andthat was all. They recited together:

 "There was a sound of revelry by night And Belgium's capital.... "

I forget the rest of it. Well, anyhow, they were supposed to makegestures all together. Teacher had rehearsed the gestures, and they alldid it simultaneously, just as if they had been wound up with a spring. But, as I said, the two end girls had all they could do to keep on theplatform, and it takes elbow room for: "'T is but the car rattlingover the stony street, " and one girl--well, she said she stepped off onpurpose, but I didn't believe her then and I don't now. We had our laughabout it, whichever way it was. 

We had our laugh.... Ah, life was all laughter then. That was beforecare came to be the shadow at our heel. That was before black Sorrowmet us in the way, and would not let us pass unless we gave to her ourdearest treasure. That was before we learned that what we covet mostis, when we get it, but a poor thing after all, that whatsoever chaliceFortune presses to our lips, a tear is in the bottom of the cup. Inthose happy days gone by if the rain fell, 't was only for a littlewhile, and presently the sky was bright again, and the birds whistledmerrily among the wet and shining leaves. Now "the clouds return afterthe rain. "

It can never be with us again as once it was. For us the bell upon theOld Red School-house calls in vain. We heed it not, we thathearkened for it years ago. The living tide of youth flows toward theschool-house, and we are not of it. Never again shall we sit at thoseold desks, whittled and carved with rude initials, and snap our fingers, eager to tell the answer. Never again shall we experience the thrill ofpride when teacher praised us openly. Never again shall we sit tremblingwhile the principal, reads the note, and then scowls at us fiercelywith: "Take off your coat, sir!" Ah, me! Never again, never again. 

Well, who wants it to be that way again? We're men and women now. We'veduties and responsibilities. Who wants to be a child again? Not I. Letme stick just at my present age for about a hundred years, and I'llnever utter a word of complaint. 

THE SABBATH-SCHOOL

 "We-a love the Sunday-school. We-a love the Sunday-school. (Girls)--So do I. (Boys)-So do I. (School)--We all love the Sunday-school. "

 "SPARKLING DEWDROPS. "

Some people believe that when General Conference assigned them to theCommittee on Hymn-Book Revision, power and authority were given untothem to put a half-sole and a new heel on any and all poetry that mightlook to them to be a little run over on one side. If they felt as Ido about the lines that head this article they would have "Sunday"scratched out and "Sabbath" written in before you could bat an eye. Themere substitution of one word for another may seem a light matter to aman that has never composed anything more literary than an obituary forthe Western Advocate of Sister Jane Malinda Sprague, who was born inWestmoreland County, Pennsylvania, in 1816, removed with her parents ata tender age to New Sardis, Washington County, Ohio, where, etc. , etc. If he wanted to extract a word he would do it, and never even offer togive the author gas. But I know just how it hurts. I know or can imaginehow the gifted poet that penned the deathless lines I have quoted musthave walked the floor in an agony until every word and syllable wasjust to suit him, and so, though I feel sure he meant to write"Sabbath-school, " I don't dare change it. 

To most persons one word seems about as good as another, Sunday orSabbath, but when there are young people about the house you learn to becareful how you talk before them. Now, I would not go so far as to saythat "Sunday" is what you might call exactly rowdy, but er... But... Er... Let me illustrate. If a man says, "It's a beautiful Sundaymorning, " like enough he has on red-and-green stockings, baggyknickerbockers, a violet-and-purple sweater, a cap shaped like amilk-roll, and is smoking a pipe. He very likely carries a bagful ofgolf-sticks, or is pumping up his bicycle. But if a man says, "Thisbeautiful Sabbath morn, " you know for a certainty that he wears along-tailed black coat, a boiled shirt, and a white tie. He is bald fromhis forehead upward, his upper lip is shaven, and his views and thoseof the late Robert Reed on the disgusting habit of using tobacco areabsolutely at one. 

Not alone a regard for respectability, but the hankering to behistorically accurate, urges me to make the change I speak of. Originally the institution was a Sunday-school, and not very respectableeither. I should hate to think any of my dear young friends were in thehabit of attending such a low-class affair as Robert Raikes conducted. Sunday-schools were for "little ragamuffins, " as he called them, whoworked such long hours on week-days (from five in the morning until nineat night) that if they were to learn the common branches at all it hadto be on a Sunday. A ragged school was bad enough in itself, puttingfoolish notions into the heads of gutter-brats and making themdiscontented and unhappy in their lot; but to teach a ragged schoolon Sunday was a little too much. So Robert Raikes encountered the mostviolent opposition, although from that beginning dates popular educationin England. 

To be able to read is no Longer a sign that Pa can afford to do withoutthe young ones' wages on a Saturday night, and can even pay fortheir schooling. It is no longer a mark of wealth or even of hard-wonprivilege, but the common fate of all; to know the three R's, and Sundayis not now set apart for secular instruction. So good and wholesome aninstitution as the Sunday-school was not permitted to perish, but waschanged to suit the environment. It is now become the Sabbath-school forthe study of the Bible, a Christian recrudescence of the synagogue. For some eighteen centuries it was supposed that a regularly ordainedminister should have exclusive charge of this work. At rare intervalsnowadays a clergyman may be found to maintain that because a man hasbeen to college and to the theological seminary, and has made the studyof the Scriptures his life-work (moved to that decision after carefulself-examination) that therefore he is better fitted to that ministrythan Miss Susie Goldrick, who teaches a class in Sabbath-school veryacceptably. Miss Goldrick is in the second year in the High School, andlast Friday afternoon read a composition on English Literatoor, in whichshe spoke in terms of high praise of John Bunion, the well-known authorof "Progress and Poverty. " Miss Goldrick is very conscientious, and always keeps her thumbnail against the questions printed on thelesson-leaf, so as not to ask twice, "What did the disciples then do?"

It were a grave error to suppose that no secular learning is acquired inthe modern Sabbath-school. I remember once, when quite young, speakingto my teacher, in the interval between the regular class work and theclosing exercises, about peacocks. I had read of them, but had neverseen one. What did they look like? She said a peacock was something likea butterfly. I have always remembered that, and when I did finally seea peacock, I was interested to note the essential accuracy of thedescription. 

Also, one day a new lady taught our class, Miss Evans having gone up toMarion to spend a Sunday with her brother, who kept a stove store there, and this new lady borrowed two flower vases from off the pulpit and apiece of string from Turkey-egg McLaughlin to explain to us boys how theearth went around the sun. We had too much manners to tell her that weknew that years and years ago when we were in Miss Humphreys's room. Idon't remember what the earth going around the sun had to do with thelesson for the day, which was about Samuel anointing David's head withoil--did I ever tell you how I anointed my own head with coal oil?--butI do remember that she broke both the vases and cut her finger, and hadto keep sucking it the rest of the time, because she didn't want to gether handkerchief all bloodied up. It was a kind of fancy handkerchief, made of thin stuff trimmed with lace--no good. 

The Sabbath-school may be said to be divided into three courses, namely, the preparatory or infant-class, the collegiate or Sabbath-schoolproper, and the post-graduate or Mr. Parker's Bible-class. 

What can a mere babe of three or four years learn in Sabbath-school?sneers the critic. Not much, I grant you, of justification by Faith, orEffectual Calling; but certain elementary precepts can be impressedupon the mind while it is still in a plastic condition that never canbe wholly obliterated, come what may in after life. Prime among theseelementary precepts is this: "Always bring a penny. "

Some one has said, "Give me the first seven years of a child's lifeand I care not who has the remainder. " I cannot endorse this withoutreserve; but I maintain as a demonstrated fact: "Bring up a child tocontribute a copper cent, and when he is old he will not depart fromit. " It was recently my high privilege to attend a summer gatheringof representative religious people in the largest auditorium in thiscountry. Sometimes under that far-spreading roof ten thousand souls wereassembled and met together. This fact could be guessed at with tolerableaccuracy from the known seating capacity, but the interesting thing wasthat it could be predicated with mathematical certainty that exactly tenthousand people were present, because the offertory footed upexactly one hundred dollars. What an encouragement to these faithfulinfant-class teachers that have labored unremittingly, instant in seasonand out of season, saying over and over again with infinite patience, "Always bring a penny, " to know that their labor has not been in vain, and that as a people we have made it the rule of our lives always tobring a penny--and no more. 

I have often tried to think what a Sabbath-school must be like inCalifornia, where they have no pennies. It seems hardly possible thatthe institution can exist under such a patent disability, and yet itdoes. Do they work it on the same principle as the post-office inthat far-off land where you 'cannot buy one postal card because thepostmaster cannot make change, but must buy five postal cards ortwo two-cent stamps and a postal? In other words, does a nickel, thesmallest extant coin, serve for five persons for one Sunday or oneperson for five Sundays? I have often wondered about this. 

Subsidiary instruction in the preparatory course consists of sittingright still and being nice, keeping your fingers out of Johnny Pym'seye, because it hurts him and makes him cry, not grabbing in the basketwhen it goes by, even though it does have pennies in it, coaching in arepertory of songs like: "Beautiful, Beautiful Little Hands, " "You inYour Little Corner and I in Mine, " "The Consecrated Cross-Eyed Bear, ""Pass Around the Wash-Rag"--the grown folks call that "Pass Along theWatchword" and stories about David and Goliath, Samson and the threehundred foxes with fire tied to their tails, Moses in the bulrushes, theinfant Samuel, Hagar in the wilderness, and so forth. The clergy haveoften objected that these stories, being told at the same period of lifewith those about Santa Claus, "One time there was a little boy and hehad a dog named Rover, " the little girl that had hair as black as ebony, skin as white as snow, and cheeks as red as blood, because her Ma, who was a queen by occupation, happened to cut her finger with ablack-handled knife along about New Year's--the clergy, I say, haveoften objected that all these matters, being brought to a child'sattention at the same period in its life, are likely to be regarded inafter years as of equal evidential value. I am not much of a hand toargue, myself, but I should like to have one of these carping criticsmeet my friend, Mrs. Sarah M. Boggs, who has taught the infant-classsince 1867, having missed only two Sundays in that time, once, in 1879, when it stormed so that nobody in town was out, and once, last winter ayear ago, when she slipped off the back porch and hurt her knee. I canjust see Sister Boggs laying down the law to anybody that finds faultwith the infant-class, let him be preacher or who. Why the very idea!Do you mean to say, sir--I guess Sister Boggs can straighten him out allright. 

No less faithful is Mr. Parker, the leading lawyer of the town, whoconducts the Bible-class. I believe one morning he didn't get thereuntil after the last bell was done ringing, but otherwise his record ofattendance compares favorably with Sister Boggs's. Both teachers agreeto ignore the stated lesson for the day, but whereas Sister Boggs leadsher flock through the flowery meads of narration, Mr. Parker and hisclass have camped out by preference for the last forty years in thearid wilderness of Romans and Hebrews and Corinthians First and Second, flinging the plentiful dornicks of "Paul says this" and "Paul says that"at each other's heads in friendly strife. Mr. Parker's class is alsovery assiduous in its attendance upon the Young People's meetings, seemingly holding the dogma, "Once a young person always a youngperson. " The prevailing style of hairdressing among the members is togrow the locks long on the left side of the head, and to bring the thinlayer across to the right, pasted down very carefully with a sort ofpeeled onion effect. 

There is a whole lot of them, and they jower away at each other allthrough the time between the opening and the closing exercises, havingthe liveliest kind of a time getting over about two verses of the Bibleand the whole ground of speculative theology. 

Immeasurably more impermanent in method and personnel is the regularcollegiate department, the Sabbath-school proper. In the early days, away back when sugar was sixteen cents a pound, the thing to do wasto learn Scripture verses by heart. If you were a rude, rough boy whodidn't exactly love the Sunday-school as much as the hymn made you sayyou did, but still one who had rather sing it than stir up a muss, youhunted for the shortest verses you could find and said them off. Fromfour to eight was considered a full day's work. But if you were a boywho put on an apron and helped your Ma with the dishes, a boy who alwayswiped your feet before you came in, a boy that never got kept in atschool, a boy that cried pretty easy, a nice, pale boy, with bulgingblue eyes, you came to Sabbath-school and disgorged verses likebuck-shot out of a bag. The four-to-eight-verse boys sat and listened, and improved their minds. There was generally one other boy like youin the class, and it was nip-and-tuck between you which should get theprize, until finally you came one Sunday, all bloated up with 238 versesin your craw, and he quit discouraged. The prize was yours. It was abeautiful little Bible with a brass clasp; it had two tiny silk stringsof an old-gold color for bookmarks, and gilt edges all around that madethe leaves stick together at first. It was printed in diamond type, sosmall it made your ears ring when you tried to read it. 

Other faculties than that of memory were called into action in thosedays by problems like these: "Who was the meekest man? Who was thestrongest man? Who was the father of Zebedee's children? Who had theiron bedstead, and whose thumbs and great-toes were cut off?" To set achild to find these things in the Bible without a concordance seemsto us as futile as setting him to hunt a needle in a haystack. But ourfathers were not so foolish as we like to think them; they didn't caretwo pins if we never discovered who had the iron bedstead, but theyknew that, leafing over the book, we should light upon treasure wherewe sought it not, kernels of the sweetest meat in the hardest shells, stories of enthralling interest where we least expected them, but, mostof all, and best of all, texts that long afterward in time of troubleshould come to us, as it were the voice of one that also had eaten thebread of affliction, calling to us across the chasm of the centuriesand saying: "O, tarry thou the Lord's leisure: be strong and He shallcomfort thine heart. "

In the higher classes, that still were not high enough to rank with Mr. Parker's, the exegetical powers were stimulated in this wise: "'And theysung a hymn and went out. ' Now what do you understand by that?" We toldwhat we "understood, " and what we "held, " and what we "believed, " andlaid traps for the teacher and tried to corner him with irrelevanttexts wrenched from their context. He had to be an able man and animble-witted man. Mere piety might shine in the prayer-meeting, in theclass-room, at the quarterly love-feast, but not in the Sabbath-school. I remember once when Brother Butler was away they set John Snyder toteach us. John didn't know any more than the law allowed, and we madehim feel it, until finally, badgered beyond endurance, he blurted outthat all he knew was that he was a sinner saved by grace. Maybe hecouldn't just tell where to find this, that, and t' other thing in theBible, but he could turn right to the place where it said that thougha body's sins were as scarlet, yet they should be white as snow. It wasregarded as a very poor sort of an excuse then, but thinking it overhere lately, it has seemed to me that maybe John had the root of thematter in him after all. 

The comparative scarcity of polemical athletes and the relative plentyof the Miss Susie Goldrick kind of teachers, apparently called intobeing the Berean Lesson Leaf system, with its Bible cut up intolady-bites of ten or twelve verses, its Golden Topics, Golden Texts, itsapt alliterations, like:

 S AMUEL EEKS AUL ORROWING

and its questions prepared in tabloid form, suitable for the mostenfeebled digestions, see directions printed on inside wrapper. Amongthe many evidences of the degeneracy of the age is the scandalousignorance of our young people regarding the sacred Scriptures, whichat the very lowest estimate are incontestably the finest English everwritten. Those whose childhood antedates the lesson leaf are not sounfamiliar with that wondrous treasure-house of thought. It is not forme to say what has wrought the change. I can only point out that lessonleaves, being about the right size for shaving papers, barely last fromSunday to Sunday, while that very identical Bible with the blinding typethat I won years and years ago, by learning verses, is with me still. Yes, and as I often wonder to discover, some of those very verses that Igobbled down as heedlessly as any ostrich are with me still. 

Remain to be considered the opening and closing exercises, principallydevoted, I remember, to learning new tunes and singing old ones out ofbooks with pretty titles, like "Golden Censer, " "Silver Spray, " "Pearland Gold, " "Sparkling Dewdrops, " and "Sabbath Chimes. " I wasn't going totell it, but I might as well, I suppose. I can remember as far back as"Musical Leaves. " There must be quite a lot of people scattered aboutthe country who sung out of that when they were little. I wish a few ofus old codgers might get together some time and with many a hummed andprefatory, "Do, mi, Sol, do; Sol, mi... Mi-i-i-i, " finally manage toquaver out the sweet old tunes we learned when we were little tads, eachwith a penny in his fat, warm hand: "Shall we Gather at the River?"and "Work, for the Night is Coming"; and what was the name of that oneabout:

 "The waves shall come and the rolling thunder shock Shall beat upon the house that is founded on a rock, And it never shall fall, never, never, never. "

What the proper English tune is to "I think when I read that sweet storyof old" I cannot tell, but I am sure it can never melt my heart as thatone in the old "Musical Leaves. " with its twistful repetitions of thelast line:

 "I should like to have been with Him then, I should like to have been with Him then, When He took little children like lambs to His fold, I should like to have been with Him then. "

I fear we could not sing that without breaking down. As we recall it, wedraw an inward fluttering breath, something grips our throats and makesthem ache, our eyes blur, and a tear slips down upon the cheek, not ofsorrow--God knows not all of sorrow--but if we had it all to live overagain, how differently we--oh, well, it's too late now, but still. 

Leafing over my little girl's "Arabian Nights" the other day, when Icame to the story of "The Enchanted Horse, " I found myself humming, "Land ahead! Its fruits are waving. " My father used to lead the singingin Sabbath-school, and when he was sol-fa-ing that tune to learn it, Iwas devouring that story, and was just about at the picture where PrinceWhat's-his-name rises up into the air on the Enchanted Horse, with histrue love hanging on behind, and all the multitude below holding theirturbans on as they look up and exclaim: "Well, if that don't beat theDutch!"

And another tune still excites in me the sullen resentment that itdid when I first heard it. In those days, just as a fellow got to theexciting part in "Frank at Don Carlos's Ranch, " or whatever the bookwas, there was kindling to be split, or an armful of wood to be broughtin, or a pitcher of water from the well, or "run over to Mrs. Boggs'sand ask her if she won't please lend me her fluting-iron, " or "run downto Galbraith's and get me a spool of white thread, Number 60, and hurryright back, because then I want you to go over to Serepta Downey'sand take her that polonaise pattern she asked me to cut out for her, "or--there was always something on hand. So what should one of thesecomposers do--I don't know what ever possessed the man--but go write aSabbath-school song with this chorus:

 "There'll be something to do, There'll be something to do, There'll be something for children to do: On that bright shining shore, Where there's joy evermore, There'll be something for children to do. "

I suppose he thought that would be an inducement!

One of these days America is going to be the musical center of theworld. When that day is fully come, and men sit down to write about it, I hope they won't forget to give due credit to the reed organ, StephenFoster, and the Sabbath-school. The reed organ had a lot to do withmusical culture. It is much decried now by people that prefer a pianothat hasn't been tuned for four years; but the reed organ will come intoits own some day, don't forget. Without it the Sabbath-school could nothave been. Anybody that would have a piano in a Sabbath-school ought tobe prosecuted. 

When music, heavenly maid, was just coming to after that awful lick thePuritans hit her, the first sign of returning life was that people beganto tire of the ten or a dozen tunes to which our great-grandfathersdroned and snuffled all their hymns. In those days there was raised up aman named Stephen Foster, who "heard in his soul the music of wonderfulmelodies, " and we have been singing them ever since--"'Way Down uponthe Swanee Ribber, " and "Old Kentucky Home, " and "Nellie Gray, " and therest. Then Bradbury and Philip Phillips and many more of them began towrite exactly the same kind of tunes for sacred words. They were justthe thing for the Sabbath-school, but they were more, much more. 

You know that when a fellow gets so he can shave himself without cuttinghalf his lip off, when it takes him half an hour to get the part in hishair to suit him, when he gets in the way of shining his shoes and hasa pretty taste in neckties, he doesn't want to bawl the air of a piecelike the old stick-in-the-muds up in the Amen corner or in Mr. Parker'sclass. He wants to sing bass. Air is too high for him anyhow unless hesings it with a hog noise. Oh, you get out! You do, too, know what a"hog noise" is. You want to let on you've always lived in town. Likelystory if you never heard anybody in the hog-pasture with a basket ofnubbins calling, "Peeg! Peeg! Boo-eel Booee!" A man's voice breaks intofalsetto on the "Boo-ee!" Well, anyhow, such a young man as I am tellingyou of would be ashamed to sing with a hog noise. He wants to sing bass. Now the regular hymn-tunes change the bass as often as they change thesoprano, and if you go fumbling about for the note, by the time you getit right it is wrong, because the tune has gone on and left you. TheSabbath-school songs had the young man Absalom distinctly in view. Theymade the bass the same all through the measure, and all the changes werestrictly on the do, sol and fa basis. As far as the other notes in thescale were concerned, the young man Absalom need not bother his headwith them. With do, sol and fa he could sing through the whole book fromcover to cover as good as anybody. 

When people find out what fun it is to sing by note, it is only a stepto the "Messiah, " two blocks up and turn to the right, as you might say. After that, it is only going ahead till you get to "Vogner. " Yes, andmany's the day you called the hogs. Don't tell me. 

Once a month on Sunday evenings there were Sabbath-school concerts. The young ones sat in the front seats, ten or twelve in a pew. "Now, children, " said the superintendent, "I want you all to sing loudand show the folks how nice you can sing. Page 65. Sixty-fi'th page, 'Scatter Seeds of Kindness. ' Now, all sing out now. " We licked ourthumbs and scuffled through the book till we found the place. We scowledat it, and stuck out our mouths at it, and shrieked at it, and bawledat it, and did the very best we knew to give an imitation of two hundredlittle pigs all grabbed by the hind leg at once. That was what madefolks call it a concert. 

There were addresses to the dear children by persons that teetered ontheir toes and dimpled their cheeks in dried-apple smiles as us. Somecomplain that they do not know how to talk to children and keep theminterested. Oh, pshaw! Simple as A B C. Once you learn the trick you cantalk to the little folks for an hour and a half on "Banking as Relatedto National Finance, " and keep them on the quiver of excitement. Askquestions. And to be sure that they give the right answers (a veryimportant thing) remember this: When you wish them to say "Yes, sir, "end your question with "Don't they?" or "isn't it?" When you wish themto say "No, sir, " end your question with "Do they?" or "Is it?" Whenyou wish them to choose between two answers, mention first the one theymustn't take, then pause, look archly at them, and mention the one theymust take. Thus:

Q. --Now, dear children, I wonder if you can tell me where the sunrises. In the north, doesn't it?

A. --Yes, sir. 

Q. --Yes, you are right. In the north. And because it rises in the northevery afternoon at three, how do we walk about? On our feet, do we?

A. --No, sir. 

Q. --No. Of course not. Then how is it we do walk about? On our earsor--(now the look) on our noses?

A. --On our noses. 

This method, if carefully and systematically employed, was never knownto fail. It is called the Socratic method. 

The most interesting feature of the monthly Sabbath-school concert isuniversally conceded to be the treasurer's report. So much on hand atthe last meeting, so much contributed by each class during the monthlast past, so much expended, so much left on hand at present. We usedto sit and listen to it with slack jaws and staring eyes. Money, money, oceans of money! Thirty-eight cents and seventy-six cents and a dollarfour cents! My!

The librarian's report was nowhere. It was a bully library, too, andcontained the "Through by Daylight" Series, and the "Ragged Dick"Series, and the "Tattered Tom" Series, and the "Frank on the Gunboat"Series, and the "Frank the Young Naturalist" Series, and the "ElmIsland" Series--Did you ever read "The Ark of Elm Island", and "GiantBen of Elm Island"? You didn't? Ah, you missed it--and the "B. O. W. C. "Series--and say! there was a book in that library--oo-oo! "Cast upby the Sea, " all about wreckers, and false lights on the shore, andadventures in Central Africa, and there's a nigger queen that wants tomarry him, and he don't want to because he loves a girl in England--Ithink that's kind of soft--and he kills about a million of them tryingto get away. You want to get that book. Don't let them give you "PatientHenry" or "Charlie Watson, the Drunkard's Little Son. " They're aboutboys that take sick and die--no good. 

It was a bully library, but the report wasn't interesting. MajorHumphreys's always was. He was the treasurer because he worked in thebank. He came from the Western Reserve, and said "cut" when he meantcoat, and "hahnt" when he meant heart. I can shut my eyes and hearhim read his report now: "Infant-class, Mrs. Sarah M. Boggs, onedolla thutty-eight cents; Miss Dan'ells's class, fawty-six cents; MissGoldrick's class, twenty-faw cents; Mr. Pahnker's class, ninety-threecents; Miss Rut's class, naw repawt. "

Poor old Miss Root! There was hardly ever any report from her class. Often she hadn't a penny to give, and perhaps the other old ladies, whofound the keenest possible delight in doing what they called "running upthe references, " had no more, for they were relics of an age when womenweren't supposed to have money to fling right and left in the foolishway that women will if they're not looked after--shoes for the baby, anda new calico dress every two or three years or so. 

Yes, it is rather interesting for a change now and then to hear thesefolks go on about what a terrible thing the Sabbath-school is, and howit does more harm than good. They get really excited about it, and stormaround as if they expected folks to take them seriously. They know, justas well as we do, that this wouldn't be any kind of a country at all ifwe couldn't look back and remember the Sabbath-school, or if we couldn'tfix up the children Sunday afternoons, and find their lesson leaves forthem, and hunt up a penny to give to the poor heathen, and hear them saythe Golden Text before they go, and tell them to be nice. Papa and mammawatch them from the window till they turn the corner, and then go backto the Sunday paper with a secure sort of feeling. They won't learnanything they oughtn't to at the Sabbath-school. 

THE REVOLVING YEAR

 "'It snows!' cries the schoolboy, 'Hurrah!' And his shout is heard through parlor and hall. "

 MCGUFFEY's THIRD READER. 

(Well, maybe it was the Second Reader. And if it was the Fourth, whatdifference does it make? And, furthermore, who 's doing this thing, youor me?)

Had it not been that never in my life have I ever heard anybody sayeither "It snows!" or "Hurrah!" it is improbable that I should haveremembered the first line of a poem describing the effect produced upondifferent kinds of people by the sight of the first snowstorm of winter. Had it not been for the plucky (not to say heroic) effort to rhyme"hall" with "hurrah" I should not have remembered the second, and stillanother line of it, depicting the emotions of a poor widow with a largefamily and a small woodpile, is burned into my memory only by reasonof the shocking language it contains, the more shocking in that it wasdeliberately put forth to be read by innocent-minded children. PoorCarrie Rinehart! When she stood up to read that, she got as red as abeet, and I believed her when she told me afterward that she thought shewould sink right through that floor. Of course, some had to snicker, butthe most of us, I am thankful to say, were a credit to our bringing up, and never let on we heard it. All the same it was a terrible thing tohave to speak right out loud before everybody. If any of the boys (letalone the girls), had said that because he felt like saying it, he wouldhave been sent in to the principal, and that night his daddy would havegiven him another licking. 

Even now I cannot bring myself to write the line without toning it down. 

"'It snows!' cries the widow. 'Oh G--d!'"

At the beginning of winter, I will not deny, that the schoolboy mighthave shouted: "It's snowin'! Hooee!" when he saw the first snow flakessifting down, and realized that the Old Woman was picking her geese. A change is always exciting, and winter brings many joyous sportsand pastimes, skating, and snowballing, and sliding down hill, and--er--er--I said skating didn't I? and--er--Oh, yes, sleigh-riding, and--er--Well, I guess that's about all. 

Skating, now, that's fine. I know a boy who, when the red ball goes upin the street-cars, sneaks under his coat a pair of wooden-soled skates, with runners that curl up over the toes like the stems of capitalletters in the Spencerian copy-book. He is ashamed of the old-fashionedthings, which went out of date long and long before my day, but he saysthat they are better than the hockeys. Well, you take a pair of suchskates and strap them on tightly until you can't tell by the feel whichis feet and which is wooden soles, and you glide out upon the ice abovethe dam for, say about four hours, with the wind from the northwest andthe temperature about nine below, and I tell you it is something grand. And if you run over a stick that is frozen in the ice, or somebody bumpsinto you, or your feet slide out from under you, and you strike on yourear and part of your face on the ice, and go about ten feet ah, it'sgreat! Simply great. And it's nice too, to skate into an air-hole intowater about up to your neck, and have the whole mob around you whoopingand "hollering" and slapping their legs with glee, because they know itisn't deep enough to drown you, and you look so comical trying to clawout. And when you do get out, it takes such along time to get yourskates of, and you feel so kind of chilly like, and when you get homeyour clothes are frozen stiff on you--Oh, who would willingly miss suchsport?

And sleigh-riding! Me for sleigh-riding! You take a nice, sharp day inwinter, when the sky is as blue as can be because all the moisture isfrozen out of the air, a day when the snow under the sleigh runnerswhines and creaks, as if thousands of tiny wineglasses were beingcrushed by them, and the bells go jing-jing, jing-jing on the frostyair which just about takes the hide off your face; when you hold yourmittens up to your ears and then have to take them down to slap yourselfacross the chest to get the blood agoing in your fingers; when you kickyour feet together and dumbly wonder why it is your toes don't clicklike marbles; when the cold creeps up under your knitted pulse-warmers, and in at every possible little leak until it has soaked into your verybones; when you snuggle down under the lap-robe where it is warm astoast (day before yesterday's toast) and try to pull your shoulders upover your head; when a little drop hangs on the end of your nose, which has ceased to feel like a living, human nose, and now resemblessomething whittled to a point; when you hold your breath as long asyou can, and your jaw waggles as if you were playing chin-chopper withit--Ah, that's the sport of kings! And after you have got as cold as youpossibly can get, and simply cannot stand it a minute longer, you rideand ride and ride and ride and ride and ride and ride and ride and ride. Once in a while you turn out for another sleigh, and nearly upset in theprocess, and you can see that in all points its occupants are exactly asyou are, just as happy and contented. There aren't any dogs to run outand bark at you. Old Maje and Tige, and even little Bounce and Guessare snoozing behind the kitchen stove. All there is is just jing-jing, jing-jing, jing-jing, not a bird-cry or a sound of living creature. Jing-jing, jing-jing..... Well, yes, kind o' monotonous, but still.... You pass a house, and a woman comes out to scrape off a plate to thechickens standing on one foot in a corner where the sun can get at them, and the wind cannot. She scrapes slowly, and looks at you as much as tosay: "I wonder who's sick. Must be somebody going for the doctor, daylike this. " And then she shudders: "B-b-b-oo-oo-oo!" and runs back intothe house and slams the door hard. You snuffle and look at the chimneythat has thick white smoke coming out of it, and consider that verylikely a nice, warm fire is making all that smoke, and you snuffleagain, and ride and ride and ride and ride and ride and ride and rideand 'ride. And about an hour and a half after you have given up allhopes, and are getting resigned to your fate, you turn off the big roadand up the lane to the house where you are going on your pleasure-trip, and you hop out as nimble as a sack of potatoes, and hobble into thehouse, and don't say how-de-do or anything, but just make right for thestove. The people all squall out: "Why, ain't you 'most froze?" andif you answer, "Yes sum, " it's as much as ever. Generally you can't doanything but just stand and snuffle and look as if you hadn't a friendon earth. And about the time you get so that some spots are pretty warm, and other spots aren't as cold as they were, why then you wrap up, andgo home again with the same experience, only more so. Fine! fine!

It's nice, too, when there's a whole crowd out together in a wagon-bedwith straw in it. There's something so cozy in straw! And the tin hornsyou blow in each other's ear, and the songs you sing: "Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way, " and "Waw-unneeta! Waw-unneeta, ay-uskthy sowl if we shud part, " and "Nearer, my God, to Thee, " and "JohnnyShmoker, " and that variation of "John Brown's Body, " where every timeyou sing over the verse you leave off one more word, and somebody alwaysforgets, and you laugh fit to kill yourself, and just have a grand time. And maybe you take a whole lot of canned cove oysters with you, and whenyou get out to Makemson's, or wherever it is you're going, Mrs. Makemsonputs the kettle on and makes a stew, cooking the oysters till they arethoroughly done. And she makes coffee, the kind you can't tell from teaby the looks, and have to try twice before you can tell by the taste. Ah! winter brings many joyous sports and pastimes. And you get back homealong about half-past two, and the fire's out, and the folks are in bed, and you have to be at the store to open up at seven--Laws! I wish it wasso I could go sleigh-riding once more in the long winter evenings, when the pitcher in the spare bedroom bursts, and makes a noise like acannon. 

And sliding down hill, I like that. 

What? Coasting? Never heard of it. If it's anything like sliding downhill, it's all right. For a joke you can take a barrel-stave and hold onto that and slide down. It goes like a scared rabbit, but that isn'tso much the point as that it slews around and spills you into a drift. Sleds are lower and narrower than they used to be, and they also lackthe artistic adornment of a pink, or a blue, or a black horse, paintedwith the same stencil but in different colors, and named "Dexter, " or"Rarus, " or "Goldsmith Maid. " These are good names, but nobody evercalled his sled by a name. Boggs's hill, back of the lady's house thattaught the infant-class in Sunday-school, was a good hill. It had acreek at the bottom, and a fine, long ride, eight or ten feet, on theice. But Dangler's hill was the boss. It was the one we all made up ourminds we would ride down some day when the snow was just right. We'dgo over there' and look up to the brow of the hill and say: "Gee! Butwouldn't a fellow come down like sixty, though?"

"Betchy!"

We'd look up again, and somebody would say: "Aw, come on. Less go overto Boggs's hill. "

"Thought you was goin' down Dangler's. "

"Yes, I know, but all the other fellows is over to Boggs's. "

"A-ah, ye're afraid. "

"Ain't either. "

"Y' are teether. "

"I dare you. "

"Oh, well now--"

"I double dare you. "

"All right. I will if you will. You go first. "

"Nah, you go first. The fellow that's dared has got to go first. Ain'tthat so, Chuck? Ain't that so, Monkey?"

"I'll go down if you will, on'y you gotta go first. "

"Er--er--Who all 's over at Boggs's hill?"

"Oh, the whole crowd of 'em, Turkey-egg McLaughlin, and DuckyHarshberger, and--Oh, I don' know who all. "

"Tell you what less do. Less wait till it gets all covered with ice, andall slick and smooth. Then less come over and go down. "

"Say, won't she go like sixty then! Jeemses Rivers! Come on, I'll beatyou to the corner. "

That was the closest we ever came to going down Dangler's hill. Railroadhill wasn't so bad, over there by the soap-factory, because they didn'trun trains all the time, and you stood a good chance of missing beingrun over by the engine, but Dangler's Well, now, I want to tell youDangler's was an awful steep hill, and a long one, and when you thinkthat it was so steep nobody ever pretended to drive up it even in thesummer-time, and you slide down the hill and think that, once you got togoing. 

Fun's fun, I know, but nobody wants to go home with half his scalphanging over one eye, and dripping all over the back porch. Because, you know, a fellow's mother gets crosser about blood on wood-work thananything else. Scrubbing doesn't do the least bit of good; it has to beplaned off, or else painted. 

Let me see, now. Have I missed anything? I'll count 'em off on myfingers. There's skating, and sleigh-riding, and sliding down hill, andOh, yes. Snowballing and making snow-men. Nobody makes a snow-man butonce, and nobody makes a snow-house after it has caved in on him onceand like to killed him. And as for snowballing--Look here. Do you knowwhat's the nicest thing about winter? Get your feet on a hot stove, and have the lamp over your left shoulder, and a pan of apples, andsomething exciting to read, like "Frank Among the Indians. " Eh, howabout it? In other words, the best thing about winter is when you canforget that it is winter. 

The excitement that prompts "It snows!" and "Hurrah!" mighty soon petersout, and along about the latter part of February, when you go to thewindow and see that it is snowing again--again? Consarn the luck!--youand the poor widow with the large family and the small woodpile areabsolutely at one. 

You do get so sick and tired of winter. School lets out at four o'clock, and it's almost dark then. There's no time for play, for there's allthat wood and kindling to get in, and Pap's awful cranky when he hopsout of bed these frosty mornings to light the fire, and finds you'vebeen skimpy with the kindling. And the pump freezes up, and you've gotto shovel snow off the walks and out in the back-yard so Tilly can hangup the clothes when she comes to do the washing. And your mother is justas particular about your neck being clean as she is in summer whenthe water doesn't make you feel so shivery. And there's the bottleof goose-grease always handy, and the red flannel to pin around yourthroat, and your feet in the bucket of hot water before you go tobed--Aw, put 'em right in. Yes, I know it's hot. That's what going tomake you well. In with 'em. Aw, child, it isn't going to scald you. Goon now. The water'll be stone-cold in a minute. "Oh, I don't like winterfor a cent. Kitchoo! There, I've gone and caught fresh cold. 

"I wish it would hurry up and come spring. 

 "When the days begin to lengthen, The cold begins to strengthen. "

Now, you know that doesn't stand to reason. Every day the sun inches alittle higher in the heavens. His rays strike us more directly and for alonger time each day. But it's the cantankerous fact, and it simply hasto stand to reason. That's the answer, and the sum has to be figured outsomehow in accordance with it. Like one time, when I was about sixteenyears old, and in the possession of positive and definite informationabout the way the earth went around the sun and all, I was arguing withone of these old codgers that think they know it all, one of thesemen that think it is so smart to tell you: "Sonny, when you get older, you'll know more 'n you do now--I hope. " Well, he was trying to tell methat the day lengthened at one end before it did at the other. I did mybest to dispel the foolish notion from his mind, and explained to himhow it simply could not be, but no, sir! he stood me down. Finally, since pure reasoning was wasted on him, I took the almanac off the nailit hung by, and--I bedog my riggin's if the old skidama link wasn'tright after all. Sundown keeps coming a minute later every day, while, for quite a while there, sun-up sticks at the same old time, 7:30 A. M. Did you ever hear of anything so foolish?

"Very early, while it is yet dark, " the alarm clock of old Dame Naturebegins to buzz. It may snow and blow, and winter may seem to havesettled in in earnest, but deep down in the earth, the root-tips, wherelie the brains of vegetables, are gaping and stretching, and ho-humming, and wishing they could snooze a little longer. When it thaws in theafternoon and freezes up at sunset as tight as bricks, they tell methat out in the sugar-camp there are great doings. I don't know aboutit myself, but I have heard tell of boring a hole in the maple-tree, and sticking in a spout, and setting a bucket to catch the drip, andcollecting the sap, and boiling down, and sugaring off. I have heardtell of taffy-pullings, and how Joe Hendricks stuck a whole gob ofmaple-wax in Sally Miller's hair, and how she got even with him byrubbing his face with soot. It is only hearsay with me, but I'll tellyou what I have done: I have eaten real maple sugar, and nearly pulledout every tooth I had in my head with maple-wax, and I have even gone sofar as to have maple syrup on pancakes. It's good, too. The maple syrupcame on the table in a sort of a glass flagon with a metal lid to it, and it was considered the height of bad manners to lick off the lastdrop of syrup that hung on the nose of the flagon. And yet it must notbe allowed to drip on the table-cloth. It is a pity we can't get anymore maple syrup nowadays, but I don't feel so bad about the loss of it, as I do to think what awful liars people can be, declaring on the labelthat 'deed and double, 'pon their word and honor, it is pure, genuine, unadulterated maple syrup, when they know just as well as they knowanything that it is only store-sugar boiled up with maple chips. 

Along about the same time, the boys come home with a ring of mud aroundtheir mouths, and exhaling spicy breaths like those which blow o'erCeylon's isle in the hymn-book. They bear a bundle of roots, whosethick, pink hide mother whittles off with the butcher-knife and setsto steep. Put away the store tea and coffee. To-night as we drink thereddish aromatic brew we return, not only to our own young days, butto the young days of the nation when our folks moved to the West in acovered wagon; when grandpap, only a little boy then, about as big asCharley there, got down the rifle and killed the bear that had climbedinto the hog-pen; when they found old Cherry out in the timber with hercalf between her legs, and two wolves lying where she had horned themto death--we return to-night to the high, heroic days of old, when ourforefathers conquered the wilderness and our foremothers reared thefamilies that peopled it. This cup of sassafras to-night in their lovingmemory! Earth, rest easy on their moldering bones!

Some there be that still take stock in the groundhog. I don't believehe knows anything about it. And I believe that any animal that hadthe sense that he is reputed to have would not have remained a mereground-hog all these years. At least not in this country. Anyhow, it'sa long ways ahead, six weeks is, especially at the time when you do wishso fervently that it would come spring. We keep on shoveling coal in thefurnace, and carrying out ashes, and longing and crying: "Oh, for pity'ssakes! When is this going to stop?" And then, one morning, we awakenwith a start Wha--what? Sh! Keep still, can't you? There is a morecanorous and horn-like quality to the crowing of Gildersleeve's rooster, and his hens chant cheerily as they kick the litter about. But it wasn'tthese cheerful sounds that wakened us with a start. There! Hear that?Hear it? Two or three long-drawn, reedy notes, and an awkward boggle ata trill, but oh, how sweet! How sweet! It is the song-sparrow, blessedbird! It won't be long now; it won't be long. 

The snow fort in the back-yard still sulks there black and dirty. "I'llgo when I get good and ready, and not before, " it seems to say. Otherplaces the thinner snow has departed and left behind it mud that seizesupon your overshoe with an "Oh, what's your rush?" In the middle ofthe road it lies as smooth as pancake-batter. A load of building stonestalls, and people gather on the sidewalk to tell the teamster quietlyand unostentatiously that he ought to have had more sense than to pileit on like that with the roads the way they are. Every time the cruelwhip comes down and the horses dance under it, the women peering out ofthe front windows wince, and cluck "Tchk! Ain't it terrible? He oughtto be arrested. " This way and that the team turns and tugs, but all invain. Somebody puts on his rubber boots and wades out to help, fearingnot the muddy spokes. Yo hee! Yo hee! No use. He talks it over with theteamster. You can hear him say: "Well, suit yourself. If you want tostay here all night. "

And then the women exult: "Goody! Goody! Serves him right. Now he has totake off some of the stone. Lazy man's load!"

The mother of children flies to the back-door when school lets out. "Don't you come in here with all that mud!" she squalls excitedly. "Lookat you! A peck o' dirt on each foot. Right in my nice clean kitchen thatI just scrubbed. Go 'long now and clean your shoes. Go 'long, I tellyou. Slave and slave for you and that's all the thanks I get. You'dkeep the place looking like a hogpen, if I wasn't at you all the time. Inever saw such young ones since the day I was made. Never. Whoopin' andhollerin' and trackin' in and out. It's enough to drive a body crazy. "

(Don't you care. It's just her talk. If it isn't one thing it's another, cleaning your shoes, or combing your hair, or brushing your clothes, orusing your handkerchief, or shutting the door softly, or holding yourspoon with your fingers and not in your fist, or keeping your finger outof your glass when you drink--something the whole blessed time. Foreverand eternally picking at a fellow about something. And saying the samething over and over so many times. That's the worst of it!)

Pap and mother read over the seed catalogues, all about "warm, lightsoils, " and "hardy annuals, " and "sow in drills four inches apart. " Itkind of hurries things along when you do that. In the south window ofthe kitchen is a box full of black dirt in which will you look out whatyou're doing? Little more and you'd have upset it. There are tomatoseeds in that, I'll have you know. Oh, yes, government seeds. Somebodysends 'em, I don't know who. Congressman, I guess, whoever he is. Idon't pretend to keep track of 'em. And say. When was this watered last?There it is. Unless I stand over you every minute--My land! If there'sanything done about this house I've got to do it. 

Between the days when it can't make up its mind whether to snow or torain, and tries to do both at once, comes a day when it is warm enough(almost) to go without an overcoat. The Sunday following you can hardlyhear what the preacher has to say for the whooping and barking. Thechoir members have cough drops in their cheeks when they stand up tosing, and everybody stops in at the drug store with: "Say, Doc, what'sgood for a cold?"

Eggs have come down. Yesterday they were nine for a quarter; to-daythey're ten. Gildersleeve wants a dollar for a setting of eggs, buthe'll let you have the same number of eggs for thirty cents if you'llwait till he can run a needle into each one. So afraid you'll raisechickens of your own. 

Excited groups gather about rude circles scratched in the mud, and thereis talk of "pureys, " and "reals, " and "aggies, " and "commies, " and "fendubs!" There is a rich click about the bulging pockets of the boys, andevery so often in school time something drops on the floor and rollsnoisily across the room. When Miss Daniels asks: "Who did that?" theboys all look so astonished. Who did what, pray tell? And when she picksup a marble and inquires: "Whose is this?" nobody can possibly imaginewhose it might be, least of all the boy whose most highly-prized shooterit is. At this season of the year, too, there is much serious talk asto the exceeding sinfulness of "playing for keeps. " The little boys, inwhose thumbs lingers the weakness of the arboreal ape, their ancestor, and who "poke" their marbles, drink in eagerly the doctrine that whenyou win a marble you ought to give it back, but the hard-eyed fellows, who can plunk it every time, sit there and let it go in one ear and outthe other, there being a hole drilled through expressly for the purpose. What? Give up the rewards of skill? Ah, g'wan!

The girls, even to those who have begun to turn their hair up under, areturning the rope and dismally chanting: "All in together, pigs in themeadow, nineteen twenty, leave the rope empty, " or whatever the rune is. 

It won't be long now. It won't be long. 

 "For lo; the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; the flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land; the fig-tree putteth forth her green figs, and the vines, with the tender grape give a good smell. Arise my love, my fair one and come away. "

 THE SONG OF SOLOMON. 

Out in the woods the leaves that rustled so bravely when we shuffledour feet through them last fall are sodden and matted. It is warm in thewoods, for the sun strikes down through the bare branches, and the coldwind is fended off. The fleshy lances of the spring beauty have stabbedupward through the mulch, and a tiny cup, delicately veined with pink, hangs its head bashfully. Anemones on brown wire stems aspire withouta leaf, and in moist patches are May pinks, the trailing arbutus of thegrown-ups. As we carry home a bunch, the heads all lopping every waylike the heads of strangled babies, we can almost hear behind us in theechoing forests a long, heart-broken moan, as of Rachel mourning forher children, and will not be comforted because they are not. The wildflowers don't look so pretty in the tin cups of water as they did backin the woods. There is something cheap and common about them. Throw 'emout. The poor plants that planned through all the ages how to attractthe first smart insects of the season, and trick them into settingthe seeds for next years' flowers did not reckon that these very meanswhereby they hoped to rear a family would prove their undoing at thehands of those who plume themselves a little on their refinement, they"are so fond of flowers. "

Old Winter hates to give up that he is beaten. It's a funny thing, butwhen you hear a person sing, "Good-a-by, Summer, good-a-by, good-a-by, "you always feel kind of sad and sorry. It's going, the time of year whenyou can stay out of doors most of the time, when you can go in swimming, and the Sunday-school picnic, and the circus, and play base-ball andcamp out, and there's no school, and everything nice, and watermelons, and all like that. Good-by, good-by, and you begin to sniff a little. The departure of summer is dignified and even splendid, but the earthlooks so sordid and draggle-trailed when winter goes, that onions couldnot bring a tear. Old winter likes to tease. Aha! You thought Iwas gone, did you? "Not yet, my child, not yet!" And he sends ushuckleberry-colored clouds from the northwest, from which snow-flakesbig as copper cents solemnly waggle down, as if they really expectedthe schoolboy to shout: "It snows! Hurrah!" and makes his shout heardthrough parlor and hall. But they only leave a few dark freckles on thegarden beds. Alas, yes! There is no light without its shadow, no joywithout its sorrow tagging after. It isn't all marbles and play in thegladsome springtide. Bub has not only to spade up the garden--there issome sense in that--but he has to dig up the flower beds, and help hismother set out her footy, trifling plants. 

The robins have come back, our robins that nest each spring in the oldseek-no-further. To the boy grunting over the spading-fork presentshimself Cock Robin. "How about it? Hey? All right? Hey?" he seemsto ask, cocking his head, and flipping out the curt inquirieswith tail-jerks. Glad of any excuse to stop work, the boy standsstatue-still, while Mr. Robin drags from the upturned clods the long, elastic fish-worms, and then with a brief "Chip!" flashes out of sight. Be right still now. Don't move. Here he comes again, and his wife withhim. They fly down, he all eager and alert to wait upon her, she whiningand scolding. She doesn't think it's much of a place for worms. Andthere's that boy yonder. He's up to some devilment or other, she justknows. She oughtn't to have come away and left those eggs. They'll getcold now, she just knows they will. Anything might happen to them whenshe 's away, and then he 'll be to blame, for he coaxed her. He knowsshe told him she didn't want to come. But he would have it. For half acent she'd go back right now. And, Heavens above! Is he going to be all'day picking up a few little worms?

She cannot finish her sentences for her gulps, for he is tamping downin her insides the reluctant angleworms that do not want to die, twoor three writhing in his bill at once, until he looks like Jove'seagle with its mouth full of thunderbolts. And all the time he ischip-chipping and flirting his tail, and saying: "How's that? All right?Hey? Here's another. How's that? All right? Hey? Open now. Like that?Here's one. Oh, a beaut! Here's two fat ones? Great? Hey? Here y' go. Touch the spot? Hey? More? Sure Mike. Lots of 'em. Wide now. Boss. Hey?Wait a second--yes, honey. In a second.... I got him. Here's the kindyou like. Oh, yes, do. Do take one more. Oh, you better. "

"D' ye think I'm made o' rubber?" she snaps at him. "I know I'll haveindigestion, and you'll be to bla--Mercy land! Them eggs!" and shegathers up her skirts and flits. He escorts her gallantly, but returnsto pick a few for himself, and to cock his head knowingly at the boy, as much as to say: "Man of family, by Ned. Or--or soon will be. Oh, yes, any minute now, any minute. "

And if I remember rightly, he even winks at the boy with a wink whosefull significance the boy does not learn till many years after whenit dawns upon him that it meant: "You got to make allowances for 'em. Especially at such a time. All upset, you know, and worried. Oh, yes. You got to; you got to make allowances for 'em. "

Day by day the air grows balmier and softer on the cheek. Out in thegarden, ranks of yellow-green pikes stand stiffly at "Present. Hump!" and rosettes of the same color crumple through the warm soil, unconsciously preparing for a soul tragedy. For an evening will comewhen a covered dish will be upon the supper-table, and when the cover istaken off, a subtle fragrance will betray, if the sense of sight do not, that the chopped-up lettuces and onions are in a marsh of cider vinegar, demanding to be eaten. And your big sister will squall out in comicdistress: "Oh, ma! You are too mean for anything! Why did you have 'emtonight? I told you Mr. Dellabaugh was going to call, and you know how Ilove spring onions! Well, I don't care. I'm just going to, anyhow. "

Things come with such a rush now, it is hard to tell what happens inits proper order. The apple-trees blossom out like pop-corn over the hotcoals. The Japan quince repeats its farfamed imitation of the BurningBush of Moses; the flowering currants are strung with knobs of vividyellow fringe; the dead grass from the front yard, the sticks and stalksand old tomato vines, the bits of rag and the old bones that Guess hasgnawed upon are burning in the alley, and the tormented smoke is dartingthis way and that, trying to get out from under the wind that seeks toflatten it to the ground. All this is spring, and--and yet it isn't. Theword is not yet spoken that sets us free to live the outdoor life; weare yet prisoners and captives of the house. 

But, one day in school, the heat that yesterday was nice and cozybecomes too dry and baking for endurance. The young ones come in fromrecess red, not with the brilliant glow of winter, but a sort of scaldedred. They juke their heads forward to escape their collars' moistembrace; they reach their hands back of them to pull their clingingwinter underwear away. They fan themselves with joggerfies, and puffout: "Phew!" and look pleadingly at the shut windows. One boy, bolderthan his fellows, moans with a suffering lament: "Miss Daniels, cain'twe have the windows open? It's awful hot!" Frightful dangers lurk indraughts. Fresh air will kill folks. So, not until the afternoon is theprayer answered. Then the outer world, so long excluded, enters oncemore the school-room life. The mellifluous crowing of distant roosters, the rhythmic creaking of a thirsty pump, the rumble of a loaded wagon, the clinking of hammers at the blacksmith shop, the whistle of No. 3away below town, all blend together in the soft spring air into onelulling harmony. 

Winter's alert activity is gone. Who cares for grades and standings now?The girls, that always are so smart, gape lazily, and stare at vacancywishing.... They don't know what they wish, but if He had a lot ofmoney, why, then they could help the poor, and all like that, and have anew dress every day. 

James Sackett--his real name is Jim Bag, but teacher calls him JamesSackett--has his face set toward: "A farmer sold 16 2-3 bu. Wheat for66 7-8 c. Per bu. ; 19 2-9 bu. Oats for, " etc. , etc. , but his soul isfar away in Cummins's woods, where there is a robbers' cave that he, andChuck Higgins, and Bunt Rogers, and Turkey-egg McLaughlin are goingto dig Saturday afternoons when the chores are done. They are goingto--Here Miss Daniels should slip up behind him and snap his ear, butshe, too, is far away in spirit. Her beau is coming after supper to takeher buggy-riding. She wonders.... She wonders.... Will she have to teachagain next fall? She wonders.... 

Wait. Wait but a moment. A subtle change is coming. 

The rim of the revolving year has a brighter and a darker half, a joyousand a somber half, Autumnal splendors cannot cheer the melancholy thatwe feel when summer goes from us, but when summer comes again the heartleaps up in glee to meet it. Wait but a moment now. Wait. 

The distant woodland swims in an amethystine haze. A long and flutingnote, honey-sweet as it were blown upon a bottle, comes to us from far. It is the turtle-dove. The blood beats in our ears. Arise, my love, myfair one, and come away. 

So gentle it can scarce be felt, a waft of air blows over us, the firstsweet breath of summer. A veil of faint and subtle perfume drifts aroundus. The vines with the tender grape give a good smell. And evermore asits enchantment is cast about us we are as once we were when first wecame beneath its spell; we are by the smokehouse at the old home place;we stand in shoes whose copper toes wink and glitter in the sunlight, a gingham apron sways in the soft breeze, and on the green, upspringingturf dances the shadow of a tasseled cap. Life was all before us then. Please God, it is not all behind us now. Please God, our best and wisestdays are yet to come the days when we shall do the work that is worthyof us. Dear one, mother of my children here and Yonder--and Yonder--thebest and wisest days are yet to come. Arise, my love, my fair one, andcome away. 

THE SWIMMING-HOLE

It is agreed by all, I think, that the two happiest periods in a man'slife are his boyhood and about ten years from now. We are exactly in theposition described in the hymn:

 "Lo! On a narrow neck of land 'Twixt two unbounded seas we stand, And cast a wishful eye. "*

 *[I am told, on good authority, that this last line of the three belongs to another hymn. As it is just what I want to say, I'm going to let it stand as it is. ]

If I remember right, the hymn went to the tune of "Ariel, " and I can seeJohn Snodgrass, the precentor, sneaking a furtive C from his pitch-pipe, finding E flat and then sol, and standing up to lead the singing, paddling the air gently with: Down, left, sing. Well, no matter aboutthat now. What I am trying to get at, is that we have all a lost Edenin the past and a Paradise Regained in the future. 'Twixt two unboundedseas of happiness we stand on the narrow and arid sand-spit of thepresent and cast a wishful eye. In hot weather particularly the wishfuleye, when directed toward the lost Eden of boyhood, lights on andlingers near the Old Swimming-hole. 

I suppose boys do grow up into a reasonable enjoyment of their facultiesin big seaside cities and on inland farms where there is no accessiblebody of water larger than a wash-tub, but I prefer to believe that themajority of our adult male population in youth went in swimming in theriver up above the dam, where the big sycamore spread out its rootsa-purpose for them to climb out on without muddying their feet. Some, Isuppose, went in at the Copperas Banks below town, where the current haddug a hole that was "over head and hands, " but that was pretty far andalmost too handy for the boys from across the tracks. 

The wash-tub fellows will have to be left out of it entirely. It was aninferior, low-grade Eden they had anyhow, and if they lost it, why, they're not out very much that I can see. And I rather pity the boys thatlived by the sea. They had a good time in their way, I suppose, with sailboats and things, but the ocean is a poor excuse for aswimming-hole. They say salt-water is easier to swim in; kind of bearsyou up more. Maybe so, but I never could see it; and even so, if itdoes, that slight advantage is more than made up for by the manifolddisadvantages entailed. First place, there's the tide to figure on. Ifit was high tide last Wednesday at half-past ten in the morning, whattime will it be high tide today? A boy can't always go when he wants to, and it is no fun to trudge away down to the beach only to find half amile of soft, gawmy mud between him and the water. And he can't go inwherever it is deep enough and nobody lives near. People own the beachaway out under water, and where he is allowed to go in may be a perfectsubmarine jungle of eel-grass or bottomed with millions of razor-edgedbarnacles that rip the soles of his feet into bleeding rags. Then, too, when one swims, more or less water gets into one's nose and mouth. River-water may not be exactly what a fastidious person would chooseto drink habitually, but there is this in its favor as compared withsea-water: it will stay down after it is swallowed; also, it doesn't gumup your hair; also, if you want to take a cake of soap with you, all youhave to look out for is that you don't lose the soap. Nobody tries touse toilet soap in sea-water more than once. 

And surf-bathing! If there is a bigger swindle than surf-bathing, theUnited States Postal authorities haven't heard of it yet. It is all verywell for the women. They can hang on to the ropes and squeal at the bigwaves and have a perfectly lovely time. Some of the really daring onescrouch down till they actually get their shoulder-blades wet. Youhave to see that for yourself to believe it, but it is as true as Iam sitting here. They do so--some of them. But good land! There's noswimming in surf-bathing, no fun for a man. The water is all bouncing upand down. One second it is over head and hands, and the next second itis about to your knees, with a malicious undertow tickling your feet andtugging at your ankles; and growling: "Aw, you think you're some, don'tyou? Yes. Well, for half a cent wouldn't take you out and drown you. "And I don't like the looks of that boat patrolling up and down betweenthe ropes and the raft. It is too suggestive, too like the skeleton atthe banquet, too blunt a reminder that maybe what the undertow growls isnot all a bluff. 

Another drawback to the ocean as a swimming-hole is that the distancesare all wrong. If you want to go to the other side of the "crick"you must take a steamboat. There is no such thing as bundling up yourclothes and holding them out of water with one hand while you swim withthe other, perhaps dropping your knife or necktie in transit. I havenever been on the other side of the "crick" even on a steamboat, butI am pretty sure that there are no yellow-hammers' nests over there orwatermelon patches. There were above the dam. At the seaside they giveyou as an objective point a raft, anchored at what seems only a littledistance from where it gets deep enough to swim in, but which turns outto be a mighty far ways when the water bounces so. When you get there, blowing like a quarter-horse and weighing nine tons as you lift yourselfout, there is nothing to do but let your feet hang over while you getrested enough to swim back. It wasn't like that above the dam. 

I tell you the ocean is altogether too big. Some profess to admire iton that account, but it is my belief that they do it to be in style. I admit that on a bright, blowy day, when you can sit and watch theshining sails far out on the horizon's rim, it does look right nice, but I account for it in this way: it puts you in mind of some of theseexpensive oil paintings, and that makes you think it is kind of highclass. And another thing: It recalls the picture in the joggerfy thatproved the earth was round because the hull of a ship disappears beforethe sails, as it would if the ship was going over a hill. You sweep youreye along where the sky and water meet, and it seems you can note thecurvature of the earth. Maybe it is that, and maybe it is all in yourown eye. I am not saying. 

There are good points, too, about the sea on a clear night when the moonis full; or when there is no moon, and the phosphorescence in the watershows, as if mermaids' children were playing with blue-tipped matches. Ilike to see it when a gale is blowing, and the white caps race. Yes, andwhen it is a flat calm, with here and there a tiny cat's-paw crinklingthe water into gray-green crepe. And also when--but there! it is no usecataloguing all kinds of weather and all hours of the day and night. What I don't approve of in the ocean is its everlasting bigness. It isso discouraging. It makes a body seem so no-account and insignificant. You come away feeling meaner than a sheep-killing dog. "Oh, what's theuse?" you say to yourself. "What's the use of my breaking my neck to doanything or be anybody? Before I was born--before History began--beforeany foot of being that could be called a man trod these sands, the wavesbeat thus the pulse of time. When I am gone--when all that man has made, that seems so firm and everlasting, shall have crumbled into the earth, whence it sprang, this wave, so momentary and so eternal, shall stillsurge up the slanting beach, and trail its lacy mantle in retreat.... Ospare me a little, that I may recover my strength before I go hence, andbe no more seen. "

And that's no way for a man to feel. He ought to be confident and sureof himself. If he hasn't yet done all that he laid out to do, he shouldfeel that it is in him to do it, and that he will before the time comesfor him to go, and that when it is done it shall be orth while. 

It is the ocean's everlasting bigness that makes it so cold to swim in. At the seaside bathing pavilions they have a blackboard whereon theychalk up "70" or "72" or whatever they think folks will like. They neversay in so many words that a man went down into the water and held athermometer in it long enough to get the true temperature, but theylead you to believe it. All I have to say is that they must have veryoptimistic thermometers. I just wish some of these poor little seashoreboys could have a chance to try the Old Swimming-hole up above the dam. Certainly along about early going-barefoot time the water is a littlecool, but you take it in the middle of August--ah, I tell you! When youcome out of the water then you don't have to run up and down to get yourblood in circulation or pile the warm sand on yourself or hunt for thesteam-room. Only thing is, if you stay in all day, as you want to, itthins your blood, and you get the "fever 'n' ager. " But you can stay inas long as you want to, that 's the point, without your lips turning thecolor of a chicken's gizzard. 

And there's this about the Old Swimming-hole, or there was in my day:There were no women and girls fussing around aid squalling: "Now, youstop splashin' water on me! Quit it now! Quee-yut!" I don't think tlooks right for women folks to have anything to do with water in largequantities. On a sail-boat, now, they are the very--but perhaps we hadbetter not go into that. At a picnic, indeed, trey used to take offtheir shoes and stockings and paddle their feet in the water, but thatwas as much as ever they did. They never thought of going in swimming. Even at the seashore, now when Woman is so emancipated, they go bathingnot swimming. I don't like to see a woman swim any more than I like tosee a woman smoke a cigar. And for the same reason. It is more funthan she is entitled to. A woman's place is home minding the baby, andcooking the meals. Nothing would do her but she had to be born a woman, she had the same liberty of choice that we men had. Very well, I say, let her take the consequencies. 

It is only natural, then, that she should refuse to let her boys goswimming. She pays off her grudge that way. Just because she can't goherself she is bound the they shan't either. She says they will getdrowned, but we know about that. It is only an excuse to keep them fromhaving a little fun. She has to say something. They won't get drowned. Why, the idea! They haven't the least intention of any such thing. 

"Well, but Robbie, supposing you couldn't help yourself?"

"How couldn't help myself?"

"Why, get the cramps. Suppose you got the cramps, then what?"

"Aw, pshaw! Cramps nothin'! They hain't no sich of a thing. And, anyhow, if I did get 'em, wouldn't jist kick 'em right out. This way. "

"Now, Robbie, you know you did have a terrible cramp in your foot justonly the other night. Don't you remember?"

"Aw, that! That ain't nothin'. That ain't the cramps that drowndspeople. Didn't I tell you wouldn't fist kick it right out? That's whatthey all do when they git the cramps. But they don't nobody git 'em nowno more. "

"I don't want you to go in the water and get drowned. You know you can'tswim. "

This is too much. Oh, this is rank injustice! Worse yet, it is badlogic. 

"How 'm I ever goin' to learn if you don't let me go to learn?"

"Well, you can't go, and that's the end of it. "

Isn't that just like a woman? Perfectly unreasonable! Dear! dear!

"Now, Ma, listen here. S'posin' we was all goin' some place on asteamboat, me and you and Pa and the baby and all of us, and--"

"That won't ever happen, I guess. "

"CAN'T YOU LET ME TELL YOU? And s'posin' the boat was to sink, and Icould swim and save you from drown--"

"You're not going swimming, and that's all there is about it. "

"Other boys' mas lets them go. I don't see why I can't go. "

No answer. 

"Ma, won't you let me go? I won't get drowned, hope to die if I do. Ma, won't you let me go? Ma! Ma-a!--Maw-ah!"

"Stop yelling at me that way. Good land! Do you think I'm deaf?"

"Won't you let me go? Please, won't you let--"

"No, I won't. I told you I wouldn't, and I mean it. You might as wellmake up your mind to stay at home, for you're--not--going. Hush up now. This instant, sir! Robbie, do you hear me? Stop crying. Great baby!wouldn't be ashamed to cry that way, as big as you are!"

Mean old Ma! Guess she'd cry too'f she could see the other kids thatwaited for him to go and ask her--if she could see them moving off, tired of waiting. They're 'most up to Lincoln Avenue. 

"Oooooooooooo-hoo--hoo--hoo--hoohoooooooooo-ah! I wanna gow-ooooo. "

"Did you hoe that corn your father told you to?"

"Oooooooooooo-hoo-hoo-hoo-oooooooo! I wanna gow-ooooooo. "

"Robbie! Did you hoe that corn?"

The last boy, the one with the stone-bruise on his heel, limps aroundthe corner. They have all the fun. His ma won't let him go barefootbecause it spreads his feet. 

"Robbie! Answer me. "

"Mam?"

"Did you hoe that corn your father told you to?"

"Yes mam. "

"All of it? Did you hoe all of it?"

"Prett' near all of it. " Well begun is half done. One hill is a goodbeginning, and half done is pretty nearly all. 

"Go and finish it. "

"I will if you'll let me go swimmin'. "

It flashes upon him that even now by running he can catch up with theother fellows. He can finishing the hoeing when he gets back. 

"You'll do it anyhow, and you're not going swimming. Now, that's the endof it. You march out to that garden this minute, or I'll take a stick toyou. And don't let me hear another whimper out of you. Robbie! Come backhere and shut that door properly. I shall tell your father how you haveacted. Wouldn't be ashamed--I'd be ashamed to show temper that way. "

It says for children to obey their parents, but if more boys mindedtheir mothers there would be fewer able to swim. While I shrinkwith horror from even seeming to encourage dropping the hoe when thesewing-machine gets to going good, by its thunderous spinning throwingup an impervious wall of sound to conceal retreat into the back alley, across the street, up the alley back of Alexander's, and so on upto Fountain Avenue in time to catch up with the gang, still I regardswimming as an exercise of the extremest value in the development of thegrowing boy. It builds up every muscle. It is particularly beneficialto the lungs. To have a good pair of lungs is the same thing as havinga good constitution. It is nice to have a healthy boy, and it is nice tohave an obedient boy, but if one must choose which he will have--that'sa very difficult question. I think it should be left to the casuists. Nevertheless, now is the boy's only chance to grow. He will haveabundant opportunities to learn obedience. 

In the last analysis there are two ways of acquiring the art ofswimming, the sudden way and the slow way. I have never personally knownanybody that learned in the sudden way, but I have heard enough about itto describe it. It it's the quickest known method. One day the boy itsamong the gibbering white monkeys at the river's edge, content to splashin the water that comes but half way to his crouching knees. The nextday he swims with the big boys as bold as any of them. In the meantimehis daddy has taken him out in a boat, out where it is deep--Oh! Ain'tit deep there?--and thrown him overboard. The boat is kept far enoughaway to be out of the boy's reach and yet near enough to be right therein case anything happens. (I like that "in case anything happens. " Itsounds so cheerful. ) It being what Aristotle defines as "a ground-hogcase, " the boy learns to swim immediately. He has to. 

It seems reasonable that he should. But still and all, I don't justfancy it. Once when a badly scared man grabbed me by the arms in deepwater I had the fear of drowning take hold of my soul, and it isn't anice feeling at all. Somehow when I hear folks praising up this methodof teaching a child to swim, I seem to hear the little fellow's screamsthat he doesn't want to be thrown into the water. I can see him clingingto his father for protection, and finding that heart hard and unpitying. I can see his fingernails whiten with his clutch on anything that givesa hand-hold. His father strips off his grip, at first with boisterouslaughter, and then with hot anger at the little fool. He calls him acry-baby, and slaps his mouth for him, to stop his noise. The littlebody sprawls in the air and strikes with a loud splash, and the child'sgargling cry is strangled by the water whitened by his mad clawings. Ican see his head come up, his eyes bulging, and his face distorted withthe awful fear that is ours by the inheritance of ages. He will sink andcome up again, not three times, but a hundred times. Eventually he willwin safe to shore, panting and trembling, his little heart knockingagainst his ribs, it is true, but lord of the water from that timeforth. It is a very fine method, yes... But... Well, if it was my boy Ihad just as lief he tarried with the little white monkeys at the river'sedge. Let him squeal and crouch and splash and learn how to half drownthe other fellow by shooting water at him with the heel of his hand. Let him alone. He will be watching the others swim. He will edge out alittle farther and kick up his heels while with his hands he holds onthe ground. He will edge out a little farther still and try to keep hisfeet on the bottom and swim with his hands. Be patient in his attempt tocombine the two methods of travel. He is not the only one that fears tobe one thing or the other, and regards a mixture of both as the safestway to get along. 

No, I cannot say that I wholly approve of the sudden method of learningto swim. It has the advantange of lumping all the scares of a lifetimeinto one and having it over with, and yet I don't suppose the scare ofbeing thrown into the water by one's daddy is really greater than beingducked in mid-stream by some hulking, cackle-voiced big boy. It seemsgreater though, I suppose, because a fellow cannot very well relievehis feelings by throwing stones at his daddy and bawling: "Goldarn youanyhow, you--you big stuff! I'll get hunk with you, now you see if Idon't!" Here would be just the place to make the little boy tie knotsin the big boy's shirt-sleeves, soak the knots in water, and pound thembetween stones. But that is kind of common, I think. They told about itat the swimming-hole above the dam, but nobody was mean enough to do it. Maybe they did it down at the Copperas Banks below town. The boys fromacross the tracks went there, a race apart, whom we feared, and whohated us, if the legend chalked up on the fences "DAMB THE PRODESTANCE, "meant anything. 

Under the slow method of learning to swim one had leisure to observe thedifferent fashions--dog-fashion and cow-fashion, steamboat-fashion, and such. The little kids and beginners swam dog-fashion, which on thataccount was considered contemptible. The fellow was sneered at thatscrewed up his face as if in a cloud of suffocating dust, and fought thewater with noise and fury, putting forth enough energy to carry him amile, and actually going about two feet if he were headed down stream. Scientific men say that the use of the limbs, first on one side and thenon the other, is instinctive to all creatures of the monkey tribe. Thatis the way they do in an emergency, since that is the way to scramble upamong the tree limbs. I know that it is the easiest way to swim, andthe least effective. When the arms are extended together in the breaststroke, it is as much superior to dogfashion as man is superior to theape. I have always thought that to swim thus with steady and deliberatearm action, the water parting at the chin and rising just to the root ofthe underlip, was the most dignified and manly attitude the human beingcould put himself in. Cow-fashion was a burlesque of this, and theswimmer reared out of water with each stroke, creating tidal waves. Itwas thought to be vastly comic. Steamboat-fashion was where a fellowswam on his back, keeping his body up by a gentle, secret paddlingmotion with his hands, while with his feet he lashed the water intofoam, like some river stern-wheeler. If he could cry: "Hoo! hoo! hoo!"in hoarse falsetto to mimic the whistle, it was an added charm. 

It was a red-headed boy from across the tracks on his good behavior atthe swimming-hole above the dam that I first saw swim hand-over-hand, or"sailor-fashion" as we called it, rightly or wrongly, I know not. I canhear now the crisp, staccato little smack his hand gave the water as hereached forward. 

It has ever since been my envy and despair. It is so knowing, so"sporty. " I class it with being able to wear a pink-barred shirt frontwith a diamond-cluster pin in it; with having my clothes so nobby andstylish that one thread more of modishness would be beyond the humanpower to endure; with being genuinely fond of horseracing; with beinga first-class poker player, I mean a really first-class one; with beingable to swallow a drink of whisky as if I liked it instead of havingto choke it down with a shudder; with knowing truly great men likeFitzsimmons, or whoever it is that is great now, so as to be able toslap him on the back and say: "Why, hello! Bob, old boy, how are you?"with being delighted with the company of actors, instead of finding themas thin as tissue-paper--what wouldn't I give if I could be like that?My life has been a sad one. But I might find some comfort in it yet ifI coin only get that natty little spat on the water when I lunge forwardswimming overhand. 

We used to think the Old Swimming-hole was a bully place, but I knowbetter now. The sycamore leaned well out over the water, and there wasa trapeze on the branch that grew parallel with the shore, but the waternear it was never deep enough to dive into. And that is another occasionof humiliation. I can't dive worth a cent. When I go down to the slipbehind Fulton Market--they sell fish at Fulton Market; just follow yournose and you can't miss it--and see the rows of little white monkeysdoing nothing but diving, I realize that the Old Swimming-hole with allits beauties, its green leafiness, its clean, long grass to lie uponwhile drying in the sun, or to pull out and bite off the tender, chrome-yellow ends, was but a provincial, country-fake affair. Therewere no watermelon rinds there, no broken berry-baskets, no orange peel, no nothing. All the fish in it were just common live ones. And there wasno diving. But at the real, proper city swimming-place all the littlewhite monkeys can dive. Each is gibbering and shrieking: "Hey, Chim-meelChimmee! Hey, Chim-mee! Chimmee! Hey, CHIM-MEEEE! How'ss t 'iss?"crossing himself and tipping over head first, coming up so as to "layhis hair, " giving a shaking snort to clear his nose and mouth of water, regaining the ladder with three overhand strokes (every one of themwith that natty little spat that I can't get), climbing up to thestring-piece and running for Chimmy, red-eyed, shivering, and dripping, to ask: "How wass Cat?" And I can't dive for a cent--that is, I can'tdive from a great elevation. I set my teeth and vow I just will divefrom ten feet above the water, and every time it gets down to a poor, picayune dive off the lowest round of the ladder. I blame my earlyeducation for it. I was taught to be careful about pitching myself headforemost on rocks and broken bottles. I used to think it was a fineswimming-hole, and that I was having a grand, good time, well worth anyordinary licking; but now that I have traveled around and seen things, Iknow that it was a poor, provincial, country-jake affair after all. The first time I swam across and back without "letting down" it wascertainly an immense place, but when I went back there a year ago lastsummer--why, pshaw! it wasn't anything at all. It was a dry summer, I admit, but not as dry as all that. A poor, pitiful, provincial, two-for-a cent--and yet... And yet... And yet I sat there after I haddressed, and mused upon the former things--the life that was, but nevercould be again; the Eden before whose gate was a flaming sword turningevery way. The night was still and moonless. The Milky Way slantedacross the dark dome above. It was far from the street lamps thatgreened among the leafy maples in the silent streets. Gushes of airstirred the fluttering sycamore, and whispered in the tall larches thatmarched down the boundary line of the Blymire property. The last groupof swimmers had turned into the road from around the clump of willows atthe end of the pasture. The boy that is always the last one had nearlycaught up with the others, for the velvet pat of his bare feet in thedeep dust was slowing. Their eager chatter softened and softened, untilit blended with the sounds of night that verge on silence, the fall of aleaf, the up-springing of a trodden tuft of grass, the sleepy twitterof a dreaming bird, and the shrilling of locusts patiently turning acreaking wheel. I heard the thump of hoofs and buggy wheels boomingin the covered bridge, and a shudder came upon me that was not all thechill of falling dew. Again I was a little boy, standing in a circle ofmy fellows and staring at something pale, stretched out upon the ground. Ben Snyder had dived for It and found It and brought It up and laid Iton the long, clean grass. Some one had said we ought to get a barrel androll It on the barrel, but there was none there. And then some onesaid: "No, it was against the law to touch anything like That beforethe Coroner came. " So, though we wished that something might be done, we were glad the law stepped in and stringently forbade us touching whatour flesh crept to think of touching. No longer existed for us the boythat had the spy-glass and the "Swiss Family Robinson. " Something coldand terrible had taken his place, something that could not see, and yetlooked upward with unwinking eyes. The gloom deepened, and the dew beganto fall. We could hear the boy that ran for the doctor whimpering a longway off. We wanted to go home, and yet we dared not. Something might getus. And we could not leave That alone in the dark with It's eyes wideopen. The locusts in the grass turned and turned their creaking wheel, and the wind whispered in the tall larches. We heard the thump of hoofsand wheels booming in the covered bridge. It was the doctor, come toolate. He put his head down to It's bosom (the cold trickled down ourbacks), and then he said it was too late. If we had known enough, hesaid, we might have saved him. We slunk away. It was very lonesome. Wekept together, and spoke low. We stopped to hearken for a moment outsidethe house where the boy had lived that had the spy-glass and the "SwissFamily Robinson. " Some one had told his mother. And then, with a greatand terrible fear within us, we ran each to his own home, swiftly andsilently. We knew now why mother did not want us to go swimming. 

But the next afternoon when Chuck Grove whistled in our back alley andheld up two fingers, I dropped the hoe and went with him. It was brightdaylight then, and that is different from the night. 

THE FIREMEN'S TOURNAMENT

It isn't only Christmas that comes but once a year and when it comes itbrings good cheer; it's any festival that is worth a hill of beans, HighSchool Commencement, Fourth of July, Sunday-school excursion, Election'bonfire, Thanksgiving Day (a nice day and one whereon you can eat roastturkey till you can't choke down another bite, and pumpkin-pie, andcranberry sauce. Tell you!)--but about the best in the whole lot, andsomething the city folks don't have, is Firemen's Tournament. That comesonce a year, generally about the time for putting up tomatoes. 

The first that most of us know about it is when we see the bills up, telling how much excursion rates will be to our town from Ostranderand Mt. Victory, and Wapatomica, and New Berlin, and Foster's, and Caledonia, and Mechanicsburg--all the towns around on both therailroads. But before that there was the Citizens' Committee, and thenthe Executive Committee, and the Finance Committee, and the Committeeon Press and Publicity, and Printing and Prizes, and Decorations andBadges, and Music, and Reception to Firemen, and Reception to Guests--asmany committees as there are nails in the fence from your house to mine. And these committees come around and tell you that we want to show thefolks that we've got public spirit in our town, some spunk, some git-upto us. We want our town to contrast favorably with Caledonia where theyhad the Tournament last year. We want to put it all over the Caledoniapeople (they think they're so smart), and we can do it, too, ifeverybody will take a-holt and help. Well, we want all we can get. Weexpect a pretty generous offer from you, for one. Man that has as prettyand tasty got-up store as you have, and does the business that you do, ought to show his appreciation of the town and try to help along.... Oh, anything you're a mind to give. 'Most anything comes in handy forprizes. But what we principally need is cash, ready cash. You see, there's a good deal of expense attached to an enterprise of thischaracter. So many little things you wouldn't think of, that you'vejust got to have. But laws! you'll make it all back and more, too. Wecackleate there'll be, at the very least, ten thousand people in townthat day, and it's just naturally bound to be that some of them will dotheir trading. 

Thank you very much, that's very handsome of you. Good day. (What areyou growling about? Lucky to get five cents out of that man. )

The Ladies' Aid of Center Street M. E. , has secured the store-roomrecently vacated by Rouse & Meyers, and is going to serve a dinner thatday for the benefit of the Carpet Fund of their church and about time, too, I say. I like to broke my neck there a week ago last Sunday night, when our minister was away. Caught my foot in a hole in the carpet, anda little more and wouldn't have gone headlong. So, it's: "Why, I've beenmeaning for more than a year, to call on you, Mrs. --. Mrs. --(Let melook at my list. Oh, yes) Mrs. Cooper, but we've had so much sicknessat home--you know my husband's father is staying with us at present, and he's been in very poor health all winter--and when it hasn't beensickness, it's been company. You know how it is. And it seemed as ifI--just--could--not make out to get up your way. What a pretty littleplace you have! So cozy! I was just saying to Mrs. Thorpe here, it wasso seldom you saw a really pretty residence in this part of town. Wethink that up on the hill, where we reside, you know, is about thehandsomest.... Yes, there are a great many wealthy people live upthere. The Quackenbushes are enormously wealthy. I was saying to Mrs. Quackenbush only the other day that I thought the hill people werealmost too exclusive .... Yes, it is a perfectly lovely day.... Er--er--We're soliciting for the Firemen's Tournament--well, not for theTournament exactly, but the Ladies' Aid are going to give a dinnerthat day for the Carpet Fund and we thought perhaps you 'd like to helpalong.... Oh, any little thing, a boiled ham or--... Well, we shall wantsome cake, but we'd druther--or, at least, rawther--have something moresubstantial, don't you know, pie or pickles or jelly, don't you know. And will you bring it or shall I send Michael with the carriage forit?.... Oh, thank you! If you would. It would be so much appreciated. So sorry we couldn't make a longer stay, but now that we've found theway.... Yes, that's very true. Well, good-afternoon. "

The lady of the house watches them as Michael inquires: "Whur next, mum?" and bangs the door of the carriage. Then she turns and says toherself: "Huh!" Mrs. Thorpe is that instant observing: "Did you noticethat crayon enlargement she had hanging up? Wouldn't it kill you?" Towhich the other lady responds: "Well, between you and I, Mrs. Thorpe, ifI couldn't have a real hand-painted picture I wouldn't have nothing atall. "

The lady of the house bakes a cake. She'll show them a thing or two inthe cake line. And while it is in the oven what does that little dev--, that provoking Freddie, do but see if he can't jump across the kitchenin two jumps. Fall? What cake wouldn't fall? Of course it falls. But itis too late now to bake another, and if they don't like it, they knowwhat they can do. She doesn't know that she's under any obligation tothem. 

Mrs. John Van Meter hears Freddie say off the little speech his mothertaught him--Oh, you may be sure she'd be there as large as life, takingcharge of everything, just as if she had been one of the workers, when, to my certain knowledge, she hadn't been to one of the committeemeetings, not a one. I declare I don't know what Mr. Craddock isthinking of to let her boss every body around the way she does--and shesmiles and says: "It's all right. It's just lovely. Tell your mamma Mrs. Van Meter is ever and ever so much obliged to her. Isn't he a dear boy?"And when he is gone, she says: "What are we ever going to do withall this cake? It seems as if everybody has sent cake. And whateverpossessed that woman to attempt a cake, I--can't imagine. Ts! ts! ts!H-well. Oh, put it somewhere. Maybe we can work it off on the countrypeople. Mrs. Filkins, your coffee smells PERfectly grand! Perfectlygrand. Do you think we'll have spoons enough?"

The Tournament prizes are exhibited in the windows of the leadingfurniture emporium at the corner of Main and Center, each with a cardattached bearing the name of the donor in distinctly legible characters. Old man Hagerman has been mowing all the rag-weed and cuckle-burrs alongthe line of march, and the lawns have had an unusual amount of shavingand sprinkling. Out near the end of Center Street, the grandstand hasbeen going up, tiers of seats rising from each curb line. The street hasbeen rolled and sprinkled and scraped until it is in fine condition fora running track. Why don't you pick up that pebble and throw it overinto the lot? Suppose some runner should slip on that stone and fall andhurt himself, you'd be to blame. 

The day before the Tournament, they hang the banner:

 "WELCOME VOLUNTEER FIREMEN"

from Case's drugstore across to the Furniture Emporium. Along the lineof march you may see the man of the house up on a step-ladder againstthe front porch, with his hands full of drapery and his mouth full oftacks. His wife is backing toward the geranium bed to get a good view, cocking her head on one side. 

"How 'v vif?" he asks as well as he can for the tacks. 

"Little higher. Oh, not so much. Down a little. Whope! that's .... Oh, plague take the firemen! Just look at that! Mercy! Mercy!"

The man of the house can't turn his head. 

"Oh, I wouldn't have had it happen for I don't know what! Ts! Ts! Ts!That lovely silverleaf geranium that Mrs. Pritchard give me a slip of. Broke right off! Oh, my! My! My! Do you s'pose it'd grow if I was tostick it into the ground just as it is with all them buds on it?"

The man of the house lets one end of the drapery go and empties hismouth of tacks into his disengaged hand. 

"I don't know. Ow! jabbed right into my gum! But I can tell you this:If you think I'm going to stick up on this ladder all morning while youcarry on about some fool old geranium that you can just as well fusswith when I'm gone, why, you're mighty much mistaken. "

"Well, you needn't take my head off. I feel awful about that geranium. "

"Well, why don't you look where you're going? Is this right?"

"Yes, I told you. I wish now I'd done it myself. I can't ask you to do athing about the house but there's a row raised right away. "

People that don't want to go to the trouble of tacking up these alphabetflags on the edge of the veranda eaves (it takes fourteen of them tospell "WELCOME FIREMEN"), say they think a handsome flag--a reallyhandsome one, not one of these twenty-five centers--is as pretty andrich looking a decoration as a body can put up. 

Tents are raised in the vacant lots along Center Street, and countersknocked together for the sale of ice-cold lemonade, lemo, lemo, lemo, made in the shade, with a spade, by an old maid, lemo, lemo. Here y' arenow, gents, gitch nice cool drink, on'y five a glass. There is even thehook for the ice-cream candy man to throw the taffy over when he pullsit. I like to watch him. It makes me dribble at the mouth to think aboutit. 

The man that sells the squawking toys and the rubber balloons on sticksis in town. All he can say is: "Fi' cent. " He will blow up the balloonstomorrow morning. The men with the black-velvet covered shields, allstuck full of "souvenirs, " are here, and the men with the little canes. I guess we'll have a big crowd if it doesn't rain. What does the papersay about the weather?

The boys have been playing a new game for some time past, but it isonly this evening that you notice it. The way of it is this: You takean express-wagon--it has to have real wheels: these sawed-out wheelsare too baby--and you tie a long rope to the tongue and fix loops on therope, so that the boys can put each a loop over his shoulder. (You wanta good many boys. ) And you get big, long, thick pieces of rag and youtake and tie them so as to make a big, big, long piece, about as long asfrom here to 'way over there. And you lay this in the wagon, kind of infolds like. Then you go up to where they water the horses and two of yougo at the back end of the wagon and the rest put the loops over theirshoulders, and one boy says, "Are you ready?" and he has a Fourth ofJuly pistol and he shoots off a cap. And when you hear that, you runlike the dickens and the two boys behind the wagon let out the hose (thebig, long, thick piece of rag) and fix it so it lies about straight onthe ground. And when you have run as far as the hose will reach, the boywith the Fourth of July pistol says: "Twenty-eight and two-fifths, "and that's the game. And the kids don't like for big folks to stand andwatch them, because they always make fun so. 

In other towns they have Boys' Companies organized strictly forTournament purposes. There was talk of having one here. Mat. King, theassistant chief, was all for having one so that we could compete in whathe calls "the juveline contests, " but it fell through somehow. 

Along about sun-up you hear the big farm-wagons clattering into town, chairs in the wagon bed, and Paw, and Maw, and Mary Elizabeth, andMartin Luther, and all the family, clean down to Teedy, the baby. He'snamed after Theodore Roosevelt, and they have the letter home now, framed and hanging up over the organ. But for all the wagon is so full, there is room for a big basket covered with a red-ended towel. (Seems tome I smell fried chicken, don't you?)

I just thought I'dt see if you'd bite. You've formed your notionsof country people from "The Old Homestead" and these by-gosh-Mirandynovels. The real farmers, nowadays, drive into town in double-seatedcarriages with matched bays, curried so that you can see to combyour hair in their glossy sides. The single rigs sparkle in the sun, conveying young men and young women of such clean-cut, high-bredfeatures as to make us wonder. And yet I don't know why we shouldwonder, either. They all come from good old stock. The young fellowsrun a little too strongly to patent-leather shoes and their horses arealmost too skittish for my liking, but the girls are all right. If theirclothes set better than you thought they would, why, you must rememberthat they subscribe for the very same fashion magazines that you do, andthere is such a thing as a mail-order business in this country, even ifyou aren't aware of it. 

All the little boys in town are out with their baskets chanting sadly:

 PEANUTS? FIVE A BAG

You 'll hear that all day long. 

But there isn't much going on before the excursion trains come in. Thenthings begin to hop. The grand marshal and his aides gallop throughthe streets as if they were going for the doctor. The trains of ten andfifteen coaches pile up in the railroad yard, and the yardmaster nearlygoes out of his mind. People are so anxious to get out of the cars, inwhich they have been packed and jammed for hours, that they don't minda little thing like being run over by a switching engine. Every platformis just one solid chunk of summer hats and babies and red shirts andalto horns. They have been nearly five hours coming fifty miles. Stoppedat every station and sidetracked for all the regular trains. Such atime! Lots of fun, though. The fellows got out and pulled flowers, andseed cucumbers, and things and threw them at folks. You never saw suchcut-ups as they are. Pretty good singers, too. Good part of the way, they sung "My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean, " and "How Can I Bear to LeaveThee, " nice and slow, you know, a good deal of tenor and not much bass, and plenty of these "minor chords. " (Yes, I know, some people call them"barber-shop chords, " but I think "minor" is a nicer name. )

The band played "Hiawatha" eighteen times. One old fellow got on atHuntsville, and he says, to Joe Bangs (that's the leader), "Shay, " hesays, "play 'Turkey in er Straw, ' won't you? Aw, go on. Play it. Thassgoof feller. Go on. "

Joe, he never heard of the tune. Don't you know it? Goes like this: ... No, that ain't it. That's "Gray Eagle. " Funny, I can't think how thattune starts. Well, no matter. They played an arrangement that had "OldZip Coon" in it. 

"Naw, " he says, "tha' ain' it 't all. Go on. Play it. Play 'Turkey iner Straw. ' Ah, ye don't know it. Thass reason. Betch don' know it. Don'know 'Turkey in er Straw!' Ho! Caw seff ml-m' sishn. Ho! You--you--youain' no m'sishn. You--you you're zis bluff. " Only about half-past eight, too. Think of that! So early in the morning. Ah me! That's one of thesad features of such an occasion. 

If there is anything more magnificent than a firemen's parade, I don'tknow what it is. The varnished woodwork on the apparatus looks as if ithad just come out of the shop and every bit of bright work glitters fitto strike you blind. You take, now, a nice hose-reel painted white andstriped into panels with a fine red line, every other panel fruits andflowers, and every other panel a piece of looking-glass shaped like acut of pie and; I tell you, it looks gay. That's what it does. It looksgay. Some of the hook-and-ladder trucks are just one mass ofgolden-rod and hydrangeas, and some of them are all fixed with thisred-white-and-blue paper rope, sort of chenille effect, or more like afeather boa. Everybody has on white cotton gloves, and those entitled tocarry speaking trumpets have bouquets in the bells of them, salvias, andgolden-rod, and nasturtiums, and marigolds, and all such. 

The Wapatomicas always have a dog up on top of their wagon. First off, you would think it didn't help out much, it is such a forlorn lookinglittle fice; but this dog, I want you to know, waked up the folks lateone night, 'way 'long about ten or eleven o'clock, barking at a fire. Saved the town, as you might say. And after that, the fire-boys took himfor a mascot. I guess he didn't belong to anybody before. And anotherwagon has a chair on it, and in that chair the cutest little girl youalmost eyer saw, hair all frizzed at the ends, and a wide blue sash andher white frock starched as stiff as a milk-pail. Everybody says: "Aw, ain't she just too sweet?"

The Caledonias have tried to make quite a splurge this year. They walkfour abreast, with their arms locked, and their white gloves on eachother's shoulders. Their truck has on it what they call "an allegoricalfigure. " There is a kind of a business (looks to me like it is the axleand wheels of a toy wagon, stood up on end and covered with white papermuslin and a string tied around the middle) that is supposed to be anhour-glass. Then there is a scythe covered with cotton batting, and thena man in a bath-robe (I saw the figure of the goods when the wind blewit open) also covered with white cotton batting. The man has a wig andbeard of wicking. First, I thought it was Santa Claus, and then I sawthe scythe and knew it must be old Father Time. The hour-glass puzzledme no little though. The man has cotton batting wings. One of them isa little wabbly, but what can you expect from Caledonia? They're alwaystrying to butt the bull off the bridge. They're jealous of our town. Oh, they stooped to all the mean, underhanded tricks you ever heard of toget the canning factory to go to their place instead of here. But weknow a thing or two ourselves. Yes, we got the canning factory, allright, all right. 

Did you notice how neat and trim our boys looked? None of this flub-dubof scarlet shirts with a big white monogram on the breast, or thesefawn-colored suits with querlycues of braid all over. They spot veryeasily. And did you notice how the Caledonias had long, lean menwalking with short, fat men, and nobody keeping step? Our boys were allcarefully graded and matched, and their dark blue uniforms with just theneat nickel badge, I think, presented the best appearance of all. AndI'll tell you another thing. They'll put it all over the Caledonias thisafternoon. They won't let 'em get a smell. 

Don't you like the fife-and-drum corps? The fifes set my teeth on edge, but I could follow the drums all day with their:

 Tucket a brum, brum brum-brum, tuck-all de brum Tucket a brum-brum, tuck-all de brum-brum-brum Tucket a blip-blip-blip-blip, tucka tuck-all de brum, Tucket a brum-brum, tuck-all de brum-brum-brum!

Part of the time the drummers click their sticks together instead ofhitting the drum-head. That's what makes it sound so nice. I wish Icould play the snare-drum. 

In the Mechanicsburg band is a boy about fourteen years old, a muscular, sturdy chunk of a lad. He walks with his heels down, his calves bulgedout behind, his head up, and the regular, proper swagger of a bandsman. He hasn't any uniform, but he's all right. He plays a solo B part, andhe and the other solo cornet spell each other. On the repeat of everystrain my boy rests, and rubs his lips with his forefinger, while helooks at the populace with bright, expectant eyes. When he blows, hescowls, and brings the cushion of muscle on the point of his chin clearup to his under lip, and he draws his breath through the corners of hismouth. He's the real thing. Bright boy, too, I judge, the kind that hasa quick answer for everybody, like: "Aw, go chase yerself, " or "Go on, yeh big stiff. " Watch him on the countermarch when they pass the Radnorcornet band. The Radnors broke up the Mechanicsburg band last yearand they're going to try to do it again this year. The musicians blowthemselves the color of a huckleberry, and the drummers grit theirteeth, and try to pound holes in their sheep-skins. Aha! It's the Radnorband got rattled in its time this year. Went all to pieces. The boysnatches, a rest. "Yah!" he squawks. "Didge ever get left?" and picks upthe tune again. I wish I could play the cornet. Wouldn't play solo B orI wouldn't play any--Ooooooooh! Did you see that? Took that stick by theother end from the knob and slung it away, 'way up in the air, whirlinglike sixty, and caught it when it came down and never missed a step. Look at him juggle it from hand to hand, over his shoulder, and behindhis back, and under one leg, whirling so fast that you can hardly seeit, and all in perfect step. Whope! I thought he was going to drop itthat time but he didn't. That's something you don't see in the cities. There, all the drum-major does with his stick is just to point it theway the band is to go. I like our fashion the best. Geeminentally! Lookat that! I bet it went up in the air forty feet if it went an inch. Iwish I was a drummajor. I guess I'd sooner be a drum-major than anythingelse. Oh, well, detective--that's different. 

Let's go farther along. Don't get too near the judges' stand. I know. It's the best place to see the finish of an event, but I've been toFiremen's Tournament before. You let me pick out the seats. Up close tothe judges' stand is all right till you come to the "wet races. " What?Oh, you wait and see. Fun? Well, I should say so. Hope they'll clear allthose boys off the rail. Here! Get down off that rail. Think we can seethrough you? You're thin, but you're not thin enough for that. Yes, Imean you, and don't you give me any of your impudence either. Look atthose women out there. Right spang in the way of the scraper. Isn'tthat a woman all over? A woman and a hen, I don't know which is--Well, hel-lo! Where'd you come from? How's all the folks? Where's Lizzie?Didn't she come with you? Aw, isn't that too bad? Scalding hot! Ts! Ts!Ts! Seems as if they made preserving kettles apurpose so's they'd tipup when you go to pour anything.... Why, I guess we can. Move over alittle, Charley. Can you squeeze in? That's all right. Pretty thickaround here, isn't it? There's the band starting up. About time, Ithink. Teedle-eedle umtum, teedle-eedle, um-tum. "Hiawatha, " of course. What other tune is there on earth? I've got so I know almost all of it. 

First is--let me see the program. First is what Mat. King calls "thejuveline contest. " It says here: "Run with truck carrying three laddersone hundred yards. Take fifteen-foot ladder from truck, raise it againststructure"--that's the judges' stand--"and boy ascend. Time to be takenwhen climber grasps top rung of ladder. " They're off. That pistol-shotstarted them. Why can't people sit down? See just as well if they did. New Berlin's, I guess. Pretty good. He's hanging out the slate with thetime on it. Eighteen and four-fifths. Oh, no, never in the world. Here'sthe Mt. Victory boys. See that light-haired boy. Go it, towhead! Ah, they've got the ladder crooked. Eighteen. That's not so bad .... Oh, quit your fooling. He's nothing of the kind. Honestly? What! that oldskeezicks? Who to, for pity's sake? Well, I thought he was a confirmedold bachelor, if anybody ever was. Well, sir, that just goes to showthat any man, I don't care who he is, can get married if he--Who werethose? Are those the Caledonia juveniles? I don't think much of 'em, doyou? Seventeen and two-fifths. I wouldn't have thought it. So their teamgets the first prize. Well, we weren't in that. 

What's next? "First prize, silver water-set, donated by Hon. WilliamKrouse. " Since when did old Bill Krouse get to be "Honorable?" Yes, well, don't talk to me about Bill Krouse. I know him and his wholeconnection and there isn't an honest hair--"Association trophy willalso be competed for. " Oh, that's the goldlined loving cup we saw in thewindow. Our boys have won it twice and the Caledonias have won it twice. If we get it this time, it will be ours for keeps. "Run with truck onehundred and fifty yards; take twenty-five foot ladder, " and so forthand so forth, Dan O'Brien's the boy for scaling ladders. He was going toenlist in the Boer War, he hates the English so. Down on them the worstway. And say, what do you think? Last year, at Caledonia, he won thefirst prize for individual ladder scaling. And what do you suppose thefirst prize was? A picture of Queen Victoria. Isn't that Caledonia allover? there's a kind of rivalry between our boys and the Caledonias. 

Here they come now. Those are the Caledonian. Tell by the truck .... Doyou think so? I don't think they're anything so very much. Nix. You'llnever do it. Look at the way they run with their heads up. That showsthey're all winded. Look at the clumsy way they got the ladder off thewagon. Blap! The judge thought it was coming through the boards on him. Oh, pretty good, pretty good, but you just wait till you see our boys. Look at the fool hanging there on the ladder waiting till the time isannounced. Isn't that Caledonia all over? Yah! Come down! Come down!What is it? Twenty-five seconds. What's the record? Twenty-four andfour-fifths? Oh, well, it isn't so bad for Caledonia, but you just what our boys do. Hear those yaps from Caledonia yell! If there'sanything I despise it is for a man to whoop and holler and make a publicspectacle of himself. Who's this? Oh, the Radnors. They're out of it. Look at them. Pulling every which way. That ladder's too straight upand down. Twenty-seven and two-fifths. What did I tell you?... What timedoes your train go? Well, why don't you and your wife come take supperwith us? Why didn't you look us up noon-time?... I could have told youbetter than that. (They went to the Ladies' Aid dinner. ) Well, we shan'thave much, I expect, but we'll try and scrape up something morefilling than layer-cake. The idea of expecting to feed hungry peopleon layer-cake! It's an imposition.... I didn't notice which one itwas. Doesn't matter any way. Only twenty-eight. Ah, here are our boys. They've got blue silk running-breeches on. Well, maybe it is sateen. Letthe women folks alone for knowing sateen from silk a mile off. How mucha yard did you say it was? Notice the way they start with their handson the ground, just like the pictures on the sporting page of the Sundaynewspapers. Here they come. Oh, I hope they'll win. That's CharleyRodehaver in front. Run! Oh, why don't you run? Come on! Come on!Come on! Come on! COME ON! COME ON! COME O--O-oh! See Dan skip up thatladder! Go it, Dan! Go it, old boy! Hooray-ay! Hooray-ay, ay! What's thetime? Twenty-four! Twenty--four flat! BROKE THE RECORD! Hooray-ay-ay!Where's Caledonia now? Where's Caledonia now? Oh, I'm so glad our boyswon. There goes the Caledonia chief. I'll bet he feels like thirtycents, Spanish. Ya-a-a-ah! Ya-a-a-ah! Where's Caledonia now? They can'tbeat that, the other fellows can't, and it's our trophy for keeps.... Oh, some crank in the next row. "Wouldn't I please sit down and notobstruct the view. " Guess he comes from Caledonia. Looks like it. Youstand up, too, why don't you? Those planks are terribly hard.... Ididn't notice. Yes, that wasn't so bad. Twenty-five and two-fifths. Butit's our trophy. There goes Dan now. Hey, Dan! Good boy, Dan! Wave yourhandkerchief at him. Hooray-ay-ay! Good boy, Dan!

Next is a wet race. Now look out. Let's see what the program says: "Runseventy-five yards to structure, on top of which an empty barrel hasbeen placed with spout outlet near top. Barrel to be filled with waterby means of buckets from reservoir"--That big tin-lined box oppositeis the reservoir. They are filling it now with a hose attached to thewater-plug yonder--"until water issues from spout. " What are they alllaughing at? Which one? Oh, but isn't she mad? Talk about a wet hen. Why, Charley, the hose got away from the man that was filling thereservoir and the lady was splashed. Why don't you use your eyes and seewhat's going on and not be bothering me to tell you? Ip! There it goesagain. Oh, ho! ho! ho! hee! hee! didn't I tell you it would be fun? Seeit run out of his sleeves.... I always get to coughing when I laugh ashard as that. Oh, dear me! Makes the tears come. 

These are the fellows from Luxora. Oh, the clumsy things! Let the ladderget away from them, and it fell and hit that man in the second row righton the head. Hope it didn't hurt him much. See 'em scurry with the waterbuckets. Aw, get a move on! Get a move! Why, what makes them so slow?"Water, water!" Well, I should think as much. Not for themselves though. Those fellows at the bottom of the ladder are catching it, aren't they?Oh, pshaw, they don't mind it. They get it worse than that at a realfire when they aren't half so well fixed for it. Why, is there no bottomto that barrel at all? Why, look!... Say, the judge forgot to close thevalve. There's a hose connected with the bottom of the barrel to run thewater off after each trial and he's forgotten to--... Well, isn't thattoo bad! All that work for nothing. I suppose they'll let them tryit over again.... That man must have got a pretty hard rap. They'recarrying him out. His head's all bloody.... Wapatomicas, I guess. Yes, Wapatomicas. I hope the valve's closed this time. Whope! did you seethat? One fellow got hit with a water bucket and it was about half-full. It's running out of the spout. Yes, and it's falling on those peopleright where you wanted to sit. Hear the girls squeal. Talk about yourfun. I don't want any better fun than this. Look at 'em come down theladder just holding the sides with their hands. They couldn't do that ifthe ladder was dry. 

Ah, here's our crowd. Come on! Come on! Come on! COME ON! Oh, don't beso slow with those buckets! Aren't they fine? Say, they don't care ifthey do spill a drop or two. Why. Why, what are they coming down for?It isn't running out of the spout yet. Come back! COME BACK! Oh, pshaw!Just threw it away by being in too much of a hurry. That judge looksfunny, doesn't he, with a rubber overcoat on and the sun shining? See, he's telling them: "One bucket more. " They'll let 'em have anothertrial, of course.... No? Oh, that's an outrage. That' s not fair. TheCaledonias will get it now.... Yes, sir, they did get it. Oh, well, accidents will happen. What? "Where's Caledonia now?" Well, they got itby a fluke. What say?... Well only for--Oh, pshaw! Now, don't tellme that because I was there and--Well, I say they didn't .... I knowbetter, they didn't.... Oh, shut up. You don't know what you're talkingabout. I tell you--Now, Mary, don't you interfere. I'm not quarreling. I'm just telling this gentleman back of me that--Well, all right, ifyou're going to cry. If there was any fouling done it was the Caledoniasthat did it, though. 

The next is where they "run three hundred feet from the judges' stand, raise ladder, hose company to couple to hydrant, break coupling in hoseand put on nozzle, scale ladder, and fill twenty-five gallon barrel. "Only the Caledonias, and our boys are entered in this. Now we'll seewhich is the best. All right, Mary, I won't say a word.... Say, forcountry-jakes, those Caledonias didn't do so badly. I give them thatmuch. Look at the water fly! I'll bet those folks near the judges' standwish they'd brought their umbrellas. Now you see why these are the bestseats, don't you? I told you I'd been to Firemen's Tournaments before. What? You'll have to talk louder than that if you want me to hear withall this noise.... Oh, that'll be all right. They'll be so hungry theywon't notice it. 

Here, be careful how you wabble that hose around. Good thing they turnedthe water off at the plug just when they did or we'd have been--Here'sour company. Where's Caledonia now? Eh? Pretty work! Pretty work! Say, do you know that hose full of water's heavy? Now watch Riley. Riley'sthe one that's got the nozzle. Always up to some monkeyshine. Ah!See him? See him? Oh, is n't he soaking them? Oh-ho! Ho! Ho! ha! ha!hee-hee! Yip. 

Blame clumsy fool!... P-too! Yes, in my mouth and in my ears and downthe back of my neck. All over. Running out of my sleeves. EverythingI got on is just ruined. Completely ruined. Come on. Let's go home. There's nothing more to see, much. Aw, come on. Well, stay if you wantto, but I'm going home, and get some dry clothes on me. You get me to goto another Firemen's Tournament and you'll know it. Look at that monkeyfrom Caledonia laughing at me. For half a cent I'd go up and smack hisface for him.... Aw, let up on your "Where's Caledonia now?" Give us arest. Well, are you coming, you folks?... Kind of a fizzle this year, wasn't it?

However, after supper, with dry clothes on, it isn't so bad. The streetsare packed. All the firemen are parading and shouting: "Who? Who? Whoare we?" The Caledonias got one more prize than our boys. Well, whyshouldn't they? Entered in three more events. I don't see as that'sanything to brag of or to carry brooms about. All the fife-and-drumcorps are out, and the bands are all playing "Hiawatha" at once, butnot together. Not all either. There's one band in front of Hofmeyer'splaying "Oh, Happy Day! That Fixed my Choce. " That's funny: to play ahymn-tune in front of a beer-saloon. Hofmeyer seems to think it's allright. He's inviting them in to have something. "Took the hint?" I don'tunderstand.... Oh, is that so? I didn't know there were other words tothat tune. 

See that woman with four little ones. Her husband's carrying two more. "I want to go howm. Why cain't we gow howm? I do' want to gow howmpretty soon. I want to gow na-ow!" Eh, Mary, how would you like to lugthem around all day and then stand up in the cars all the way home?

Well, good-by. Hope you had a nice time. Give my regards to all thefolks. Don't be in such a rush, my friend.... Oh, did you see? It mustbe the man that got hit on the head with the ladder. Taking him home ona stretcher. Gee! That's tough. Skull fractured, eh? Dear! Dear! Ihear they have been keeping company a long time, and were to have beenmarried soon. No wonder she cried and took on so. Poor girl! Yes, it'sthe women that suffer .... Oh, quite a day for accidents. I didn't mind, though, after I had changed my clothes. I took some quinine, and Iguess I'll be all right. Lucky you got a seat. Well, you're off at last. Good-by. Remember me to all. Good-by. 

Well, thank goodness, that's over. Another ten minutes of them andwouldn't have--Well, Mary, what else could I do but ask them home afterhe told me what they didn't have to eat at the Ladies' Aid?... It wasall right. Plenty good enough. Better than they have at home and I'llbet on it. The table looked beautiful. I'm glad the Tournament doesn'tcome but once a year. I'm about ready to drop. 

THE DEVOURING ELEMENT

Mr. Silverstone was gloomily considering whether he had not better blowout the lights in the New York One Price Clothing Store, and lock up forthe night. Kerosene was fifteen cents a gallon, and not a customer hadbeen in since supper-time. Business was "ofle, simbly ofle. "

The streets were empty. There were lights only in the barber shop whereone patron was being lathered while two mandolins and a guitar gave acorrect imitation of two house-flies and a bluebottle in Riley'swhere, in default of other occupation, Mr. Riley was counting up;in Oesterle's, where a hot discussion was going on as to whetherChristopher Columbus was a Dutchman or a Dago, and in Miller's, whereTom Ball was telling Tony, who impassively wiped the perforated brassplate let into the top of the bar, that he, Tom Ball, "coul' lick em manill Logan coun'y. "

Lamps shone in every parlor, where little girls labored with: "And oneand two, three and one and two, three, " occasionally coming out to lookat the clock to see if the hour was any nearer being up than it wasfive minutes ago. They also shone in sitting-rooms, where boys lookedfiercely at "X2 +2Xy+y2, " mothers placidly darned stockings, andfathers, Weekly Examiner in hand, patiently struggled to disengage from"boiler-plate" and bogus news about people snatched from the jaws ofdeath by the timely use of Dr. McKinnon's Healing Extract of Timothy andRed-top, items of real news, such as who was sick and what ailed them, who cut his foot with the ax while splitting stove-wood, and where thecake sale by the Rector's Aid of Grace P. E. Would be held next week. 

At the prayer-meeting, Uncle Billy Nicholson was giving in hisexperience and had just got to that part about: "Sometimes onthe mountaintop, and sometimes in the valley, but still, nevertheless--" when, all of a sudden, something happened. 

The mandolins stopped with a jerk. Mr. Riley stood tranced at: "And tenis thirty-five. " Mr. Ball was stricken dumb in the celebration of hisown great physical powers. The crowd in Oesterle's forgot Columbus, andwere as men beholding a ghost. The drowsy congregation sat up rigid, andMr. Silverstone gave a guilty start. He had been thinking of that verything!

The next instant, front doors were wrenched open, and the street echoedwith the sound of windows being raised. Fathers and sons rushed out onthe front porch, followed by little girls, to whom any excuse to stoppractising was like a plank to a drowning man. 

They had heard aright. Up by the Soldiers' Monument fell the clump oftired feet, and upon the air floated the wild alarm of--. 

"FIRE! Pooh-ha! FIRE! Poof! FIRE!"

Mat King, the assistant chief, kicked off his slippers, and swiftlylaced up his shoes, grabbed his speaking-trumpet and his helmet, andtore out of the house. If he could only get to the engine-house beforeCharley Lomax, the chief! But Charley was the lone customer in thebarber's char. With the lather on one side of his face, he clapped onhis hat and broke for the firebell, four doors below. 

"Where's it at?"

"FIRE! Pooh-ha! FIRE! Sm-poohl Fi--(gulp)--FIRE!"

"It's Linc Hoover. Hay, Linc! Where's the fire?"

"FIRE! Pooh-ha! FIRE! ha, ha! FIRE!"

"Hay, Linc! Where's it at? Tell me and I'll run. Hay! Where's it at?"

"FIRE! Swope's be--(gulp) Swope's barn. FIRE!"

"Which Swope? Henry or the old man?"

"FIRE! Pooh! J. K. Swope. Whoo-ha, whooh-ha! Out out on West End Avenue. Poof!"

The news thus being passed, the fresher runners scampered ahead, bawling: "FOY-URRR' FOY-URRR! and Linc, the hero, slowed down, gaspingfor breath and spitting cotton. 

"Whew!" he whistled, gustily, his arms dropping and his whole framecollapsing. "Gee! I'm 'bout tuckered. Sm-pooh! Sm-pooh! Run all th'way f'm--sm-ha, sm-ha!--run all th' way f'm--mouth's all stucktogether--p'too! ha! Pooh! Fm West End Avenue and Swo--Swope's. Gee! I'mhot's flitter. "

"Keep y' coat on when you're all of a prespiration, that way. How'd itketch?"

"Ount know. 'S comin' by there an' I--whoof! I smelt smoke and--Gosh!I'm all out o' breath--an' I looked an' I je-e-est could see alight--wisht I had a drink o' somepin' to rench mum mouth out. Whew! Oh, laws! An' it was Swope's barn and I run in an' opened the door, didn'tstop to knock or nung, an' I hollered out: 'Yib barn's afire!' an' herun out in his sockfeet, an' he says: 'My Lord!' he says. 'Linc, ' hesays, 'run git the ingine an' I putt. " Linc drew in a long, tremulousbreath like a man that has looked on sorrow. 

"Why 'n't you--"

"Betchy 't was tramps, " interrupted a bystander. "Git in the haymow an'think they got to have their blamed old pipe a-goin'--"

"Cigarettes, more likely, " said another. "More darn devilment comes fromcigarettes--"

"Why'n't you--"

"Ount know nung 'bout tramps, " said Linc. "All I seen was the fire. Iwas a-comin' long a-past there an' I smelt the smoke an' thinks I--Whatsay?"

"Why'n't you telefoam down?"

Linc, the hero, shrunk a foot. "I gosh!" he admitted, "I never thoughtto. "

"Jist'a' telefoamed, you could 'a' saved yourself all that--"

"Ain't they weltin' the daylights out o' that bell? All foolishness! Nowthey're ringin' the number--one, two, three, four. Yes, sir, that's upin the West End. You goin'? Come on, then. "

"No, Frank, I can't let you go. You've got your lessons to get. Well, now, mother, make up your mind if you're comin' along. Cora, what onearth are you doing out here in the night air with nothing around you?Now, you mosey right back into that parlor, and don't you make a moveoff that piano-stool till your hour's up. Do you hear me? No. Frank. I told you once you couldn't go and that ends it. Stop your whining! Ican't have you running hither and yon all hours of the night, and we notknow where you are. Well, hurry up, then, mother. Take him in with you. Oh, just throw a shawl over your head. Nobody 'll see you, or if theydo they won't care. " The apparatus trundles by, the bells on the truckstolling sadly as the striking gear on the rear axle engages the cam. Ahurrying throng scuffles by in the gloom. The tolling grows fainter, thethrong thinner. 

"Good land! Is she going to be all night? Wish 't I hadn't proposed it. That's the worst of taking a woman anyplace. Fuss and fiddle by thehour in front of the looking-glass. Em! (Be all over by the time we getthere) Oh, Em! Em!... EM! (Holler my head offl) EM!.... Well, why don'tyou answer me? Well, I didn't hear you. How much long--Oh, I knowabout-- 'Hour' you mean.... Oh, how do you do, Mrs. Conklin? Hello, Fred. Pleased to meet you, Miss Shoemaker. Yes, I saw in the paper you werevisiting your sister. This your first visit to our little burg? Yes, we think it's quite a place. You see, we're trying to make your stay asinteresting as possible.... Oh, no, not altogether on your account. No, no. Ha! Ha-ha-ha! Hum! ah!... Well, yes, if she ever gets done primpingup. Oh, there you are. Miss Shoemaker, let me make you acquainted withmy wife. Now, you girls'll have to get a move on if you want to seeanything. "

The male escorts grasp the ladies' arms and shove them ahead, that beingthe only way if you are ever going to get any place. The women gasp andpant and make a great to-do. 

"Ooh! Wait till I get my breath. Will! Weeull! Don't go so fay-ust!Oooh! I can't stand it. Oh, well, you're a man. "

But when they turn the corner that gives them a good view of theblaze, fluttering great puffs of flame, and hear the steady crackle andsnapping, as it were, of a great popper full of pop-corn, they, too, catch the infection, and run with a loud swashing and slatting ofskirts, giggling and squealing about their hair coming down. 

In the waving orange glare the crowd is seen, shifting and moving. Itseems impossible for the onlookers to remain constant in one spot. Thechief, Charley Lomax, is gesticulating with wide arm movements. He putshis speaking-trumpet to his mouth. "Yoffemoffemoffemoffemoffi" he says. 

"Wha-at?" the men halloo back. 

"Yoffemoffemoffemoffemoff. "

"What'd he say?"

"Search me. John, you run over and ask him what he wants. Or, no; I'llgo myself. "

"Why in Sam Hill didn't you come sooner?" demands the angry chief. 

"Well, why in Sam Hill don't you talk so 's a body can understand you?'Yoffemoffemoffemoffem. ' Who can make sense out o' that?"

"The hose ain't long enough to reach from here to the hydrant. You 'n'some more of 'em run down t' th' house an' git that other reel. "

"Aw, say, Chief! Look here. I'm awful busy right now. Can't somebodyelse go?"

"You go an' do what I tell you to, and don't gimme none o' your backtalk. "

(Too dag-gon bossy and dictatorial, that Charley Lomax is. Getting'most too big for his breeches. Never mind, there's going to be a fireelection week from Tuesday. See whether he'll be chief next year or not. Sending a man away from the fire right at the most interesting part!)

"I'll go, Chief, wommetoo, " puts in jumbo Lee, all in a huddle ofwords. "Ije slivsnot. Aw ri. Mon Jim. Shoonmeansmore of 'em gogitth'otherreel. "

Jumbo isn't a member of the fire department, though he is wild to join. He isn't old enough. He is six feet one inch, weighs 180, and won'tbe sixteen till the 5th of next February. Nobody ever saw him whenhe wasn't eating. They say he clips his words so as to save time foreating. He takes a cracker out of his pocket, shoves it in his mouthwhole, jams his hat down till his ears stick out, and, with hiscompanions, tears down the road, seemingly propelled as much by hiselbows as by his legs. Why, under the combined strain of growing andrunning, he doesn't part a seam somewhere is a dark mystery. 

Crash! The roof of the barn caves in and reveals what we had not beforesuspected, that Platt's barn, on the other side of the alley, is afiretoo. Say! This is getting interesting. The wind is setting directlytoward Swope's house. It has been so terribly dry this last month orso that the house will go like powder if it ever catches. Why, I thinkSwope has a well and cistern both. Used to have, anyway, before they putthe water-works in, and the board of health condemned the wells. Say!There was a put-up job if there ever was one. Why, sure! Sure he hadstock in the water works. Doc. Muzzey? I guess, yes.... Pity they evertraded off the hand-engine. They got a light-running hook-and-laddertruck. Won two prizes at the tournament, just with that truck. But ifthey had that hand-engine now though! "Up with her! Down with her!" Havethat fire out in no time!

They're not trying to save the barns. They're a dead loss. What littlewater they can get from the cisterns and wells around--hasn't it beendry?--they are using to try to save Swope's house, and the one nextto it. Is that where Lonny Wheeler lives? I knew it was up this waysomewhere. Don't he look ridiculous, sitting up there a-straddle of hisridgepole, with a tin-cup? A tin-cup, if you please. Over this waya little. See better. They're wetting down the roof. Line of fellowspassing buckets to the ladder, and a line up the ladder. What big sparksthose are! Puts you in mind of Fourth of July. How the roof steams! Mustbe hot up there. 

O-o-o-oh!

A universal indrawn breath from all spectators proclaims their horror. One of the men on the roof missed his footing and slipped, rolling overand over till he reached the roof of the porch, where he spread-eagledfor a fall. The women begin to moan. Some poor fellow gone to his death. Or, if he be so lucky as to miss death itself, he is doomed to languishall his days a helpless cripple. Like enough the sole support of an agedmother; or perhaps his wife is sitting up for him at home now, tiptoeinginto the bedroom every little while to look at the sleeping children. That's generally the way of it. Who is there so free and foot-loosethat, if harm befall him, some woman will not go mourning all her days?It must take the heart out of brave men to think what their women folkmust suffer, mothers and wives and--Who? Dan O'Brien? Oh, he'll be allright. He'll light on his feet like a cat. I believe that boy is made ofIndia rubber. He never gets hurt. Why, one time--Ah! There he goesnow up the ladder as if nothing had happened. Hooray-ayayay!Hooray-ay-ay-ay! I thought he'd broken his neck as sure as shooting. 

Wandering about one cannot fail to encounter what the gallantfire-laddies have rescued from the devouring element. There is the pianowith a deep scratch across the upper part, and the top lid hanging byone hinge. It caught in the door, and the boys were kind of in a hurry. There is the parlor carpet, plucked up by the roots, as it were; andtwo tubs, the washboard and a bag of clothes-pins; a stuffed chair, with three casters gone, the coffee-pot, a crayon enlargement, a winterovercoat, a blanket, a pile of old dresses, the screw-driver and a paperof tacks in the colander, the couch with a triangular rip in the cover, the coal-scuttle, a pile of dishes, the ax and wood-saw, a fancy pillow, the sewing-machine with the top gone, the wash-boiler, the basket ofdirty clothes, with the stove-shaker and the parlor clock in together, and a heap of books, all spraddled and sprawled every which way. Uponthis pitiful mound sits Mrs. Swope with her baby sound asleep upon herbosom. She mingles her tears with the sustaining tea that Mrs. Farleyhas made for her. Swope, still in his socks and with his wife'sshoulder-cape upon him, caught up somehow, is trying to soothe her. Heis as mad as a hornet, and doesn't dare to show it. All this furniturehe had insured. It was all old stuff their folks had given them. If thegallant fire-laddies had been as discreet as they were zealous, theywould have let the furniture go, and Swope and his wife would have hadan entire, brand-new outfit. As it is, who can ever make that junk looklike anything any more?

What's this coming up the road? Jumbo Lee and his friends with the otherhose-reel. Now they will connect it with the hydrant, and have watera-plenty to save the house. Now the fellows are coming down from theladder. Cistern's empty, I suppose. The other reel didn't come any toosoon. How the roof steams! Or is it smoking?

"Don't stand around here with that reel! Up to that water-plug. Fartherup the street. Front o' Cummins's. "

Jumbo crams another cracker into his mouth and speeds away, hunching thepatient, unresenting air with his elbows. 

Ah! See--that little flicker of flame on the roof! Do, for pity's sake, hurry up with that connection! The roof is really burning. See? They aretrying to chop away the burning place. But there's another! And another!

A-a-ah! Hooray-ay! Connection's made! Now you'll see something. Out ofthe way there! One side! One side! Up you go!... Wha-at? Is that thebest they can do? Why, it won't run out of the nozzle at all when it'sup on the roof. Not a drop. Feeble little dribble when it's on theground-level. There's your water-works for you. It is a good long wayfrom the fire-plug I know, but there ought to be more pressure thanthat. Oh, pshaw! If we only had the old hand-engine! "Up with her! Downwith her!" Have that fire out in no time. The house will have to go now. Too bad!

Somebody in the second story is rescuing property from the devouringelement. He has just tossed out a wash-bowl and pitcher. Luckily theyboth fell on the sod and rolled apart. He takes down the roller-shadeand flings it out. The lace curtains follow. They catch on the edgeof the veranda roof, and languidly wave there as for some holiday. Bed-clothes issue and pillows hurtle out. What's he doing now? No use. No use. You can't get the mattress out of that window. A waste-paperbasket, a rag rug, a brush and comb--as fast as his hands can fly he'sthrowing out things. 

The women began to whimper. 

"Oh, the poor man! The roof will fall in on him! He'll smother to death!Oh, why doesn't somebody go tell him to come away? Not you! Don't youthink of such a trick! Oh, why does he risk his life for a lot of trashI wouldn't have around the house?"

The smoke oozes out of the open window. It must be choking in there. For a long time no jettison of household goods appears. Perhaps the man, whoever he is, has seen his peril and fled while yet it was possible toflee. Ah, but suppose he has been overcome and lies there huddled in aheap, never to rouse again? Is there none to save him? Is there none?Ah! A couple of collars and a magazine flutter out into the light! Heis still there. He is still alive. Plague take the idiot! Why doesn't hecome down out of that?

"Yoffemoffemoffemoffemoff. Yoffemoff!"

But no! He will do it himself. The Chief rushes gallantly into theburning building and disappears up the dark stair. 

Desperate measures are now to be resorted to. On the lawn a line ofmen forms. They bend their necks, cowering before the fierce glow, butdaring it, and prepared to face it at even closer range. You are towitness now an exhibition of that heroism which is commoner with usthan we think, that spirit of do and dare which mocks at danger andeven welcomes pain. It is a far finer sentiment than the cold-heartedcalculation which looks ahead, and figures out first whether it is worthwhile or not. 

The men dash forward in the withering heat. With frantic haste they fixthe hook into the lattice-work beneath the porch and scamper back. 

"Yo hee! Yo hee!"

The thick rope tautens as the firemen lay their weight to it. You canalmost see the bristling fibers stand up on it. 

"Yo hee! Yo hee!"

With a splintering crash the timber parts, and a piece of lattice-workis dragged away. 

Another sortie and another. Bit by bit the porch is ripped and torn torubbish. You smile. It seems so futile. What are these kindlings savedwhen the whole house is burning? Is this what you call heroism? Yetthe charge at Balaklava was not more futile. It had even less ofcommonsense, less of hope of benefit to mankind to back it and inspireit. Heroism is an instinct, not a thoughtout policy. Its quality is thesame, in two-ounce samples or in car-load lots. 

The weather-boarding slips down in a sparkling fall. The joists andstringers, all outlined and gemmed with coals, are, as it were, a goldengrille, through which the world may look unhindered in upon the holyplace of home, heretofore conventually private. There stands the familyaltar, pitifully grotesque amid the ruinous splendor of the destroyingfire, the tea-kettle upon it proudly flaunting its steamy plume. What?Is a common cooking-stove an altar? Yes, verily, in lineal descent. Examine an ancient altar and you will see its sacrificial stone scoredand guttered to catch the dripping from the roasting meat. Who isthe priestess, after an order older than Melchisedec's, but she thatministers to us that most comfortable sacrament, wherein we are madepartakers not alone of the outward and visible food which we do carnallypress with our teeth, but also of that inward and spiritual sustenance, the patient and enduring love of wife and mother, without which therecan be no such thing as home? All other sacraments wherein men breakthe bread of amity together are but copies of this pattern, the BlessedSacrament of the Household Altar, the first and primal one of all, theone that shall perdure, please God! throughout all ages of ages. 

The flames die down. The timbers sink together with a softer fall. Theair grows chill. We fetch a sigh. We cannot bear to look at that mutefigure of the priestess seated on the sordid heap of broken furniture, her sleeping baby pressed against her breast, her gaze fixed--butseeing naught--upon her ruined temple. We do not like to think upon suchthings. We do not like to think at all. Is there nothing more to laughat?

The firemen, having all borrowed the makings of a cigarette from eachother, put on their hats and coats, left on the hook-and-ladder truck inthe custody of a trusted member. The apparatus trundles off, the bellsdolorously tolling as the striking gear on the rear axle engages thecam. 

Who is this weeping man approaches, supported by two friends, thatcomfort him with: "All right, Tom. You done noble, " uttered in pacifyingif not convincing tones? Heart-brokenly he cries: "I dull le ver' bes' Iknowed, now di' n't I? Charley? Billy, I dub bes' I knowed how. An' nenhe says to me--Oo-hoo-hoo-oooo-oo! He says to me: 'Come ou' that, yecussed fool!' Oo-oooo-hoo-hoo-oo-oo! Smf! Lemme gi' amma ham hankshiff. Leg go my arm. Waw gi' amma hankshifp. Oo-oo-oo-hoo-hoo-oo-oo! Fmf! Iash you as may wurl--I ash you as may--man of world, is that--is thatproper way address me? Me! Know who I am? I'm Tom Ball. 'S who I am. Ikill lick em man ill Logan Coun'y. Ai' thasso? Hay? 'S aw ri. Mfi choosestay up there, aw thas sec--aw thas second floor and rescue fel-cizzen'spropprop'ty from devouring em--from devouring emlement, thas my bizless. Ai' tham my bizless, Charley? Ai' tham my bizless, Billy? W'y, sure. Charley, you're goof feller. You too, Billy. You're goof feller, too. Say. Wur-wur if Miller's is open yet? 'Spose it is? Charley; I dub bes'I knowed how, di'n't I, now? Affor that Chief come up thas stairway andsay me: 'Come ou' that, ye cussed fool!' Aw say! 'Come ou' that--'Calledme fool, too! Oo-hoo-hoo-oo-oo-oo!"

"Hello, Dan! Hurt yourself any? (That's Dan O'Brien. Fell off the roof. )Well, sir, I thought sure you'd broken your neck. You don't know yourluck. And let me tell you one thing, my bold bucko: You'll do that justonce too often. Now you mark. "

The day before the Weekly Examiner goes to press, Mr. Swope hands theeditor a composition entitled: "A Card of Thanks, " signed by John K. And Amelia M. Swope, and addressed to the firemen and all who showed bytheir many acts of kindness, and so forth and so on. 

"Kind of help to fill up the paper, " says Mr. Swope, covering hisretreat. 

"Sure, " replies the editor. When Mr. Swope is good and gone, he says:"Dog my riggin's if I didn't forget all about writing up that fire. Beenso busy here lately. Good thing he come in. Hay, Andy!"

"Watch want?" from the composing-room. 

"Got room for about two sticks more?"

"Yes, guess so. If it don't run over that. "

A brief silence. Then:

"Hay, Andy?"

"What?"

"Is it 'had have, ' or 'had of?"

"What's the connection?"

"Why-ah. 'If the gallant fire-laddies, under the able direction of ChiefCharley Lomax, had of had a sufficiency of water with which to cope withthe devouring element--'etc. "

"'Had have, ' I guess. I don't know. "

"Guess you're right. Run it that way anyhow. "

CIRCUS DAY

Only the other day, the man that in all this country knows better thananybody else how a circus should be advertised, said (with some sadness, I do believe) that it didn't pay any longer to put up showbills; themoney was better invested in newspaper advertising. 

"It doesn't pay. " Ah, me! How the commercial spirit of the age playswhaley with the romance of existence! You shall not look long uponthe showbill now that there is no money to be had from it. "Youth'ssweet-scented manuscript" is about to close, but ere it does, let usturn back a little to the pages illuminated by the glowing colors of thecircus poster. 

Saturday afternoon when we went by the enginehouse, its brick wallfluttered with the rags and tatters of "Esther, the Beautiful Queen, "and the lecture on "The Republic: Will it Endure?" (Gee! But that wasexciting!) Sunday morning, after Sunday-school, there was a suddenquickening among the boys. We stopped nibbling on the edges of thelesson leaf and followed the crowd in scuttling haste. Miraculously, over-night, the shabby wall had blossomed into thralling splendor. Whatwas Daniel in the Lions' Den, compared with Herr Alexander in the same?Not, as the prophet is pictured, in the farthest corner from the lions, and manifestly saying to himself: "If I was only out of this!" But withhis head right smack dab in the lion's mouth. Right in it. Yes, sir. 

"S' Posin'!" we gasped, all goggle-eyed, "jist s'posin' that there lionwas to shut his mouth! Ga-ash!"

The Golden Text? It faded before the lemon-and-scarlet glories of theGolden Chariot. Drawn by sixteen dappled steeds, each with his neckarching like a fish-hook and reined with fancy scalloped reins, itoccupied the center of the foreground. The band rode in it, far morefortunate than our local band whose best was, Charley Wells's depot'bus. And nobler than all his fellows was the bass-drummer. He had acanopy over him, a carved and golden canopy, on whose top revolved aclown's head with its tongue stuck out. On each quarter of this rococoshallop a golden circus-girl in short skirts gaily skipped rope witha nubia or fascinator, or whatever it is the women call the thing theywrap around their heads in cold weather when they hang out the clothes. There were big pieces of looking-glass let into the sides of theband-wagon, and every decorator knows that when you put looking-glass ona thing it is impossible to fix it so that it will be any finer. 

Winding back and forth across the picture was the long train oftableau-cars and animal cages, diminishing with distance until away, 'way up in the upper left-hand corner the hindmost van was all immersedin the blue-and-yellow haze just this side of out-of-sight. That withour own eyes we should behold the glories here set forth we knew rightwell. Cruel Fortune might cheat us of the raptures to be had inside thetents, but the street-parade was ours, for it was free. 

It seems to me that we did not linger so long before these pictures, norbefore those of the rare and costly animals, which, if we but knew it, were the main reason why we were permitted to go (if we did get to go). To look at these animals is improving to the mind, and since we couldnot go alone, an older person had to accompany us, and... And... I trustI make myself clear. But we didn't want to improve our minds if it wasa possible thing to avoid it. The pictures of these animals were inthe joggerfy book anyhow, though not in colors, unless we had a boxof paints. There can be no doubt that the show-bill pictures of themenageries were in colors. I seem to recollect that Mr. Galbraith, whokept the dry-goods store across the street from the engine-house, wasvery much exercised in his mind about the way one of these pictures wasprinted. It was the counterfeit presentment of the Hip-po-pot-a-mus, or Behemoth of Holy Writ. His objection to the hip--you know was notbecause its open countenance was so fearsome, but because it was so red. Six feet by two of flaming crimson across the street in the afternoonsun made it necessary for him to take the goods to the back window ofthe store to show to customers. He didn't like it a bit. 

No. Neither before the large and expensive pictures of thestreet-parade, nor the large and expensive wild beasts did we linger. The swarm was thickest, sand the jabbering loudest, the "O-o-oh's, " the"M! Looky's" the "Geeminently's" shrillest, in front of where the deedsof high emprise were set forth. Men with their fists clenched on theirbreasts, and their neatly slippered toes touching the backs of theirheads, crashed through paper-covered hoops beneath which horses madlycoursed; they flew through the air with the greatest of ease, the daringyoung men on the flying; trapeze, or they posed in living pyramids. 

And as the sons of men assembled themselves together, Satan came also, the spirit I, that evermore denies. 

"A-a-ah!" sneers his embodiment in one whose crackling voice cannotmake up its mind whether to be bass or treble, "A-a-ah, to the show theydown't do hay-uf what they is in the pitchers. "

A chilling silence follows. A cold uneasiness strikes into all thelisteners. We are all made wretched by destructive criticism. Let usalone in our ideals. Let us alone, can't you?

"Now... Now, " pursues the crackle-voiced Mephisto, pointing to whereJapanese jugglers defy the law of gravitation and other experiences ofdaily life, "now, they cain't walk up no ladder made out o' reel sharpswords. "

"They can so walk up it, " stoutly declares one boy. Hurrah! A championto the rescue! The others edge closer to him. They like him. 

"Nah, they cain't. How kin they? They'd cut their feet all to pieces. "

"They kin so. I seen 'em do it. The time I went with Uncle George I seena man, a Japanee.... Yes, sharp. Cut paper with 'em.... A-a-ah, I didso. I guess I know what I seen an' what I didn't. "

The little boys breathe easier, but fearing another onslaught, make allhaste to call attention to the most fascinating one of all, the pictureof a little boy standing up on top of his daddy's head. And, as if thatweren't enough, his daddy is standing up on a horse and the horse isgoing round the ring lickety-split. And, as if these circumstancesweren't sufficiently trying, that little show-boy is standing on onlyone foot. The other is stuck up in the air like five minutes to six, andhe has hold of his toe with his hand. I'll bet you can't do that justas you are on the ground, let alone on your daddy's head, and him on ahorse that's going like sixty. Now you just try it once. Just try it.... Aa-ah! Told you you couldn't. 

Now, how the show-actors can do that looks very wonderful to you. Itreally is very simple. I'll tell you about it. All show-actors are borndouble-jointed. You have only two hip-joints. They have four. And it'sthe same all over with them. Where you have only one joint, they havetwo. So, you see, the wonder isn't how they can bend themselves everywhich way, but how they can keep from doubling up like a foot-rule. 

And another thing. Every day they rub themselves all over withsnake-oil. Snakes are all limber and supple, and it stands to reasonthat if you take and try out their oil, which is their express essence, and then rub that into your skin, it will make you supple and limber, too. I should think garter-snakes would do all right, if you could catchenough of them, but they 're so awfully scarce. Fishworms won't do. Itried 'em. There's no grease in 'em at all. They just dry up. 

And I suppose you know the reason why they stay on the horse's back. They have rosin on their feet. Did you ever stand up on a horse's back?I did. It was out to grandpap's, on old Tib.... No, not very long. Ididn't have any rosin on my feet. I was going to put some on, but myUncle Jimmy said: "Hay! What you got there?" I told him. "Well, " hesays, "you jist mosey right into the house and put that back in thefiddle-box where you got it. Go on, now. And if I catch you foolin' withmy things again, I'll.... Well, I don't know what I will do to you. " SoI put it back. Anyhow, I don't think rosin would have helped me stay ona second longer, because old Tib, with an intelligence you wouldn't havesuspected in her, walked under the wagon-shed and calmly scraped me offher back. 

And did you ever try to walk the tight-rope? You take the clothes-lineand stretch it in the grape-arbor--better not make it too high atfirst--and then you take the clothes-prop for a balance-pole and goright ahead--er--er as far as you can. The real reason why you falloff so is that you don't have chalk on your shoes. Got to have lots ofchalk. Then after you get used to the rope wabbling so all-fired fast, you can do it like a mice. And while I'm about it, I might as well tellyou that if you ever expect to amount to a hill of beans as a trapezeperformer you must have clear-starch with oil of cloves in it to rub onyour hands. Finest thing in the world. My mother wouldn't let me haveany. She said she couldn't have me messing around that way, I blameher as much as anybody that I am not now a competent performer on thetrapeze. 

I don't know that I had better go into details about the state of mindboys are in from the time the bills are first put up until after thecircus has actually departed. I don't mean the boys that get to go toeverything that comes along, and that have pennies to spend for candy, and all like that, whenever they ask for it. I mean the regular, proper, natural boys, that used to be "Back Home, " boys whose daddies tormentedthem with: "Well, we Il see--" that's so exasperating!--or, "I wish youwouldn't tease, when you know we can't spare the money just at present. "A perfectly foolish answer, that last. They had money to fritter away atthe grocery, and the butcher-shop, and the dry-goods store, but when itcame to a necessity of life, such as going to the circus, they let onthey couldn't afford it. A likely story. 

"Only jist this little bit of a once. Aw, now, please. Please, cain't Igo? Aw now, I think you might. Aw now, woncha? Aw, paw. I ain't been toa reely show for ever so long. Aw, the Scripture pammerammer, that don'tcount. Aw, paw. Please cain't I go? Aw, please!" And so forth and so on, with much more of the same sort. No, I can't go into details, it's tooterrible. 

Even those of us whose daddies said plainly and positively: "Now, Ican't let you go. No, Willie. That's the end of it. You can't go. " Eventhose, I say, hoped against hope. It simply could not be that what thehuman heart so ardently longed for should be denied by a loving father. This same conviction applies to other things, even when we are grown up. It is against nature and the constituted scheme of things that we cannothave what we want so badly. (And, in general, it may be said that we canhave almost anything we want, if we only want it hard enough. That's thetrouble with us. We don't want it hard enough. ) We boys lay there inthe shade and pulled the long stalks of grass and nibbled off the sweet, yellow ends, as we dramatized miracles that could happen just as well asnot, if they only would, consarn 'em! For instance, you might be goingalong the street, not thinking of anything but how much you wanted to goto the circus, and how sorry you were because you hadn't the money, andyour daddy wouldn't give you any; and first thing you 'd know, you 'dstub your toe on something, and you'd look down and there'd be a half adollar that somebody had lost--Gee! If it would only be that way! But weknew it wouldn't, because only the other Sunday, Brother Longenecker hadsaid: "The age of miracles is past. " So we had to give up all hopes. Oh, it's terrible. Just terrible!

But some of the boys lay there in the grass with their hands under theirheads, looking up at the sky, and making little white spots come in andout on the corners of their jaws, they had their teeth set so hard, and were chewing so fiercely. You could almost hear their minds creak, scheming, scheming, scheming. I suppose there were ways for boys to makemoney in those times, but they always fizzled out when you came to trythem, to say nothing of the way they broke into your day. Why, you hadscarcely any time to play in. You 'd go 'round to some neighbor's housewith a magazine, and you'd say: "Good afternoon, Mrs. Slaymaker. Do youwant to subscribe for this?" Just the way you had studied out you wouldsay. And she'd take it, and go sit down with it, and read it clearthrough while you played with the dog, and then when she got all throughwith it, and had read all the advertisements, she'd hand it back to youand say: No, she didn't believe she would. They had so many books andpapers now that she didn't get a chance hardly to read in any of them, let alone taking any new ornes. Were you getting many new subscribers?Just commenced, eh? Well, she wished you all the luck in the world. How was your ma? That's good. Did she hear from your Uncle John's folkssince they moved out to Kansas?

I have heard that there were boys who, under the dire necessity of goingto the circus, got together enough rags, old iron, and bottles to makeup the price, sold 'em, collected the money, and went. I don't believeit. I don't believe it. We all had, hidden under the back porch, ourtreasure-heap of rusty grates, cracked fire-pots, broken griddles andlid-lifters, tub-hoops and pokers, but I do not believe that any humanboy ever collected fifty cents' worth. I want you to understand thatfifty cents is a whole lot of money, particularly when it is laid out inscrap-iron. Only the tin-wagon takes rags, and they pay in tinware, and that's no good to a boy that wants to go to the circus. And as forbottles--well, sir, you wash out a whole, whole lot of bottles, a wholebig lot of 'em, a wash-basket full, and tote 'em down to Mr. Case'sdrug--and book-store, as much as ever you and your brother can wag, andsee what he gives you. It's simply scandalous. You have no idea of howmean and stingy a man can be until you try to sell him old bottles. Andthe cold-hearted way in which he will throw back ink-bottles that youworked so hard to clean, and the ones that have reading blown into theglass--Oh, it's enough to set you against business transactions allyour life long. There's something about bargain and sale that's mean andcensorious, finding this fault and finding that fault, and paying justas little as ever they can. It gets on one's nerves. It really does. 

The boys that made the little white spots come on the corners of theirjaws as they lay there in the grass, scheming, scheming, scheming, planned rags, and bottles, and scrap-iron, and more also. Sometimes itwas a plan so much bigger that if they had kept it to themselves, likethe darkey's cow, they would have "all swole up and died. "

"Sst! Come here once. Tell you sumpum. Now don't you go and blab it out, now will you? Hope to die? Well.... Now, no kiddin'. Cross your heart?Well.... Ah, you will, too. I know you. You go and tattle everything youhear.... Well.... Cheese it! Here comes somebody. Make out we're talkin'about sumpum else. Ah, he did, did he? What for, I wonder? (Say sumpum, can't ye?) Why 'nu' ye say sumpum when he was goin' by? Now he'llsuspicion sumpum 's up, and nose around till he.... Aw, they ain'tno use tellin' you anything.... Well. Put your head over so 's I canwhisper. Sure I am.... Well, I could learn, couldn't I? Now don't youtell a living soul, will you? If anybody asts you, you tell 'em youdon't know anything at all about it. Say, why 'n't you come along? Ipromised you the last time. That's jist your mother callin' you. Let onyou don't hear her. Aw, stay. Aw, you don't either have to go. Say. Lessyou and me get up early, and go see the circus come in town, will you? Iwill, if you will. All right. Remember now. Don't you tell anybody whatI told you. You know. "

If a fellow just only could run off with a circus! Wouldn't it be great?No more splitting kindling and carrying in coal; no more: "Hurry up, now, or you'll be late for school;" no more poking along in a humdrumexistence, never going any place or seeing anything, but the glad, free, untrammeled life, the life of a circus-boy, standing up on top ofsomebody's head (you could pretend he was your daddy. Who'd ever knowthe difference?) and your leg stuck up like five minutes to six, and himstanding on top of a horse--and the horse going around the ring, and thering master cracking his whip--aw, say! How about it?

Maybe the show-people would take you even if you didn't have two jointsto common folks' one, and hadn't had early advantages in the way ofplenty of snakes to try the grease out of. And then... And then.... Travel all around, and be in a new town every day! And see things! Thewater-works, and Main Street, and the Soldiers' Monument, and the SecondPresbyterian Church. All the sights there are to see in strange places. And then when the show came back to your own home-town next year, peoplewould wonder whose was that slim and gracile figure in the green silktights and spangled breech-clout that capered so nimbly on the boundingcourser's back, that switched the natty switch and shrilly called out:"Hep! Hep!" They'd screw up their eyes to look hard, and they'd say:"Yes, sir. It is. It's him. It's Willie Bigelow. Well, of all things!"And they'd clap their hands, and be so proud of you. And they'd wonderhow it was that they could have been so blind to your many merits whenthey had you with them. They'd feel sorry that they ever said you werea "regular little imp, " if ever there was one, and that you had the OldBoy in you as big as a horse. They'd feel ashamed of themselves, so theywould. And they'd come and apologize to you for the way they had acted, and you'd say: "Oh, that's all right. Forgive and forget. " And they'dmiss you at home, too. Your daddy would wish he hadn't whaled you theway he did, just for nothing at all. And your mother, too, she'd besorry for the way she acted to you, tormenting the life and soul out ofyou, sending you on errands just when you got a man in the king row, andmaking you wash your feet in a bucket before you went to bed, instead ofbeing satisfied to let you pump on them, as any reasonable mother would. She'll think about that when you're gone. It'll be lonesome then, withnobody to bang the doors, and upset the cream-pitcher on the cleantable-cloth, and fall over backward in the rocking-chair and break arocker off. Your daddy will sigh and say:

"I wonder where Willie is to-night. Poor boy, I sometimes fear I was tooharsh with him. " And your mother will try to keep back her tears, butshe can't, and first thing she knows she'll burst out crying, and... And... And old Maje will go around the house looking for you, andwhining because he can't find his little playmate.... It will seem as ifyou were dead--dead to them, and.... Smf! Smf!

(Confound that orchestra leader anyhow! How many times have I got totell him that this is the music-cue for "Where is My Wandering BoyTo-night?")

We were all going to get up early enough to see the show come in at thedepot. Very few of us did it. Somehow we couldn't seem to wake up. Hereand there a hardy spirit compasses the feat. 

All the town is asleep when this boy slips out of his front-gate andsnicks the latch behind him softly. It is very still, so still thatthough he is more than a mile away from the railroad he can hear JohnnyMara, the night yardmaster, bawl out: "Run them three empties over onNumber Four track!" the short exhaust of the obedient pony-engine, andthe succeeding crash of the cars as they bump against their fellows. Itis very still, scarey still. The gas-lamp flaring and flickering amongthe green maples at the corner has a strange look to him. His footfallson the sidewalk sound so loud he takes the soft middle of the dustyroad. He hears some one pursuing him and his bosom contracts with fear, as he stands to see who it is. Although he hardly knows the boy bound onthe same errand as his, he takes him to his heart, as a chosen friend. They are kin. 

On the freight-house platform they find other boys. Some of them havewaited up all night so as not to miss it. They are from across thetracks. They have all the fun, those fellows do. They can swear and chewtobacco, and play hookey from school and have a good time. They getto go barefoot before anybody else, and nobody tells them it will thintheir blood to go in swimming so much. Yes, and they can fight, too. They'd sooner fight than eat. Our boys, conscious of inferiority, keepto themselves. The boys from across the tracks show off all the badwords they can think of. One of them has a mouth-harp which he playsupon, now and then opening his hands hollowed around the instrument. Patsy Gubbins dances to the music, which is a thing even more recklessand daredevil than swearing. Patsy's going with a "troupe" some day. Orelse, he's going to get a job firing on an engine. He isn't right surewhich he wants to do the most. 

Now and then a brakeman goes by swinging his lantern. The boys wouldlike to ask him what time it is, but for one thing they're too bashful. Being a brakeman is almost as good as going with a "troupe" or a circus. You get to go to places that way, too, Marysville, and Mechanicsburg, and Harrod's--that is, if you're on the local freight, and then you layover in Cincinnati. Some ways it's better than firing, and some ways itisn't so good. And then there is another reason why they don't askthe brakeman what time it is. He'd say it was "forty-five" or maybe"fifty-three, " and never tell what hour. 

"Say! Do you know it's cold? You wouldn't think it would be so cold inthe summer-time. "

The maple-trees, from being formless blobs, insensibly begin to looklike lace-work. Presently the heavens and the earth are bathed in liquidblue that casts a spell so potent on the soul of him that sees it thathe yearns for something he knows not what, except that it is utterlybeyond him, as far beyond him as what he means to be will be from whathe shall attain to. One dreams of romance and renown, of all that shouldbe and is not. And as he dreams the birds awaken. In the East therecomes a greenish tinge. Far up the track, there is a sullen roar, andthen the hoarse diapason of an engine whistle. The roar strengthens andstrengthens. It is the circus train. 

Under the witchcraft of the dreaming blue, each boy had a firm andstubborn purpose. Over and over again he rehearsed how he would go upto the man that runs the show, and say: "Please, mister, can I go withyou?" And the man would say, "Yes. " (As easy as that. ) But the purposewavered as he saw the roustabouts come tumbling out, all frowsy andunwashed, rubbing the sleep out of their eyes, cross and savage. And theman whose word they jump to obey, he's kind of discouraging, it's allbusiness with him. The fellows may plead with their eyes; he never seesthem. If he does, he tells them where to get to out of that and howquick he wants it done, in language that makes the boldest efforts ofthe boys from across the tracks seem puny in comparison. The ladsdivide into two parties. One follows the buggy of the boss canvasman toVandeman's lots where the stand is made. They will witness the spectacleof the raising of the tents, but they will also be near the man thatruns the show, and if all goes well it may be he will like your looksand saunter up to you and say: "Well, bub, and how would you like totravel with us?" You don't know. Things not half so strange as that havehappened. And if you were right there at the time.... 

The other party lingers awhile looking up wistfully at the unresponsivewindows of the sleeping-cars, behind which are the happy circus-actors. Perhaps the show-boy that stands up on top of his daddy's head will lookout. If he should raise the window and smile at you, and get to talkingwith you maybe he would introduce you to his pa, and tell him that youwould like to go with the show, and his pa would be a nice sort of aman, and he'd say: "Why, yes. I guess we can fix that all right. " Andthere you'd be. 

Or if it didn't come out like that, why, maybe the boy would be another"Little Arthur, the Boy Circus-rider, " like it told about in he Ladies'Repository. It seems there was a man, and one day he went by where therewas a circus, and in a quiet secluded, vine-clad nook only a fewsteps from the main tent, he heard somebody sigh, oh, so sadly and sopitifully! Come to find out, it was Little Arthur, the Boy Circus-rider. He had large sensitive violet eyes, and a wealth of clustering ringlets, and he was very, very unhappy. So the man took from his pocket a Biblethat he happened to have with him, and he read from it to Little Arthur, which cheered him up right away, because up to that moment he had onlyheard of the Bible. (Think of that!) And that night at the show, what doyou s'pose? Little Arthur fell off the horse and hurt himself. And thisman was at the show and he went back in the dressing-room, and heldLittle Arthur's hand. And the clown was crying, and the actors werecrying, for they all loved Little Arthur in their rude, untutored way. And Little Arthur opened his large sensitive violet eyes, and saw theman, and said off the text that the man taught him that afternoon. 

And then he died. It was a sad story, but it made you wish it had beenyou that happened to have a Bible in your pocket as you passed thesecluded, vine-clad nook only a few paces from the main tent, and hadheard Little Arthur sigh so pitifully. It was those sensitive eyes welooked for in the sleeping-car windows, and all in vain. I think I sawthe wealth of clustering ringlets, or at least the makings of it. Iam almost positive I saw curl-papers as the curtain was drawn aside amoment. 

But whether a boy stands gazing at the sleepers, or runs over to thelots, there is something pathetic about it, something almost terrible. It is the death of an ideal. I can't conceive of a boy coming down tothe depot to see the circus train come in another time. Hitherto, theshow has been to him the ne plus ultra of romance. It comes in the nightfrom 'way off yonder; it goes in the night to 'way off yonder. It is allsplendor, all deeds of high emprise. It stands to reason then, that thecloser you get to it, the closer you get to pure romance. And it isn'tthat way at all. 

What gravels a boy the most of all is to have to do the same old thingover and over again, day after day, week in, week out. Once he has seenthe circus come in, he cannot blind himself to the fact that everythingis marked and numbered; that all is system, and that everything is donetoday exactly as it was done yesterday, and as it will be done tomorrow. 

"What town is this?" he hears a man inquire of another. 

"Blest if I know. What's the odds what town it is?"

Didn't know what town it was! Didn't care!

The keen morning air, or something, makes a fellow mighty unromantic, too. Perhaps it was the thin blue wood-smoke from the field-stoves, andthe smell of the hot coffee and the victuals the waiters are carryingabout, some to the tent where the bare tables are for the canvasmen, some to the table covered with a red and white table-cloth as befitsperformers. These have no rosy cheeks. Their lithe limbs are not richlydecked with silken tights. Insensibly the upper lip curls. They're notso much. They're only folks. That's all, just folks. 

But when ideals die, great truths are born. To such a boy at such amoment there comes the firm conviction which increasing years can onlyemphasize: Home is but a poor prosaic place, but Home--Ah, my brother, think on this--Home is where Breakfast is. 

"Hay! Wait for me, you fellows! Hay! Hold on a minute. Well, ain't Ia-comin' jis''s fast's ever I kin? What's your rush?"

It is the exceptional boy has this experience. The normal one preservesthe delicate bloom of romance, by never seeing the show until it makesits Grand Triumphal Entree in a Pageant of Unparalleled Magnificence farSurpassing the Pomp and Splendor of Oriental Potentates. 

The hitching-posts are full of whinnering country horses, and people arein town you wouldn't think existed if you hadn't seen their pictures inPuck and Yudge, people from over by Muchinippi, and out Noodletoozy way, big, red-necked men with the long loping step that comes from walking onthe plowed ground. Following them are lanky women with their front teethgone, and their figures bowed by drudgery, dragging wide-eyed childrenwhose uncouth finery betrays the "country jake, " even if the frecklesand the sun-bleached hair could keep the secret. From the far-offfastnesses, where there are still log-cabins chinked with mud, they haveventured to see the show come into town, and when they have seen that, they will retire again beyond our ken. How every sense is numbed andstunned by the magnificence and splendor of the painted and gildedwagons as they rumble past, the driver rolling and pitching in his seat, as he handles the ribbons of eight horses all at once! The farmer'sheart is filled with admiration of his craft, as much as the children'shearts are at the gaudy pictures. 

The allegorical tableau-car solemnly waggles past, Europe, and Asia, andAfrica, and Australia brilliant in grease-paint and gorgeous cheeseclothrobes. And can you guess who the fat lady is up on the very tip-top ofall, on the tip-top where the wobble is the worst? Our own Columbia!It must be fine to ride around that way all dressed up in a flag. Buta sourer lot of faces you never saw in your life. No. I am wrong. Fordownright melancholy and despondency you must wait till the funny oldclown comes along in his little bit of a buggy drawn by a little bit ofa donkey. 

"And, oh, looky! Here comes the elephants, just the same as in thejoggerfy books. And see the men walking beside them. They come from theplace the elephants do. See, they have on the clothes they wear in thatcountry. Don't they look proud? Who wouldn't be proud to get to walkwith an elephant? And if you ever do anything to an elephant to make himmad, he'll always remember it, and some day he'll get even with you. One time there was a man, and he gave an elephant a chew of tobacco, and--O-o-ooh! See that man in the cage with the lions! Don't it justmake the cold chills run over you? I wouldn't be there for a milliondollars, would you, ma?

"What they laughing at down the street? Ma, make Lizzie get down; she'sright in my way. I don't want to see it pretty soon. I want to see itnaow! Oh, ain't it funny? See the old clowns playing on horns! Ain't ittoo killing? Aw, look at them ponies. I woosht I had one. Johnny Pymhas got a goat he can hitch up. What was that, pa? What was that went'OoOOoohm!'"

"Whoa, Nell, whoa there! Steady, gal, steaday! Ho, there! Ho!Whoa--whoa-hup! Whad dy y' about? Fool horse. Whoa... Whoa so, gal, soo-o. Lion, I guess, or a tagger, or sumpum or other. "

And talk about music. You thought the band was grand. You just wait. Don't you hear it down the street? It'll be along in a minute now. 

There it is. That's the cally-ope. That's what the show bills call:"The Steam Car of the Muses. "... Mm-well, I don't know but it is just aleetle off the pitch, especially towards the end of a note, but youmust remember that you can't haul a very big boiler on a wagon, and thewhistles let out an awful lot of steam. It's pretty hard to keep thepressure even. But it's loud. That's the main thing. And the man thatplays on it--no, not that fellow in the overalls with a wad of greasywaste in his hand. He 's only the engineer. I mean the artist, the manthat plays on the keys. Well, he knows what the people want. He hashis fingers on the public pulse. Does he give them a Bach fugue, orGuillmant's "Grand Choeur?" 'Deed, he doesn't. He goes right to theheart, with "Patrick's Day in the Morning, " and "The Carnival ofVenice, " and "Home, Sweet Home, " and "Oh, Where, Oh Where has my LittleDog Gone?" He knows his business. A shade off the key, perhaps, but my!Ain't it grand? So loud and nice!

"Well, that's all of it.... Why, child, I can't make it any longer thanit is. "

"What do you want me to drive round into the other street for? You'veseen all there is to see. Got all your trading done, mother? Well, thenI expect we'd better put for home. Now, Eddy, I told you 'No' once, andthat's the end of it. Hush up now! Look here, sir! Do you want me totake and 'tend to you right before everybody? Well, I will now, if Ihear another whimper out o' ye. Ck-ck-ck! Git ep there, Nelly. "

Some day, when we get big, and have whole, whole lots of money we'regoing to the circus every time it comes to town, to the real circus, theone you have to pay to get into. For if merely the street parade is somagnificent, what must the show itself be?

How people can sit at the table on circus day and stuff, and stuff theway they do is more than I can understand. You'd think they hadn't anymore chances to eat than they had to go to the show. And they can findmore things to do before they get started! And then, after the houseis all locked up and everything, they've got to go back after ahandkerchief! What does anybody want with a handkerchief at a circus?

It's exasperating enough to have to choose between going in theafternoon and not going at all. Why, sure, it's finer at night. Lotsfiner. You know that kind of a light the peanut-roaster man has gotdown by the post-office. Burns that kind of stuff they use to take outgrease-spots. Ye-ah. Gasoline. Well, at the circus at night, they don'thave just one light like that, but bunches and bunches of them on thetentpoles. No, silly! Of course not. Of course they don't set the tentafire. But say! What if they did, eh? The place would be all fullof people, laughing at the country jake that comes out to ride thetrick-mule, and you'd happen to look up and see where the canvas wasju-u-ust beginning to blaze, and you'd jump up and holler: "Fire! Fire!"as loud as ever you could because you saw it first, and you'd point tothe place. Excitement? Well, I guess yes. The people would all run everywhich way, and fall all over themselves, and the women would squeal--Anddo you know what I'd do? Wouldn't just let myself down between the kindof bedslat benches, and drop to the ground, and lift up the canvas andthere I'd be all safe. And after I was all safe, then I'd go back andrescue folks. 

We-ell, I s'pose I'd have to rescue a girl. It seems they always dothat. But it would be nicer, I think, to rescue some real rich man. He'dsay: "My noble preserver! How can I sufficiently reward you?" and takeout his pocketbook. And wouldn't say: "Take back your proffered gold, "and make like I was pushing it away, "take back your proffered gold. Ibut did my duty. " And then wouldn't forget all about it. And one day, after I'd forgotten all about, it, the man would die, and will me amillion dollars, or a thousand, I don't know. Enough to make me rich. 

And say! Wouldn't the animals get excited when they saw the show wasafire? They'd just roar and roar, and upset the cages, and maybe they'dget loose. O-o-o-Oh! How about that? If there was a lion come at me I'dclimb a tree. What would you do? Ah, your pa's shot-gun nothing! Why, you crazy, that would only infuriate him the more. What you want to dois to take an express rifle, like Doo Challoo did, and aim right for hisheart. An express rifle is what you send off and get, and they ship itto you by express. 

So you see what a fellow misses by having to go to the show in theafternoon, like the girls and the a-b-abs. The boys from across thetracks get to go at night. They have all the fun. When they go theydon't have to poke along, and poke along, and keep hold of hands so asnot to get lost.... Aw, hurry up, can't you? Don't you hear the bandplaying? It'll be all over before we get there. 

But finally the lots are reached, and there are the tents, with allkinds of flags snapping from the centerpoles and the guy-ropes. Andthere are the sideshows. Alas! You never thought of the sideshows whenyou asked if you could go. And now it's too late. It must be fine in theside-shows. I never got to go to one. I didn't have the money. But ifthe big, painted banners, bulging in and out, as the wind plays withthem, are anything to go by, it must be something grand to see the FatLady, and the Circassian Beauty, whose frizzled head will just about fita bushel basket, and the Armless Wonder. They say he can take a pair ofscissors with his toes and cut your picture out of paper just elegant. 

Oh, and something else you miss by going in the afternoon. At night youcan sneak around at the back, and when nobody is looking you can justlift up the canvas and go right in for nothing.... Why, what's wrongabout that? Ah, you're too particular.... And if the canvasman catchesyou, you can commence to cry and say you had only forty cents, andwanted to see the circus so bad, and he'll take it and let you in, and you can have ten cents, don't you see, to spend for lemonade, red lemonade, you understand; and peanuts, the littlest bags, and the"on-riest" peanuts that ever were. 

As far as I can see, the animal part of the show is just the same as italways was. The people that take you to the show always pretend to beinterested in them, but it's my belief they stop and look only to teaseyou. Away, 'way back in ancient times, there used to be a man that tookthe folks around and told them what was in each cage, and where it camefrom, and how much it cost, and what useful purpose it served in thewise economy of nature, and all about it. That was before my time. ButI can recollect something they had that they don't have any more. I canremember when Mr. Barnum first brought his show to our town. It didn'ttake much teasing to get to go to that, because in those days Mr. Barnumwas a "biger man than old Grant. " "The Life of P. T. Barnum, Written byHimself" was on everybody's marble-topped centertable, just the same as"The History of the Great Rebellion. " You show some elderly person fromout of town the church across the street from the Astor House, andsay: "That's St. Paul's Chapel. General Montgomery's monument is in thechancel window. George Washington went to meeting there the day he wasinaugurated president, " and your friend will say: "M-hm. " But you tellhim that right across Broadway is where Barnum's Museum used to be, andhe'll brighten right up and remember all about how Barnum strung aflag across to St. Paul's steeple and what a fuss the vestry of TrinityParish made. That's something he knows about, that's part of the historyof our country. 

Well, when Mr. Barnum first came to our town, all around one tent werevans full of the very identical Moral Waxworks that we had read about, and had given up all hopes of ever seeing because New York was so faraway. There was the Dying Zouave. Oh, that was a beauty! The AdvanceCourier said that "the crimson torrent of his heart's blood spouted inrhythmic jets as the tide of life ebbed silently away;" but I guess bythe time they got to our town they must have run all out of pokeberryjuice, for the "crimson torrent" didn't spout at all. But his bosomheaved every so often, and he rolled up his eyes something grand! Iliked it, but my mother said it was horrid. That's the way with women. They don't like anything that anybody else does. There's no pleasing'em. And she thought the Drunkard's Family was "kind o' low. " It wasn'teither. It was fine, and taught a great moral lesson. I told her so, butshe said it was low, just the same. She thought the Temperance Familywas nice, but it wasn't anywhere near as good as the Drunkard's Family. Why, let me tell you. The Drunkard's Wife was in a ragged calico dress, and her eye was all black and blue, where he had hit her the weekbefore. And the Drunkard had hold of a black quart bottle, and his nosewas all red, and he wore a plug hat that was even rustier and more cavedin than Elder Drown's, if such a thing were possible. And there was--ButI can't begin to tell you of all the fine things Mr. Barnum had thatyear, but never had again. 

Another thing Mr. Barnum had that year that never appeared again. Itmay be that after that time the Funny Old Clown did crack a joke, butI never heard him. The one that Mr. Barnum had got off the most comicalthing you ever heard. I'll never forget it the longest day I live. Laugh? Why, I nearly took a conniption over it. It seems the clown gotto crying about something.... Now what was it made him cry? Let me seenow.... Ain't it queer I can't remember that? Fudge! Well, never mindnow. It will come to me in a minute. 

I feel kind of sorry for the poor little young ones that grow up andnever know what a clown is like. Oh, yes, they have them to-day, after afashion. They stub their toes and fall down the same as ever, but thereis a whole mob of them and you can't take the interest in them that youcould in "the one, the only, the inimitable" clown there used to be, acharacter of such importance that he got his name on the bills. He was amighty man in those days. The ring-master was a kind of stuck-up fellow, very important in his own estimation, but he didn't have a spark ofhumor. Not a spark. And he'd be swelling around there, all so grand, and the clown, just to take him down a peg or two, would ask him aconundrum. And do you think he could ever guess one? Never. Not a one. And when the clown would tell him what the answer was, he'd be so vexedat himself that he'd try to take it out on the poor clown, and cut athim with his long whip. But Mr. Clown was just as spry in his shoes ashe was under the hat, and he'd hop up on the ring-side out of the way, and squall out: "A-a-aah! Never touched me!" We had that for a byword. Oh, you'd die laughing at the comical remarks he'd make. And he'd be soquick about it. The ring-master would say something, and before you'dthink, the clown would make a joke out of it.... I wish I could rememberwhat it was he said that was so funny, the time he started crying. Seemsto me it was something about his little brother.... Well, no matter. 

Yes, sir, there are heads of families to-day, I'll bet you, that havegrown up without ever having heard a clown sing a comic song, and askthe audience to join in the chorus. And if you say to such people: "Herewe are again, Mr. Merryman, " or "Bring on another horse, " or "What willthe little lady have now? the banners, my lord?" they look at you sofunny. They don't know what you mean, and they don't know whether to gethuffy or not. Well, I suppose it had to be that the Funny Old Clown withall his songs, and quips, and conundrums, and comical remarks shoulddisappear. Perhaps he "didn't pay. "

I can't see that the rest of the show has changed so very much. Perhapsthe trapeze performances are more marvelous and breath-suspending thanthey used to be. But they were far and far beyond what we could dream ofthen, and to go still farther as little impresses us as to be told thatpeople live still even westerly of Idaho. The trapeze performers areup-to-date in one respect. The fellow that comes down with his armsfolded, one leg stuck out and the other twined around the big rope, revolving slowly, slowly--well, the band plays the Intermezzo from"Cavalleria Rusticana" nowadays when he does that. It used to play: "OThou, Sweet Spirit, Hear my Prayer!" But the lady in the riding-habitstill smiles as if it hurt her when her horse walks on its hind legs;the bareback rider does the very same fancy steps as the horse goesround the ring in a rocking-chair lope; the attendants still slant thehurdles almost flat for the horse to jump; they still snake the bannersunder the rider's feet as he gives a little hop up, and they still banghim on the head with the paper-covered hoop to .... Hold on a minute. Now. 

Now... That story the clown told that was so funny, that had somethingto do with those hoops. I wish I could think of it. It would make youlaugh, I know. 

People try to lay the blame of the modern circus's failure to interestthem on the three rings. They say so many things to watch at once keepsthem from being watching properly any one act. They can't give it theattention it deserves. But I'll tell you what's wrong: There isn't anyFunny Old Clown, a particular one, to give it human interest. It isall too splendid, too magnificent, too far beyond us. We want to hearsomebody talk once in awhile. 

They pretended that the tent was too big for the clown to be heard, butI take notice it wasn't too big for the fellow to get up and declaim"The puffawmance ees not yait hawf ovah. The jaintlemanly agents willnow pawss around the ring with tickets faw the concert. " I used to hatethat man. When he said the performance was not yet half over, he liedlike a dog, consarn his picture! There were only a few more acts tocome. He knew it and we knew it. We wanted the show to go on and on, andalways to be just as exciting as at the very first, and it wouldn't!We had got to the point where we couldn't be interested in anything anymore. We were as little ones unable to prop their eyelids open and yetquarreling with bed. We were surfeited, but not satisfied. We sat thereand pouted because there wasn't any more, and yet we couldn't but yawnat the act before us. We were mad at ourselves, and mad at everybodyelse. We clambered down the rattling bedslats seats, sour and sullen. We didn't want to look at the animals; we didn't want to do this, andwe didn't want to do that. We whined and snarled, and wriggled and shookourselves with temper, and we got a good hard slap, side of the head, right before everybody, and then we yelled as if we were being killedalive. 

"Now, mister, if I ever take you any place again, you'll know it. I'dbe ashamed of myself if I was you. Hush up! Hush up, I tell you. Nowyou mark. You're never going to the show again. Do you hear me? Never! Imean it. You're never going again. "

But at eventide there was light. After supper, after a little rest anda good deal of food, while chopping the kindling for morning (it'swonderful how useful employ tends to induce a cheerful view of life)out of her dazzling treasure-heap of jewels, Memory took up, one afteranother, a glowing recollection and viewed it with delight. The eveningperformance, the one all lighted up with bunches and bunches of lights, was a-preparing, and in the gentle breeze the far-off music waved as ithad been a flag. A harsh and rumbling noise as of heavy timbers fallingtore through the tissue of sweet sounds. The horses in the barn nextdoor screamed in their stalls to hear it. Ages and ages ago, on distantwind-swept plains their ancestors had hearkened to that hunting-cry, andsummoned up their valor and their speed. It still thrilled in the bloodof these patient slaves of man, though countless generations of them hadnever even so much as seen a lion. 

"And is that all the difference, pa, that the lion roars at night andthe ostrich in the daytime?"

Out on the back porch in the deepening dusk we sat, with eyes relaxedand dreaming, and watched the stars that powdered the dark sky. Beforeour inward vision passed in review the day of splendor and renown. Wesighed, at last, but it was the happy sigh of him who has full dined. Ambition was digesting. In our turn, when we grew up, we, too, were todo the deeds of high emprise. We were to be somebody. 

(I never heard of anybody sitting up to see the show depart. And yet itseems to me that would be the best time to run off with it. )

The next day we visited the lots. It was no dream. See the litter thatmussed up the place. 

We were all there. None had heard the man that runs the show saygenially: "Yes, I think we can arrange to take you with us. " Here wasthe ring; here the tent-pole holes, and here a scrap of paper torn froma hoop the bareback rider leaped through.... Oh, now I know what I wasgoing to tell you that the clown said. The comicalest thing!

He picked up one of these hoops and began to sniffle. 

So the ring-master asked him what he was crying about. 

"I--I--was thinking of my mother. Smf! My good old mother!"

So the ring-master asked him what made him think of his mother. 

"This. " And he held up the paper-covered hoop. 

The ring-master couldn't see how that put the clown in mind of hismother. He was awful dumb, that man. 

"It looks just like the pancakes she used to make for us. "

Well, sir, we just hollered and laughed at that. And after we hadquieted down a little, the ringmaster says: "As big as that?"

"Bigger, " says the clown. "Why, she used to make 'em so big we used 'emfor bedclothes. "

"Indeed" (Just like that. He took it all in, just as if it was so. )

"Oh, my, yes! I mind one time I was sleeping with my little brother, andI waked up just as cold--Brr! But I was cold!"

"But how could that be, sir? You just now said you had pancakes forbedclothes. "

"Yes, but my little brother got hungry in the night, and et up all thecover. "

Laugh? Why, they screamed. Me? I thought I'd just about go up. But thering master never cracked a smile. He didn't see the joke at all. 

Good-by, old clown, friend of our childhood, goodby, good-by forever!And you, our other friend, the street parade, must you go, too? And you, the gorgeous show-bills, must you tread the path toward the sundown?Good-by! Good-by! In that dreary land where you are going, the Kingdomof the Ausgespielt, it may comfort you to recollect the young hearts youhave made happy in the days that were, but never more can be again. 

THE COUNTY FAIR

Whether or not the name had an influence on the weather, I don't know. Perhaps it did rain some years, but, as I remember, County Fair timeseems to have had a sky perfectly cloudless, with its blue only a littledulled around the edges where it came close to the ground and the dustsettled on it. Things far off were sort of hazy, but that might havebeen the result of the bonfires of leaves we had been having eveningsafter supper. In Fair weather, when the sun had been up long enoughto get a really good start, it was right warm, but in the shade itwas cool, and nights and mornings there was a chill in the air thatthreatened worse things to come. 

The harvest is past, the summer is ended. Down cellar the swing-shelf iscram-jam full of jellyglasses, and jars of fruit. Out on the hen-houseroof are drying what, when the soap-box wagon was first built, promisedbarrels and barrels of nuts to be brought up with the pitcher of ciderfor our comforting in the long winter evenings, but what turns out, whenthe shucks are off, to be a poor, pitiful half-peck, daily depleted bythe urgent necessity of finding out if they are dry enough yet. Folksare picking apples, and Koontz's cider-mill is in full operation. (Doyou know any place where a fellow can get some nice long straws?) Out inthe fields are champagne-colored pyramids, each with a pale-gold heapof corn beside it, and the good black earth is dotted with orange blobsthat promise pumpkin-pies for Thanksgiving Day. No. Let me look again. Those aren't pie-pumpkins; those are cow-pumpkins, and if you want tosee something kind of pitiful, I'll show you Abe Bethard chopping upone of those yellow globes--with what, do you suppose? With the cavalrysaber his daddy used at Gettysburg. 

The harvest is past, the summer is ended. As a result of all the goodfeeding and the outdoor air we have had for three or four months past, the strawberry shortcakes, and cherry-pies, and green peas, andnew potatoes, and string beans, and roasting-ears, and all suchgarden-stuff, and the fresh eggs, broken into the skillet before Specklegets done cackling, and the cockerels we pick off the roost Saturdayevenings (you see, we're thinning 'em out; no sense in keeping all of'em over winter)--as a result, I say, of all this good eating, and theoutdoor life, and the necessity of stirring around a little lively thesedays we feel pretty good. And yet we get kind of low in our minds, too. The harvest is past, the summer is ended. It's gone, the good playtimewhen we didn't have to go to school, when the only foot-covering we worewas a rag around one big toe or the other; the days when we could stayin swimming all day long except mealtimes; the days of Sabbath-schoolpicnics and excursions to the Soldiers' Home--it's gone. The harvestis past, the summer is ended. The green and leafy things have heard theword, and most of them are taking it pretty seriously, judging by theirlooks. But the maples and some more of them, particularly the maples, with daredevil recklessness, have resolved, as it were, to die withtheir boots on, and flame out in such violent and unbelievable colorsthat we feel obliged to take testimony in certain outrageous cases, and file away the exhibits in the Family Bible where nobody will botherthem. The harvest is past, the summer is ended. Rainy days you can seehow played-out and forlorn the whole world looks. But at Fair time, whenthe sun shines bright, it appears right cheerful. 

It seems to me the Fair lasted three days. One of them was a holidayfrom school, I know, and unless I'm wrong, it wasn't on the first day, because then they were getting the things in, and it wasn't on the lastday, because then they were taking the things out, so it must have beenon the middle day, when everybody went. Charley Wells had both the depot'buses out with "County FAIR" painted on muslin hung on the sides. TheCornet Band rode all round town in one, and so on over to the "scene ofthe festivities" as the Weekly Examiner very aptly put it, and then both'buses stood out in front of the American House, waiting for passengers, with Dinny Enright calling out: "This sway t' the Fair Groun's! GoingRIGHT over!" Only he always waited till he got a good load before heturned a wheel. (Dinny's foreman at the chair factory now. Did you knowthat? Doing fine. Gets $15 a week, and hasn't drunk a drop for nearlytwo years. )

Everybody goes the middle day of the Fair, everybody that you ever didknow or hear tell of. You'll be going along, kind of half-listening tothe man selling Temperance Bitters, and denouncing the other bittersbecause they have "al-cue-hawl" in them, and "al-cue-hawl will make youdrunk, " (which is perfectly true), and kind of half-listening to the manwith the electric machine, declaring: "Ground is the first conductor;water is the second conductor, " and you'll be thinking how slippery thegrass is to walk on, when a face in the crowd will, as it were, stingyour memory. "I ought to know that man, " says you to yourself. "Now, whothe mischief is he? Barker? No, 't isn't Barker, Barkdull? No. FunnyI can't think of his name. Begins with B I'm pretty certain. " And youtrail along after him, as if you were a detective, sort of keeping outof his sight, and yet every once in a while getting a good look at him. "Mmmmmm!" says you. "What is that fellow's name? Why, sure. McConica. "And you walk up to him and stick out your hand while he's gassing withsomebody, and there's that smile on your face that says: "I know youbut you don't know me, " and he takes it in a limp sort of fashion, andstarts to say: "You have the advantage of--" when, all of a sudden, hegrabs your hand as if he were going to jerk your arm out of its socketand beat you over the head with the bloody end, and shouts out: "Why, HELLO, Billy! Well, suffering Cyrus and all hands round! Hold still asecond and let me look at you. Gosh darn your hide, where you been forso long? I though you'd clean evaporated off the face the earth. Why, how AIR you? How's everything? That's good. Let me make you acquaintedwith my wife. Molly, this is Mr. --" But she says: "Now don't you tell mewhat his name is. Let me think. Why, Willie Smith! Well, of all things!Why, how you've changed! Honest, I wouldn't have knowed you. Do you mindthe time we went sleigh-ridin' the whole posse of us, and got upset downthere by Hanks's place?" And then you start in on "D' you mind?" and"Don't you recollect?" and you talk about the old school-days, and who'smarried, and who's moved out to Kansas, and who's got the Elias Hooverplace now, and how Ella Trimble--You know Ella Diefenbaugh, old JakeDiefenbaugh's daughter, the one that lisped. Course you do. Well, shemarried Ed Trimble, and he died along in the early part of the summer. Typhoid. Was getting well but he took a relapse, and went off like that!And now she's left with three little ones, and they guess poor Ella hasa pretty hard time making out. And this old schoolmate that you startto tell a funny story about is dead, and the freckle-faced boy with thebuck teeth that put the rabbit in the teacher's desk, he's dead, too, and the boy that used to cry in school when they read:

 "Give me three grains of corn, mother, Only three grains o f corn; To save what little life I have, mother, Till the coming o f the morn. "

well, he studied law with old judge Rodehaver, and got to be ProsecutingAttorney, but he took to drinking--politics, you know--and now he's justgone to the dogs. Smart as a steel-trap, and bright as a dollar. Oh, aterrible pity! A terrible pity. And as you hear the fate of one afteranother of the happy companions of your childhood, and the sadness oflife comes over you, they start to tell something that makes you laughagain. I tell you. Did you ever see one of these concave glasses, suchas the artists use when they want to get an idea of how a picture looksall together as a whole, and not as an assemblage of parts? Well, whatthe concave glass is to a picture, so such talk is to life. It sort ofdraws it all together, and you see it as a whole, its sunshine and itsshadow, its laughter and its tears, its work and its play, its past andits present. But not its future. The Good Man has mercifully hidden thatfrom us. 

It does a body good to get such a talk once in a while. 

And there are the young fellows and the girls. This young gentleman inthe rimless eye-glasses, who is now beginning to "go out among 'em" thelast time you saw him was in meeting when Elder Drown was preaching, andmy gentleman stood up in the seat and shouted shrilly: "'T ain't at all, man. 'T ain't at all!" And this sweet girl-graduate--the last time yousaw her was just after Becky Daly, in the vain effort to "peacify" thesqualling young one, had given her a fresh egg to play with. I kindo' like the looks of the younger generation of girls. But I don't knowabout the young fellows. They look to me like a trifling lot. Nothinglike what they were in our young days. I don't see but what us oldcodgers had better hold on a while longer to the County Clerk's office, and the Sheriff's office, and the Probate judgeship, and the presidencyof the National Bank. It wouldn't be safe to trust the destinies ofthe country in the hands of such heedless young whiffets. Engaged to bemarried! Oh, get out! What? Those babies?

I kept awake most of the time the man was lecturing on: "The Republic:Will it Endure?" but I don't remember that he said anything in it aboutthe crops. (We can't go 'round meeting the folks all day. We really mustgive a glance at the exhibition. ) And I am one of those who hold to thebelief that while the farmers can raise ears of corn as long as fromyour elbow to your fingertips, as big 'round as a rollingpin, and setwith grains as regular and even as an eight-dollar set of artificialteeth; as long as they grow potatoes the size of your foot, and suchpretty oats and wheat, and turnips, and squashes, and onions, and applesand all kinds of truck, and raise them not only in increasing size butincreasing quantities to the acre I feel as if the Republic would lastthe year out anyway. Not that I have any notion that mere materialprosperity will make and keep us a free people, but it goes to show thatthe farmers are not plodding along, doing as their fathers did beforethem, but that they are reading and studying, and taking advantage ofmodern methods. There are two ways of increasing your income. One is byenlarging your output, and the other is by enlarging your share of theproceeds from the sale of that output. The Grand Dukes will not alwaysrun this country. The farmers saved the Union once by dying for it;they will save it again by living for it. 

The scientific fellows tell us that we have not nearly reached themaximum of yield to the acre of crops that are harvested once a year, but in regard to the crops that are harvested twice a day it looks to meas if we were doing fairly well. Nowadays we hardly know what is meantby the expression, "Spring poor. " It is a sinister phrase, and tellsa story of the old, cruel days when farmers begrudged their cattle thelittle bite they ate in wintertime, so that when the grass came againthe poor creatures would fall over trying to crop it. They were sostarved and weak that, as the saying went, they had to lean up againstthe fence to breathe. They don't do that way now, as one look at thefine, sleek cows will show you. A cow these days is a different sort ofa being, her coat like satin, and her udder generous, compared with thewild-eyed things with burrs in their tails, and their flanks crustedwith filth, their udders the size of a kid glove, and yielding such alittle dab of milk and for such a short period. Hear the dairymen boastnow of the miraculous yearly yield in pounds of butter and milk, andwhen they say: "You've got to treat a cow as if she were a lady, " itsounds like good sense. 

Pigs are naturally so untidy about their persons, and have such shockingtable-manners that it seems difficult to treat a sow like a lady, butthat one in the pen yonder, with her litter of sucking pigs, seemsvery interesting. Come, let's have a look. Aren't the little pigs dearthings? I'd like to climb in and take one of them up to pet it; do yous'pose she'd mind it if I did? I can see decided improvement in themodern hogs over old Mose Batcheller's. If you remember, his were whatwere known as "razorbacks. " They could go like the wind, and the fencewas not made that could stop them. If they couldn't root under it, theycould turn themselves sidewise and slide through between the rails. It was told me that, failing all else, they could give their tails aswing--you remember the big balls of mud they used to have on theirtails' ends--they could swing their tails after the manner of an athletethrowing the hammer, and fly over the top of the tallest stake-and-riderfence ever put up. I don't know whether this is the strict truth or not, but it is what was told me as a little boy, and I don't think peoplewould wilfully deceive an innocent child. 

The pigs nowaday aren't as smart as that, but they cut up better athog-killing time. They aren't quite so trim; indeed, they are nothingbut cylinders of meat, whittled to a point at the front end, and set onfour pegs, but as you lean on the top-rail of the pens out at the CountyFair and look down upon them, you can picture in your mind, withoutmuch effort, ham, and sidemeat, and bacon, and spare-ribs, and smokedshoulder, and head-cheese, and liver-wurst, and sausages, and glisteningwhite lard for crullers and pie-crust--Yes, I think pigs are rightinteresting. I know they've got Scripture for it, the folks that thinkit is wrong to eat pork, but somehow I feel sorry for them; they misssuch a lot, not only in the eating line, but other ways. They are alwaysbeing persecuted, and harassed, and picked at. Whereas the pork-fed man, it seems to me, sort of hankers to be picked at. It gives him a goodchance to slap somebody slonchways. He feels better after he has seenhis persecutors go away with a cut lip, and fingering of their teeth tosee if they're all there. 

You'll just have to take me gently but firmly by the sleeve and lead mepast the next exhibit, the noisy one, where there's so much cacklingand crowing. I give you fair warning that if you get me started talkingabout chickens, the County Fair will have to wait till some other time. I don't know much about ducks, and geese, and guinea-hens, and pea-fowl, and turkeys, but chickens--Why, say. We had a hen once (Plymouth Rockshe was; we called her Henrietta), and honestly, that hen knew more thansome folks. One time she--all right. I'll hush. Let's go in here. 

I don't remember whether the pies, and cakes, and canned fruit, and suchare in Pomona Hall or the Fine Arts Hall. Fine Arts Hall I think. Theyought to be. I speak to be one of the judges that give out the premiumsin this department. I'd be generous and let somebody else do the judgingof the cakes, because I don't care much for cake. Oh, I can manageto choke it down, but I haven't the expert knowledge, practical andscientific, that I have in the matter of pie. I'd bear my share of thework when it came to the other things, jellies and preserves, and pies, but not cake. Wouldn't know just exactly how to go at it in the matterof jellies. I'd take a glass of currant, and hold it up to the light tonote its crimson glory. And I'd lift off the waxed paper top and peerin, and maybe give the jelly a shake. And then I'd take a spoon andtaste, closing my eyes so as to appear to deliberate--they'd roll upin an ecstacy anyhow--and I'd smack my lips, and say: "Mmmmm!" verythoughtfully, and set the glass back, and write down in my book myjudgment, which would invariably be: "First Prize. " Because if there isanything on top of this green earth that I think is just about right, itis currant jelly. Grape jelly is nice, and crab-apple jelly has its goodpoints, and quince jelly is very delicate, but there is something aboutcurrant jelly that seems to touch the spot. Quince preserves are goodif there is enough apple with the quince, and watermelon preserves are agreat favorite, not because they are so much better tasting, but becausethe lucent golden cubes in the spicy syrup appeal so to the eye. Butif you want to know what I think is really good eating in the preserveline, you just watch my motions when I come to the tomato preserves, these little fig-tomatoes, and see how quick the red card is put onthem. Yes, indeed. It's been a long time, hasn't it? since you had anytomato-preserves, you that haven't been "Back Home" lately. 

It's no great trick to put up other fruit so that it will keep, but I'dlook the canned tomatoes over pretty carefully, and if I saw that onelady had not only put them up so that they hadn't turned foamy, but hadalso succeeded with green corn, and that other poser, string beans, I'd give her first premium, because I'd know she was a first-ratehousekeeper, and a careful woman, and one that deserved encouragement. 

But I'd save myself for the pies. I can tell a rich, short, flaky crust, and I can tell the kind that is as brown as a dried apple, and tough asthe same on the top, and sad and livery on the bottom. And I know aboutfillings, how thick they ought to be, and how they ought to be seasoned, and all. Particularly pumpkin-pies, because I had early advantages thatway that very few other boys had. I was allowed to scrape the crock thathad held the pumpkin for the pies. So that's how I know as much as I do. 

I suppose, however, when all is said and done, that there is no pie thatcan quite come up to an apple-pie. You take nice, short crust that'sbeen worked up with ice-water, and line the tin with it, and fill itheaping with sliced, tart apples--not sauce. Mercy, no!--and sweetenthem just right, and put on a lump of butter, and some allspice, andperhaps a clove, and a little lemon peel, and then put on the cover, and trim off the edge, and pinch it up in scallops, and draw a couple ofleaves in the top with a sharp knife, and have the oven just right, andset it in there, and I tell you that when ma opens the oven-door to seehow the pie is coming on, there distils through the house such a perfumethat you cry out in a choking voice: "Say! Ain't dinner 'most ready?"

But I fully recognize the fact that very often our judgment is warped byfeeling, and I am inclined to believe that even the undoubted merit ofthe apple-pie would not prevail against a vinegar-pie, if such should bepresented to me for my decision. A vinegar-pie? Well, it has a top andbottom crust, the same as any other pie, but its filling is madeof vinegar, diluted with water to the proper degree of sub-acidity, sweetened with molasses, thickened with flour, and all baked as anyother pie. You smile at its crude simplicity, and wonder why I shouldfavor it. To you it doesn't tell the story that it does to me. Itdoesn't take you back in imagination to "the airly days, " when folkscame over the mountains in covered wagons, and settled in the WesternReserve, leaving behind them all the civilization of their day, and itscomforts, parting from relatives and friends, knowing full well thatin this life they never more should look upon their faces--leavingeverything behind to make a new home in the western wilds. 

Is was a land of promise that they came to. The virgin soil boreriotously. There were fruit-trees in the forest that Johnny Appleseedhad planted on his journeyings. The young husband could stand in hisdooryard and kill wild turkeys with his rifle. They fed to loathingon venison, and squirrels, and all manner of game, and once in a greatwhile they had the luxury of salt pork. They were well-nourished, but sometimes they pined for that which was more than mere food. Theyhungered for that which should be to the meals' victuals what the floweris to the plant. 

"I whoosh't--I woosh't was so we could hev pie, " sighed one such. (Letus call him Uriah Kinney). I think that sounds as if it were his name. 

"Land's sakes!" snapped his wife, exasperated that he should be thinkingof the same thing that she was. "Land's sakes! Haow d' ye s'pose I kinmake a pie when I hain't got e'er a thing to make it aout o'? You gimmesuthirnn to make it aout o', an' you see haow quick--"

"I ain't a-faultinn ye, Mary Ann, " interposed Uriah gently. "I know haow't is. I was on'y tellin' ye. I git I git a kind o' hum'sick sometimes. 'Pears like as if I sh'd feel more resigned like.... Don't ye cry, MaryAnn. I know, I know. You feel julluk I do 'baout back home, an' all lukthat. "

O woman! When the heft of thy intellect is thrown against a problem, something has got to give. Not long after, Uriah sits down to dinner, and can hardly ask a blessing, he has to swallow so. A pie is on thetable!

"Gosh, Mary Ann, but this is good!" says he, holding out his handfor the third piece. "This is lickinn good!" And he celebrates herachievement far and wide. 

"My Mary Ann med me a pie t' other day, was the all-firedest best pie Iever et. "

"Med you what?"

"Med me a pie. "

"Pie? Whutch talkinn' baout? Can't git nummore pies naow. Frot 's allgin aout. "

"I golly, she med it just the same. Smartest woman y' ever see. " The mandribbled at the mouth. 

"What sh' make it aout o'?"

"Vinegar an' worter, I think she said. I d' know 's I ever et anythinnI relished julluk that. My Mary Ann, tell yew! She's 'baout's smart 'sthey make 'em. "

I wish I knew who she really was whom I have called Mary Ann Kinney, shethat made the first vinegar-pie. I wish I knew where her grave is thatI might lay upon it a bunch of flowers, such as she knew andliked--sweet-william, and phlox, and larkspur, and wild columbine. Itcouldn't make it up to her for all the hardships she underwent when shewas bringing up a family in that wild, western country, and especiallythat fall when they all had the "fever 'n' ager" so bad, Uriah and thetwins chilling one day, and Hiram and Sophronia Jane the next, and shejust as miserable as any of them, but keeping up somehow, God only knowshow. It couldn't make it up to her, but as I laid the pretty posiesagainst the leaning headstone on which is written:

 "A Loving Wife, a Mother Dear, Faithful Friend Lies Buried Here. "

I believe she 'd get word of it somehow, and understand what I wastrying to say by it. 

I'll ask to be let off the committee that judges the rest of theexhibits in the Fine Arts Hall, the quilts and the Battenberg, and thecrocheting, and such. I know the Log Cabin pattern, and theMexican Feather pattern, and I think I could make out to tell theHen-and-Chickens pattern of quilts, but that's as much as ever. And asto the real, hand-painted views of fruit-cake, and grapes and apples ona red table-cloth, I am one of those that can't make allowances for thefact that she only took two terms. I call to mind one picture that MissAlvalou Ashbaker made of her pap, old "Coonrod" Ashbaker. The Lord knowshe was a "humbly critter, " but he wasn't as "humbly" as she made him outto be, with his eyes bulging out of his head as if he was choking on afishbone. And, instead of her dressing him up in his Sunday clothes, Iwish I may never see the back of my neck if that girl didn't paint himin a red-and-black barred flannel shirt, with porcelain buttons on it!And his hair looked as if the calf had been at it. Wouldn't you thinksomebody would have told her? And that isn't all. She got the premium!

Neither am I prepared to pass judgment on the fancy penmanship displayedby Professor Swope, framed elegantly in black walnut, and gilt, depicting a bounding deer, all made out of hair-line, shaded spirals, done with his facile pen. (No wonder a deer can jump so, with all thosesprings inside him. ) Professor Swope writes visiting cards for you, wonderful birds done in flourishes and holding ribbons in their bills. He puts your name on the ribbon place. Neatest and tastiest thing youcan imagine. I like to watch him do it, but it makes me feel unhappy, somehow. I never was much of a scribe, and it's too late for me to learnnow. 

I don't feel so downcast when I examine the specimens of writing done bythe children of District No. 34. I can just see the young ones workingat home on these things, with their tongues stuck out of one corner oftheir mouths. 

 "Rome was not built in a day Rome was not built in a day Rome was not built in a day"

and so on, bearing down hard on the downstroke of the curve in thecapital "R, " and clubbing the end of the little "t. " And in the highergrades, they toil over "An Original Social Letter, " describing toan imaginary correspondent a visit to Crystal Lake, or the MagneticSprings. I can hear them mourn: "What shall I say next?" and "Ma, makeEffie play some place else, won't you? She jist joggles the table likeeverything. Now, see what you done! Now I got to write it all overagain. No, I cain't 'scratch it out. How'd it look to the County Fairall scratched out? Plague take it all!"

The same hands have done maps of North and South America, andred-and-blue ink pictures of the circulation of the blood. It does beatall how smart the young ones are nowadays. I could no more draw off apicture of the circulation of the blood--get it right, I mean--why, Iwouldn't attempt it. 

I am kind of mixed up in my recollection of the hall right next to theFine Arts. You know it had two doors in each end. Sometimes I cansee the central space between the doors, roped off and devoted tosewing-machines with persons demonstrating that they ran as light as afeather, and how it was no trouble at all to tuck and gather, andfell; to organs, which struck me with amaze, because by some witchcraft(octave coupler, I think they called it) the man could play on keysthat he didn't touch, and pianos, whereon young ladies were prevailed toperform "Silvery Waves"--that's a lovely piece, I think, don't you?--and

 "Listen to the mocking-bird, TEE-die-eedle-DONG Lisen to the mocking-bird, teedle-eedle-EE-dle DONG The mocking-bird still singing oer her grave, toomatooral-oo-cal-LEE!"

And then again I can see that central, roped-off space given overto reckless deviltry, sheer impudent, brazen-faced, bold, discipline-defying er--er--wickedness. I had heard that people didthings like that, but this was the first time I had ever caught aglimpse of such carryings-on in the broad open daylight, right beforeeverybody. I stood there and watched them for hours, expecting everyminute to see fire fall from heaven on them and burn up every son anddaughter of Belial. But it didn't. 

I seem to recollect that it was a hot day, and that, tucked away wherenot a breath of air could get to them, were three fellows in theirshirtsleeves, one playing on an organ, one on a yellow clarinet, andone on a fiddle. Every chance he could get, the fiddler would say to theorganist: "Gimme A, please, " and saw away trying to get into some sortof tune, but the catgut was never twisted that would hold to pitchwith the perspiration dribbling down his fingers in little rills. Theclarinet man looked as if he wanted to cry, and he had to twitter hiseyelids all the time to keep the sweat from blinding him, and every oncein a while, his soggy reed would let go of a squawk that sounded likea scared chicken. But the organ groaned on unrelentingly, and the tunedidn't matter so much as the rhythm which was kept up as regular as aclock, whack! whack! whack! whack! And there were two or three otherfellows with badges on that went around shouting: "Select your podnersfor the next quadrille! One more couple wanted right over here!"

Dancing. M-hm. 

The fiddler "called off" and chanted to the tune, with his mouth on oneside: "Sullootch podners! First couple forward and back. Side couplesthe same. Doe see do-o-o-o. Al-lee-man LEFT! Ballunce ALL! Sa-weeny thecorners!" I don't know whether I get the proper order of these commandsor not, or whether my memory serves me as to their effect, but it seemsto me that at "Bal-lunce ALL!" the ladies demurely teetered, first onone foot and then on the other, like a frozen-toed rooster, while thegents fairly tore themselves apart with grape-vine twists and fancysteps, and slapped the dust out of the cracks in the floor. When it cameto "SaWEENG your podners!" the room billowed with flying skirts, and theladies squealed like anything. It made you a little dizzy to watch themdo "Graaan' right and left, " and you could understand how those folksfelt--there were always one or two in each set--who had to be hauledthis way and that, not sure whether they were having a good time ornot, but hoping they were, their faces set in a sickly grin, while theirforeheads wrinkled into a puzzled: "How's that? I didn't quite catchthat last remark" expression. I don't know if it affected you in thesame way that it did me, but after I had stood there for a time andwatched those young men and women thus wasting the precious moments thatdropped like priceless pearls into the ocean of Eternity, and werelost irrevocably, young, men and women giving themselves up to presentenjoyment without one serious thought in their minds as to who was goingto wash the supper dishes, or what would happen if the house took firewhile they were away I say I do not know how the sight of such recklessfrivolity affected you, but I know that after so long a time my facewould get all cramped up from wearing a grin, and I'd have to go out andlook at the reapers and binders to rest myself so I could come back andlook some. There are two things that you simply have to do at the CountyFair, or you aren't right sure you've been. One is to drink a glass ofsweet cider just from the press, (which, I may say in passing, is anover-rated luxury. Cider has to be just the least bit "frisky" to begood. I don't mean hard, but "frisky. " You know). And the other is tobuy a whip, if it is only the little toy, fifteen-cent kind. On thenext soap-box to the old fellow that comes every year to sell pictorialBibles and red, plush-covered albums, the old fellow in the greenslippers that talks as if he were just ready to drop off to sleep--onthe next soap-box to him is the man that sells the whips. You can buyone for a dollar, two for a dollar, or four for a dollar, but not onefor fifty cents, or one for a quarter. Don't ask me why, for I don'tknow. I am just stating the facts. It can't be done, for I've seen ittried, and if you keep up the attempt too long, the whip-man will loseall patience with your unreasonableness, and tell you to go 'long aboutyour business if you've got any, and not bother the life and soul out ofhim, because he won't sell anything but a dollar's worth of whips, andthat's all there is about it. 

He sells other things, handsaws, and pencils, and mouth-harps, and twoknives for a quarter, of such pure steel that he whittles shavings offa wire nail with 'em, and is particular to hand you the very identicalknife he did it with. He has jewelry, though I don't suppose you couldcut a wire nail with it. You might, at that. 

To him approaches a boy. 

"Got 'ny collar-buttons?"

"Well, now, I'll just look and see. Here's a beautiful rolled-plate goldwatch-chain, with an elegant jewel charm. Lovely blue jewel. " He danglesthe chain and its rich glass pendant, and it certainly does look fine. "That'd cost you $2. 50 at the store. How'd that strike you?"

"Hpm. I want a collar-button. "

"Well, now, you hold on a minute. Lemme look again. Ah, here's a package'at orta have some in it. Yes, sir, here's four of 'em, enough to lastyou a lifetime; front, back, and both sleeves, the kind that flips anddon't tear the buttonholes. Well, by ginger! Now, how'd that git inhere, I want to know? That gold ring? Well, I don't care. It'll have togo with the collar-buttons. Tell you what I'll do with you: I'll let youhave this elegant solid gold rolled-plate watch-chain and jewel, thiselegant, solid gold ring to git married with--Hay? How about it?--andthese four collar-buttons for--for--twenty-five cents, or a quarter of adollar. "

That boy never took that quarter out of his breeches pocket. It justjumped out of itself. But I see that you are getting the fidgets. You'rehoping that I'll come to the horse-racing pretty soon. You want tohave it all brought back to you, the big, big race-track which, as youremember it now, must have been about the next size smaller than theearth's orbit around the sun. You want me to tell about the old farmerwith the bunch of timothy whiskers under his chin that gets his oldjingling wagon on the track just before a heat is to be trotted, andall the people yell at him: "Take him out!" You want me to tell howthe trotters looked walking around in their dusters, with the eye-holesbound with red braid, and how the drivers of the sulkies sat with thetails of their horses tucked under one leg. Well, I'm not going todo anything of the kind, and if you don't like it, you can go to thebox-office and demand your money back. I hope you'll get it. Firstplace, I don't know anything about racing, and consequently I don'tbelieve it's a good thing for the country. All I know is, that somehorses can go faster than others, but which are the fastest ones I can'ttell by the looks, though I have tried several times.... I did not walkback. I bought a round-trip ticket. They will tell you that these eventsat the County Fair tend to improve the breed of horses. So they do--offast horses. But the fast horses are no good. They can't any of them goas fast as a nickel trolley-car when it gets out where there aren't anyhouses. And they not only are no good; they're a positive harm. You knowand I know that just as soon as a man gets cracked after fast horses, it's good-by John with him. 

In the next place, I wouldn't mind it if it was only interesting to me. But it isn't. It bores me to death. You sit there and sit there tryingto keep awake while the drivers jockey and jockey, scheming to get theadvantage of the other fellow, and the bell rings so many times for themto come back after you think: "They're off this time, sure, " that youget sick of hearing it. And when they do get away, why, who can tellwhich horse is in the lead? On the far side of the track they don'tappear to do anything but poke along, and once in a while some foolhorse will "break" and that's annoying. And then when they come intothe stretch, the other folks that see you with the field-glasses, keepnudging you and asking: "Who 's ahead, mister? Hay? Who's ahead?" Andit's ruinous to the voice to yell: "Go it! Go it! Go IT, ye devil, you!" with your throat all clenched that way and your face as red as aturkey-gobbler's. And that second when they are going under the wire, and the horse you rather like is about a nose behind the other onethat you despise--Oh, tedious, very tedious. Ho hum, Harry! If I wasn'tengaged, I wouldn't marry. Did you think to put a saucer of milk out forthe kitty before you locked up the house?

No. Horse-racing bores me to death, and as I am one of the chartermembers of the Anti-Other-Folks-Enjoyment Society, organized to stoppeople from amusing themselves in ways that we don't care for, youcan readily see that it is a matter of principle with me to ignorehorseracing, and not to give it so much encouragement as would come frommentioning it. 

If you're so interested in improving the breed of horses by competitivecontests, what 's the matter with that one where the prize is $5 for theteam that can haul the heaviest load on a stoneboat, straight pulling?Pile on enough stones to build a house, pretty near, and the ownerof the team, a young fellow with a face like Keats, goes "Ck! Ck! Ck!Geet... Ep... Thah BILL! Geet ep, Doll-ay!" and cracks his whip, andkisses with his mouth, and the horses dance and tug, and jump around andstrain till the stone-boat slides on the grass, and then men climb onuntil the load gets so heavy that the team can't budge it. Then anotherteam tries, and so on, the competitors jawing and jowering at each otherwith: "Ah, that ain't fair! That ain't fair! They started it sideways. "

"That don't make no difference. "

"Yes, it does, too, make a difference. Straight ahead four inches. That's the rule. "

"Well, didn't they go straight ahead four inches? What's a matter withye?"

"I'll darn soon show ye what's the matter with me, you come any o' yourshenanigan around here. "

"Mighty ready to accuse other folks o' shenannigan, ain't ye? For halfa cent I'd paste you in the moot. "

"Now, boys! Now boys! None o' that. "

Lots more excitement than a horse-race. Lots more improving to the mind, and beneficial to the country. 

And if you hanker after the human element of skill, what's the matterwith the contest where the women see who can hitch up a horse thequickest? Didn't you have your favorite picked out from the start? Idid. She was about thirteen years old, dressed in an organdie, and Ithink she had light blue ribbons flying from her hat, light blue orpink, I forget which. Her pa helped her unharness, and you could tell bythe way he look-at her that he thought she was about the smartestyoung one for her age in her neighborhood. (You ought to hear her play"General Grant's Grand March" on the organ he bought for her, a fineorgan with twenty-four stops and two full sets of reeds, and a mirror inthe top, and places to set bouquets and all. ) There was a woman in thecontest that seemed, by her actions, to think that the others were justwasting their time competing with her, but when they got the word "Go!"(Old Nate Wells was the judge; he sold out the livery-stable businessto Charley, you recollect) her horse backed in wrong, and she got theharness all twisty-ways, and everything went bewitched. And wasn't sheprovoked, though? Served her right, I say. A little woman beside her wasthe first to jump into her buggy, and drive off with a strong inhalationof breath, and that nipping together of the lips that says: "A-a-ah! Itell ye!" The little girl that we picked out was hopping around like ascared cockroach, and her pa seemed to be saying: "Now, keep cool! Keepcool! Don't get flustered, " but when another woman drove off, I know shealmost cried, she felt so bad. But she was third, and when she and herpa drove around the ring, the people clapped her lots more than theother two. I guess they must have picked her for a favorite the same asyou and I did. Bless her heart! I hope she got a good man when she grewup. 

Around back of the Old Settlers' Cabin, where they have the relics, thespinning-wheel, the flax-hackle, and the bunch of dusty tow that nobodyknows how to spin in these degenerate days; the old flint-lock rifle, and the powder-horn; the tinder-box, and the blue plate, "more'n ahundred years old;" the dog-irons, tongs, poker, and turkey-wing of anancient fireplace--around back of the Old Settlers' Cabin all the earlypart of the day a bunch of dirty canvas has been dangling from a ropestretched between two trees. It was fenced off from the curious, butafter dinner a stranger in fringy trousers and a black singlet wentaround picking out big, strong, adventurous young fellows to stand aboutthe wooden ring fastened to the bottom of the bunch of canvas, whichwent over the smoke-pipe of a sort of underground furnace in which aroaring fire had been built. As the hot air filled the great bag, it wasthe task of these helpers to shake out the wrinkles and to hold it down. Older and wiser ones forbade their young ones to go near it. Supposingit should explode; what then? But we have always wanted to fly awayup into the air, and what did we come to the Fair for, if not forexcitement? The balloon swells out amazingly fast, and when theguy-ropes are loosened and drop to the ground, the elephantine bagclumsily lunges this way and that, causing shrill squeals from those whofear to be whelmed in it. The man in the singlet tosses kerosene intothe furnace from a tin cup, and you can see the tall flames leap upwardfrom the flue into the balloon. It grows tight as a drum. 

"Watch your horses!" he calls out. There is a pause.... "Let go all!"The mighty shape shoots up twenty feet or so, and the man in the singletdarts to the corner to cut a lone detaining rope. As he runs he shedshis fringy trousers. 

"Good-by, everybody!" he cries out, and the sinister possibilities inthat phrase are overlooked in the wonder at seeing him lurch upwardthrough the air, all glorious in black tights and yellow breech-clout. Up and up he soars above the tree-tops, and the wind gently wafts himalong, a pendant to a dusky globe hanging in the sky. He is just a specknow swaying to and fro. The globe plunges upward; the pendant drops likea shot. There is a rustling sound. It is the intake of the breath ofhorror from ten thousand pairs of lungs. Look! Look! The edges of theparachute ruffle, and then it blossoms out like an opening flower. Itbounces on the air a little, and rocking gently sinks like thistle-downbehind the woods. 

It is all over. The Fair is over. Let's go home. Isn't it wonderfulthough, what men can do? You'll see; they'll be flying like birds, oneof these days. That's what we little boys think, but we overhear oldNate Wells say to Tom Slaymaker, as we pass them: "Well, I d' know. Id' know 's these here b'loon ascensions is worth the money they costthe 'Sociation. I seen so many of 'em, they don't interest me nummore. 'Less, o' course, sumpun should happen to the feller. "

CHRISTMAS BACK HOME

It was the time of year when the store windows are mighty interesting. Plotner's bakery, that away, 'way back in the summer-time, was anice-cream saloon, showed a plaster man in the window, with long, whitewhiskers, in top boots and a brown coat and peaked hat, all trimmed withfur, and carrying a little pinetree with arsenical foliage. Over hishead dangled a thicket of canes hanging by their crooks from a twinestring stretched across. They were made of candy striped spirally in redand white. There were candy men and women in the window, and chocolatemice with red eyes, and a big cake, all over frosting, with a candypreacher on it marrying a candy man and lady. The little children stoodoutside, with their joggerfies, and arithmetics, and spellers, andslates bound in red flannel under their arms, and swallowed hard as theylooked. Whenever anybody went in for a penny's worth of yeast and openedthe door, that had a bell fastened to it so that Mrs. Plotner couldhear in the back room, and come to wait on the customer, the smell ofwintergreen and peppermint and lemonsticks and hot taffy gushed out sostrong that they couldn't swallow fast enough, but stood there chokingand dribbling at the mouth. 

Brown's shoe store exhibited green velvet slippers with deers' headson them, and Galbraith's windows were hung with fancy dressgoods, andhandkerchiefs with dogs' heads in the corners; but, next to Plotner's, Case's drug-and-book store was the nicest. When you first went in, itsmelled of cough candy and orris root, but pretty soon you could noticethe smell of drums and new sleds, and about the last smell, (sort ofdown at the bottom of things) was the smell of new books, the fish-glueon the binding, and the muslin covers, and the printer's ink, and thatis a smell that if it ever gets a good hold of you, never lets go. Therewere the "Rollo" books, and the "Little Prudy" books, and "Minnie andHer Pets, " and the "Elm Island" series, and the "Arabian Nights, " withcolored pictures, and There were skates all curled up at the toes, andballs of red and black leather in alternate quarters, and China mugs, with "Love the Giver, " and "For a Good Boy" in gilt letters on them. Kind of Dutch letters they were. And there were dolls with black, shinyhair, and red cheeks, and blue eyes, with perfectly arched eyebrows. They had on black shoes and white stockings, with pink garters, and theyalmost always toed in a little. They looked so cold in the window withnothing but a "shimmy" on, and fairly ached to be dressed, and nursed, and sung to. The little girls outside the window felt an emptiness inthe hollow of their left arms as they gazed. There was one big doll inthe middle all dressed up. It had real hair that you could comb, and itwas wax. Pure wax! Yes, sir. And it could open and shut its eyes, and ifyou squeezed its stomach it would cry, of course, not like a real baby, but more like one of those ducks that stand on a sort of bellows thing. Though they all "chose" that doll and hoped for miracles, none of themreally expected to find it in her stocking sixteen days later. (Theykept count of the days. ) Maybe Bell Brown might get it; her pa boughther lots of things. She had parlor skates and a parrot, only her mawouldn't let her skate in the parlor, it tore up the carpet so, and theparrot bit her finger like anything. 

The little boys kicked their copper-toed boots to keep warm andquarreled about which one chose the train of cars first, and then beganto quarrel over an army of soldiers. 

"I choose them!"

"A-aw! You choosed the ingine and the cars. "

"Dung care. I choose everything in this whole window. "

"A-aw! That ain't fair!"

In the midst of the wrangle somebody finds out that Johnny Pym hasa piece of red glass, and then they begin fighting for turns lookingthrough it at the snow and the court-house. But not for long. Theyfall to bragging about what they are going to get for Christmas. EddieCameron was pretty sure he 'd get a spy-glass. He asked his pa, and hispa said "Mebby. He'd see about it. " Then, just in time, they looked upand saw old man Nicholson coming along with his shawl pinned around him. They ran to the other side of the street because he stops little boys, and pats them on the head, and asks them if they have found the Savior. It makes some boys cry when he asks them that. 

The Rowan twins--Alfaretta and Luanna May--are working a pair ofslippers for their pa, one apiece, because it is such slow work. Alongabout suppertime they make Elmer Lonnie stay outside and watch for hiscoming, and he has to say: "Hello, pa!" very loud, and romp with himoutside the gate so as to give the twins time to gather up the coloredzephyrs and things, and hide them in the lower bureau drawer in thespare bedroom. At such a time their mother finds an errand that takesher into the parlor so that she can see that they do not, by any chance, look into the middle drawer in the farther left-hand corner, under thepillow-slips. 

One night, just at supper-time, Elmer Lonnie said: "Hello, pa!" andthen they heard pa whispering and Elmer Lonnie came in looking verysolemn--or trying to--and said: "Ma, Miss Waldo wants to know if youwon't please step over there a minute. "

"Did she say what for? Because I'm right in the midst of gettingsupper. I look for your pa any minute now, and I don't want to keep himwaiting. "

"No 'm, she didn't say what for. She jist said: 'Ast yer ma won't sheplease an' step over here a minute. ' I wouldn't put anythin' on. 'Tain't cold. You needn't stay long, only till... I guess she's in some ofa hurry. "

"Well, if Harriet Waldo thinks 'at I haven't anythin' better to do 'ntrot around after her at her beck an'.... All right, I'll come. "

The twins got their slippers hid, and Mrs. Rowan threw her shawl overher head, and went next door to take Mrs. Waldo completely by surprise. The good woman immediately invented an intricate problem in crochetwork demanding instant solution. Mr. Rowan had brought home a crayonenlargement of a daguerreotype of Ma, taken before she was married, whenthey wore their hair combed down over their ears, and wide lace collarsfastened with a big cameo pin, and puffed sleeves with the armholesnearly at the elbows. They wore lace mitts then, too. The twins thoughtit looked so funny, but Pa said: "It was all the style in them days. Laws! I mind the first time I took her home from singin' school.... Tell you where less hide it. In between the straw tick, and the feathertick. " And Luanna May said: "What if company should come?" Elmer Lonnieran over to Mrs. Waldo's to tell Ma that Pa had come home, and wantedhis supper right quick, because he had to get back to the store, therewas so much trade in the evenings now. 

"I declare, Emmeline Rowan, you're gettin' to be a reg'lar gadabout, "said Mr. Rowan, very savagely. "Gad, gad, gad, from mornin' till night. Ain't they time in daylight fer you an' Hat Waldo to talk about yourneighbors 'at you can't stay home long enough to git me my supper?"

He winked at the twins so funny that Alfaretta, who always was kind offlighty, made a little noise with her soft palate and tried to pass itoff for a cough. Luanna May poked her in the ribs with her elbow, andMrs. Rowan spoke up quite loud: "Why, Pa, how you go on! I wasn't buta minute, an' you hardly ever come before halfpast. And furthermore, mister, I want to know how I'm to keep this house a-lookin' likeanything an' you a-trackin' in snow like that. Just look at you. I sh'dthink you'd know enough to stomp your feet before you come in. Luanna May, you come grind the coffee. Alfie, run git your Pa his oldslippers. " That set both of them to giggling, and Mrs. Rowan went outinto the kitchen and began to pound the beefsteak. 

"D' you think she sispicioned anythin'?" asked Mr. Rowan out of one sideof his mouth, and Elmer Lonnie said, "No, sir, " and wondered if his Pa"sispicioned anythin"' when Ma said, "Run git the old slippers. "

Mr. Waldo always walked up with Mr. Rowan, and just about that time hislittle Mary Ellen was climbing up into his lap and saying: "I bet youcan't guess what I'm a-goin' to buy you for a Christmas gift with mypennies what I got saved up. "

"I'll just bet I can. "

"No, you can't. It's awful pretty--I mean, they're awful pretty. Somepinyou want, too. " How could he guess with her fingering his tarnished cuffbuttons and looking down at them every minute or two?

"Well, now, let me see. Is it a gold watch?"

"Nope. "

"Aw, now! I jist set my heart on a gold watch and chain. "

"Well, but it'd cost more money 'n I got. Three or fifteen dollars, mebby. "

"Well, let me see. Is it a shotgun?"

"No, sir. Oh, you just can't guess it. "

"Is it a--a--Is it a horse and buggy?"

"Aw, now, you're foolin'. No, it ain't a horse and buggy. "

"I know what it is. It's a dolly with real hair that you can comb, andall dressed up in a blue dress. One that can shut its eyes when it goesbye-bye. "

Little Mary Ellen looks at him very seriously a minute, and sighs, andsays: "No, it ain't that. But if it was, wouldn't you let me play withit when you was to the store?" And he catches her up in his arms andsays: "You betchy! Now, I ain't goin' to guess any more! I want to besurprised. You jump down an' run an' ask Ma if supper ain't most ready. Tell her I'm as hungry as a hound pup. "

He hears her deliver the message, and also the word her mother sendsback: "Tell him to hold his horses. It 'll be ready in a minute. "

"It will, eh? Well, I can't wait a minute, an' I'm goin' to take ahog-bite right out of YOU!" and he snarls and bites her right in themiddle of her stomach, and if there is anything more ticklesome thanthat, it hasn't been heard of yet. 

After supper, little Eddie Allgire teases his brother D. To tell himabout Santa Claus. D. Is cracking walnuts on a flat-iron held betweenhis knees. 

"Is they any Santy Claus, D. ?"

"W'y, cert, they is. Who says not?"

"Bunty Rogers says they ain't no sech a person. "

"You tell Bunt Rogers that he's a-gittin' too big fer his britches, an'first thing he knows, he'll whirl round an' see his naked nose. Tell himI said so. "

"Well, is they any Santy Claus?"

"W'y cert. Ain't I a-tellin' you? Laws! ain't you never seen him yet?"

"I seen that kind of a idol they got down in Plotner's winder. "

"Well, he looks jist like that, on'y he's alive. "

"Did you ever see him, D. ?"

"O-oh, well! Think I'm goin' to tell everything I know? Well, I guessnot. "

"Well, but did you now?"

"M-well, that 'd be tellin'. "

"Aw, now, D. , tell me. "

"Look out what you're doin'. Now see that. You pretty near made me mashmy thumb. "

"Aw, now, D. , tell me. I think you might. I don't believe you ever did. "

"Oh, you don't, hey? Well, if you had 'a saw what I saw. M-m! Littleround eyes an' red nose an' white whiskers, an' heard the sleigh bells, an' oh, my! them reindeers! Cutest little things! Stompin' their littlefeet" Here he stopped, and went on cracking nuts. 

"Tell some more. Woncha, please? Ma, make D. Tell me the rest of it. "

"Huck-uh! Dassant. 'T wouldn't be right. Like's not he won't put anythin'in my stockin' now fer what I did tell. "

"How'll he know?"

"How'll he know? Easy enough. He goes around all the houses evenings nowto see how the young ones act, an' if he finds they're sassy, an' don'tmind their Ma when she tells them to leave the cat alone, an' if theywhine: 'I don' want to go out an' cut the kindlin'. Why cain't D. Doit?' then he puts potatoes an' lumps o' coal in their stockin's. Oh, he'll be here, course o' the evenin'. "

"D' you s'pose he's round here now?" Eddie got a little closer to hisbrother. 

"I wouldn't wonder. Yes, sir. There he goes now. Sure's you're alive. "

"Where?"

"Right over yan. Aw, you don't look. See? There he is. Aw! you're tooslow. Didn't you see him? Now the next time I tell you--Look, look!There! He run right acrost the floor an' into the closet. Plain 's day. Didn't you see him? You saw him, mother?"

Mrs. Allgire nodded her head. She was busy counting the stitches in anubia she was knitting for old Aunt Pashy, Roebuck. 

"W'y, you couldn't help but see him, didn't you take notice to his whitewhiskers?"

"Ye-es, " said the child, slowly, with the wide-open stare of hypnosis. 

"Didn't you see the evergreen tree he carried?"

"M-hm, " said Eddie, the image taking shape in his mind's eye. 

"And his brown coat all trimmed with fur, an' his funny peaked hat? An'his red nose? W'y, course you did. " The boy nodded his head. He was surenow. Yes. Faith was lost in sight. He believed. 

"I expect he's in the closet now. Go look. "

"No. You. " He clung to D. 

"I can't. I got this flat-iron in my lap, an' wouldn't spill thenut-shells all over the floor. You don't want me to, do you, Ma?"

Mrs. Allgire shook her head. 

"Well, now, " said D. "Anybody tell you they ain't sich a person as SantyClaus, you kin jist stand 'em down 'at you know better, 'cause you seenhim, didn't you?"

Eddie nodded his head. Anyhow, what D. Told him was "the Lord said untoMoses, " and now that he had the evidence of his own eyes--Well, the nextday he defied Bunt Rogers and all his works. To tell the plain truth, Bunt wasn't too well grounded in his newly cut infidelity. 

In the public schools the children were no longer singing:

 "None knew thee but to love thee, thou dear one of my heart; Oh, thy mem'ry is ever fresh and green. The sweet buds may wither and fond hearts be broken, Still I love thee, my darling, Daisy Deane. "

They turned over now to page 53, and there was a picture of Santa Clausjust as in Plotner's window, except that he had a pack on his back andone leg in the chimney. This is what they sang:

 "Ho, ho, ho! Who wouldn't go? Ho, ho, ho! Who wouldn't go? Up on the house-top, click, click, click Down through the chimney with good St. Nick. "

Miss Munsell, who taught the D primary, traded rooms with Miss Crutcher, who taught the "a-b Abs. " Miss Munsell was a big fat lady, and shesmiled so that the dimples came in both cheeks and her double Chin wasdoubter than ever, when she told the children what a dear, nice teacherMiss Crutcher was, and how fond she was of them, and wouldn't they liketo make a Christmas present to their dear, kind teacher? They all said"Yes, mam. " Well, now, the way to do would be for each child to bringmoney (if Miss Munsell had smiled at a bird in the tree as she did then, it would have had to come right down and perch in her hand), just asmuch money as ever they could, and all must bring something, because itwould make Miss Crutcher feel so bad to think that there was onelittle boy or one little girl that didn't love her enough to give her aChristmas present. And if everybody brought a dime or maybe a quarter, they could get her such a nice present. If their papas wouldn't letthem have that much money, why surely they would let them have a penny, wouldn't they, children? And the children said: "Yes, mam. "

"And now all that love their dear, kind teacher, raise their hands. Why, there's a little girl over that hasn't her hand up! That's right, dear, put it up, bless your little heart! Now, we mustn't say a word to MissCrutcher, must we? No. And that will be our secret, won't it? And all besure to have your money ready by to-morrow. Now, I wonder if you can bejust as still as little mice. I'm going to give this little girl a pinto drop and see if I can hear it out in the hall. "

Then she tiptoed down the hall clear to her own room and Mary EllenWaldo let the pin drop, and Miss Mussell didn't come back to say whethershe heard the pin drop or not. The children sat in breathlesssilence. Selma Morgenroth knocked her slate off and bit her lip withmortification while the others looked at her as much as to say: "Oh, my! ain't you 'shamed?" Then Miss Crutchet came back and smiled at thechildren, and they smiled back at her because they knew something shedidn't know and couldn't guess at all. It was a secret. 

The next morning Miss Crutchet traded rooms again, and the littlechildren gave Miss Mussell their money, and she counted it, and it cameto $2. 84. The next day she came again because there were three thathadn't their money, so there was $2. 88 at last. Miss Mussell had threelittle girls go with her after school to pick out the present. Theychose a silver-plated pickle caster, which is exactly what girls ofseven will choose, and, do you know, it came exactly to $2. 88?

Then, on the last day of school, Miss Mussell came in, and, with thethree little girls standing on the platform and following every movewith their eyes as a dog watches his master, she gave the caster to MissCrutchet and Miss Crutchet cried, she was so surprised. They were tearsof joy, she said. After that, she went into Miss Munsell's room, andthree little girls in there gave Miss Mussell a copy of Tennyson's poemsthat cost exactly $2. 53, which was what Miss Crutchet had collected, andMiss Mussell cried because she was so surprised. How they could guessthat she wanted a copy of Tennyson's poems, she couldn't think, butshe would always keep the book and prize it because her dear pupils hadgiven it to her. And just as Selma Morgenroth called out to the monitor, Charley Freer, who sat in Miss Crutchers chair, while she was absent:"Teacher! Make Miky Ryan he should ka-vit a-pullin' at my hair yet!" andthe school was laughing because she called Charley Freer "teacher, " incame Miss Crutchet as cross as anything, and boxed Miky Ryan's earsand shook Selma Morgenroth for making so much noise. They didn't giveanything, though they promised they would. 

It was not alone in the day schools that there were extra preparations. The Sunday-schools were getting ready, too, and when Janey Pettit camehome and told her Pa how big her class was, he started to say something, but her Ma shook her head at him and he looked very serious and seemedto be trying hard not to smile. He was very much interested, though, when she told him that Iky Morgenroth, whose father kept the One-PriceClothing House down on Main Street, had joined, and how he didn't knowenough to take his hat off when he came into church. Patsy Gubbins andMiky Ryan and six boys from the Baptist Sunday-School had joined, too, and they all went into Miss Sarepta Downey's class, so that she had twowhole pews full to teach, and they acted just awful. The infantclass was crowded, and there was one little boy that grabbed for thecollection when it was passed in front of him, and got a whole handfuland wouldn't give it up, and they had to twist the money out of hisfist, and he screamed and "hollered" like he was being killed. Andcoming home, Sophy Perkins, who goes to the Baptist Church, toldher that there wasn't going to be any Christmas tree at theirSabbath-school. She said that there wasn't hardly anybody out. Theteachers just sat round and finally went into the pastor's Bible class. Mr. Pettit said he was surprised to hear it. It couldn't have been theweather that kept them away, could it? Janey said she didn't know. Thenhe asked her what they were going to sing for Christmas, and shebegan on "We three kings of Orient are, " and broke off to ask him what"Orient" meant, and he told her that Orient was out on the Sunbury pike, about three miles this side of Olive Green, and her Ma said: "LesterPettit, I wish't you'd ever grow up and learn how to behave yourself. Why, honey, it means the East. The three wise men came from the East, don't you mind?"

At the Centre Street M. E. Church, where Janey Pettit went toSunday-school, there were big doings. Little Lycurgus Emerson, whosemother sent him down to Littell's in a hurry for two pounds of brownsugar, and who had already been an hour and a half getting pastPlotner's and Case's, heard Brother Littell and Abel Horn talking overwhat they had decided at the "fishery meetin'. " (By the time Curg gotso that he shaved, he knew that "officiary" was the right way to sayit, just as "certificate" is the right way to say "stiffcut. ") There wasgoing to be a Christmas tree clear up to the ceiling, all stuck full ofcandles and strung with pop-corn, and a chimney for Santa Claus to climbdown and give out the presents and call out the names on them. Everychild in the Sunday-school was to get a bag of candy and an orange, andthere were going to be "exercises. " Curg thought it would be kind offunny to go through gymnastics, but, just then, he saw Uncle BillyNicholson come in, and he hid. He didn't want to be patted on the headand--asked things. 

Uncle Billy had his mouth all puckered up, and his eyebrows looked morelike tooth-brushes than ever. He put down the list of groceries thatAunt Libby had written out for him, because he couldn't remember thingsvery well, and commenced to lay down the law. 

"Such carryin's on in the house o' God!" he snorted. "Why the very idy!Talk about them Pharisees an' Sadducees a-makin' the temple a den o'thieves! W'y, you're a-turnin' it into a theayter with your play-actin'tomfoolery! They'll be no blessin' on it, now you mark. "

"Aunt Libby say whether she wanted stoned raisins?" asked BrotherLittell, who was copying off the list on the order book. 

"I disremember, but you better send up the reg'lar raisins. Gittin' toomany newfangled contraptions these days. They're a-callin' it a theayterright now, the Babtists is. What you astin' fer your eatin' apples?Whew! My souls alive! I don't wonder you grocery storekeepers git richin a hurry. No, I guess you needn't send 'ny up. Taste too strong o'money. Don't have no good apples now no more anyways. All so dried upand pethy. An' what is it but a theayter, I'd like to know? Weth yourlectures about the Ar'tic regions an' your mum-socials, an' all likethat, chargin' money fer to git in the meetin' house. I tell you what itis, Brother Littell, the women folks 'd take the money they fritter awayon ribbons and artificial flowers an' gold an'costly apparel, which Ihave saw them turned away from the love-feast fer wearin', an' 'ud giveit in fer quarterage an' he'p support the preachin' of the Word, theywouldn't need to be no shows in the meetin' house an' they 'd be moreexpeerimental religion. "

Abel Horn (Abel led the singing in meeting, and had a loud bass voice;he always began before everybody and ended after everybody) was standingbehind Uncle Billy, and Lycurgus could see him with his head jukedforward and his eyebrows up and his mouth wide open in silent laughter, very disconcerting to Brother Littell, who didn't want to anger UncleBilly, and maybe lose his trade by grinning in his face. 

"An' now you got to go an' put up a Christmas tree right in the altar, "stormed Uncle Billy, "an' dike it all out with pop-corn an' candles. You're gittin' as bad 's the Catholics, every bit. Worse, I say, becuzthey never had the Gospel light, an' is jist led round by the priest an'have to pay to git their sins forgive. But you, you're a-walkin'right smack dab into it, weth your eyes open, teachin' fer Gospel theinventions o' men. "

"W'y what, Uncle Billy?"

"W'y, this here Santy Claus a-climbin' down a chimley an' a-cuttin' updidoes fer to make them little ones think they is a reel Santy Claus'cuz they seen him to the meetin' house. Poot soon when they git alittle older 'n' they find out how you been afoolin' 'em about SantyClaus, they'll wonder if what you been a-tellin' 'em about the Good Manain't off o' the same bolt o' goods, an' another one o' them cunninglydevised fables. Think they'll come any blessin' on tellin' a lie? An'a-actin' it out? No, sir. No, sir. Ain't ary good thing to a lie, no wayyou kin fix it. How kin they be? Who's the father of lies? W'y the OldScratch! That's who. An' here you go a--"

The old man was so wroth that he couldn't finish and turned and stampedout, slamming the door after him. 

Brother Littell winked and waited till Mr. Nicholson got out before hemildly observed "Kind o' hot in under the collar, 'pears like. "

"Righteous mad, I s'pose, " said Abel Horn. 

"You waited on yit, bub?" asked Brother Littell. "I betchy he'sa-thinkin' right now he'll take his letter out o' Centre Street an' goto the Barefoot Church. He would, too, if 't wasn't clean plumb at thefur end o' town an' a reg'lar mud-hole to git there. "

"Pity him an' a few more of 'em up in the Amen corner wouldn't go, " saidAbel Horn. "Mind the time we sung, 'There is a Stream?' You knowthey's a solo in it fer the soprano. Well, 't is kind o' operatic an'skallyhootin' up an' down the scale. I give the solo to Tilly Wilkersonan' if that old skeezicks didn't beller right out in the middle of it:'It's a disgrace tud Divine service!' He did. You could 'a' heard himclear to the court-house. My! I thought I'd go up. Tilly, she was kindo' scared an' trimbly, but she stuck to it like a major. Said afterwardsshe'd 'a' finished that solo if it was the last act she ever done. "

"Who's a-goin' to be Santy Claus?" asked Brother Littell, with cheerfulirrevelance. 

"The committee thought that had better be kept a secret, " replied Abel, with as much dignity as his four feet nine would admit of. 

"Ort to be somebody kind o' heavy-set, ort n't it?" hinted the grocer, giving a recognizable description of himself. 

"Well, I don' know 'bout that, " contested Abel. "Git somebody kind o'spry an' he could pad out weth a pilfer. A pussy man 'd find it ratheronhandy comin' down that chimbly an' hoppin' hether an' yan takin'things off o' the tree. Need somebody with a good strong voice, too, to call off the names.... Woosh's you'd git them things up to the housesoon 's you kin, Otho. Ma's in a hurry fer 'em. "

"Betchy two cents, " said Brother Littell to his clerk, ClarenceBowersox, "'at Abel Horn 'll be Santy Claus. "

"Git out!" doubted Clarence. 

"'Ll, you see now. He's the daggonedest feller to crowd himself in an'be the head leader o' everything. W'y, he ain't no more call to be SantyClaus 'n that hitchin' post out yan. Little, dried-up runt, bald 's aapple. Told me one time: 'I never grow'd a' inch tell I was sixteen'n' then I shot up like a weed. '... Bub, you tell yer Ma if she wants aturkey fer Christmas she better be gittin' her order in right quick. "

Only six more days till Christmas now--only five--only four--onlythree--only two--Christmas Eve. One day more of holding in such swellingsecrets, and some of the young folks would have popped right wide open. Families gather about the Franklin stove, Pa and Ma gaping and rubbingtheir eyes--saying, "Oh, hum!" and making out that they are just plumbperishing for the lack of sleep. But the children cannot take the hint. They don't want to go to bed. The imminence of a great event nerves themin their hopeless fight against the hosts of Nod. They sit and starewith bulging eyes at the red coals and dancing flames, spurting out hereand there like tiny sabers. 

The mystic hour draws near. Sometime in the night will come the jingleof silver bells, and the patter of tiny hoofs. Old Santa will halloo:"Whoa!" and come sliding down the chimney. The drowsing heads, fuddledwith weariness, wrestle clumsily with the problem, "How is he to getthrough the stove without burning himself?" Reason falters and Faithtriumphs. It would be done somehow, and then the reindeer would flyto the next house, and the next, and so on, and so on. The mystic hourdraws near. Like a tidal wave it rolls around the world, foaming at itscrest in a golden spray of gifts and love. The mystic hour. 

"Oh, just a little longer, just a little longer. "

"No, no. You cain't hardly prop your eyes open now. Come now. Get tobed. Now, Elmer Lonnie; now, Mary Ellen; now, Janey; now, Eddie; now, Lycurgus. Don't be naughty at the last minute and say, 'I don't wantto, ' or else Santa Claus won't come a-near. No, sir. "

After the last drink of water and the last "Now I lay me, " a longpause.... Then from the spare bedroom the loud rustling of stiff paper, the snap of broken, string, and whispers of, "Won't her eyes stick outwhen she sees that!" and, "He's been just fretting for a sled; I'm soglad it was so 't we could get it for him, " and, "I s'pose we ort n't tospent so much, but seems like with such nice young ones 's we've got 'tain't no more 'n right we should do for 'em all we can afford, 'n'mebby a little more. Janey 's 'stiffcut' said she was 100 in everything, deportment an' all. "

At one house something white slips down the staircase to where a goodview can be had through the half-open parlor door. It pauses when a stepcracks loudly in the stillness. The parlor door is slammed to. 

"D' you think he saw?"

"I don't know. I'm afraid so. Little tyke!"

Something white creeps back and crawls into bed. A heart thumpsviolently under the covers, and two big, round eyes stare up at the darkceiling. Somebody has eaten of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, andthe gates of Eden have shut behind him forever. 

He does not sense that now; he is glad in the exulting consciousnessthat he is "a little kid" no longer. Pretty soon he'll be a man, andthen.... And then.... Oh, what grand things are to happen then!

The mutual gifts are brought out with many a shamefaced: "It looks awfullittle, but 't was the best I could do for the money. You see I spentmore on the children than I lotted to, " and many a cheerful fib of:"Why, that's exactly what I've been wishing for. " Some poor fools, thathave never learned and never will learn that the truest word ever spokenis: "It is more blessed to give than to receive, " make their husbands apresent of a parlor lamp or a pair of lace curtains, and their wivesa present of a sack of flour, or enough muslin to make half a dozenshirts. And there are deeper depths. There are such words as: "Whatpossessed you to buy me that old thing? Well, I won't have it! Now!" Thestove-door is slammed open and the gift crammed in upon the coals, andtwo people sit there with lips puffed out, chests heaving and heartsburning with hate. 

It is the truth, but cover it up. Cover it up. Turn away the head. Onthis Holy Night of Illusion let us forget the truth for once. Thereare three hundred and sixty-four other nights in which to consider theeternal verities. On this one, let us be as little children. "Let us nowgo even to Bethlehem and see this thing which is come to pass. "

The mystic hour draws nigh. The lights go out, one by one. The watchmanat the flax mills rings the bell, and they that are waking count thestrokes that tremble in the frosty air. Eleven o'clock. Father andmother sit silent by the fire. The tree in the corner of the roomflashes its tinselry in the dying light. A cinder tinkles on the hearth. Their thoughts are one. "He would be nine years old, if he had lived, "murmurs the mother. Their hands grope for each other, meet and clasp. Something aches in their throats. The red coals swell and blur into aformless mass. 

The mystic hour is come. The town sleeps. The moon rides high in theclear heavens. The wind sighs in the fir trees. Faint and far-off acrossthe centuries sounds the chant of angels. 

The hour is come.