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SoiMB : Thb Hususiffi Vallit. tlMM l FORTT TO FlTTT YkABS ASO. BT MABK TWAIN. WITH ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY-FOUR ILLUSTRATIONS. MONTREAL: DAWSON BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS. 1886. ^M ^^^sjpw^^ • I mBm II UU MI—— «WWM ' ' iiJi liaMimsMi^ipio Entered according to Act of Parliament of Canada, in the year 1884, by Andbbw Chatto, in tiie Office of the Minister of Agriculture. {> {^ EXPLANATORY. i In this book a number of dialects ar used, to wit : tho Missouri negro dia- lect ; tho extremest form of the backwoods South- Western dialect ; the ordinary " Pike-County » dialect ; and four modified varieties of this last. The shadings have not been done in a hap-hazard fashion, or by guess-work ; but pains-takingly, and with the tri-^tworthy guidance and support of personal familiarity with these several forms bpeech. I make this explanation for the reason that without it many readers would fluppose that all these characters were trying to talk alike and not succeeding. THE AUTHOE. i NOTICE. Persons attemptln? to find a motive in this narratiye will be prosecuted; persons attemp^ ing to And a moral in it viU be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot BY ORDER OF THE AUTHOR P«a Q. a., CHIEF OP ORDNANCSB. i -r > meXm,mi»i,mm *^ — " • ! ♦ CONTENTS. i CHAPTER I. CUTlllaing Hack.— Miss Wataon.— Tom Sawyer Waits . . . , , 17 OnAPTBR II. TheBoysEaoapoJlm.— Tom Sawyer's Gang. —Deep-laid Plana ... 88 CHAPTER III. AGoodGoing-over.— Grace Triumphant.—" One of Tom Sawyere's Lies" , , » CHAPTER IV. Huck and the Judge.— Superstition jl CHAPTER V. Huok's Father.— The Fond Parent.— Reform 3q CHAPTER VI. He Went for Judge Thatcher.-Huck Decided to LeaTe.-PoUtical Economy.-Thrashing Around ... ._ • • • . 40 CHAPTER Vn. Laying for Him.— Looked in the Cabin.— Sinking the Body.— Resting ... 68 CHAPTER Vin. Sleeping in the Woods.— Raising the Dead.— Exploring the Wand.— Finding Jim.-Jim's B6cape.-Sign8.-Balum ^ CHAPTER IX. The 0»Te. —The Floating Hoiwe ^^ hm f ■MM 10 CONTENTS. TASM 79 84 lis CHAPTER X The Find.-01d Hank Bunker.-rn Disguise rr , , CHAPTER XI. Huck and the Woman—The Saa«.i, d The Search.-Preva„cation.-Going to Goshen SJnu, V • .. CHAPTER XII. " • • CHAPTER XIIL Escapmg from the W™ck.-The Watchman. -Sinking * • • • • .103 CHAPTER XIV. A General Good Time.-The Harem. -French - . 109 „ , , CHAPTER XV. H.* Use, ths 8.ft_i„ tt, j,„^. _^„^, ^_^ ^^^ ^^ _^ !?«».. .• CHAPTER XVI • 123 j^ CHAPTER XVII. o, „ ' CHAPTER XVIII. ^I. Grangerford.-Aristoc«icy._Peuds-TheT«sf.™ Wood-pUe.-Porkand Cabbage Te«tament.-Recorering the Raft.-The 148 CHAPTER XIX. ■lying Up Day.time8,-An Astronomical Th«n^ u • The Duke „,BHa^™..._lJZlw'C:'^ ' ^'^'^ '^^^- . 167 CHAPTER TT HuokBxplains.-LayingOuta Campaign -Workin«r fh„ n the Camp.xneeting.-The DukeL^rinl CamP-°>eeting.-A Pirate at 167 / .f^ ) i / CONTENTS. 11 CHAPTER XXI. PASB Sword Exercise.— Hamlet's Soliloquy.— They Loaf'^d Around Town,— A Lazy Town.— Old Boggs.— Dead I77 CHAPTER XXII. Sherbum.— Attending the Circus.— Intoxication in the Ring.— The Thrilling Tragedy. 189 CHAPTER XXm. Sold.— Royal Comparisons.— Jim Gets Home-sick . . . . . 196 CHAPTER XXIV. Jim in Royal Robes.— They Take a Passenger.— Getting Information.— Family Grief. 203 CHAPTER XXV. Is It Them?— Singing the " Doxologer."— Awful Square.— Funeral Orgies. -A Bad In- vestment . 211 CHAPTER XXVI. A Pious King.— The King's Clergy.— She Asked His Pardon.— Hiding in the Room.— Huck Takes the Money ........ 220 CHAPTER XXVII. The Funeral.- Satisfying Curiosity,— Suspicious of Huck.— Quick Sales and Small Profits 330 CHAPTER XXVIII. The Trip to England.— "The Brute I "—Mary Jane Decides to Leave.— Huck Parting with Mary Jane.— Mumps.— The Opposition Line . . . . .289 CHAPTER XXIX. Contested Relationship.— The King Explains the Loss.— A Question of Handwriting.— Digging up the Corpse.— Huck Escapes . . . . .250 CHAPTER XXX. TheKing Went for Him.— A Royal Row.— Powerful Mellow . . . . CHAPTER XXXI. Ominous Plans.— News from Jim.— Old Recollections.— A Sheep Story.— Valuable In- 261 XOimatioa . . 266 W I: V 12 CONTENTS. rkat . 277 800 809 CHAPTER XXXII. Stai and Sunday.like.-Mistaken Identity.-Up a Stump._In a Dilemma CHAPTER XXXni. A Nigger Stealer.-Southem Hospitality._A Pretty Long Blessing.-Tar and Feathers . 284 CHAPTER XXXJV. The Hut by the Ash Hopper. -Outrageous. -Climbing the Lightning Rod.-Troubled with Witches CHAPTER XXXV. Escaping Properly.-Dark Schemes.-Discrimination in Stealing.-A Deep Hole CHAPTER XXXVI. The Lightning Rod—His Level Best. -A Bequest to Posterity.-A High Figure CHAPTER XXXVIL The Last Shirt.— Mooning Around.— Sailing Orders.— The Witch Pie . . .816 CHAPTER XXXVin. The Coat of Arms.-A Skilled Superintendent.-Unpleasant Glory.-A Tearful Subject . U24 CHAPTER yyYTT Rat8.-LivelyBed-fellows.-The Straw Dummy 888 CHAPTER XL Fishing.-The VigUance Committee.-A Lively Run.-Jim Advises a Doctor. . . 889 CHAPTER XLL The Doctor.-Unde SUaa. -Sister Hotchkiss. -Aunt Sally in Trouble . . . 847 CHAPTER XLIL Tom Sawyer Wounded—The Doctor's Story.-Tom ConfesseB—Atmt PoUy Arrives— I I Hand Out Them Letters CHAPTER THE LAST. Out of Bondage.— Paying the Captive.— Yours Truly, Huck Finn . 856 . 8M 4.: I » X ILLUSTRATIONS. Huckleberry Finn. F^roniitpieee The Widow's. Learning about Moses ~** ^ " Boy, that's a Lie " "flerelis, Huck" . Climbing up the Bank "Who's There?" , ' " ' "Buck" . ' ' ■ • "It made Her look Spidery" ' * • • Col. Grangerford Young Harney Shepherdso'n ■Miss Charlotte "And asked me if I Liked Her" "Behind the Wood .pile" Hiding Day-times. " And Dogs a-Coming » "By rights I am a Duke f " I am the Late Dauphin " Tail Piece On the Raft " • , The King as Juliet . " Courting on the Sly " "A Pirate for Thirty Years ' Another little Job jPractising Hamlet's Soliloquy "Gimme a Chaw" A Little Monthly Drunk The Death of Boggs Sherbum steps out A Dead Head He shed Seventeen SuitB Tragedy Their Pockets Bulged Henry the Eighth in Boston Harbor Harmless Adolphus He fairly emptied that Young Fellow " Alas, our Poor Brother " " You Bet it is " Lealcing Making up the "Defflsit" Going for him The Doctor The Bag of Money The Cubby . ' Supper with the Hare-Lip* Honest Injun The Duke looks under the Bed. Huck takes the Money A Crack in the Dining-room Door The Undertaker He had a Rati" "Was you in my Room? Jawing In Trouble Indignation How to Find Them He Wrote Hannah with the Mumps The Auction The True Brothers The Doctoi leads Huck The Duke Wrote Gentlemen, Gentlemen 1 " Jim Lit Out " The King shakes Huck The Duke went tor Him PASS . 196 . 198 . SOO . 803 . 205 . 207 . 209 . 211 . 313 . 31S . 216 . 318 . 219 . 230 231 234 326 388 383 285 387 389 . 341 . 243 . 344 ■ 346 . 348 350 253 355 357 360 361 368 r L I FAOa . 186 198 • 205 ' . 207 . 209 . 211 . 212 . 215 . 216 . 218 . 219 . 220 . 221 . 224 ■ 226 • 229 . 230 . 232 . 233 . 2S5 . 287 • 289 . 341 ■ 242 . 244 . 346 . 348 ■ 250 252 253 257 260 ILLUSTRATION. 15 Spanish Moss .... "Who Nailed Him?" Thinking .... He gave him Ten Cents . Striking for the Back Country . Still and Sunday-like She hugged him tight •• Who do you reckon it is?" . • It was Tom Sawyer " " Mr. Archibald Nichols, I presume? A pretty long Blessing Traveling By Rail Vittles . A Simple Job . Witches . Getting Wood . One of the Best Authorities The Breakfast-Horn . Smouching the Knives Going down the Lightning-Rod Stealing spoons . Tom advises a Witch Pie The Rubbage-Pile . •« Missus, dey's a Sheet Gone " PAOK . 266 . 271 . 274 . 275 . 277 . 279 . 283 . 284 . 387 . 290 . 291 . 293 . 296 . 299 . 800 . 302 . 305 . 807 . 809 . 311 . 814 . 316 . 818 In a Tearing Way . One of his Ancestors Jim's Coat of Arms . A Tough Job . Buttons on their Tails Irrigation Keeping off Dull Times Sawdust Diet . Trouble is Brewing . Fishing . Every one had a Gun Tom caught on a Splinter Jim advises a Doctor The Doctor . Uncle Silas in Danger Old Mrs. Hotchkiss . Aunt Sally talks to Huck Tom Sawyer wounded The Doctor speaks for Jim Tom rose square up in Bed " Hand out them Letters " Out of Bondage Tom's Liberality Y)urs Truly . . , PAOS . 831 824 837 . 881 . 888 . 885 . 887 . 889 . 841 . 843 . 845 . 847 . 348 . 860 . 858 . 865 867 . 861 . 862 . 864 . 865 . 866 263 I 1 Cl^a|>ter i > i/ don't know about me, without you have read a book by the name of " The Adventures of Tom Sawyer," but that ain't no matter. That book was made by Mr. Mark Twain, and he told the truth, mainly. There was things which he stretched, but mainly he told the truth. That is nothing. I never seen anybody but lied, one time or another, without it was Aunt Polly, or the widow, or maybe Mary. Aunt Polly— Tom.'s Aunt Polly, she is— and Mary, and the Widow Douglas, is all told about in that book— which is mostly a true book ; with some stretch- ers, as I said before. Now the way that the book winds np, 18 this : Tom and me found the money that the robbers hid in the cave and.it made us rich. We got six thousand dollars apiece-all gold. It was an awful sight of money when it was piled up. Well, Judge Thatcher, he took it and put It out at interest, and it fetched us a dollar a day apiece, all the year round-more than a body could tell what to do with. The Widow Douglas she took me for her eon, and allowed she would sivilize me ; but it was rough living m the hou^e aU the time, considering how dismal regular and decent the widow was m all her ways ; and so when I couldn't stand it no longer, I lit out I got into my old rags, and my sugar-hogshead again, and was free and satisfied. But THB widow's. I f 18 TBB ADVmTCrSBa OP BtTOStBSSSRT FWIT. ^ritXi';: i;?'"' :; -V-" ""«™.o,„g to start aband„f,;bbe™, mil m,ght ,„,n .f I would go back to the widovr and bo re,pootable. So I weul mo IttT^T"' °™* °™ "'• ""^ """"^ ™ » "»<" 'o«t lamb, and she called mo a lot of other names, loo, b„t she never meant no harm bv it. She put me Walerampednp. WeU, th... the old thing commenced again. The" rung a bell for supper, and you had to come to time. When ,1 got to the tabl you couldn't go right to eat- ing, but you had to wait for the widow to tuck down her head and grumble a little over the victuals, tliough there warn't really anything the matter with them. That is, nothing only everything was cooked by itself. In a barrel of odds and ends it is different; things get mixed up, and the juice kind of swaps around, and the things go better. After supper she got out her book and learned me about Moses and the Bul- LEARNiNa ABOUT MOSES AND THK " BUI.RU8HKR8." '"shcrs ; aud I was iu a swcat r^„4. i> J 1. , , . ^ ^^^ 0^* all about him • bu hy.a.d by she let it out that Moses had been de«i a considerable long ttaT : so ften I didn't care no more about him; because I don't take no stock fa d"Il' ftetty swn I wanted to smoke, mA asked the mdow to let me. But she try to .0* *, ,t «>y mor.. Ihat is j«,t the way with soae people. T^ f I XI8S WATSOir. 19 r h get down on a thmg whea they don't know nothing about it H„ ,. WM a bothering about Moses, which wa> no kin t„ l . '""' bodv, being gone, yon see iet IJ ' *"'' ''° ""' '° °"y a tiing th't'haJ Ze ^.I in Wri l' t"" "f ™ "" ^°'»« that wa, ,„ right, because she done ifilelf! """ '""' °' °°"™ Her sister, Miss Watson, a tolerable slim nH «,o;^ -x,. just come to live with her, and took ' " ' ''^^'" °"' '"^ a set at me now, with a spelling-book. She worked me middling hard for about an hour, and then the widow made her ease up. I couldn't stood it much longer. Then for an hour it was deadly dull, and I was fidgety. Miss Watson would say, "Dont put your feet up there. Huckleberry;" and "dont scrunch up liketliat. Huckleberry— set up straight;" and pretty soon she would say, "Don't gap and stretch like tliat, Huckleberry- why don't you try to behave?" Then she told me all about the bad place, and I said I wished I was there. She got mad, then, but I didn't mean no harm. All I wanted M'as to go some- wheres; all I wanted was a change, I wam't particular. She said it was wicked to say what I said ; said she wouldn't say it for the whole world; she was going to live so as to go to the good place Well, I couldn't see no advantage in going wherf she was gomg, so I ma. , my mind I -^ >uldn't try for it. But I never said so, because it would only make trouble, and wouldn't do no good Jew she had got a start, and she went on and told me all about the good place. She said all a body would have to do there was to go around aU day long with a harp and »ng, forever and (^ver. So I didn't think h'35 Wdt^or; 20 TEE ADVENTURES OF EUCKLEBERRT FINN. much of it. But I never said so. I asked her if she reckoned Tom Sawyer would go there, and, she said, not by a considerable sight. I was glad about that, because I wanted him and mo to be together. Miss Watson she kept pecking at me, and it got tiresome and lonesome. By-and-by they fetched the niggers in and had prayers, and then everybody was off to bed. I went up to my room with a piece of candle and put it on the table. Then I set down in a chair by the window and tried to think of something cheerful, but it warn't no use. I felt so lonesome I most wished I was dead. The stars was shining, and the leaves rustled in the woods ever so mournful; and I heard an owl, away off, who-whooing about somebody that was dead, and a whippowill and a dog crying about somebody that was going to die; and the wind was trying to whisper some- thing to me and I couldn't make out what it was, and so it made the cold shivers run over me. Then away out in the woods I heard that kind of a sound that a ghost makes when it wants to tell about something that's on its mind and can't make itself understood, and so can't rest easy in its grave and has to go about that way every night grieving. I got so down-hearted and scared, I did wish I had some company. Pretty soon a spider went crawling up my shoulder, and I flipped it off and it lit in the candle ; and before I could budge it was all shriveled up. I didn't need anybody to tell me that that was an awful bad sign and would fetch me some bad luck, so I was scared and most shook the clothes off of me. I got up and turned around in my tracks three times and crossed my breast every time; and then I tied up a little lock of my hair with a thread to keep witches away. But I hadn't no confidence. You do that when you've lost a horse-shoe that you've found, instead of nailing it up over the door, but I hadn't ever heard anybody say it was any way to keep off bad luck when you'd killed a spider. I set down again, a shaking all over, and got out my pipe for a smoke ; for the house was all as still as death, now, and so the widow wouldn't know. Well, after a long time I heard the clock away off in the town go boom — boom — boom ^twelve hcks — and all still again — stiller than ever. Pretty soon I heard a, twig snap, down in the dark amongst the I !\l -K. T MM nm iMm TOM SAWYER WAITS. 91 trees-something was a stirring. I set still and listened. Directly I could just barely hear a ^'me-yow! me-yowl- down there. That was good ' Says I -me-ym! mcyowr as soft as I could, and then I put out the light and scrambled out of the window onto the shed. Then I slipped down to the ground and crawled in amongst the trees, and sure enough there was lorn Sawyer waiting for me. ,. nuoK wnkissQ awat. A. f r \\^\tr JI E went tip-toeing along a path amongst the trees back towards the end of the widow's garden, stooping down so as the branches wouldn't scrape our heads. When we waa passing by the kitchen I fell over a root and made a noise. Wo Bcrouched down and laid still. Miss Watson's big nigger, named Jim, was setting in the kitchen door ; ■we could see him pretty clear, because there was a light behind him. He got up and etrctchol hi*' neck out about a minute, listcim - 'J'ben ho says, "Who dab?" He listened some more; then he oome tip-toeing down and stood right between us ; we could a touched him, nearly. Well, likely it was min- utes and minutes that there warn't a sound, and we all there so close together. There was a place on my ankle that got to itching ; but I dasn't scratch it; and then my ear begun to itch; and next my back, right be- tween my shoulders. Seemed like I'd die if I couldn't scratch. Well, I've noticed that thing plenty of times since. If you are with the quality, or at a funeral, or trying to go to sleep when you ain't sleepy— if you are anywheres THIT TIF-TOSD ALONO. 1 v. TEE BOYS BBOAPE JTM. 23 wlicro it won't do for you to scnitch, why you will itch all over in up\^ 4a ol a thousand places. Pretty soon Jim auys: «< Say— who is you? Whur is you? Dog my cats of I didn' heai sumfn. Well I knows what I's gwyne to do. I'a gwyne to set down here and listen tell I } "ars it uglu." So ho set down on the ground betwixt mo and Tom. Ho leaned his bn np against a tree, and stretched his legs out till ( no of thom most touched A mine. My nose begun to itch. It itched till tl " tears como into my eyes. ut I dasn't Bcrntch. Then it begun to itch on thi inside. Next I got to itch » underneath. I didn't know how I was going t- set still. This miserable: went on as much as six or seven minutes; but it seemed a sight longer than th I was itching iu eleven different places now. 1 reckoned I couldn't stand it more'n a minute longer, but I set my teeth hard ai I got ready to try. Just the. Jim begun to breathe heavy; next he begun to snor * — and then I was pretty soon comfortable again. Tom he made a -Ign to me — kind of a little noise ''ithhis mouth — and we went creeping away on our hands and knees. When we vas ten foot off, Tom whis- pered to me and wanted to tie Jim to the tree for fu : but I said no ; he might wake and make a disturbance, and then they'd find ( it I wam't in. Then Tom said ho hadn't got candles enough, and he would si p in the kitchen and get some more. I didn't want him to try. I said Jim might wake up and como. But Tom wanted to resk it; so we slid in there and got three candles, and Tom laid five cents on the table for pay. Then we got our . and I was in a sweat to get away; but nothing would do Tom but he must era vl to where Jim was, on his hands and knees, and play something on him. I waii d, and it seemed a good while, everything was so still and lonesome. As soon u; Tom was back, we cut along the path, around the garden fence, and by-and-by fetched up on the steep top of the hill the other side of the house. Tom said he slipped Jim's hat off of liis head and hung it on a limb right over him, and Jim stirred a little, but he didn't wake. Afterwards Jim said the witches bewitched him and put him in a trance, and rode him all over the State, and then set him under the trees again and hung his hat on a limb to show who done it. And next time Jim told it he said they rode him down to New Orleans; • '~'*^g)ii ^ilM^i^i^S^&wi**** -■ ? 34 TEE ADVENTURES OF BUOKLEBERRT FHTK and after that, every time he told it he spread it more and more, till by-and-by he said they rode him all over the world, and tired him most to death, and his baclc was all over saddle-boils. Jim was monstrous proud about it, and he got so ho wouldn't hardly notice the other niggers. Niggers would come miles to hear Jim tell about it, aud ho was more looked up to than any nigger in that country. Strange niggers would stand with their mouths open and look him all over, same as if he was a wonder. Niggers is always talking about witches in the dark by the kitchen fire; but whenever one was talking and letting on to know all about such things, Jim would happen in and eay, " Hm I What you know 'bout witches ?" and that nigger was corked up and had to take a back seat. Jim always kept that five-center piece around his neck with a string and said it was a charm the devil give to him with his own hands and told him he could cure anybody with it and fetch witches whenever he wanted to, just by saying something to it; but he never told what it was he said to it. Niggers would come from all around there and give Jim anything they had, just for a sight of that five- center piece ; but they wouldn't touch it, be- cause the devil had had his hands on it. Jim was most ruined, for a servant, because he got so stuck up on account of having seen the devil and been rode by witches. Well, when Tom and me got to the edge of the hill-top, we looked away down into the village and could see three or four lights twinkling, where there was sick folks, may be ; and the stars over us was sparkling ever so fine ; and down by the village was the river, a whole mile broad, and awful still and grand. We went down the hill and found Jo Harper, and Ben Rogers, and two or three more of the boys, hid in the old tanyard. So we uuhitclied a skiff and pulled down the river two mile and a half, to the big scar on the hillside, and went ashore. nil. t • w T t • TOM SAWYER'S GANG. 25 We went to a clump of bushes, and Tom made everybody swear to keep the secret, and then showed them a hole in the hill, right in the thickest i)art of the bushes. Then we lit the candles and crawled in on our hands and kuccs. We went about two hundred yards, and then the cave opened up. Tom poked about amongst the passages and pretty soon ducked under a wall where yon wouldn't a noticed that there was a hole. We went along a narrow place ai:d got into a kind of room, all damp and sweaty and cold, and there v stopped. Tom says : «'Now we'll start this band of robbers and caU it Tom Sawyer^s Gang. e //'I TOM SAWTER's band of R0BBBR8. Everybody that wants to join has got to take an oath, and write his name in blood." Everybody was willing. So Tom got out a sheet of paper that he had wrote the oath on, and read it. It swore every boy to stick to the band, and never tell any of the secrets ; and if anybody done anything to any boy in the band, whichever boy was ordered to kill that person and his family must do it, and he mustn't eat and he mustn't sleep till he had killed them and hacked a cross in 26 TEE ADVENTUHES OF BUOKLEBERRT FIITir. their breasts, which was the sign of the band. And nobody that didn't belong to the band could use that mark, and if he did he must be sued ; and if he done it again he must be killed. And if anybody that belonged to the band told the secrets, he must have his throat cut, and then have his carcass burnt up and the ashes scattered all around, and his name blotted ofE of the i.ist with blood and never mentioned again by the gang, but have a curse put on it and be forgot, forever. Everybody said it was a real beautiful oath, and asked Tom if he got it out of his own head. He said, some of it, but the rest was out of pirate books, and robber books, and every gang that was high-toned had it. Some thought it would bo good to kill the families of boys that told the secrets. Tom said it was a good idea, so he took a pencil and wrote it in. Then Ben Rogers says : "Here's Huck Finn, he hain'b got no family-what you going to do 'bout him ? " " Well, hain't he got a father ? " says Tom Sawyer. "Yes, he's got a father, but you can't never find him, these days. He used to lay drunk with the hogs in the tanyard, but he hain't been seen in these parts for a year or more." They talked it over, and they was going to rule me out, becauso they said every boy must have a family or somebody to kill, or else it wouldn't be fair and square for the others. Well, nobody could think of anything to do-every- body was stumped, and set still. I was most ready to cry; but all at once I thought of a way, and so I offered them Miss Watson-they could kill her. Everybody said : " Oh, she'll do, she'll do. That's all right. Huck can come in." Then they all stuck a pin in their fingers to get blood to sign with, and I made my mark on the paper. " Now," says Ben Rogers, "what's the line of business of this Gang ?" " Nothing only robbery and murder," Tom said. "But who are we going to rob ? houses— or cattle— or " "Stuff! stealing cattle and such things ain't robbery, it's burglary" says Tom Sawyer. "We ain't burglars. That ain't no sort of style. Weaiehigh- I .■^-*s -L MtiiiijffLtfiar g D^EP.LAID PLANB. 27 '* waymen. We stop stages and carriages on the road, with masks on, and kill the people and take their watches and money." " Must we always kill the people ?" ** Oh, certainly. It's best. Some authorities think different, but mostly it's considered best to kill them. Except some that you bring to the cave here and keep them till they're ransomed." «* Ransomed ? What's that ? " " I don't know. But that's what they do. I've seen it in books ; and so of course that's what we've got to do." " But how can we do it if we don't know what it is ? " " Why blame it all, we've got to do it. Don't I tell you it's in thf ■ oks ? Do you want to go to doing different from what's in the books, and gc Jiings all muddled up ? " " Oh, that's all very fine to say, Tom Sawyer, but how in the nation are these fellows going to be ransomed if we don't know how to do it to them ? that's the thing I want to get at. Now what do you reckon it is ? " "Well 1 don't know. But per'aps if we keep them till they're ransomed, it means that we keep them till they're dead." " Now, that's something like. That'll answer. Why couldn't you said that before ? We'll keep them till they're ransomed to death— and a bothersome lot they'll be, too, eating up everything and always trying to get loose." "How you talk, Ben Rogers. How can they get loose when there's a guard over them, ready to shoot them down if they move a peg ?" "A guard. Well, that is good. So somebody's got to set up all night and never get any sleep, just so as to watch them. I think that's foolishness. Why can't a body take a club and ransom them as soon as they get here ? " " Because it ain't in the books so— that's why. Now Ben Rogers, do you want to do things regular, or don't you ?— that's the idea. Don't you reckon that the people that made the books knows what's the correct thing to do ? Do you reckon you can learn 'em anything ? Not by a good deal. No, sir, we'll just go on and ransom them in the regular way." "All right. I don't mind; but I say it's a fool way, anyhow. Say— do we kiU the women, too?" .L., «■«" <»*K3I: iimBKm i -.4 " I 28 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERET FINN. " Well, Ben Rogers, if I was as ignorant aa you I wouldn't let on. Kill the women? No-nobody ever saw anything in the books like that. You feteh them to the cave, and you're always as polite as pie to them ; and by-and-by they fall in love with you and never want to go home any more." " ^^'^"'/^ that's the way, I'm agreed, but I don't take no stock in it. Mighty "btr: s^T -^'^ '' - P^- ^- ^^« -^^ers. But go ahead/l ain't «o..^'"' J°°'-T ^"'"'' '''' "'^''P' ^°^' "'^^ ^^^" *^«y ^-'^^d him up he was soared, and eried, and said he wanted to go home to his ma, and didn't want to be a robber any more. mad and he sa.d ho ,vo«ld go straight and Ml all the secret.. But Tom givo hnn five cents to keep quiet, and .a.d we would „U go home and meet ne. week and rob somebody and kill some people ^„? next Sunday; but all the boys said it would be wicked to do it on Sunday, and that settled the thing. They agreed to got together and fa a day™ soon „a they could, and then we elected Tom Sawyer fir.t »ptain and j! Harper second captain of the Oang, and so started home 1 dumb up the shod and crept into my window just before day was breaking My new clothes was all greased up and clayey, and 1 w^ dog-frel *' HPCK CRRBPB ntTO U» WIITOOW, T sMmmmmmmm ^lippiMBW •mnmn I^ ni e VVELL, I got a good going-over in the morning, from old Miss Watson, on account of my clothes ; but the widow she didn't scold, but only cleaned off the grease and clay and looked so sorry that I thought I would be- have a while if I could. Then Miss Watson she took me in the closet and prayed, but nothing come of it. She told me to pray every day, and whatever 1 asked for I would get it. But it warn't so. I tried it. Once I got a fish-line, but no hooks. It warn't any good to me without hooks. I tried for the hooks three or four times, but somehow I couldn't make it work. By-and-by, one day, I asked Miss Watson to try for me, but she said I was a fool. She never told me why, and I couldn't make it cut no way. I set down, one time, back in the woods, and had a long think about it. I says to myself, if a body can get anything they pray for, why don't Deacon Winn get back the money he losb on pork ? Why can't the widow get back her silver snuff-box that was stole ? Why can't Miss Watson fat up ? No, says I to myself, there ain't nothing in it. I went and told the widow about it, and she said the thing a body could get by praying for it was "spiritual gifts." This was too many for me, but she told me what she meant-T must help other people, and do everything I could for other people, and look out for them aU the time, and never think about myself. This was including Miss Watson. MISS WATSON'S LECTtTBB. If 80 TBB ADVENTURES OF HUOKLEBERRY FINK as I took It. I went out in the woods and turned it over in my mind a long time, but I couldn't see no advantage about it-except for the other people- Bo at la.t I reckoned I wouldn't worry about it any more, but just let it go. Sometimes the widow would take me one side and talk about Providence in a way to make a body's mouth water; but maybe next day Miss Watson would take hold and knock it all down again. I judged I could see that there was two providences, and a poor chap would stand considerable show with the widow's Providence, but if Miss Watson's got him there wam't no help for him any more. I thought It all out, and reckoned I would belong to the widow's, if he wanted me, though I couldn't make out how he was agoing to be any better off then than what he was before, seeing I was so ignorant and so kind of low-down and ornery. Pap he hadn't been seen for more than a year, and that waa comfortable for me ; I didn t want to see him no more. He used lo alivaj, whale me when he wa« «,ber and could get his hands on me ; though I used to take to the woods most of the t.me when he was around. Well, about this time he was fouri in the nver drowned, about twelve mile above town, so people said. They juaged .t was h,m, anyway ; said this drowned man w»s just his size, and J> IgU nothmg out of the face, because it had been in the water so long it wam't much hke a face at all. They said he was floating on his back in the water, t", ook h,m and buned him on the bank. But I warn't comfortable long becaul onTfl:: hi "iT"™^- ' '"""- "'^"'^ «■' «-"' « ^-'^ "» n nan b!t a r . '. "" '" '^- ^ ' ''"°«''' '"™' *«' «■- ""'t I L^ed r M "" '" " """'' ''°*"- '» ' ™ "ncomfortable again. We played robber now and then about a month, and then I resigned. Al th boys d,d. We hadn't robbed nobody, we hadn't killed any people but only ,nst pretended. We used to hop out of the woods and goTh^;! mg down on hog-drovers and women in carts taking garden stuff J market but we never hned any of them. Tom Sawyer called the hogs "ingots " «d he called the turnip and stuff "julery" «,a wo would g» to thfX f.l i! 'a J f} «■ GRACE TRIUMPHANT. 31 and pow-wow over what we had done and how many people we had killed and marked. But I couldn't see no profit in it. One time Tom sent a boy to run about town with a blazing stick, which he called a slogan (which was the sign for the Gang to get together), and then he said he had got secret news by his spies that next day a whole parcel of Spanish merchants and rich A-rabs was going to camp in Cave Hollow with two hundred elephants, and six hundred camels, and oyer a thousand "sumter" mules, all loaded down with di'monds, and they didn't have only a guard of four hundred soldiers, and so we would lay in ambuscade, as he called it, and kill the lot and scoop the things. He said we must slick up our Bwords and guns, and get ready. He never could go after even a turnip-cart but he must have the swords and guns all scoured up for it ; though they was only lath and broom-sticks, and you might scour at them till you rotted and then they warn't worth a mouthful of ashes more than what they was before. I didn't believe we could lick such a crowd of Spaniards and A-rabs, but I wanted to see the camels and elephants, so I was on hand next day, Saturday, in the ambuscade ; and when we got the word, we rushed out of the woods and down the hill. But there warn't no Spaniards and A-rabs, and there warn't no camels nor no elephants. It wara't anything but a Sunday-school picnic, JUid only a primer-class ut TUE ROBBERS DI8PEBSED ;■'»'• { ■ 'UAiammsi4ii' 32 TBe ADrmTUBEa of bjtoklbbbrbt mm. te«c,,or Ciargod in a„d m™ / . i3"»n-''oal< auc, a tract; aud tl.c, the di'».o„d, afd I J Tr ;:;':: 'T7:t ""■ ' '"'^'' -™ tW, anywa,; .„d ho .aidToro ^ A rl '"" "" """' "'"'»■" -d. 'l-ng,. I «d, wh, couldn't IZ ttl t ^^7' r, t^"""" «o .gaorant, but l,ad road a book cal,cd "Don o f .f "I™'' witliout asking. He ,,m it „ „ ' °° Quiioto, » I would know wa= hnndred/of Mdi^ th ro ". , T "' o-hantn.ont. lie .aid tboro we had enemies whi h o Zd '""^ """" '™"""' ""'> "> »"' "»' «.mg into „n infant 8„ndaTho7;:r' 7\'"" '"' '""■^■' '"" """'^ then the thing for „, to do wartgo' tZ ■""'" ' ""' "" "«'"' I was a numsknil. ^ *° magicians. Tom Sawyer said woJ,7h'r;r„p\?J:lT "»" "»" -O « ><" »f genies, and the, the otheVcrowdT™'?-^"" " '"' ""^ «™°' '» ""''l- — "'' wc hck "Hon- you going to get them f" ;;: don't know. How do «<,y get them ?" «-~,Iing. and everything "t d d! «"""""" """"" ™' "» ™"^' think nothing of nuUinf a slrfl ! ^^ "'' "'' *" "• '^'y ^on't -hoo, snperi:tond'en o^ve the w' IV ™°''' ""' "^"^ » «'"'^»^- ;;Who make, them *:; aLnd J'-' "-' "'^ "*- --" Why, whoever rubs the kmr. m- +i,« • r«, rubs the lamp or the ring LdTJ .T^' ^'^ ^^""^ *° '"««™ tells them to build a plTfortv m^ ^1 "''"'°™' '■° "^'- « "» foU of chewing gum ^r If v ^"''' °"' °' ""'■""»''»' ""^ fill it daughter from 'cifinr'for yol o ra/'tw '' ""'' '^'* •» ^P'^r's got to do it before sun.;™ ::i f^ f /" '° ''"""^ "■'^'™ y mormng, too. And more-they'Te got to L-Jtl i *t? 'WiwoBa^smsssmKM K*i» A«9sS!iW« •• ONE OF TOM 8A WTEIV8 LIES." 33 waltz that palace around over the country wherever you want it, you understand. " "Well," saya I, "I think they are a pack of flatheads for not keeping the palace themselves 'stead of fooling them away like that. And what's more— if I was one of them I would see a man in Jericho before I would drop my business and come to him for the rubbing of an old tin lamp." "How you talk, Huck Finn. Why, you'd have to come when he rubbed it, whether you wanted to or not." "What, and I as high as a tree and as big as a church ? All right, then ; I would come; but I lay I'd make that man climb the highest tree there was in the country." "Shucks, it ain't no use to talk to you, Huck Finn. You don't seem to know anything, somehow — perfect sap-head." I thought all this over for two or three days, and then I reckoned I would see if there was anything in it. I got an old tin lamp and an iron ring and went out in the woods and rubbed and rubbed till I sweat like an Injun, calculating to build a palace and sell it ; but it warn't no use, none of the genies come. So then I judged that all that stuff was only just one of Tom Sawyer's lies. I reckoned he believed in the A-rabs and the elephants, but as for me I think different. It had all the marks of a. Sunday school. RUBBINO TBB XAKF. V m t' r I 4 Gl^abter e) VV ELL, three or four months run along, and it was well into the winter, now. I had been to schoo. Most all the time, and could spell, and read, and write' just a little, and could say the mul- tiplication table up to six times seven is thirty-five, and I don't reckon I could ever get any further than that if I was to live forever. I don't take no stock in mathematics, anyway. At first I hated the school, but by and-bv I got so I could stand it. Whenever I got uncommon tired 1 played hookey, and the hiding I got next day done me good -^nd cheered me up. So the longer I went to school the easier it got to be. I was getting sort of used to the widow's ways, too, and they wam't so raspy on me. Living in a house, and sleep- ing in a bed, pulled on me pretty tight, mostly, but before the cold weather I used to slide out and sleep in the woods, sometimes, and so that was a rest to me. I liked the old ways best, but I was getting so I liked the new ones, too, a little bit. The widow said I was coming along slow but sure, and doing very satisfactory. She said she wam't ashamed of me. Mill BUCK AND THE JUDOS. 85 Ono morning I happened to turn over the salt-cellor at breakfast. I reached for some of it as quick as I could, to throw over my left shoulder and keep off the bad luck, but Miss Watson was in ahead of me, and crossed me off. She says, ** Take your hands away, Huckleberry— what a moss you are always making." The widow put in a good word for me, but that wam't going to keep off the bad luck, I knowed that well enough. I started out, after breakfast, feeling worried and shaky, and wondering where it was going to fall on me, and what it was going to be. There is ways to keep off some kinds of bad luck, but this wasn't ono of them kind; so I never tried to do anything, but just poked along low-spirited and on the watch-out. I went down the front garden and dumb over the stile, where jou go through the high board fence. There was an inch of new snow on the ground, and I seen somebody's tracks. They had como up from the quarry and stood around the stile a while, and then went on around the garden fence. It was funny they hadn't come in, after standing around so. I couldn't make it out. It was very curious, somehow. I was going to follow around, but I stooped down to look at the tracks first. I didn't notice anjrthing at first, but next I did. There was a cross in the left boot-heel made with big nails, to keep off the devil. I was up in a second and shinning down the hill. I looked over my shoulder every now and then, but I didn't see nobody. I was at Judge Thatcher's as quick as I could get there. He said: " Whv, my boy, you are all out of breath. Did you coma for your interest ?" ** No sir," I says ; "is there some for me?" " Oh, yes, a half-yearly is in, last night. Over a hundred and fifty dollars. Quite a fortune for you. You better let me invest it along with your six thou- sand, because if you take it you'll spend it." "No sir," I says, "I don't want to spend it. I don't want it at all — nor the six thousand, nuther. I want you to take it; I want to give it to you — the six thousand and all." He looked surprised. He couldn't seem to make it out. He says: " Why, what can you mean, my boy ? " I says, "Don't you ask me no questions about it, please. You'll take it— won't you? " % 86 THE ADVENTURES OF nUCKLEBEIiRT FINK. i I i- t Ho says: *' Well I'm puzzled. Is something the matter P " ** Please take it," says I, " and don't ask me nothing— then I won't havG to tell no lies." He studied a while, and then he says : " Oho-o. I think I sco. You want to sell all your property to me — not give it. That's the correct idea. " Then he wrote something on a paper and read it over, and says: " There— you see it says * for a consideration.* That means I have bought it of you and paid you for it. Here's a dollar for you. Now, you sign it." So I signed it, and left. tVDVU THATOHXB ■nilFBISIID. Miss Watson's nigger, Jim, had a hair-ball as big as your fist, which had been took out of the fourth stomach of an ox, and he used to do magic with it. He said there was a spirit inside of it, and it knowed everything. So I went to him that night and told him pap was here again, for I found his tracks in the snow. What I wanted to know, was, what he was going to do, and was he going to stay? Jim got out his hair-ball, and said something over it, and then he held it up and dropped it on the floor. It fell pretty solid, and only rolled about an inch. Jim tried it again, and then another time, and it acted just the same. Jim got down on his knees and put his ear against it and listened. But it warn't no use ; he said it wouldn't talk. He said sometimes it wouldn't talk without money. I told him I h BUPEnsTmoir. tfi had un old slick counterfeit quarter that warn't no good because the brass showed through the silver a little, and it wouldn't pass nohow, oven if the brass didn't show, because it was so slick it felt greasy, and so that would toll on it every time. (I reckoned I wouldn't say nothing about the dollar I got from the judge.) I I said it was pretty bad money, but maybo the hair-ball would take it, because maybe it wouldn't know the difference. Jim smelt it, and bit it, and rubbed it, and said ho would manage so the hair-ball would think it was good. Ho said ho would split open a raw Irish potato and stick the quarter in between and keep it there all niglit, and next morning you couldn't see no brass, and it wouldn't feel greasy no more, and so anybody in town would take it in a minute, lot alone a hair-b;ill. Well, I knowcd a potato would do that, before, but I had forgot it. Jim put the quarter under the hair-ball and got dowT' and listened again. Th'M time he said the i i . hair-ball was all right. __| I I llo said it would tell my whole fortune if I wanted it to. I says, go on. So the hair-ball talked to Jim, and Jim told it to me. He says : " Yo' ole father doan' know, yit, what he's a-gwyne to do. Some- times he spec he'll go 'way, en den agin he spec he'll stay. De bes' ■way is to res' easy en let de ole man take his own way. Bey's two angels hoverin* roun' 'bout him. One uv 'em is white en shiny, en 'tother one is black. De white one gits him to go right, a little while, den de black one sail in en bust it all up. A body can't tell, yit, which one gwyne to fetch him at de las'. But you is all right. You gwyne to have considable trouble in yo* afe, en considable joy. Sometimes you gwyne to git hurt, en sometimes y .,. gwyne to git sick ; but every time you's gwyne to git well agiu. Dey's two gals flyin' 'bout you JIV LISTEMINO. f-S.,S«.^ILC£:-f"i1i. // •IMIPH i.,ii«.ijik,iy.ji,i,n»' '.".'JSW""^ 'HW!' 88 rifJS? ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINIT. in yo' life. One uv 'em's light en 'tother one is dark. One is rich en 'tother is po'. You's gwyne to marry de po' one fust en de rich one by- en-by. You wants to keep 'way fum de water as much as you kin, en don't run no resk, 'kase it's down in de bills dat you's gwyne to git hung. When I lit my candle and went up to my room that mght, there set pap, his own self I 7!-f\.'iii:~-'.:^^i:'t:;i en by. en set T HAD shut the door to. Then I turned around, and there he was. I used to he scared of him all the time, he tanned me so much. I reckoned I was scared now, too ; hut in a minute I see I was mistaken. That is, after the first jolt, as you may say, when my breath sort of hitched— he being so unexpected; hut right away after, I see I warn't scared , of him worth bothering about. He was most fifty, and he looked it. His hair was long and tangled and greasy, and hung down, and you could see his eyes shining through like he was behind Tines. It was all black, no gray; so was his long, mixed-up whiskers. There warn't no color in his face, where his face showed; it was white; not like another man's white, but a white to make a body sick, a white to make a body's flesh crawl-a t--toad jM^;^ a fish-belly white. As for his clothes-just rags, that was all He had one ankle resting on 'tother knee; the boot on that foot was busted, and two of his toes stuck through, and he worked them now ana then. His hat was laying on the floor; an old black slouch with the top caved m, like a lid. ... , . • !„• I stood a-looking at him ; he set there a-lookmg at me, with hs chair tilted back a little. I set the oaudle down. I noticed the wmdow was " PAP." r/- mmmmmmmmfl'mmmmt - unmf -^ it 40 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINS'. all over. up; so he had clumb in by the shed. He kept a-looking me By-and-by he says : "Starchy clothes— very. You think you're a good deal of a big-bug, donH you?" "Maybe I am, maybe I ain't," I says. "Don't you give me none o' your lip," says he. "You've put on con- Biderble many frills since I been away. I'll take you down a peg before I get done with you. You're educated, too, they say ; can read and write. You think you're better'n your father, now, don't you, because he can't? ni take it out of you. Who told you you might meddle with such hifalut'n foolishness, hey?— who told you you could?" <*The widow. She told me." "The widow, hey?— and who told the widow slie could put in her shovel about a thing that ain't none of her business?" ** Nobody never told her." "Well, I'll learn her how to meddle. And looky here— you drop that school, you hear? I'll learn people to bring up a boy to put on airs over his own father and let on to be better'n what he is. You lemme catch you fooling around that school again, you hear ? Your mother couldn't read, and she couldn't write, nuther, before she died. None of the family couldn't, before they died. / can't; and here you're a-swelling yourself up like this. I ain't the man to stand it— you hear? Say— lemme hear you read." I took up a book and begun something about General Washington and the wars. When I'd read about a half a minute, he fetched the book a whack with his hand and knocked it across the house. He says : " It's so. You can do it. I had my doubts when you told me. Now looky here ; you stop that putting on frills. I won't have it. I'll lay for you, my smarty ; and if I catch you about that school I'll tan you good. First you know you'll get religion, too. I never see such a son." He took up a little blue and yaller picture of some cows and a boy, and says: "What's this?" i k 1 THE FOND PARENT. 41 k " It's something they give me for learning my lessons good." He tore it up, and says — "I'll give you something better— I'll give you a cowhide." He set there a-mumbling and a-growling a minute, and then he says— *' Ain't you a sweet-scented dandy, though ? A bed j and bedclothes ; and a look'n-glass ; and a piece of carpet on the floor — and your own father got to sleep with the hogs in the tanyard. I never see such a son. I bet I'll take some o* these frills out o' you bofore I'm done with you. Why there ain't no end to your airs — they say you're rich. Hey ? —how's that?" " They lie— that's how." *' Looky here — mind how you talk to me ; I'm a-stand- ing about all I can stand, now — so don't gimme no sass. I've been in town two days, and I hain't heard nothing but about you bein' rich. I heard about it away down the river, too. That's why I come. You git mo that money to-morrow— I want it." ** I hain't got no money." " It's a lie. Judge Thatcher's got it. You git it. I want it." " I hain't got no money, I tell you. You ask Judge Thatcher ; he'll tell you the same." "All right. I'll ask him ; and 111 make him pungle, too, or 111 know the reason why. Say— how much you got in your pocket ? I want it." [ "I hain't got only a dollar, and I want that to " "It don't make no difference "what you want it for— you just shell ib out." HUCK AKD HIS FATHEB. Is i 42 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. He took it and bit it to see if it was good, and then ho said he was going down town to get some whisky ; said he hadn't had a drink all day. When he had got out on the shed, he put his head in again, and cussed me for putting on frills and trying to be better than him ; and when I reckoned he was gone, he come back and put his head in again, and told me to mind about that school, becauoe he was going to lay for me and lick me if I didn't drop that. ^ Next day he was drunk, and he went to Judge Thatcher's and bullyragged him t.ad tried to make him give up the money, but he couldn't, and then he sworo he'd muko the law force him. The judge and the widow went to law to get the court to take me away from ium and let one of them be my guardian ; but it was a new judge that had just c^me, and he didn't know the old man ; so he said courts mustn't interfere and sepaiata families if they could help it ; said he'd druther not take a child away from Its fathev. So Judge Thatcher and the widow had to quit on tho business. ^ That pleased the old man till he couldn't rest. He said he'd cowhide me till X was black and blue if I didn't raise some money for him. I borrowed three dollars from Judge Thatcher, and pap took it and got drunk and went a-blowing around and cussing and whooping and carrying on ; and he kept it up all oyer town with a tin pan, till most midnight ; then they jailed him, and next day they had him before court, and jailed him again for a week. But he saad U was satisfied j said he was boss of his son, and he'd make it warm for him. When ue got out the new judge said he was agoing to make a man of him. So he took mm to his own house, and dressed him up clean and nice, and had him to breakfast and dinner and supper with the family, and was ju.t old pie to him, so o speak. And after supper he talked to him about temperance and such things till the old man cried, and said he'd been a fool, and fooled away his life : but now he was agoing to turn over a new leaf and be a man nobody wouldn't be ashamed of, and he hoped the judge would help him and not look down on him. The judge said he could hug him for them words ; so U cried, and his wife she cned again ; pap said he'd been a man that had always been misunderstood before and the judge said he believed it. The old man said that what a man want^ ^ ' t REFOBM. 43 that was down, was sympathy ; and the judge said it was so ; so they .ed again. And when it was bedtime, the old man rose up and held out his hand, and says : "Look at it gentlemen, and ladies all ; take ahold of it ; shake it. There's a hand that was the hand of a hog ; but it ain't so no more ; it's the hand of a man that's started in on a new life, and '11 die before he'll go back. You mark them words — don't forget I said them. It's a clean hand now ; shake it— don't be afeard." BBFOBmNG THE DBUNKARD. So they shook it, one after the other, all around, and cried. The judge's wife she kissed it. Then the old man he signed a pledge— made his mark. The judge said it was the holiest time on record, or something like that. Then they tucked the old man into a beautiful room, which was the spare room, and in the night sometime he got powerful thirsty and dumb out onto the porch-roof and slid down a stanchion and traded his new coat for a jug of forty-rod, and dumb back again and had a good dd time ; and towards daylight he crawled out again, drunk as a fiddler, and rolled ofE the porch and broke his left arm in two places and was most froze to death when somebody found him after sun-up. 1 i; 4ii . ' , j»iHi Mi mi i » ■ •M i itra ii» nti- '••iiTji m-ytfr.i] B' 44 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRT FTNIT. And when they como to look at that spare room, they had to take soundings before they could navigate it. The judge he felt kind of sore. He said he reckoned a body could reform the ole man with a shot-gun, maybe, but he didn't know no other way. H-^ ]>ALLIHe fBOK aSMOL ,( t !- idinge •eform .( I, I i*" Well, pretty soon the old man was up and / / around again, and then he went for Judge Thatcher in the courts to make him give up that money, and he went for me, too, for not stopping school. He catched me a couple of times and thrashed me, but I went to school just the same, and dodged him or out-run him most of the time. I didn't want to go to school much, before, but I reckoned I'd go now to spite pap. /7^!WBSMM f ^S^ it^liS That law trial was a slow business ; /vliuaW ^ml tif - appeared like they warn't ever going to get started on it ; so every now and then I'd borrow two or three dollars off of the judge for him, to keep from getting a cowhiding. Every time he got money he got drunk ; and every time he got drunk he raised Cain around town ; and every time he raised Cain he got jailed. He was just suited— this kind of thing was right in his line. He got to hanging around the widow's too much, and so she told him at last, that if he didn't quit using around there she would make trouble for him. Well, was7i't he mad ? He said he would show who was Huck Finn's boss. So he watched out for me one day in the spring, and catched me, and took me up the river about three mile, in a skiff, and crossed over to the Illinois shore where it was woody and there warn't no houses but an old log hut in a place where the timber was so thick you couldn't find it if you didn't know where it was. /',/ GBTTTNe OTTT OF TH« WAT. JH ^■^...^i; ■MH i I I 46 THE ADVENTURES OF HUGKLEBERRY FINN. He kept me with him all the time, and I never got a chance to run off. We lived in that old cabin, and he always locked the door and put the key under hia head, nights. He had a gun which he had stole, I reckon, and we fished and hunted, and that was what we lived on. Every little while he locked mo in anij went down to the store, three miles, to the ferry, and traded fish and game for whisky and fetched it home and got drunk and had a good time, and licked me. The widow she found out where I was, by-and-by, and she sent a man over to try BOLIS COMFORT. IThhT °* "'^'•"' P'P *™™ •■'■» »« ^■'h ""o gnn, and it wam't long after tha fU I waa „eed to bemg where I waa, and liked it, all but the cowhide part. It was kind of la.yand jolly, laying off eomfortable all day, smoking and c othes got tobeall rags and dirt, and Ididn't see how I'devergot tolik it so Z M and get np regular, and be forever bothering over a book and have old Miss Watson pectang at you all the time. I didn't want to go baok no more. I had stopped eussmg, beeause the widow didn't like it ; but now I took to it again be- EUOK DECIDES TO LEAVE. 47 cause pap hadn't no objections. It was pretty good times up in the woods there, take it all around. But by-and-by pap got too handy with his hick'ry, and I couldn't stand it. I was all over welts. He got to going away so much, too, and locking mo in. Once ho locked me in and was gone three days, it was dreadful lonesome. I judged he had got drowned and I wasn't ever going to get out any more. I was scared. I made up my mind I would fix up some way to leave there. I had tried to get out of that cabin many a time, but I couldn't find no way. There warn't a window to it big enought for a dog to get through. I couldn't get up thechimbly, it was too narrow. The door was thick solid oak slabs. Pap was pretty careful not to leave a knife or anything in the cabin when he was away ; I reckon I had hunted the place over as much as a hundred times ; well, I was 'most all the time at it, because it was about the only way to put in the time. But this time I found something at last ; I found an old rusty wood-saw without any handle ; it was laid in between a rafter and the clapboards of the roof. I greased it up and went to work. There was an old horse-blanket nailed against the logs at the far end of the cabin behind the table, to keep the wind from blowing through the chmks and putting the candle out. I got under the table and raised the blanket and went to work to saw a section of the big bottom log out, big enough to let me through. Well, it was a good long job, but I was getting towards the end of it when I heard pap's gun in the woods. I got rid of the signs of my work, and dropped the blanket and hid my saw, and pretty soon pap come in. Pap warn't in a good humor-so he was his natural self. He said he was down to town, and everything was going wrong. His lawyer said he reckoned he would win his lawsuit and get the money, if they ever got started on the trial ; but then there wa« ways to put it off a long time, and Judge Thatcher knowed how to do it. And he said people allowed there'd be another trial to get me away from him and give me to the widow for my guardian, and they guessed it would win this time. This shook me up considerable, because I didn't want to go back to the widow's any more and be so cramped up and sivilized, as they called it. Then the old man got to cussing, and cussed everything and everybody he could think of, and then cussed them all over again to make sure he hadn't skipped any, and after that he polished ofi with a kind of a general cuss all round, including a con- SSili, 48 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCELEBERltT FINN. Biderable parcel of people which he didn't know the names of, and so called them what's-his-name, when he got to them, and went right along with his cussing. He said he would like to see the widow get mo. He said he would wutch out, and if they tried to come any such game on him he knowed of a place six or seven mile off, to stow me in, where they might hunt till they dropped and they couldn't find me. That made me pretty uneasy again, but only for a minute ; I reckoned I wouldn't stay on hand till he got that chance. The old man made me go to the skiff and fetch the things ho had got. There was a fifty-pound sack of corn meal, and a side of bacon, ammunition, and a four-gallon jug of whisky, and an old book and two newspapers for wadding, besides some tow. I toted up a load, and went back and set down on the bow of the skiff to rest. I thought it all over, and 1 reckoned I would walk off with the gun and some lines, and take to the woods when I run away. I guessed I wouldn't stay in one place, but just tramp right across the country, mostly night times, and hunt and fish to keep alive, and so get so far away that the old man nor the widow couldn't ever find me any more. I judged I would saw out and leave that night if pap got drunk enough, and I reckoned he would. I got so full of it I didn't notice how long I was staying, till the old man hollered and asked me whether I was asleep or drownded. I got the things all up to the cabin, and then it was about dark. While I was cooking supper the old man took a swig or two and got sort THINKINO IT OVKR. POLTTIUAL FCOyOMr. 49 of warmed up, and went to ripping again. He had been drunk over in town, and laid in the gutter all night, and ho was a sight to look at. A body would a thought ho was Adam, he was just all mud. Whenever his liquor begun to work, he most always went for the govment. This time ho says : "Call this a govment 1 why, just look at it and see what it's like. Here's the law a-standing ready to take a man's son away from him— a man's own son, which he has had all the trouble and all the anxiety and all the expense of raising. Yes, just as that man has got that son raised at last, and ready to go to work and begin to do suthin' for him and give him a rest, the law up and goes for him. And they cull that govment! That ain't all, nuther. The law backs that old Judge Thatcher up and helps him to keep me out o' my property. Here's what the law does. The law takes a man worth six thousand dollars and upards, and jams him into an old trap of a cabin like this, and lets him go round in clothes that ain't fltten for a hog. They call that govment! A man can't get his rights in a govment like this. Sometimes I've a mighty notion to just leave the country for good and all. Yes, and I (old 'em so ; I told old Thatcher so to his face. Lots of 'em heard me, and can tell what I said. Says I, for two cents I'd leave the blamed country and never come anear it agin.' Them's the very words. I says, look at my hat— if you call it a hat— but the lid raises up and the rest of it goes down till it's below my chin, and then it ain't rightly a hat at all, but more like my head was shoved up through a jint o' stove-pipe. Look at it, says I— such a hat for me to wear— one of the wealthiest men in this town, if I could git my rights. " Oh, yes, this is a wonderful govment, wonderful. Why, looky here. There was a free nigger there, from Ohio; a mulatter, most as white as a white man. He had the whitest shirt on you ever see, too, and the shiniest hat ; and there ain't a man in that town that's got as fine clothes as what he had ; and he had a gold watch and chain, and a silver-headed cane— the awfulest old gray-headed nabob in the State. And what do you think? they said he was a p'fessor in a college, and could talk all kinds i HI ' ) -«»•■• "Pl»"*»«p»"i" >H •M ; 50 TBE ADVENTURES OF lIUCfCLEBEBRT FINIT. ryth And that ain't the wuat. They said of languages, and knowcd evorj ho could vote, when ho was at homo. Well, that let mo out. Thinks I, what is the country a-coming to ? It was 'lection day, and I was just about to go and vote, myself, if I warn't too drunk to get there ; but when they told mo there was a State in this country where tliey'd let that nigger vote, I drawed out. I says I'll never vote agin. Them's the very words I said ; they all heard me ; and the country may rot for all me — I'll never vote agin as long as I live. And to see the cool way of that jijggcr— why, he wouldn't a give mo the road if I hadn't shoved him out o' the way. I saya to the people, why ain't this nigger put up at auction and sold?— that's what I want to know. And what do you reckon they Baid? "Why, they said he couldn't bo sold till he'd been in the State six months, and ho hadn't been th&re that long yet. There, now— that's a Bpecimei . They call that a govment that can't .sell a free nigger till he's been in the State six months. Here's a govment that calls itself a govment, and lets on to bo a govment, and thinks it is a govment, and yet's got to set stock-still for six whole months biforo it can take ahold of a prowling, thieving, infernal, white-shirtcd free nigger, and " Pap was agoing on so, he never noticed where his old limber legs was taking him to, so ho went head over heels over the tub of Bait pork, and barked both shins, and the rest of his speech was all the hottest kind of language — mostly hovo at the nigger and the govment, though he give the tub some, too, all along, hero and there. He hopped around the cabin considerable, first on one leg and then on the other, holding first one shin and then the other one, and at last he let out with his left foot all of a sudden and fetched the tub a rattling kick. But it warn't good judgment, becauLie that was the boot that had a couple of his toes leaking out of the front end of it ; so now 1 'vised a howl that fairly made a body's hair raise, and down he went in the dirt, and rolled there, and held his toes; and the cussing he done then lai over uuything he had ever done previous. He said so his own self, aft iwarua. He had heard old Sowberry Hagan in his best days, and ho said it laid over him, too ; but i reckon that was sort of piling it on, maybe. i TUJlAFtmyO AHOUND. 51 After took the jug, und said he had enough whisky there for supper p two drunks and one delirium tremens. Tliat was always bis Avord. I judged ho would be blind drunk in about an hour, and then I would steal the key, or saw myself out, one or ' tother. He drank, and drank, and tumbled down on his blankets, by-and-by ; but luck didn't run , way. He didn't go !^. ind asleep, but was uneasy. He groaned, and moaned, nii.l thrashed around this way and that, for a long time. At last I got so sleepy I couldn't keep my eyes open, all I could do, and so before I knowed what I was about I was sound asleep, and the candle burning. 1 don't know how long I was asleep, but all of a sudden there was an awful scream and I was up. There was pup, looking wild and skipping around every which way and yelling about snakes. He said they was crawl- ing up his legs ; and then he would give a jump and scream, and say one had bit him on the cheek — but I couldn't see no snakes. He started and run round and round the cabin, hollering " take him ofE I take him off 1 he's biting me on the neck !" I never see a man look so wild in the eyes. Pretty soon he was all fagged out, and fell down panting; then he rolled over and over, wonderful fast, kicking things every which way, and striking and grabbing at the air with his hands, and screaming, and saying there was devils ahold of him. He wore out, by-and-by, and laid still a while, moaning. Then he laid stiller, and didn't make a sound. I could hear PR?- RAIBINU A UOWL. ~ ^mri-r mt i m mt n m m v ^iUff U f^ m"" ■tN m ■ppBssraasp^ipnsJBssrT! ' ■''flBWI(Bif'"WF)*f*^i 52 TSE ADVENTURES OF BWKLEBESB7 FINIT. the owls and the wolves, away off in the woods, and it seemed terrible still. He was laying over by the corner. By-and-by he raised up, part way, and listened, with his head to one side. He says very low : " Tramp— tramp— tramp ; that's the dead ; tramp — tramp — tramp ; they're coming after me ; but I won't go — Oh, they're here! don't touch me— don'tl hands ofE — they're cold; let go — Oh, let a poor devil alone!" Then he went down on all fours and crawled off begging them to let him alone, and he rolled himself up in his blanket and wallowed in under the old pine table, still a-begging ; and then ho went to crying. I could hear him through the blanket. By-and-by he rolled out and jumped up on his feet looking wild, and ho see me and went for me. He chased me round and round the place, with a clasp-knife, calling me the Angel of Death and saying he would kill me and then I couldn't come for him no more. I begged, and told him I was only Huck, but he laughed such a Ecreechy laugh, and roared and cussed, and kept on chasing me up. Once when I turned short and dodged under his arm he made a grab and got me by the jacket between my shoulders, and I thought I was gone ; but I slid out of the jacket quick as lightning, and saved myself. Pretty soon he was all tired out, and dropped down with his back against the door, and said he would rest a minute and then kill me. He put his knife under him, and said he would sleep and get strong, and then he would see who was who. So he dozed off, pretty soon. By-and-by I got the old split-bottom chair and dumb up, as easy as I could, not. to make any noise, and got down the gun. I slipped the ramrod down it to make sure it was loaded, and then I laid it across the turnip barrel, pointing towards pap, and set down behind it to wait for him to stir. And how slow and still the time did drag along. J» ^'^--.^^■■'s'iMi^i^'^**^ " "*'^' ''- rifV^jT tl I i^APTER "aiT UP.' up! what you 'boutl" I opened my eyes and looked around, trying to make out where I was. It was after sun-up, and I had been sound asleep. Pap was standing over me, looking sour— and sick, too. He says— "What you doin' with, this gun?" I judged he didn't know nothing about what he had been doing, so I says: "Somebody tried to get in, so 1 was laying for him." "Why didn't you roust me out?" " Well I tried to, but I couldn't ; ' °::^:' aS'righr"Don-t ,tand there paWng a« day. Ut out with y„„ If .eo il tire, a fish on the lines .or breakfast. HI be aiong m a minute." ^, . ^ i,„„v t He unlocked the door and T cleared out, up the mer bank. I noticed some pieces of limbs and such things floating down, and a spnnk- ling of bark; so I knowed the river had begun to rise, ^^^f °^«d. ^ would have great times, now, if I was over at the town. The June nse used to be always luck for me; because as soon as that rise begins here comes cord-wood floating down, and pieces of log rafts-sometimes a dozeix rzi.... 54 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. logs together ; so all you have to do is to catch them and sell them to the wood yards and the sawmill. I went along up the bank with one eye out for pap and 'tother one out for what the rise might fetch along. Well, all at once, here comes a canoe ; just a beauty, too, about thirteen or fourteen foot long, riding high like a duck. I shot head first off of the bank, like a frog, clothes and all on, and struck out for the canoe. I just expected there'd be somebody laying down in it, because people often done that to fool folks, and when a chap had pulled a skiff out most THE BHANTT. to it they'd raise up and laugh at him. But it wam't so this time. It was a drift-canoe, sure enough, and I dumb in and paddled her ashore. Thinks I, the old man will be glad when he sees this— she's worth ten dollars. But when I got to shore pap wasn't in sight yet, and as I was running her into a little creek like a gully, all hung over with vines and willows, I struck another idea ; I judged I'd hide her good, and then, stead of taking to the woods when I run off, I'd go down the river about fifty mile and camp in one place for good, and not have such a rough time tramping on foot. if o^ \ af^m^^nr'y^ w ^ 4 It was pretty close to the shanty, and I thought I heard the old man coming, all the time ; but I got her hid ; and then I out and looked around a bunch of willows, and there was the old man down the path apiece just drawing a bead on a bird with his gun. So he hadn't seen anything. When he got along, I was hard at it taking up a " trot " line. He abused me a little for being so slow, but I told him I fell in the river and that was what made me so long. I knowed he would see I was wet, and then he would be asking qi7-. ihns. We got five cat-fish off of the lines and went home. V 'ulo we laid off, after breakfast, to sleep up, both of us being about wore out, I got to thinking that if I could fix up some way to keep pap and the widow from trying to follow me, it would be a certainer thing than trusting to luck to get far enough off before they missed mr ; you see, all kinds of things might happen. Well, I didn't see no way 1." a. ..hile, but by-and-by pap raised up a minute, to drink another barrel of water, and he says : " Another time a man comes a-prowling round here, you roust me out, you hear ? That man warn't here for no good. I'd a shot him. Next time, you roust me out, you hear ?" Then he dropped down and went to sleep again— but what he had been saying give me the Tcry idea I wanted. I says to myself, I can fix it now so nobody won't think of following mo. About twelve o'clock we turned out and went along up the bank. The river was coming up pretty fast, and lots of drift-wood going by on the rise. By-and- by, along comes part of a log raft-nine logs fast together. We went out with the skiff and towed it ashore. Then we had dinner. Anybody but pap would a waited and seen the day through, so as to catch more stuff ; but that warn't pap's style. Nino logs was enough for one time ; he must shove right over to town and sell. So he locked me in and took the skiff and started off towing the raft about half-past three. I judged he wouldn't come back that night. I waited till I reckoned ho had got a good start, then I out with my saw and went to work on that log again. Before he was 'tother side of the river I was out of the hole } him and his raft was just a speck on the water away off yonder. I took the sack of corn meal and took it to where the canoe was hid, and shoved the vines and branches apart and put it in ; then I done the same with i (__„. - yf f' j^ i !., 56 TEE ADVENTURES OF EUOELEBERBT FINK the side of bacon ; then the whisky jug ; I took all the coffee and sugar there was, and all the ammunition ; I took the wadding ; I took the bucket and gourd, I took a dipper and a tin cup, f nd my old saw and two blankets, and the skillet and the coffee-pot. I took fish-lmes and matches and other things— everything that was worth a cent. I cleaned out the place. I wanted an axe, but there wasn't any, only the one out at the wood pile, and I knowed why I was going to leave that. I fetched out the gun, and now I was done. I had wore the ground a good deal, crawling out of the hole and dragging out ^tr-i^m BHOOTINO THB Pia. BO many thmgs. So I fixed that as good as I could from the outside by scattering dust on the place, which covered up the smoothness and the sawdust. Then I fixed the piece of log back into its place, and put two rocks under it and one against it to hold it there,-for it was bent up at that place, and didn't quite touch ground. If you stood four or five foot away and didn't know it was sawed, you wouldn't ever notice it ; and besides, this was the back of the cabin and it wara't likely anybody would go fooling around there. It waa aU grass clear to the canoe j so I hadn't left a track. I followed v»' g doublo loaf como alou., »n^ could have, aud I wam't dmppomted. •ny foot .lipped and Ittd t fu^/ Of 'co''"' J '""'^ """" '"' current set in the closest to the sho.-I IT^^Z I ZtT\T :i ::irtrdr;fr:e:i:t/ r : r »' - ^-- something struck me I ravs r,L t , Batished. And then I lit a pipe and had a good long smoke and went on watching Ti, c.ose w. „ ,,, , -:: s-;!;r;-: :;- 7- :^ ir ^ir^r „rt,:r; irritV"" -' '^"■^"" log forked I could pee; lo^h "''" ^"'"- ^"^ '"» # ► I ? V| il I i rsM BAISmO THE DEAD. 68 By-and-hy she como along, and alio drifted in bo close that they could a run out a plank and walked ash(»ro. Most everybody was on the boat. Pap, and Judge Thatcher, and liosBio Thatcher, and Jo Harper, and Tom Sawyer, and lii.s old Aunt Polly, and Sid and Mary, and plenty more. Every- body was talking about the murder, but the captain broke in and says: *' Look sharp, now ; the current sots in the i losest here, and maybe hc'a washed ashore and got tangled amongst the brush at the water's edge. I hope so, anyway." I didn't hope so. They all crowded up and leaned over the rails, nearly in my face, and kept still, watching with all their might. I could see them first- rate, hut they couldn't see me. Then the captain sung out : " Stand away ! " and the cannon let off such a blast right before nio that it made I me deef with the noise and pretty near blind with the / smoke, and I judged I was gone. If they'd a had some bullets in, I reckon thev'd a got the corpse they was after. Well, I see I warn't hurt, thanks to goodness. The boat floated on and went out of sight around the shoulder of the isl- and. I could hear the boom- ing, now and thou, further and further off, and by-and-by after an hour, I didn't hear it no more. The island was three mile long. I judged they had WATCHINO THK BOAT. got to the foot, and waa giving it up. But they didn't yet a while. They turned if ijj I %, -• •■ '-tJ-Tiy, 'b«' s. °" ""» Wb head wasnel irthe firr r ''°,^'' t'"™^^"-'"''! >>- head, and about six foot of hfm and t 7' *""■" '""""'^ " "'™P »' ""bLo^, in daylight, now. fteTtVsl t "'T ^ "°' "'»^^- "™ #'»« Pay says: vvacsons Jim I I bet I was glad to see him. I " Hello, Jim ! » and skipped out. n 1 FINDING JIV. 67 He bounced np and stared at me wild. Then he drops down on his kncoa, and puts his hands together and says : "Dean' hurt me— don't 1 I hain't ever done no harm to a ghos'. I awluz nx AND THB 0H08T. liked dead people, en done all I could for 'em. You go en git in de river agin, whah you b'longs, en doan' do nuffn to Ole Jim, 'at 'uz awluz yo' fren'." Well, I warn't long making him understand I warn't dead. I was ever so glad to see Jim. I warn't lonesome, now. I told him I warn't afraid of Mm telling the people where I was. I talked along, but he only set there and looked at me ; never said nothing. Then I says : " It's good daylight. Le's get breakfast. Make up your camp fire good." « What's de use er makin' up de camp fire to cook strawbries en sich truck ? But you got a gun, hain't you ? Den we kin git sumfn better den strawbries." •' Strawberries and such truck," I says. '• Is that what you live on ? » " I couldn' git nuffn else," he says. ** Why, how long you been on the island, Jim ? * " I come heah de night arter you's killed. " \ AW \m '>%i vna 68 THE AT) VENTURED! OF BUCELEBERRT FINN. "What, all that time?" " Yes-indeedy." " And aiu't you had nothing bnt that kind of rubbage to eat ?» " No, sah— nuffn else." " Well, you must be most starved, ain't you ? ' ■dan- r'*"'™"" "'"'"''• I ""-^ I -"W- How long you ben on do "Since the night I got killed." ,n.."''nV^^'V't'""^°""™''°''^ But yo„ got a gun. Oh, yes, you got a gun. Data good. Now you Ml sumfn on I'll mako up do flro » So we went over to where the eanoo wa., and while he built'a fire in a grasay open plaeo amongst the tree., I fetohed meal and baeou and coflee, and ooLZ ate Z'T' "t °T ""* "- ""i^- ™^ '"» ■"««- - -' "-t oo!!' r. able beoause he ..okoaed it wa. all done with witcho^ft. I oatehed a good big oat.flsh, too, and J,m eleaued him with hia knife, and fried him When breakfast wa, ready, we lolled on the gra« and eat it smoking hot J.m la.d .t .n w,th all his might, for he was most about starred. Then when we had got pretty well stuffed, we laid off and lazied. By-and-by Jim says : ^^_^'' But looky here, Huek, who wu. it dat 'u. kiUed in dat shanty, ef it wam't Then I told him the whole thing, and he said it was smart. He said Tom Satyer oou dn-t get up no better plan than what I had. Then I sayT- ^How do you oome to be here, Jim, and how'd you get here ?» ,,^, looked pretty uneasy, «>d didn't eay nothing (or a minute. Then he " Maybe I better not tell." "Why, Jim?" you'Tck ?'"''' ''^"'"' ^"* ^°" ^°"^'"' '"^ °° ^^ '' ^ '^ *o ^" yon, woald "Blamed if I would, Jim." " Well, I b'lieye you, Huck. I -I run off.» "Jim I" '*' 1 . JIM'S B80APB. 69 , ^ J^But mind, you said you wouldn't tell-you know you said you wouldn't tell, "Well, I did. I said I wouldn't, and I'll stick to if tt. *•• r but that don t make no difference. I ain't aaoin^ to tell »n,, T ? *• there anywa,. S„ now, le'= know all about T" ' "" ' "«"'°« '"^^ wxuuer sue try to git her to say she wouldn' do it hnf T never wa,ted to hear de r.'. I lit out might, ,niok. I tell yl ' "' ' I tuek out en »hin down de hill en 'spee to steal a skift 'long do .ho- umble-down eooper .hop oa de bank to wait for everybody to go 'way. We I wuz dah al n,ght. Dey wu. somebody roun' all do time. 'l^ng wS m de mawnm., sk,fts begin to go by, en W eight er nine every skiftd^ ™^.long w„. taw w how yo- pap come over to de town en' a y„; kdled. De.e las .k.ft, wu. Ml o' ladies en genlmen agoin' over lor to see de phce. Someti.es dey'd pnll np at de sho' en take a res' b'fo' d^y st^Z aorost so by de talk I got to know all 'bout de killin'. I '„, powelw yen's killed, Huek, but I ain't no mo', now. ^ "I laid dah nnder de shavins all day. I 'u. hungry, but I warn't afeared • tek.se knowed ole missus en de widder wn. goin' to start to de eampi" tn' ngh arter breakf.' e„ be gone all day, en dey knows I goes off wid deTttk bout dayhght, so dey wouldn' 'spee to see me roun' de plaee, en soT^ Z m" T T d T' '"' '"' '" ^™"°' ""' ^""- -rvLnts wo„W mjss me, kase dey'd shm out on take holiday, soon as de ole folks 'u. out'n " Well, when it come dark I tuok out up de river road, en went 'bout / ^ 70 THE ADVENTURES OF EUCELEBEItRY FmiT. 11 '^ two mile er more to whah dey warn't no houses. I'd made up my mine 'bout what I's agwyne to do. You see ef I kep' on tryin' to git away afoot de dogs 'ud track me ; ef I stole a skif t to cross oyer, dey'd miss dat skift you see, en dey'd know 'bout whah I'd Ian' on de yuther side en whah to pick up my track. So I says, a raff is what I's arter; it doan' make no track. "I see a light a-comin' roun' de p'int, bymeby, so I wade' in en shove' a log ahead 0' me, en swum more'n half-way acrost de river, en got in 'mongst de drift-wood, en kep' my head down low, en kinder swum agin de current tell de raif come along. Den I swum to de stern uv it, en tuck aholt It clouded up en 'uz pooty dark for a little while. So I dumb up en laid down on do planks. De men 'uz all 'way yonder in do middle, whah de lantern wuz. De river wuz arisin' en dey wuz a good current; so I reck'n'd 'at by fo' in de mawnin' I'd be twenty-five mile down do river, en den Td slip m, j.8' b'fo' daylight, en swim asho' en take to do woods on de Illinoi side "^But I didn' have no luck. When we 'uz mos' down to de head er do islan , a man begin to come aft wid de lantern. I see it warn't no use f^r to wait, so I slid overboad, en struck out fer de islan'. Well, I had a notion I could Ian mos' anywhers, but I couldn't-bank too bluff. I 'uz mos' to de foot er de islan' b'fo' I foun' a good .lace. I went into de woods en jodged I wouldn' fool wid raffs no mo', L. .g as dey move de lantern roun' 80. I had my pipe en a plug er dog-leg, en some matches in my cap, en dey warn't wet, so I 'uz all right." ^ -And so you ain't had no meat nor bread to eat all this time? Why didn't you get mud-turkles ? " ^ how a body g.y„e to hit „„ wid . „ck ? How eo.,ld a b^ do it i; de "W n .T ^^"^ *" '"^ "'^'" ^ ■*" """'^ ™ do daytime." Wel^ thats 80. YottVe had to keep iu the woods all the time of oouree. Did yoa hear 'em shooting the cannon ?" nMro'dThnie'r''"^""^"^"^""- ' ^ - «» ""^ »eah , *atehed Some joang birds come along, flying a yard or two at a time and lighting. i "'■"O'NHMin SIGHS. r n Jim said it was a sign it was ffoing to rain Wo .oM -^ ohiokcn, aew that wly, and ,„ he 11-1, it ' 1 ™ " "^ "'™ ^°°''« birds dn.,A It 7 •" . " ™ "« reckoned it was tho eamo way when voimir did. ^ •'^ ^^^ ^'^^^^^ ^^ould die, and lie .oeatr that "X-^r "^rj^oT ^°T '" -" '" ^^"- after saadown. And he aaid if » t , ^°" *°* *'"' ™^-">* «.o bees n,„3t be trib: eClt LT'"-""" ''"' "" ■""*• I had heard about some of these mn.r. i. t Jim knowcd ail kinds of »i ' "'"« ^"'^ t"' "»' "" »£ them. I a.ud it looked to n,e like Tl ' ^ '""^'' ""^^ ^™'->'""''«- him if n u "^' "'"' *'"'"' '""1 '""k, and so I asked h.m If there warn't any good-luek signs. He says • "M,ghty few-an' &y ai„' no use to a body. What you want to Ef you a got hairy arms en a hairy breas', it's a sign dat you's agwyno ahead Yon see, maybe you's got to bo po' a long time fust, en so yon might g,t d,seourage' en kill yo'sef 'f you didn' know by .1„ sign dat von gwyne to be rich bymeby." ^ ^ "Haro yon got hairy arms and a hairy breast, Jim?" "What's de use to a.t dat question? don' you see I has?" Well, are you rich?" "*^»' •""* I '""' rich wonst, and gwyne to be rich agin Wunst I had foteen deta, but I tuck to speoalat'n', en got basted It." What did you speculate in, Jim?" "Well, fust I tackled stock.'* "What kind of stock?" . "Why, lire 6took. Catae, you know. I put ten dollars in a cow. m 72 THE ADVENTURES OF RUCKLEBERRT FINN, / I)! (( Yes. But I ain' gwyno to resk no mo' money 1h stock. De cow up 'n' died on my ban's." ^ "So yo^ lost the ten dollars." "No, I didn' ioso it all I on'y los' 'bout nine of it. I sole do hide c. taller for a dollar en ten . .nta," xnoreT''"" ^ ^'' ^'^"" """^ "^ "^ ^'^'^ ^'^ ^"^ «P««"^*^« ^^7 You know dut on,-laigged nigger dat b'longs to old Misto Bradisb ? well, he y-.t up a bank, en say anybody dat put in a dollar would git fo' dollars mo' at de en' er de year. Well, all do niggers went in, but dey didn' have much. I wuz de on'y one dat had much. So I stuck out for mo' dan fo' dollars, en I said 'f I didn' git it I'd start a bank myeef. Well o' course dat nigger want' to keep me out er de business, bekase he say dey warn't business 'nough for two banks, so he say I could put in my five dollar-- oa he - •■"■■rw /MM inHM P^y me thirty-five at He en' "So I done . Den I reck'n'd I'd inves' . . thirty- five dollars right ol ra keep *^hings a-movin'. Dei- -r-iz a. mg^ name- Bob, dat had ketched a wood-Sat, en hia marste. W how rt , en I bought it offn him en told him to t»ke de thirtv-a™ dota when de en' er da year oome; but «,n.ebody stole de wood-Z dit MUTO BIUBISH'g NISSKB. ■I I 'BALUM.' 78 night, en nex' day de one-laigged nigger say de bank 'a busted. So dey didn none uv us git no money." "What did you do with the ten cents, Jim?" "Well, I 'uz gwyne to spen' it, but I had a dream, en de dream tole me to give it to a nigger name' Balum-Balum's Ass dey call him for short hes one er dem chuckle-heads, you know. But he's lucky, dey say en I see I wam't lucky. De dream say let Balum inves' de ten cents en he'd make a raise for me. Well, Balum he tuck de money, en when he wuz in church he hear de preachor say dat whoever give to de po' len' to de Lord, en boun' to git his money back a hund'd times. So Balum he tuck en give de ten cents to de po.' en laid low to see what wuz gwyne to come of it." 6 J o i/u ** Well, what did come of it, Jim ? " "Nuffn' never come of it. I couldn' manage to k'leck dat money no way ; en Balum he couldn'. I ain' gwyne to len' no mo' money 'dout I Bee de security. Boun' to git yo' money back a hund'd times, de preacher Bays ! Ef I could git de ten cents back, I'd call it squah, en be glad er de chanst." "Woll, it's all right, anyway, Jim, long as you're going to be rich again some time or other." "Yes-en I's rich now, come to look at it. I owns mysef, en I's wuth eight hund'd dollars. I wisht I had de money, I wouldn' want no , : mo'." |- r Placo right abo«t the middle of tte .ahnd that Pd x„„„d ^,.„„ j »a« oxplonng. so „ started, and y «:' '» ". k-a,« the Liana ™ ""'y "=™ miles long and a luarter oi! a n,i,o ^ij,,. This place was a tolerable lone *op hill or ridge, about forty &ot h-gh. We had a rough time «ottmg to the top, the side, .•„ fo steep and the bushes so thie'c .,; '""^VedaM dumb around' >I1 over .t, and by-and-by f™„d " «°° ^'e -^"vem in the rook r';P to the top on the sid towards lUinoia. The eavern was »^ b'g «s two or three rooms bunched together, and Jim could Cf' atand np st^ght ;„ ;, j^ J ~™.™ ^ r C7n te---f »l»d »d they would never Cnsrh,?'"'' "" *« "°»» '» '^o "■em httle birds had said it was goiu.l? ^^^ ^"^ '''"'''' ^^ "^l *» get wet? "^ ^O'-S ^0 ram, and did I want the things THE CAVE, 75 So wo went back and got tho canoo and paddled up abreast the cavern, and lugged all tho traps up there. Then we hunted up a place close by to hide tho canoo in, amongst tho thick willows. We took some fish off of the lines and set them again, and begun to get ready for dinner. Tho door of tho cavern was big enough to roll a hogshead in, and on one side of tho door tho floor stuck out a little bit and was flat and a good place to build a flro on. So wo built it there and cooked dinner. Wo spread tho blankets inside for a carpet, and cat our dinner in there. J IN THH CAVB. We put all the other things handy at the back of the cavern. Pretty soon it darkened up and begun to thunder and lighten ; so the birds was right about it. Directly it begun to rain, and it rained like all fury, too, and I never see the wmd blow so. It was one of these regular summer storms.' It would get so dark that it looked all blue-black outside, and lovely ; and tho rain would thrush along by so thick that the trees off a little ways looked dim and spider-webby ; and here would come a blast of wind that would bend the trees down and tnrn up the pale underside of the leaves ; and then a perfect ripper of a gust would follow along and set the branches to tossing their arms as if they was just wild ; t f? 16 TBE ADVEWTTTRSS Of BWKLEBBRTIT rzrv. and next, when it was jurt about thTbluert anrblackost-/.< / it was aa briAt i In alaint, 7 1' °' ^'""^ '"*" '' ™ ?°» -"'■> »« "''"m , dark »m agmn „ a ,oeond, and now you'd hear ti.e thunder lot go with an awful ,1 "", Tk'° "■^"•"'"^' «™->ta«. tumbling down the sky LZTZ w. V ""'■' ""^ '"""^ ™P'^ •-""* 'i°>™ «'«-. where ,rion« stmrs and they bouneo a good deal, you know. * P..!'*""', "" '' "'""•" ' '''^■'- " ' ""'''"'' ™"' '» ' " -""hero else but here Pass me along another hunk of ,l»l, and some hot com-bread " "Well you wouldn't a ben here, -1 it hadn-t a ben r Jim. You'd a I«„ down dah .„ de wood., widout any dinner, en gittn' mos' drownd d lo 1" vt wouM, honey. Chiekens knows when its g,vyne to rain, en so do ^e'bt ^ L'" but on ih. M- • ! ''^ "'^' '^ ^^' ■" 5°od many miles wide • but on the Missouri side it was the ,,r, )n olJ dist-mr .rn«=_ , i* ' because the Missouri shore was jast a wal, of hi.ht ^s ' ' "'^"-" Daytimes wo paddled all over the islm ,i in n,„ and shady in the deep woods o J if * T"'- ^' """ "igWy oool winding in and out all t JI . .Ij"' "'f" -"^'^- We wont we had to haek away and 'go some Xr l^ w ^n t" ZJZT T"' that you eould padd^ ^^hru T^d'^t" uT tZ' ^ r"; "' "'"^ r"-' bat. not the snake, and turtios-they'woL .1 r off" n t Z wat^ ZT'T'' ^roavern was in, was full of them. We eould a had pets en^^^ we^'':a::S «w"rt«c:::rfnd:b'::rc° °' :'™^^^ ■^'^■"^ "'- ^--^ above water si. „.• Jenlt "1:7 I '1'°%"°' "" "" ""°^ by in ft, daylight, sometimes, but we IZJ^': we d^t hi: '"1°^ ^° daylight. ^ ^^ '' ''""^ ourselves in Another night, when we was up at the head of the island, Just Ulore daylight. 1 i id TBF rxoATmu nnxrsB. ___^^ 77 hero comes ,. frame house down, „„ the west side. Sl.e was « two-story, and .Ited over con.dorabK.. We ,,addiod out and got ab„ar,i-eluu,b iu at an np-sta,. w,nd„„. But it was t„„ dark to ace jet, so wo made tl.e canoe fas and set in her to wait r daylight. The light besuu to come hrfore we got to the foot of the island. Then we 1 , Ved m at the w.ndow. We could make out a bed, and a table, „„d two old oha™, and lots of thing, around about on the floor, and ther was ZZ JIM '■' < A IJEAD MAN. hanging against the all. Ther. w something laying on the floor in th. far corner that looko Mil a man. So Jin says: " Hello, you ! ' But it didn't b. Ige. So J holler. 1 again, and then Jim says • "De man ain't a«leep-he'. lead. You hold stul-I" ' ao en see." He went and bent down and looked, au"> -•" «-t to thread tie »« -"'« the h ad t «land, and then started across I took off the sun-bonnet, for I didn't want no W,nders on then. When I was about the middle, I hear the clock b'" t nke ; so I stops and listens ; the sound come faint over the water, but r elaven. When I struck the hc^ of the island I never waited to UoTl I #1 1J ' 'I / ^^ >s^, -'^^ ^. <^ -^^^ .0. IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) 1.0 I.I |45 130 Hi Ki U ■^~ Has - '""2.2 il 12.0 1.8 1.25 1.4 ]||i.6 = — \h — .4 6" ► Vi Hiotographic Sdences Corporation 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, N.Y. MS80 (716) 87'^-4503 92 THE ADVENTURES OF BUCKLEBBBRT FINIT.^ was most winded, but I shoved right into the timber where my old camp used to be, and started a good fire there on a high-and-dry spot. Then I jumped in the canoe and dug out for our place a mile and a hali below, as hard as I could go. 1 landed, and slopped through the timber and up the ridge and into the cavern. There Jim laid, sound asleep on the ground. I roused him out and says : "Git up and hump yourself, Jim I There ain't a minute to lose. They're after us ! " Jim never asked no questions, he never said a word ; but the way he worked for the next half an hour showed about how he was scared. By that time everything we had in the worid was on our raft and she was ready to be shoved out from the willow cove where she was hid. We put out the camp fire at the cavern the first thing, and didn't show a candle outside after that. I took the canoe out from shore a little piece and took a look, but if there was a boat around I couldn't see it, for stars and shadows ain't good to see by. Then we got out the raft and slipped along down in the shade, past the foot of the island dead still, never saying a word. i ■^ fo as bi, h£ a or K- tiimtmmm if-f"-^^'- raj'' I ' M^x. MUST a been close onto one o'clock when we got below the island at last, and the raft did seem to go mighty slow. If a boat was to come along, we was going to take to the canoe and break for the Illinois shore ; and it was well a boat didn't come, for we hadn't ever thought to put the gun into the canoe, or a fish- ing-line or anything to eat. We was in ruther too much of a sweat to think of so many things. It wam't good judg- ment to put everything on the raft. If the men went to the island, I just expect they found the camp fire I built, and watched it all night for Jim to come. Anyways, they stayed away from us, and if my building the fire never fooled them it warn't no fault of mine. I played it as low-down on them as I could. When the first streak of day begun to show, we tied up to a tow-head in a big bend on the Illinois side, and hacked off cotton-wood branches with the hatchet and covered up the raft with them so she looked like there had been a cave-in in the bank there. A tow-head is a sand-bar that has cotton-woods on it as thick as harrow-teeth. ;, > We had mountains on the Missouri shore and heavy timber on the Illinois side. ON THE RAFT. 1 i,' •* "M and the channel was down the Missouri shore at that place, so we warn't afraid of anybody running across us. AVe laid there all day and watched the rafts and steamboats spin down the Missouri shore, and up-bound steamboats fight the big river in the middle. I told Jim all about the time I had jabbering with that woman ; and Jim said she was a smart one, and if she was to start after us herself she wouldn't set down and watch a camp fire— no, sir, she'd fetch a dog. WjU, then, I said, why couldn't she tell her husband to fetch a dog ? Jim said he bet she did think of it by the time the men was ready to start, and he believed they must a gone up town to get a dog and so they lost all that time, or else we wouldn't be here on a tow-head sixteen or seventeen mile below the village —no, indeedy, we would be in that same old town again. So I said 1 didn't care what was the reason they didn't get us, as long as they didn't. When it was beginning to come on dark, wc poked our heads cut of the Cot- tonwood thicket and looked up, and down, and across ; nothing in sight ; so Jim took up some of the top planks of the raft and built a snug wigwa:;i to get under in blazing weather and rainy, and to keep the things dry. Jim made a floor for the wigwam, and raised it a foot or more above the level of the raft, so now the blankets and all the traps was out of the reach of stcamboiit waves. Hight in the middle of the wigwam we made a layer of dirt about five or six inches deep with a frame around it for to hold it to its placo ; this was to build a fire on in sloppy weather or chilly ; the wigwam would keep it from being seen. We made an ex- tra steering oar, too, because one of the others might get broke, on a snag or Bomething. We fixed up a short forked stick to hang the old lantern on ; be- cause we must always light the lantern whenever we see a steamboat coming down stream, to keep from getting run over ; but we wouldn't have to light it for up- stream boats unless we see we was in what they call a "crossing ;" for the river was pretty high yet, very low banks being still a little under water ; so up-bound boats didn't always run the channel, but hunted easy water. This second night we run between seven and eight hours, with a current that was making over four mile an hour. We catched fish, and talked, and we took a Bwim now and then to keep off sleepiness. It was kind of solemn, drifting down the big still river, laying on our backs looking up at the stars, and we didn't ever feel like talking loud, and it warn't often that we laughed, only a little r 11 DORIiOWmO THINGS. 95 %' jt^' \ kind of a low chuckle. "We had mighty good weather, as a general thing, and noth- ing ever happened to us at all, that night, nor the next, nor the next. Every night we passed towns, some of them away up on black hillsides, noth- ing but just a shiny bed of lights, not a house could yon see. The fifth night we passed St. Louis, and it was like the whole world lit up. In St. Petersburg they used to say there was twenty or thirty thousand people in St. Louis, but I never believed it till I see that wonderful spread of lights at two o'clock that still night. There warn't a sound there ; everybody was asleep. Every night, now, T u ed to slip ashore, towards ton o'clock, at bome little village, and buy ton or fifteen cents' worth of meal or bacon or other stuff to eat ; W and sometimes I lifted a chicken that warn't roosting comfortable, and took him "' along. Pap always said, take a chicken when you get a chance, because if you don't want him yourself you can easy find some- body that does, and a good deed ain't ever forgot. I never see pap when he didn't want the chicken himself, but that is what ho used to say, anyway. Mornings, before daylight, I slipped into corn fields and bor- rowed a watermelon, or a mush- melon, or a punkin, or some new corn, or things of that kind. Pap always said it warn't no harm to borrow things, if you was meaning to pay them back, sometime ; but the widow said it warn't anything but a soft name for stealing, and no decent body would do it. Jim said he reckoned the widow was partly right and pap was partly right ; so the best way would be for us to pick out two or three BE BOMETIKEB LIFTED A CHICKEN. ! i I- 96 THE adventuhes of euckleberrt fink .1 ) w things from the list and say we wouldn't borrow them any more— then he reckoned it wouldn't be no harm to borrow the others. So we talked it over all one night, drifting along down the river, trying to make np our minds whether to drop the watermelons, or the cantelopes, or the mushmelons, or what. But towards day- light we got it all settled satisfactory, and concluded to drop crabapples and p'simmons. We warn't feeling just right, before that, but it was all comfortable now. I was glad the way it come out, too, because crabapples aiu't ever good, and the p'simmons wouldn't be ripe for two or three months yet. We shot a water-fowl, now and then, that got up too early in the morning or didn't go to bed early enough m the evening. Take it all around, we lived pretty high. ,^ Ihe fifth night below St. Louis we had a big storm after midnight, with power of thunder and lightning, and the rain poured down in a solid sheet. We stayed in the wigwam and let the raft take care of itself. When the lightning glared out we could see a big straight river ahead, and high rocky bluffs on both sides. By-and-by says I, " B.el-lo, Jim, looky yonder ! " It was a steamboat that had killed herself on a rock. We was drifting straight down for her. The lightning showed her very distinct. She was leaning over, with part of her upper deck above water, and you could sdfe every little chimbly-guy clean and clear, and a chair by the big bell, with an old slouch hat hanging on the back of it when the flashes come. Well, it being away in the night, and stormy, and all so mysterious-Ike, f felt just the way any other boy would a felt when I see that wreck laying there so mournful and lonesome in the middle of the river. I wanted to get aboard of her and slink around a little, and see what there was there. So I says : "Le'e land on her, Jim." But Jim was dead against it, at first. He says : " I doan' want to go fool'n 'long er no wrack. We's doin' blame' well, en we better let blame' well alone, as de good book says. Like as not dey's a watchman on dat wrack,' " Watchman your grandmother," I says ; *' there ain't nothing to watch but the texas and the pilot-house ; and do you reckon anybody's going to resk his / ' ' ■ 1 I \ ^-j mm 3'' BOARDmo TEE WRECK 97 life for a texas and a pilot-house such anight as this, when it's likely to break u:> and wash off down the river any.inute?" Jinx couldn't say notW to that so hed,dnt try ^^And besides," I says, " we nxight borrow sometCw-th ap^e^^ ca : T^b T''"^' ''''''" ' ''' ^'^-^ ^^ «- -^ apiece, solid cash. Steamboat captains is always rirh «n,i „„+ • . ^ i, ..th and. ^ don't care a cent^what a ..1::::';::^^:::^:^:; want t. Stick a candle in your pocket; I can't rest, Jim, till ^^e ^ve her a rummaging. Do you reckon Tom Sawyer would ever go by this thL v 1! or p. be wouldn't. He'd call it an adventure-tlfafs Vh^ leZ Ll T style into it ?--wouldn't he spread himself, nor nothing ? Why, you'd think i^ was (.l^stopher C'lumbus discovering Kingdom-Come^ I ^^Z twye! th.n '" ^' uT";''" ' ^'''''' ^"* ''"' ^"- ^' «^'^ ^« °^-tn't talk any more fast Lr ' "' '''''''' *'^ ^*^^'°^^^ ^--^' -d -ade The deck was high out, here. We went sneaking down the slone of it fo labboard, in the dark, towards the texas, feeling our w!y slow wiU our ee nd Tsl rrtre^rr^^^'^'^" ^^^^-^^^ '- ^^ waLodark wecoi^dn't: no sign of them. Pretty soon we struck the forward end of the skylight and w—aiv :: j-^'^ ^^^^ '''' '-'''-' ^' ^^ ''-' '' ''^ -p^^^"'« " ' and all r '^"^^""^"y' ^^^y d«^ through the texas-hall we see a light I and all m the same second we seem to hear low voices in yonder ! Jim whispered and said he was feeling powerful sick, and told me to oo„,e along. I says, all right ; and was going to start for th^ raft; but "st then heard a voice wail out and say : '' ^ " Oh, please don't, boys ; I swear I won't ever tell ! " Another voice said, pretty loud : n,nT' ' "''/'"" ^''™''- You've acted this way before. You always want swo^e^IfTou r >f ''n *"^'' ^^' '''''' ^^^^^^ ^^' ^'' ^-' beca:T3 many. You re the meanest, treacherousest hound in this country. " ' I ^ r ! 11 I . 98 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBBItRT FINN. By this time Jim was gone for the raft. I was just a-biling with curiosity ; and I says to myself, Tom Sawyer wouldn't back out now, and so I won't either ; I'm agoing to see what's going on here. So I dropped on my hands and knees, in the little passage, and crept aft in the dark, till there warn't but about one Btateroom betwixt me and the cross-hall of the texas. Then, in there I see a man Stretched on the floor and tied hand and foot, and two men standing over him. ; ■• I r 'niASR DON'T, Bnx.' and one of them had a dim lintem in his hand, and the other one had a pistol. This one kept pointing the pistol at the man's head on the floor and saying — " I'd like to ! And I orter, too, a mean skunk ! " The man oa the floor would shrivel up, and say : " Oh, please don't, Bill— I hain't ever goin' to tell." And every time he said that, the man with the lantern would laugh, and say : **'Deed you ain't! You never said no truer thing 'n that, you bet you.** And once he said : ** Hear him beg I and yit if we hadn't got the best of him and tied him, he'd a killed us both. And what/o/? Jist for noth'n. Jist be- r THE PLOTTERS. 99 cause we stood on our rights— ihaVs, what for. But I lay you ain't agoin' to threaten nobody any more, Jim Turner. Put up that pistol, Bill." Bill says : " I don't want to, Jake Packard. I'm for killin' him— and didn't he kill old Hatfield jist the same way— and don't he deserve it ? " " But I don't ivant him killed, and I've got my reasons for it." " Bless yo' heart for tliem words, Jake Packard 1 I'll never forgit you, long's I live 1 " says the man on the floor, sort of blubbering. Packard didn't take no notice of that, but hung up his lantern on a nail, and started towards wlacro I was, there in the dark, and motioned Bill to come. I crawfished as fast as I could, about two yards, but the boat slanted so that I couldn't make very good time ; so to keep from getting run over and catched I crawled into a stateroom on the upper side. The man come a-pawing along in the dark, and when Packard got to my stateroom, he says : ** Here — come in here." And in he come, and Bill after him. But before they got in, I was up in the upper bertli, cornered, and sorry I come. Then they stood there, with their hands on the ledge of the berth, and talked. I couldn't see them, but I could tell where they was, by the whisky they'd been having. I was glad I didn't drink whisky ; but it wouldn't made much difference, anyway, because most of the time they couldn't atreed me because I didn't breathe. I was too scared. And besides, a body couldn't breathe, and hear such talk. They talked low and earnest. Bill wanted to kill Turner. He says : '' He's said he'll tell, and he will. If we was to give both our shares to him now, it wouldn't make no difference after the row, and the way we've served him. Shore's you're bom, he'll turn State's evidence ; now you hear me. I'm for put- ting him out of his troubles." ** So'm I," says Packard, very quiet. " Blame it, I'd sorter begun to think you wasn't. Well, then, that's all right. Les' go and doit." " Hold on a minute ; I hain't had my say yit. You listen to me. Shooting^a good, but there's quieter ways if the thing's got to be done. But what /say, is this ; it ain't good sense to go court'n around after a halter, if you can git at \fA. I 1.' 'I[ 'n I 'i m Bva w nnf ; 100 THE AD VENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. \\ what you're up to in some way that's jist as good and at the same time don't bring you into no resks. Ain't that so ? " " You bet it i3. But how you goin' to manage it this time P " " Well, my idoa is this : we'll rustle around and gethcr up whatever pickins we've overlooked in the staterooms, and shove for shore and hide the truck. Then we'll wait. Now I say it ain't agoin' to bo more 'n two hours befo' this wruck breaks up and washes off down the river. See ? He'll be drownded, and won't have nobody to blame for it but his own self. I reckon that's a considerble sight better'n kiUin' of him. I'm unfavorable to killin' a man as long as you can git around it ; it ain't good sense, it ain't good morals. Ain't I right ? " " Yes— I reck'n you are. But s'pose she donH break up and wash off ? " "Well, we can wait the two hours, anyway, and see, can't we?" "All right, then; come along." So they started, and I lit out, all in a cold sweat, and scrambled forward. It waa dark as pitch there ; but I said in a kind of a coarse whisper, "Jiml" and he answered up, right at my elbow, with a sort of a moan, and I says : "Quick, Jim, it ain't no time for fooling around and moaning ; there's a gang of murderers in yonder, and If we don't hnnt 'up their boat and set her drifting down the river so these fellows can't get away from the wreck, there's one of 'em going to be in a bad fix. " IT AUi'T fiOOO H0BAL8." Bu 'en Bta en \' I " OB 1 LOSDT LOBDT i '* I ' \ ■■ Xlll^ if riL, I cntchcd my hrcath and most fainted. Shut up on n wreck with such a gang as that I But it warn't no timo to bo sentimentcring. We'd got to find that boat, now — had to havo it for ourselves. So wo went a-quaking and shaking down the stabboard side, and slow work it was, too — seemed a week before wo got to the stern. No sign of a boat. Jim said ho didn't believe he could go any further — co scared he hadn't hardly any strength left, he said. But I said come on, if wc get left on this wreck, we are in a fix, sure. So on we prowled, again. Wo struck for the stem of the tezas, and found it, and then scrabbled along forwards on the skylight, hanging on from shutter to shutter, for the edge of the skylight was in the water. When we got pretty close to the cross-hall door, there was the skiff, sure enough ! I could just barely see her. I felt ever so thankful. In another second I would a been aboard of her ; but just then the door opened. One of the men stuck his head out, only about a couple of foot from me, and I thought I was gone ; but he jerked it in again, and says : "Heave that blame lantern out o' sight, Bill !" He flung a bag of something into the boat^ and then got in himself; and set IK L. nx. -^z E80AI TNn FItOM TEE WRECK. 108 down. It was Packard. Then Bill he comoout and got in. Packard says, in a low voice : " All ready— shovo off ! " I couldn't hardly hang onto the shutters, I was so weak. But Bill says : ** Hold on— 'd you go through him ? " "No. Didn't you?" " No. So he's got his share o' the cash, yet." "Well, then, come along— no use to take truck and leave money." ** Say— won't ho suspicion what we're up to ? " " Maybe he won't. But we got to have it anyway. Come along." So they got out and went in. The door slammed to, because it was on the careened side ; and in a half second I was in the boat, and Jim come a tumbling after mo. I out with my knife and cut the rope, and away wo went ! We didn't touch an oar, and wo didn speak nor whisper, nor hardly even breathe. We went gliding swift along, dead silent, past the tip of the paddle- box, and past the stern ; then in a second or two more wo was a hundred yards below the wreck, and the darkness soaked her up, every last sign of her, and we was safe, and knowed it. When we was three or four hundred yards down stream, -^e see the lantern show like a little spark at the texas door, for a second, and we knowed by that that the rascals had missed their boat, and was beginning to understand that they was in just as much trouble, now, as Jim Turner was. Then Jim manned the oars, and we took out after our raft. Now was the first time that I begun to worry -ibout the men — I reckon I hadn't had time to before. I begun to think how dreadful it was, even for murdei-ers, to be in such a fix. I says to myself, there ain't no telling but I might come to be a murderer myself, yet, and then how would / like it ? So says I to Jim: ** The first light we see, we'll land a hundred yards below it or above it, in a place where it's a good hiding-place for you and the skiflE, and then I'll go and fix up some kind of a yam, and get somebody to go for that gang and get them out of their scrape, so they can be hung when their time comes." But that idea was a failure ; for pretty soon it begun to storm again, and this (I i ti 104 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINHT. time worse than ever. The rain poured down, and never a light showed ; every- body in bed, I reckon. We boomed along down the river, watching for lights and watching for our raft. After a long time the rain let up, but the clouds staid, and the lightning kept whimpering, and by-and-by a flash showed us a black thing ahead, floating, and we made for it. It was the raft, and mighty glad was we to get aboard of it again. We seen a "hello, what's UPf" light, now, away down to the right, on shore. So I said I would go for it. The skiflf was half full of plunder which that gang had stole, there on the wreck. We hustled it onto the raft in a pile> and I told Jim to float along down, and show a light when he judged he had gone about two mile, and keep it burning till I come ; then I manned my oars and shoved for the light. As I got down towards it, three or four more showed— up on a hillside. It was a village. I closed in above the shore-light, and laid on my oars and floated. As I went by, I see it was a lantern hanging on the jackstaff of a double-hull ferry-boat. I skimmed around for the watchman, a-wondering whereabouts he slept ; and by-aud-by I found him roost- -*% 1 THE WATCHMAN. 105 ing on the bitts, forward, with his head down between his knees. I giye his shoulder two or three little shoves, and begun to cry. He stirred up, in a kind of a startlish way ; but when he see it was only me, ho took a good gap and stretch, and then he says : " Hello, what's up ? Don't cry, bub. What's the trouble ? " I says : " Pap, an lam, and sis, and '* Then i broke down. He says : " Oh, dang it, now, donH take on so, we all has to have our troubles and this'n 11 come out all right. What's the matter with 'em ? " " They're— they're— are you the watchman of the boat ? " " Yes," he says, kind of pretty-well-satisfied like. " I'm the captain and the owner, and the mate, and the pilot, and watchman, ai^d head deck-hand ; and sometimes I'm the freight and passengers. I ain't as rich as old Jim Homback, and I can't be so blame' generous and good to Tom, Dick and Harry as what he is, and slam around money the way he does ; but I've told him a many a time 't I wouldn't trade places with him ; for, says I, a sailor's life's the life for me, and I'm demed if I'd live two mile out o' town, where there ain't nothing ever goin' on, not for all his spondulicks and as much more on top of it. Says I " I broke in and says : " They're in an awful peck of trouble, and '* "PF^ois?'* ** Why, pap, and mam, and sis, and Miss Hooker ; and if you'd take your ferry-boat and go up there " " Up where ? Where are they ? " "On the wreck." "What wreck?" "Why, there ain't but one." "What, you don't mean the Walter Scott 9" "Yes." ^ "Good land ! what are they doin* there, for gracious sakes ?" "Well, they didn't go there a-purpose." **I bet they didn't 1 Why, great goodness, there ain't no chance for 'em if I — 'V' < ju.ijim mmmmmm0mmgf0is ■^^"■rfss^w^swww »)i I .....;-^.n^f-»»-«««>«»BI»«f 106 TEE ADVENTURES OF HUGKLEBEBRY FINN. \ they don't git off mighty quick 1 "Why, how in the nation did they ever git into such a scrape ? " " Easy enough. Miss Hooker was a-visiting, up there to the town " "Yes, Booth's Landing— go on." " She was a-visiting, there at Booth's Landing, and just in the edge of the evening she started over with her nigger woman in the horse-ferry, to stay all night at her friend's house. Miss What-you-may-call-her, I disremember her name, and they lost their steering-oar, and swung around and went a-floating down, stem-first, about two mile, and saddle-baggsed on the wreck, and the ferry man and the nigger woman and the horses was all lost, but Miss Hooker she made a grab and got aboard the wreck. Well, about an hour after dark, we come along down in our trading-scow, and it was so dark we didn't notice the wreck till we was right on it ; and so we saddle-baggsed ; but all of us was saved but Bill Whipple— and oh, he was the best creturl— I most wish't it had been me, I do." " My George ! It's the beatenest thing I ever struck. And then what did you all do ? " " Well, wo hollered and took on, but it's so wide there, we couldn't make nobody hear. So pap said somebody got to get ashore and get help somehow. I was the only one that could swim, so I made a dash for it, and Miss Hooker she said if I didn't strike help sooner, come here and hunt up her uncle, and he'd fix the thing. I made the land about a mile below, and been fooling along ever since, trying to get people to do something, but they said, * What, in such a night and such a current ? there ain't no sense in it ; go for the steam-ferry.' Now if you'll go, and " " By Jackson, I'd like to, and blame it I don't know but I will ; but who in the dingnation's agoin' to pay for it ? Do you reckon your pap " ** Why that's all right. Miss Hooker she told me, particular, that her uncle Hornback " " Great guns 1 is he her uncle ? Looky here, you break for that light over yonder-way, and turn out west when you git there, and about a quarter of a mile out you'll come to the tavern ; tell 'em to dart you out to Jim Horn- back's and he'll foot the bilL And don't you fool around any, because he'll \ f 8INKIN0. 107 want to know the news. Tell him I'll have his niece all safe before he can get to town. Hump yourself, now ; I'm agoing up around the corner here, to roust out my engineer." I struck for the light, but as soon as he turned the corner I went back and got into my skill and bailed her out and then pulled up shore in the easy water about six hundred yards, and tucked myself in among some woodboats ; for I couldn't rest easy till I could see the ferry-boat start. But take it all around, 1 was feeling ruther comfortable on accounts of taking all this trouble for that gang, for not many would a done it. I wished the } THX WRECK. widow knowed about it. I judged she would be proud of me for helping these rapscallions, because rapscallions and dead beats is the kind the widow and good people takes the most interest in. Well, before long, here comes the wreck, dim and dusky, sliding along down I A kind of cold shiver went through me, and then I struck out for her. She was very deep, and I see in a minute there warn't much chance for anybody being alive in her. I pulled all around her and hollered a little, but there wasn't any answer ; all dead still. I felt a little bit heavy-hearted about the gang, but not much^ for I reckoned if they could stand it, I could. ii mgfi I 108 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINK \ Then here comes the ferry-boat ; so I shoved for the middle of the river on a long down-stream slant ; and when I judged I was out of eye-reach, I laid on my oars, and looked back and see her go and smell around the wreck for Miss Hooker's remainders, because the captain would know her uncle Homback would want them ; and then pretty soon the ferry-boat give it up and went for shore, and I laid into my work and went a-booming down the river. WK TUBHID nr kSD 8LKFT. It did seem a powerful long time before Jim's light showed up ; and when it did show, it looked like it was a thousand mile off. By the time I got there the sky was beginning to get a little gray in the east ; so we struck for an island, and hid the raft, and sunk the skiS, and turned in and slept like dead people. \ fY-and-by, when we got up, we turned over the truck the gang had stole oflE of the wreck, and found boots, and blankets, and clothes, and all sorts of other things, and a lot of books, and a spyglass, and three boxes of seegars. We hadn't ever been this rich before, in neither of our lives. The seegara was prime. We laid off all the after- noon in the woods talking, and me reading the books, and having a gen- eral good time. I told Jim all about what happened inside the wreck, and at the ferry-boat ; and I said these kinds of things was adventures ; but he said he didn't want no more advent- ures. He :!aid that when I went in the texas and he crawled back to get on the raft and found her gone, he nearly died ; because he judged it was all up with Mm, anyway it could be fixed ; for if he didn't get saved he would get drownded ; and if he did get saved, whoever saved him would send him back home so as to get the reward, and then Miss Watson would sell him South, sui'e. Well, he was right ; he was most always right ; he had an uncommon level head, for a nigger. I read considerable to Jim about kings, and dukes, and earls, and such, and how gaudy they dressed, and how much style they put on, and called each other TTTRNINQ OVER THE TRUCK. ■11 lawki 110 THE ADVENTURE8 OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. your majesty, and your grace, and your lordship, and so on, 'stead of mister • and Jim's eyes bugged outj and he was interested. He says : "I didn' know dey wan so many un urn. I hain't hearn 'bout none un um, Bkasely, but ole King SoUormun, ouless you counts dem kings dat's in a pack er k'yards. How much do a king git? " " Get? " I says ; "why, they get a thousand dollars a month if they want it ; they can have just as much as they want; everything belongs to them." " Ain' dat gay? En vhat dey got to do, Huck? " BOLOXON AND HIS JinXION WITKS. " TJiey don't do nothing! Why how you talk. They just set around." «No_isdatso?" " Of course it is. They just set around. Except maybe when there *s a war ; then they go to the war. But other times they just lazy around ; or go hawking —just hawking and sp— Sh!— d' you hear a noise? " We skipped out and looked ; but it warn't nothing but the flutter of a steamboat's wheel, away down coming around the point ; so we come back. "Yes," says I, " aud other times, when things is dull, they fuss with the *"*v THE HAREM. Ill parlyment; and if everybody don't go just so he whacks their heads off. But mostly they hang round the harem." "Roun'de which?" "Harem." ** "What's de harem?" *'Tho place where he keep his wives. Don't you know about the harem? Solomon had one ; he had about a million wives." "Why, yes, dat's so; I— I'd done forgot it. A harem's a bo'd'n-house, I reck'n. Mos' likely dey has rackety times in de nussery. En I reck'n de wives quarrels considable ; en dat 'crease de racket. Yit dey say Sollermun de wises' man dat ever live'. I doan' take no stock in dat. Bekase why : would a wise man want to live in de mids' er sich a blimblammin' all de time? No-'deed he wouldn't. A wise man 'ud take en buil' a biler-factry; en den he could shet down de biler-factry when he want to res'." "Well, but ho was the wisest man, anyway ; Docause the widow she told me Bo, her own self." rr t, j " I doan k'yer what de widder say, he warnH no wise man, nuther. He had some cr de dad-fetchedes' ways I evor sec. Docs you know 'bout dat chile dat he 'uz gwyne to chop in two?" "Yes, the widow told me all about it." " Well, den! Warn' dat de beatenes' notion in de worl'? You jes' take en look at it 'a minute. Dah's de stump, dah-dat's one er de women : heah's you- dat's de yuther one ; I's Sollermun ; en dish-yer dollar bill's de chile. Bofe un you claims it. What does I do? Does I shin aroun' mongs' de neighbors en fine out which un you do bill do b'long to, en han' it over to de right one, all safe en Boun', de way dat anybody dat had any gumption would? No-I take en whack de bill in two, en give half un it to you, en de yuther half to de yuther woman. Dat's de way Sollermun was gwyne to do wid de chile. Now I want to ast you: what's de use er dat half a bill ?-can't buy noth'n wid it. En what use is a half a chile? I would'n give a dem for a million un um." *' But hang it, Jim, you've clean missed the point-blame it. you've missed it a thousand mile." " Who ? Me ? Go 'long. Doan' talk to me 'bout yo' piuts. I reck'n I knows til ! ■ t 1^1 i i 1 mm ;■ I 113 TEE ADVENTUBEa OF HUCKLEBERRY FINK sense when I sees it ; en dey ain' no sense in sich doin's as dat. De 'spate wam't 'bout a half a chile, de 'spute was 'bout a whole chile ; en de man dat think he kin settle a 'spute 'bout a whole chile wid a half a chile, doan' know enough to come in out'n de rain. Doan' talk to me 'bout SoUermun, Huck, I knows him by de back." " But I tell you you don't get the point." " Blame de pint 1 I reck'n I knows what 1 knows. En mine you, de real pint is down furder — it's down deeper. It lays in de way SoUermun was raised. You THK BTOBT OF " BOLLXHXUN.** take a man dat's got on'y one er two chillen ; is dat man gwyne to be waseful o* chillen ? No, he ain't ; he can't 'ford it. He know how to value 'em. But you take a man dat's got 'bout five million chillen runnin' roun' de house, en it's diflfunt. He as soon chop a chile in two as a cat. Bey's plenty mo'. A chile er two, mo' er less, wam't no consekens to Sollermun, dad fetch him 1 " I never see such a nigger. If he got a notion in his head once, there wam't no getting it out again. He was the most down on Solomon of any nigger I ever see. So I went to talking about other kings, and let Solomon slide. I told about Louis Sixteenth that got his head cut oS. in France long time age ; and about his lil in B le a H FRKKCn. 113 little boy the dolphin, that would a been a king, but they took and shut him up in jail, and some say he died there. " Po' little chap." ** But some says he got out and got away, and come to America." ** Dat's good 1 But he'll be pooty lonesome — dey ain' no kings here, is dey. Buck ?" "No." ** Den he cain't git no situation. What he gwyne to do ? " " Well, I don't know. Some of them gets on the police, and some of them learns people how to talk French." "Why, Huck, doan' de French people talk de same way we does ?" ** No, Jim ; you couldn't understand a word they said— not a single word." " Well, now, I be ding-busted 1 How do dat come ?" " /don't know ; but it's so. I got some of their jabber out of a book. Spose a man was to come to you and say Polly-voo-franzy—yfhat would you think ?" " I wouldn' think nufE 'n ; I'd take en bust him over de head. Dat is, if he wam't white. I wouldn't 'low no nigger to call me dat." " Shucks, it ain't calling you anything. It's only saying do you know how to talk French." ** Well, den, why couldn't he say it ?" " Why, he is a-saying it. That's a Frenchman's way of saying it." " Well, it's a blame' ridicklous way, en I doan' want to hear no mo' 'bout it. Dey ain' no sense in it." " Looky here, Jim ; does a cat talk like we do ? ** " No, a cat don't." "Well, does a cow?" " No, a cow don't, nuther.'* " Does a cat talk like a cow, or a cow talk like a cat ?'* " No, dey do. "It's natural and right for 'em to talk different from each other, ain't it ?** "'Course." « And ain't it natural and right for a cat and a cow to talk different from ua t " « Why, mos' sholy it is." 9 ! :.■ '«?K'lfK^05l|r yl ESEE 126 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRT FINN. " I will, sir, I will, honest — but don't leave us, please. It's the — the— gentle- men, if you'll only pull ahead, and let me heave you the head-line, you won't have to come a-near the raft — please do." *' Set her back, John, set her back I " says one. They backed water. "Keep away, boy — keep to looard. Confound it, I just expect the wind hug blowed it to us. Your pap's got the small-pox, and you know it precious well. Why didn't you come out and say so ? Do you want to spread it all over ? '* a ki fc .ii 'bot, that's a lib." tf 'Well," says I, a-blubbering, "I've told everybody before, and then they just went away and left us." " Poor devil, there's something in that. We aro right down sorry for you, but we— well, hang it, we don't want the small-pox, you see. Look here, I'll tell you what to do. Don't you try to land by yourself, or you'll smash every- thing to pieces. You float along down about twenty miles and you'll come to a town on the left-hand side of the river. It will be long after sun-up, then, and when you ask for help, you tell them your folks are all down with chills and fever. Don't be a fool again, and let people guess what is the matter. Now we're trying to do you a kindness ; so you ji;st put twenty miles between us, that's a I t MMMiawWi^i - TimriuMi rmyf'"*"" tK0il»a>m-- FLOATING CURRENCY, 127 good boy. It wouldn't do any good to land yonder where the light is — it's only a wood-yard. Say — I reckon your father's poor, and I'm bound to say he's in pretty hard luck. Here — I'll put a twenty dollar gold piece on this board, and you get it when it Hoats by. I feel mighty mean to leave you, but my kingdom ! it won't do to fool with small-pox, don't you see ? " *' Hold on, Parker," says the other man, "here's a twenty to put on the board lor me. Good-bye, boy, you do as Mr. Parker told you, and you'll be all right." *aBBB I le, HUCE." '* That's so, my boy— good-bye, good-bye. If you see any runaway niggers, you get help and nab them, and you can make some money by it." " Good-bye, sir," says I, "I won't let no runaway niggers get by me if I can help it." They went off, and I got aboard the raft, feeling bad and low, because I knowed very well I had done wrong, and I see it warn't no use for me to try to learn to do right ; a body that don't get started right when he's little, ain't y > ' ■ • I'll li 'i' ^mtm ■V!f^ ^ 128 TEE ADVENTUREa OF BUOKLEBiHIiT FINIT. got no show-when the pinch comes there ain't nothing to back him up and keep him to his work, and so he gets beat. Then I thought a minute, ai)d says to myself, hold on,-8pose you'd a done right and give Jim up ; would you felt better than what you do now ? No, says I, I'd feel bad-I'd feel jusi; the same way I do now. Well, then, says I, what's the use you learning to do right t^heu It's troublesome to do right imd ain't no trouble to do wrong, and the wages ig just the same ? I was stuck. I couldn't answer that. So I reckoned I wouldn't bother no more about it, but after this always do whichever come handiest at the time. I went into the wigwam ; Jim warn't there. I lo'>ked all around he wam't anywhere. I says : ' "Jim!" " Here I is, Huck. Is dey out o' sight yit ? Don't talk loud." He was in the river, under the stern oar, with just his nose out. I told him they was out of sight, so ho come aboard. He says : "I was a-listenin' to all de talk, en I slips into de river en was gwyne to shove fo. sho' If dey come aboard. Den I was gwyne to swim to de ri agin when dey was gone. But lawsy, how you did fool 'em, Huck ! Dat wuz\ smartes dodge I I tell you, chile, I 'speck it save' ole Jim-ole Jim ain't gwyne to forgit you for dat, honey." Then we talked about the money. It was a pretty good raise, twenty dollars apiece. Jim said we could take deck passage on a steamboat now, and the money would last us as far as we wanted to go in the free States. He said twenty mile more wam't far for the raft to go, but he wished we was'already there. Towards daybreak we tied up, and Jim was mighty particular about hiding the raft good. Then he worked all day fixing things in bundles, and getting all ready to quit rafting. ^ That mght about ten we hove in sight of the lights of a town away down m a left-hand bend. I went oflf in the canoe, to ask about it. Pretty soon I found a man out in the nver with a skiff, setting a trot-line. I ranged up and says : " Mister, is that town Cairo ? " " Cairo ? no. You must be a blame' fool." i m w f( b •■«►■ " RUNNING BY CAIRO. 129 " What town is it, mister ? " " If you want to know, go and find out. If you stay hero bothcrin' around me for about a half a minute longer, you'll got something you won't want." I paddled to the raft. Jim was awful disappointed, but I said never mind, Cairo would bo the next place, I reckoned. We passed another town before daylight, and I was going out again ; but it was high ground, so i didn't go. No high ground about Cairo, Jim said. I had forgot it. We laid up for the day, on a tow-head tolerable close to the left-hand bank. I begun to suspicion something. So did Jim. I says : " Maybe we went by Cairo in the fog that night." He says : " Doan' less' talk about it, Huck. Po* niggers can't have no luck. I awluz 'spected dat rattle-snake skin warn't done wid it's work." " I wish I'd never seen that snake-skin, Jim— I do wish I'd never laid eyes on it." "It ain't yo' fault, Huck; you didn' know. Don't you blame yo'self 'bout it." When it was daylight, here was the clear Ohio water in shore, sure enough, and outside was the old regular Muddy ! So it was all up with Cairo. We talked it all over. It wouldn't do to take to the shore ; we couldn't take the raft up the stream, of course. There warn't no way but to wait for dark, and start back in the canoe and take the chances. So we slept all day amongst the cotton-wood thicket, so as to be fresh for the work, and when we went back to the raft about dark the canoe was gone ! We didn't say a word for a good while. There warn't anything to say. We both knowed well enough it was some more work of the rattle-snake skin ; so what was the use to talk about it ? It would only look like we was finding fault, and that would be bound to fetch more bad luck— and keep on fetching it, too, till we knowed enough to keep still. By-and-by we talked about what we better do, and found there warn't no way but just to go along down with the raft till we got a chance to buy a canoe to go back in. We wam't going to borrow it when there warn't anybody around, the way pap would do, for that might set people after us. b t i| i^^ •.H'-.'»"'- " %» 180 THE ADVENTUBES OF ffWELEBERRT FINN. So we slioved out, after dark, on the raft. Auybody that don't believe yet, that it's foolishnesa to handle a snake-Bkin, after all that that snake-skin done for us, will believe it now, if they read on and Bee what more it done for us. The place to buy canoes is off of rafts laying up at shore. But wo didn't see no rafta laying up ; bo wo went along during three hours and more. Well, the night got gray, and ruther thick, which is the next meanest thing to fog. You can't tell the shape of the river, and you can't see no distance. It got to be very late and still, and then along comes a steamboat up the river. We lit the lan- tern, and judged she would see it. Up-stream boats didn't generly come close to U3 ; they go out and follow the bars and hunt for easy water under the reefs ; but nights like this they bull right up the channel against the whole river. We could hear her pounding along, but wo didn't see her good till she was close. She aimed right for us. Often they do that and try to see how close they can come without touching ; sometimes the wheel bites off a sweep, and then the pilot sticks \\\i head out and laughs, and thinks he's mighty cmart. Well, here shn comes, and wo said she was going to try to shave us ; but she didn't seem to be sheering oft a bit. She was a big one, and she was coming in a hurry, too, looking like a black cloud with rows of glow-worms around it ; but all of a sudden she bulged out, big and scary, with a long row of wide-open furnace doors shining like red-hot teeth, and her monstrous bows and guards hanging right over us. There was a yell at us, and a jingling of bells to stop the engines, a pow-wow of ciissing, and whistling of steam— and as Jim went overboard on one Bide and I on tho other, she come smashing straight through the raft. I dived— and I aimed to find the bottom, too, for a thirty-foot wheel had got to go over me, and I wanted it to have plenty of room. I could always stay under water a minute ; this time I reckon I staid under water a minute and a half. Then I bounced for the top in a hurry, for I was nearly busting. I popped out to my arm-pits and blowed the water out of my nose, and puffed a bit. Of course there was a booming current ; and of course that boat started her engines again ten seconds after she stopped them, for they never cared much for rafts- men ; so now she was churning along up the river, out of sight in the thick weather, though I could hear her. fo CD 80 ti EC a I a; a: k l' SWIMMTNO ASHORE. 181 I sung out for Jim about a dozen times, but I didn't get any answer ; BO I grabbed a plank that touched nu^ while 1 was «* treading water," and struck out for shore, shoving it ahead of mc. But I made out to see that the drift of the current was towards the left-hand shore, which meant that I wua iu a crossing j 80 I changed oil and went that way. It was one of these long, slanting, two-milo crossings ; so I was a good long time in getting over. I made a safe landing, and clum up the bank. I couldn't Beo but a little ways, but I went poking along over rough ground for a quarter of a mile or more, and then I run across a big old-fashioned double log house before I noticed it. I was going to rush by and get away, but a lot of dogs jumped out and went to howUng uud burking at mo, and I knowed better than to move another peg. OUMBINU UP TUE BANK. I ■|f| !.4u£«Mh;»^ut.4i«ib'i,; «'-i i'- ^^}"\ ABOUT half a minute somebody spoke out of a window, without putting his head out, and says : " Be done, boys ! Who's there ? " I says : " It's me." *' Who's me?" ** George Jackson, sir." " What do you want ? " " I don't want nothing, sir. I only want to go along by, but the dogs won't let me." "What are you prowling around here this time of night, for — hey ? " " I warn't prowling around, sir ; I fell overboard off of the steamboat." " Oh, you did, did you ? Strike a light there, somebody. What did you say your name was ?" ** George Jackson, sir. I'm only a boy." "Look here; if you're telling the truth, you needn't be afraid— nobody '11 hurt you. But don't try to budge ; stand right where you are. Eouse out Bob and Tom, some of you, and fetch the guns. George Jackson, is there anybody with you ? " " No, sir, nobody." I heard the people stirring around in the house, now, and see a light. The man sung out : 'who's THBRlt" i mtm Mi 1 AN EVENING CALL. 133 " Snatch that light away, Betsy, you old fool— ain't you got any sense ? Put it on the floor behind the front door. Bob, if you and Tom are ready, take your places." "All ready." "Now, George Jackson, do yon know the Shepherdsons ?'* "No, sir— I never heard of them." " "Well, that may be so, and it mayn't. Now, all ready. Step forward, George Jackson. And mind, don't you hurry — come mighty slow. If there's anybody with you, let him keep back— if he shows himself he'll be shot. Come along, now. Come slow ; push the door open, yourself— just enough to squeeze in, d' you hear ? " I didn't hurry, I couldn't if I'd a wanted to. I took one slow step at a time, and there warn't a sound, only I thought I could hear my heart. The dogs were as still as the humans, but they followed a little behind me. When I got to the three log door-steps, I heard them unlocking and unbarring and unbolting. I put my hand on the door and pushed it a little and a little more, till somebody said, " There, that's enough— put your head in." I done it, but I judged they would take it off. The candle was on the floor, and there they all was, looking at me, and me at them, for about a quarter of a minute. Three big men with guns pointed at me, which made me wince, I tell you ; the oldest, gray and about sixty, the other two thirty or more — all of them fine and handsome — and the sweetest old gray-headed lady, and back of her two young women which I couldn't see right well. The old gentleman says : " There — I reckon it's all right. Come in." As soon as I was in, the old gentleman he locked the door and barrfed it and bolted it, and told the young men to come in with their guns, and they all went in a big parlor that had a new rag carpet on the floor, and got together in a corner that was out of range of the front windows— there warn't none on the side. They held the candle, and took a good look at me, and all said, "Why Jib ain't a Shepherdson— no, there ain't any Shepherdson about him. " Then the old man said he hoped I wouldn't mind being searched for arras, because he didn't mean no harm by it — it was only to make sure. So ho didn't pry 'Vl' I J ^1^1 -lyiiiy Ir/ 134 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRT FINN. into my pockets, but only felt outside with his hands, and said it was all right. Ho told me to make myself easy and at home, and tell all about myself ; but the old lady says : "Why bless you, Saul, the poor thing's as wet as he can be; and don't you reckon it may be he's hungry ? " "True for you, Rachel— I forgot." So the old lady says : " Betsy " (this was a nigger woman), "you fly around and get him something to eat, as quick aa you can, poor thing; and one of you girls go and wake up Buck and toll him- Oh, here he is himself. Buck, take this little stranger and get the wet clothes off from him and dress him up in some of yours that's dry." Buck looked about as old as me thirteen or fourteen or along there, though he was a little bigger than me. Uo hadn't on anything but a shirt, and he was very frowsy-headed. He come in gaping and digging one list into his eyes, and ho Avas dragging a gun along with the other one. He says they no Shephcrdsons " Ain't around ? " They said, no, 'twas a false alarm. "Well," he says, "if they'd a ben some, I reckon I'd a got one." They all laughed, and Bob says : "Why, Buck, they might have scalped us all, you've been so slow in coming." "Well, nobody come after me, and it ain't right. I'm always kep' down ; I don't get no show." "ifever mind, Buck, my boy," says the old man, "you'll have show enough, ' "wmw iP THE FARM IF ARKANSAW. 135 all in good time, don't you fret about that. Go 'long witk you now, and do as your mother told you." When Ave got up stairs to his room, ho got mc a coarse shirt and a round- about and pants of his, and I put them on. While I was at it he asked me what my name was, but before I could tell him, he started to telling me about a blue jay and a young rabbit he had catched in the woods day before yesterday, and he asked me where Moses was when the candle went out. I said I didn't know j I hadn't heard about it before, no way. " Well, guess," he says. "How'm I going to guess," says I, **when I never heard tell about it before?" " But you can guess, can't you ? It's just as easy." "TT/mcA candle?" I says. *' Why, any candle," he says. "I don't know where he was," says I; " where was he ?" " Why he was in the dark ! That's where he was ! " ** Well, if you knowed where he was, what did you ask me for ?" *' Why, blame it, it's a riddle, don't you see ? Say, how long are you going to stay here ? You got to stay always. We can just have booming times— they don't have no school now. Do you own a dog ? I've got a dog— and he'll go in the river and bring out chips that you throw in. Do you like to comb up, Sundays, and all that kind of foolishness ? You bet I don't, but ma she makes me. Confound these ole britches, I reckon I'd better put 'em on, but I'd ruther not, it's so warm. Are you all ready ? All right— come along, old boss." Cold corn-pone, cold corn-beef, butter and butter-milk— that is what tlicy had for me down there, and there ain't nothing better that ever I've come across yet. Buck and his ma and all of them smoked cob pipes, except the nigger woman, which was gone, and the two young women. They all smoked and talked, and I eat and talked. The young women had quilts around them, and their hair down their backs. They all asked me questions, and I told them how pap and me and all the family was living on a little farm down at the bottom of Arkansaw, and my sister Mary Ann run ofE and got married and never was heard of no more, and Bill went to hunt them and he warn't heard of ..f A. I IXji ulr I Ik i 1^ 136 THE ADVENTURES OF HUGELEBERRT FINN. no more, and Tom and Mort died, and then there warn't nobody but just me and pap left, and he was just trimmed down to nothing, on account of his troubles ; so when he died I took what there was left, because the farm didn't belong to us, and started up the river, deck passage, and fell overboard ; and that was how I come to be here. So they said I could have a home there as long as I wanted it. Then it was most daylight, and everybody went to bed, and I went to bed with Buck, and when I waked up in the morning, drat it all, I had forgot what my name was. So I laid there about an hour trying to think, and when Buck waked up, I says : *' Can you spell. Buck ? " "Yes," he says. " I bet you can't spell my name," says L "I bei you what you dare I can," says he. "All right," says I, "go ahead." "' G-o-r-g-e J-a-x-o-n— there now," he says. "Well," says I, "you done it, but I didn't think you could. It ain't no slouch of a name to spell— right off without studying." I set it down, private, because somebody might want me to spell it, next, and so I wanted to be handy with it and rattle it off like I was used to it. It was a mighty nice family, and a mighty nice house, too. I hadn't seen no house out in the country before that was so nice and had so much style. It didn't have an iron latch on the front door, nor a wooden one with a buckskin string, but a brass knob to turn, the same as houses in a town. There wam't no bed in V .e parlor, not a sign of a bed ; but heaps of parlors in towns has beds in them. There was a big fireplace that was bricked on the bottom, and the bricks was kept clean and red by pouring water on them and scrubbing them with another brick ; sometimes they washed them over with red wuter-paint that they call Spanish-brown, same as they do in town. They had big brass dog-irous that could hold up a saw-log. There was a clock on the middle of the mantel-piece, with a picture of a town painted on the bottom half of the glass front, and a round place in the middle of it for the sun, and you could see the pendulum Bwmg behind it. It was beautiful to hear that clock tick ; and sometimes when one of these peddlers had been along and scoured her up and got her in good r r 1 INTERIOR DECORATIONS. 137 shape, she would start in and strike a hundred and fifty before she got tuck- ered out. They wouldn't took any money for her. Well, there was a big outlandish parrot on each side of the clock, made out of something like chalk, and painted up gaudy. By one of the parrots was a cat made of crockery, and a crockery dog by the other ; and when you pressed down on them they squeaked, but didn't open their mouths nor look different nor interested. They squeaked through underneath. There was a couple of big wild-turkey-wing fans spread out behind those things. On a table in the middle of th3 room was a kind of a lovely crockery basket that had apples and oranges and p3aches and grapes piled up in it which was much redder and yellower and prettier than real ones is, but they warn't real because you could see where pieces had got chipped off and showed the white chalk or whatever it was, underneath. This table had a cover made out of beautiful oil-cloth, with a red and blue spread-eagle painted on it, and a painted border all around. It come all the way from Philadelphia, they said. There was some books too, piled up perfectly exact, on each corner of the table. One was a big family Bible, full of pictures. One was " Pilgrim's Progress," about a man that left his family it didn't say why, I read considerable in it now and then. The statements was interesting, but tough. Another was " Friendship's Offering," full of beautiful stuff and poetry ; but I didn't read the poetry. Another was Henry Clay's Speeches, and another was Dr. Gunn's Family Medicine, which told you all about what to do if a body was sick or dead. There was a Hymn Book, and a lot of other books. And there was nice split-bottom chairs, and perfectly sound, too— not bagged down in the middle and -busted, like an old basket. They had pictures hung on the walls— mainly Washingtons and Lafayettes, and battles, and Highland Marys, and one called " Signing the Declaration." There was some that they called crayons, which one of the daughters which was dead made her own self when she was only fifteen years old. They was different from any pictures I ever see before ; blacker, mostly, than is common. One was a woman in a slim black dress, belted small under the arm-pits, with bulges like a cabbage in the middle of the sleeves, and a large black scoop-sliovel bonnet with a black veil, and white slim ankles crossed about with black tape, and very wee black slippers, like a chisel, and she was leaning pensive on a tombstone on her m -! it 11 138 THE ADVENTURES OF nUGKLEBERnT FmK right elbow, under a weeping willow, and her other hand hanging down her side holding a white handkerchief and a reticule, and underneath the picture it said "Shall I Never See Thee More Alas." Another one was a young lady with her hair all combed up straight to the top of her head, and knotted there in front of a comb like a chair-back, and she was crying into a handkerchief and had a dead bird laying on its back in her other hand with its heels up, and underneath the picture it said "I Shall Never Hear Thy Sweet Chirrup More Alas." There was one where a young lady was at a window looking up at the moon, and tears running down her cheeks ; and she had an open letter in one hand with black sealing-wax showing on one edge of it, and she was mashing a locket with a chain to it a<^ainst her mouth, and underneath the. picture it said "And Art Thou Gone Yes Thou Art Gone Alas." These was all nice pictures, I reckon, but I didn't somehow seem to take to them, be- cause if ever I was down a little, they always give me the fan-tods. Everybody was sorry she died, be- cause she had laid out a lot more of these pictures to do, and a body could see by what she had done what they had lost. But I reckoned, that with her disposition, she was having a better time in the grave- yard. She was at work on what they said was her greatest picture when she took sick, and every day and every night it was her prayer to be allowed to live till she got it done, but she never got the chance. It was a picture of a young woman in a long white gown, standing on the rail of a bridge all ready to jump ofl, with her hair aU down her back, and looking up to the "it mask hbr look sfisirt I l-l r ■*«p«pp I STEPHEN DOWLmO B0T8. 139 moou, with the tears running down Jicr face, and she had two arms folded across lier breast, and two arms stretched out in front, and two more reaching up towards the moon-aud the idea was, to see which pair would look best and then scratch out all the other arms ; but, as I was saying, she died before she got her mind made up, and now they kept this picture over the head of the bed in her room, and every time her birthday come they hung flowers on it Other times it was hid with a little curtain. The young woman in the picture had a kind of a nice sweet face, but there was so many arms it made her look too spidery, seemed to me. This young girl kept a scrap-book when she was alive, and used to paste obituaries and accidents and cases of patient sufEering in it out of the Pros- byterian Observer, and write poetry after them out of her own head. It r.-as very good poetry. This h what slic wrote about a boy by the name of Stephen Dowling Bots that fell down a well and was drownded : Odb to Stephen Dowling Bots, Dec'o. And did young Stephen sicken. And did young Stephen die ? And did the sad hearts thicken, And did the mourners cry ? No ; such was not the fate of Young Stephen Dowling Bots ; Though sad hearts round him thiotened, 'Twas not from sickness* shots. No whooping-cough did rack his frame, Nor measles drear, with spots ; Not these impaired the sacred name Of Stephen Dowling Bots. ! > /■ V- 140 TEE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINK Despised love struck not with woe Tiiat head oJt curly knots. Nor stomach troubles laid him low, Young Stephen Bowling Bots. no. Then list with tearful eye, WhUst I his fate do tbll. His soul did from this cold world fly. By falling down a welL They got him out and emptied him ; Alas it was too late ; His spirit was gone for to sport aloft In the realms of the good and great. , i TEXT QOT Hllf OUT AND BKPTUD BIH.*' POETICAL EFFUSIONS. 141 If Emmeline Grangerford could make poetry like that before she was fourteen, there ain't no telling what she could a done by-and-by. Buck said she could rattle off poetry like nothing. She didn't ever have to stop to think. He said she would slap down a line, and if she couldn't find anything to rhyme with it she would just scratch it out and slap down another one, and go ahead. She warn't particular, she could write about anything you choose to give her to write about, just so it was sadful. Every time a man died, or a woman died, or a child died, she would be on hand with her "tribute" before he was cold. She called them tributes. The neighbors said it was the doctor first, then Emmeline, then the undertaker— the under- taker never got in ahead of Emmeline but once, and then she hung fire on a rhyme for the dead person's name, which was Whistler. She warn't ever the same, after that ; she never complained, but she kind of pined away and did not live long. Poor thing, many's the time I made myself go up to the little room that used to be hers and get out her poor old scrap- book and read in it when her pictures had been aggravating me and I had soured on her a little. I liked all that family, dead ones and all, and warn't going to let anything come between us. Poor Emmeline made poetry about all the dead people when she was alive, and it didn't seem right that there warn't nobody to make some about her, now she was gone ; so I tried to sweat out a verse or two myself, but I couldn't seem to make it go, somehow. They kept Emmeline's room trim and nice and all the things fixed in it just the way she liked to have them when she was alive, and nobody ever slept there. The old lady took care of the room herself, though there was plenty of niggers, and she sewed there a good deal and read her Bible there, mostly. Well, as I was saying about the parlor, there was beautiful curtains on the windows : white, with pictures painted on them, of castks with vines all down the walls, and cattle coming down to drink. There was a little old piano, too, that had tin pans in it, I reckon, and nothing was ever so lovely as to hear the young ladies sing, "The Last Link is Broken " and play "The Battle of Prague'* on it. The walls of all the rooms was plastered, and most had carpets on the floors, and the whole house was whitewashed on the outside. I il I -i 142 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRT FINN. It was a double house, and the big open place betwixt them was roofed and floored, and sometimes the table waa set there in the middle of the day, and it was a cool, comfortable place. Nothing couldn't be better. And warn't the cooking good, and just bushels of it too I •--O^i^^MtUH.'-' IM|M» 1 I i' GEANGERFORD was a gentleman, you see. He was a gentleman all over; and so was his family. Ho was well bom, as the saying is, and. that's worth as much in a man as it is in a horse, BO the Widow Douglass said, and no- body ever denied that she was of the first aristocracy in our town; and pap he always said it, too, though he warn't no more quality than a mud- cat, himself. Col. Grangerford was very tall and very slim, and had a darkish-paly complexion, not a sign of red in it anywheres ; he was clean- shaved every morning, all over his thin face, and he had the thinnest kind of lips, and the thinnest kind of nostrils, and a high nose, and heavy eyebrows, and the blackest kind of eyes, sunk so deep back that they seemed like they was looking out of caverns at you, as you may say. His forehead was high, and his hair was black and straight, and hung to his shoulders. His hands was long and thin, and every day of his life he put on a clean shirt and a full suit from head to foot made out of linen so white it hurt your eyes to look at it ; and on Sundays he wore a blue tail-coat with brass buttons on it. He carried a mahogany cane with a silver COL. ORANOBRTOBD. °! f i i 144 THE AT) VENTURED OP ffWFLEUERRr Fmif. i li'f p head to it. There wam't no frivolishnoas about him, not a bit, and ho wam't ever loud. He wea as kind as he could be— you could feel that, you know, and BO you had confidence. Sometimes ho smiled, and it was good to see ; but when he straightened himself up like a liberty-pole, and the lightning begun to flicker out from under his eyebrows you wanted to climb a tree first, and find out what the matter was afterwards. He didn't over have to tell anybody to mind their manners— everybody was always good mannered where he was. Everybody loved to have him around, too ; ho was sunshine most always— I mean he made it seem like good weather. When he turned into a cloud-bank it was awful dark for a half a minute and that was enough ; there wouldn't nothing go wrong again for a week. When him and the old lady come down in the morning, all the family got up out of their chairs and give them good-day, and didn't set down again till they had set down. Then Tom and Bob went to the sideboard where the decanters was, and mixed a glass of bitters and handed it to him, and ho held it in his hand and waited till Tom's and Bob's was nixed, and then they bowed and said " Our duty to you, sir, and mad.-m ; " and they bowed Mie least bit in the world and said thank you, and so they arank, all three, and Bob and Tom poured a spoonful of water on the sugar and the mito of whisky or apple brandy in the bottom of their tumblers, and give it to me and Buck, and we drank to the old people too. Bob was the oldest, and Tom next. Tall, beautiful men with very broad shoulders and brown faces, and long black hair and black eyes. They dressed in white linen from head to foot, like the old gentleman, and wore broad Panama hats. Then there was Miss Charlotte, she was twerty-fiye, and tall and proud and grand, but as good as she could be, when she wurn't stirred up ; but when she was, she had a look that would make you wilt ii your tracks, like her father. She was beautiful. So was her sister. Miss Sophia, but it was a different kind. She was gentle and sweet, like a dove, and . ue was only twenty Each person had tht ir owu nigger to wait on them— Buck, too. My uiggei • 'I 4L ARrawcRAor. 146 • 'I had u monstrous easy time, becauBO I warn't used to having anybody do anything for me, but Buck's was on the jump most of the time. This was all there was of the family, now ; but there used to bo more— three sons ; they got killed ; and Emmelino that died. The old gentleman owned a lot of farms, and over a hundred niggerB. Sometimes a stack of people would come there, horseback, from ten or fifteen mile around, and stay five or six days, and have such junketings round about and on the river, and dances and picnics in the woods, day-times, and balls at the house, nights. Those people was mostly kiu-folkd of the family. The men brouglit their guns with them. It was a handsome lot of quality, I tell you. There was another clan of aristocracy around there — fivo or six families — mostly of the name of Shepherdson. They was as high-toned, and well bom, and rich and £Tand, as the tribe of Grangerfords. The Shejjherdaons and the Granger- fords used the same steamboat landing, which was about two mile above our house ; so some- times when I went up there with a lot of our folks I used to see a lot of the Shepherdsons there, on their fine horses. One day Buck and me waa away out in the woods, hunt- ing, and heard a horse coming. We waa crossing the road. Buck says : " Quick ! Jump for the woods I " 10 TOUMO BABITKT BHICPHXRDBOir. \ 'h ' i; 146 THE ADVEKTUSES OF EUCKLEBERRY FINN. We done it, and then peeped down the woods through the leaves. Pretty soon a splendid young man come galloping down the road, setting his horse easy and looking like a soldier. He had his gun across his pommel. I had seen him before. It was young Harney Shepherdson. I heard Buck's gun go off at my ear, and Harney's hat tumbled off from his head. He grabbed his gun and rode straight to the place where we was hid. But we didn't wait. We started through the woods on a run. The woods warn't thick, so I looked over my shoulder, to dodge the bullet, and twice I seen Harney cover Buck with his gun ; and then he rode away the way he come— to get his hat, I reckon, but I couldn't see. We never stopped running till we got home. The old gentleman's eyes blazed a minute— 'twas pleasure, mainly, I judged— then his face sort of smoothed down, and he says, kind of gentle : " I don't like that shooting from be- hind a bush. Why didn't you step into the road, my boy ? " "The Shepherdsons don't, father. They always take advantage." Miss Charlotte she held her head up like a queen while Buck was telling his tale, and her nostrils spread and her eyes snapped. The two young men looked dark, but never said nothing. Miss Sophia she turned pale, but the color come back when she found the man warn't hurt. Soon as I could get Buck down by the corn-cribs under the trees by our- ■^ - selves, I says : iiiB» oHAHLoiTB. " Did you want to kill him, Buck ?" "Well, I bet I did." ^ «* What did he do to you P »' ■• ■^ -• FEUDB. 147 " Him ? He never done nothing to me." " Well, then, what did you want to kill him for ? " " Why nothing — only it's on account of the feud.'* "What's a feud?" "Why, where was you raised ? Don't you know what a feud is ?" "Never heard of it before— tell me about it." " Well," says Buck, "a feud is this way. A man has a quarrel with another man, and kills him ; then that other man's brother kills him; then the other brothers, on both sides, goes for one another ; then the cousins chip in— and by- and-by everybody's killed off, and there ain't no more feud. But it's kind of slow, and takes a long time. " " Has this one been going on long, Buck ? " " Well I should recJcon ! it started thirty year ago, or som'ers along there. There was trouble 'bout something and then a lawsuit to settle it ; and the suit went agin one of the men, and so he up and shot the man that won the suit — which he would naturally do, of course. Anybody would." "What was the trouble about, Buck?— land ?" "I reckon maybe — I don't know." "Well, who done the shooting ? —was it a Grangerford or a Shepherd- sou ? " " Laws, how do /know ? it was so long ago." "Don't anybody know ?" " Oh, yes, pa knows, I reckon, and some of the other old folks ; but they don't know, now, what the row was about in the first place." " Has there been many killed, Buck ? " "Yes — right smart chance of funerals. But they don't always kill. Pa's got a few buck-shot in him ; but he don't mind it 'cuz he don't weigh much anyway. Bob's been carved up some with a bowie, and Tom's been hurt once or twice." "Has anybody been killed this year. Buck ? " " Yes, we got one and they got one. 'Bout three months ago, my cousin Bud, fourteen year old, was riding through the woods, on t'other side of the river, i i i! ill '^ and didn't have no weapon with him, which was blame' foolishness, and in a lone- some place he hears a horse a-coming behind him, and sees old Baldy Shepherd- son a-linkin' after him with his gun in his hand and his white hair a-liying in the wind ; and 'stead of jumping off and taking to the brush. Bud 'lowed he could outrun him ; so they had it, nip and tuck, for five mile or more, the old man a-gaining all the time ; so at last Bud seen it warn't any use, so he stopped and faced around so as to have the bullet holes in front, you know, and the old man he rode up and shot him down. But he didn't git much chance to enjoy his luck, for inside of a week our folks laid him out." "I reckon that old man was a coward. Buck." " I reckon he warnH a coward. Not by a blame' sight. There ain't a coward amongst them Shepherdsons— not a one. And there ain't no cowards amongst the Grangerfords, either. Why, that old man kep' up his end in a fight one day, for a half an hour, against three Grangerfords, and come out winner. They was all a-horseback ; he lit ofi of his horse and got behind a little wood-pile, and kep' his horse before him to stop the bullets ; but the Grangerfords staid on their horses and capered around the old man, and peppered away at him, and he peppered away at them. Him and his horse both went home pretty leaky and crippled, but the Grangerfords had to be fetched home — and one of 'em was dead, and another died the next day. No, sir, if a body's out hunting for cowards, he don't want to fool away any time amongst them Shepherdsons, becuz they don't breed any of that kind." Next Sunday we all went to church, about three mile, everybody a-horsebaok. The men took their guns along, so did Buck, and kept them between their knees or stood them handy against the wall. The Shepherdsons done the same. It was pretty ornery preaching — all about brotherly love, and such-like tiresomeness; but everybody said it was a good sermon, and they all talked it over going home, and had such a powerful lot to say about faith, and good works, and free grace, and preforeordestination, and I don't know what all, that it did seem to me to be one of the roughest Sundays I had run across yet. About an hour after dinner everybody was dozing around, some in their chaira and some in their rooms, and it got to be pretty dull. Buck and a dog waa n "mmm* '- TEE TESTAMENT. 149 stretched out on the grass in the sun, sound asleep. I went up to our room, and judged I would take a nap myself. I found that sweet Miss Sophia standing in her door, which was next to ours, and she took me in her room and shut the door very sof b, and asked me if I liked her, and I said I did ; and she asked me if I would do something for her and not tell anybody, and I said I would. Then she said she'd forgot her Testament, and left it in the scat at church, between two other books and would I slip out quiet and go there and fetch it to her, and not say nothing to nobody. I said I would. So I slid out and slipped off up the road, and there wam't anybody at the church, except maybe a hog or two, for there wam't any lock on the door, and hogs likes a puncheon floor in summer-time because it's cool. If you notice, most folks don"' n *n church only when they've got to; but a hog is different. Says I to myself something's up — it ain't natural for a girl to be in such a sweat about a Testament ; 60 1 give it a shake, and out drops a little piece of paper with ''Half-past two " wrote on it with a pencil. I ransacked it, but couldn't find any- thing else. I couldn't make any- thing out of that, so I T)ut the paper in the book again, and when I got home and up stairs, there was Miss Sophia in her door waiting for me. She pulled me in and shut the door ; then she looked in the Testament till she found the paper, and as soon as she read it she looked glad; and before a body could think, she grabbed me and give me a squeeze, and said I waa the best boy in the world, and not to tell anybody. She wes mighty red in 'aks abkxd MX ir i ufbs ubr fl; r k: il ■^^, the face, for a minute, and her eyes lighted up and it made her powerful pretty. I was a good deal astonished, but when I got my breath I asked her what the paper was about, and she asked me if I had read it, and I said no, and she asked me if I could read writing, and I told her " no, only coarse-hand," and then she Baid the paper wam't anything but a book-mark to keep her place, and I might go and play now. I went oiBE down to the river, studying over this thing, and pretty soon I noticed that my nigger was following along behind. When we was out of sight of the house, he looked back and around a second, and then comes a-running, and says : " Mars Jawge, if you'll come down into de swamp, I'll show you a whole stack o' water-moccasins." Thinks I, that's mighty curious ; he said that yesterday. He oughter know a body don't love water-moccasins enough to go around hunting for them. What is he up to anyway ? So I says — " All right, trot ahead." I followed a half a mile, then he struck out over the swamp and waded ankle deep as much as another half mile. We come to a little flat piece of land which was dry and very thick with trees and bushes and vines, and he says — **you shove right in dah, jist a few steps. Mars Jawge, dah's whah deyis. I's seed 'm befo', I don't k'yer to see 'em no mo'." Then he slopped right along and went away, and pretty soon the trees hid him. I poked into the place a-ways, and come to a little open patch as big as a bedroom, all hung around with vines, and found a man laying there asleep — and by jings it was my old Jim ! I waked him up, and I reckoned it was going to be a grand surprise to him to see me again, but it wam't. He nearly cried, he was so glad, but he wam't surprised. Said he swum along behind me, that night, and heard me yell every time, but dasn't answer, because he didn't want nobody to pick Jiim up, and take him into slavery again. Says he — " I got hurt a little, en couldn't swim fas', so I wuz a considable ways behine you, towards de las' ; when you landed I reck'ned I could ketch up.idd you on do H riiiii !• ■WMMMP RECOVERING THE RAFT. 161 Ian' 'dout havin' to shout at you, but when I see dat house I begin to go slow. I *uz off too fur to hear what dey say to you— I wuz 'fraid o' de dogs— but when it 'uz all quiet agin, I knowed you's in do house, so I struck out for de woods to wait for day. Early in de mawnin' some er de niggers come along, gwyne to do fields, en dey tuck me en showed me dis place, whah de dogs can't track me on accounts o' de water, en dey brings me truck to eat every night, en tells me how you's agitt'n along." *' Why didn't you tell my Jack to fetch me here sooner, Jim ? " •' Well, 'twarn't no use to 'sturb you, Huck, tell we could do sumfn— but we's all right, now. i ben a-buyin' pots en pans en vittles, as I got a chanst, en a patchin' up de raf, nights, when '* " What raft, Jim ? " " Our ole raf," " You mean to say our old raft wam't smashed all to flinders ?'* " No, she wam't. She was tore up a good deal— one en' of her was— but dey wam't no great harm done, on'y our traps was mos' all los'. Ef we hadn' dive' BO deep en swum so fur under water, en de night hadn' ben so dark, en we wara't 80 sk'yerd, en ben sich punkin-heads, as de sayin' is, we'd a seed de raf. But it's jis' as well we didn't, 'kase now she's all fixed up agin mos' as good as new, en we's got a new lot o' stuff, too, in de place o' what 'uz los'." "Why, how did you get hold of the raft again, Jim— did you catch her ?'* " How I gwyne to ketch her, en I out in de woods ? No, some or de niggers foun' her ketched on a snag, along heah in de ben', en dey hid her in a crick, 'mongst de willows, en dey wuz so much jawin' 'bout which un 'um she b'long to do mos', dat I come to heah 'bout it pooty soon, so I ups en settles de trouble by tellin' *um she don't b'long to none uv um, but to you en me ; en I ast 'm if dey gwyne to grab a young white genlman's propaty, en git a hid'n for it ? Den I gin 'm ten cents apiece, en dey 'uz mighty well satisfied, en wisht some mo' raf's 'ud come along en make 'm rich agin. Dey's mighty good to me, dese niggers is, en •whatever I wants 'm to do fur me, I doan' have to ast 'm twice, honey. Dat Jack's a good nigger, en pooty smart." ■ Yes, he. is. He ain't ever told me you was here ; told me to come, and he'd r i II : f' i I 162 TEE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. 11 show me a lot of water-moccasins. If anything happens, he ain't mixed up in it. He can say he never seen us together, and it'll be the truth. " I don't want to talk much about the next day. I reckon I'll cut it pretty short. I waked up about dawn, and was agoing to turn over and go to sleep again, when I noticed how still it was — didn't seem to be anybody stirring. That warn't usual. Next I noticed that Buck was up and gone. Well, I gets up, a-wondering, and goes down stairs— nobody around ; everything as still as a mouse. Just the same outside ; thinks I, what does it mean ? Down by the wood-pile I comes across my Jack, and says : "What's it all about?" Says he : ** Don't you know. Mars Jawge ? '* "No," says I, "I don't." " Well, den, Miss Sophia's run off ! 'deed she has. She run off in de night, sometime — nobody don't know jis' when — run off to git married to dat young Harney Shepherdson, you know — leastways, so dey 'spec. De fambly foun' it out, 'bout half an hour ago— maybe a little mo' — en' I tell you dey warn't no time los'. Sich another hurryin' up guns en bosses you never see ! De women folks has gone for to stir up de relations, en ole Mars Saul en de boys tuck dey guns en rode up de river road for to try to ketch dat young man en kill him 'fo' he kin git acrost de river wid Miss Sophia. I reck'n day's gwyne to be mighty rough times." ** Buck went off 'thout waking me up." "Well I reck'n he did! Dey warn't gwyne to mix you up in it. Mars Buck he loaded up his gun en 'lowed he's gwyne to fetch home a Shepherdson or bust. Well, dey'll be plenty un 'm dah, I reck'n, en you bet you he'll fetch one ef he gits a chanst." I took up thfe river road as hard as I could put. By-and-by I begin to hear guns a good ways off. When I come in sight of the log store and the wood-pile whea the steamboats lands, I worked along under the trees and brush till I go* to a good place, and then I dumb up into the forks of a cotton-wood that was out of reach, and watched. There was a wood-rank four foot high, a little ways in r v.. 'jitrlilllilfiffi' • I 1 % THE WOOD PILE. 168 front of the tree, and first I was going to hide behind that ; but maybe it was luckier I didn't. There was four or five men cavorting around on their horses in the open place before the log store, cussing and yelling, and trying to get at a couple of young chaps that was behind the wood-rank alongside of the steamboat landing — but they couldn't come it. Every time one of them showed himself on the river r ' BEHIND THB WOOD FILB. ' Bide of the wood-pile he got shot at. The two boys was squatting back to back behind the pile, so they could watch both ways. By-and-by the men stopped cavorting around and yelling. They started riding towards the store ; then up gets one of the boys, draws a steady bead over the wood-rank, and drops one of them out of his saddle. All the men jumped off of their horses and grabbed the hurt one and started to carry him to the store; and that minute the two boys started on the run. They got half-way to the tree I was in before the men noticed. Then the men see them, and jumped on their horses and took out after them. They gained on the boys, but it didn't do no good, the boys had too good a start ; they got to the wood-pile that was in front iJ f ( li \Ui t :-*•?!»' ' ! 154 THE ADVENTURE8 OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. of my tree, and slipped in behind it, and so they had the bulge on the men again. One of the boys was Buck, and the other was a slim young chap about nineteen years old. The men ripped around awhile, and then rode away. As soon as they was out of sight, I sung out to Buck and told him. He didn't know what to make of my voice coming out of the tree, at first. He was awful surprised. He told me to watch out sharp and let him know when the men come in sight again ; said they was up to some devilment or other — wouldn't be gone long. I wished I was out of that tree, but I dasn't come down. Buck begun to cry and rip, and 'lowed that him and his cousin Joe (that was the other young chap) would make up for this day, yet. He said his father and his two brothers was killed, and two or three of the enemy. Said the Shepherdsons laid for them, in ambush. Buck Baid his father and brothers ought to waited for their relations — the Shepherdsons was too strong for them. I asked him what was become of young Harney and Miss Sophia. He said they'd got across the river and was safe. I was glad of that ; but the way Buck did take on because he didn't manage to kill Harney that day he shot at him — I hain't ever heard anything like it. All of a sudden, bang ! bang ! bang ! goes three or four guns — the men had slipped around through the woods and come in from behind without their horsesl The boys jumped for the river — both of them hurt — and as they swum down the current the men run along the bank shooting at them and singing out, " Kill them, kill them !" It made me so sick I most fell out of the tree. I ain't agoing to tell all that happened — it would make me sick again if I was to do that. I wished I hadn't ever come ashore that night, to see such things. I ain't ever going to get shut of them — lots of times I dream about them. I staid in the tree till it begun to get dark, afraid to come down. Sometimes I heard guns away off in the woods ; and twice I seen little gangs of men gallop past the log store with guns ; so I reckoned the trouble was still agoing on. I was mighty down-hearted ; so I made up my mind I wouldn't ever go anear that house again, because I reckoned I was to blame, somehow. I judged that that piece of paper meant that Miss Sophia was to meet Harney somewheres at half-past two and inin oS. ; and I judged I ought to told her father about that ► PORK AND CABBAGE. 155 ^ paper and the carious way she acted, and then maybe he would a locked her up and this awful mess wouldn't ever happened. When I got down out of the tree, I crept along down the river bank a piece, and found the two bodies laying in the edge of the water, and tugged at them till I got them ashore ; then I covered up their faces, and got away aa quick as I could. I cried a little when I was covering up Buck's face, for ho was mighty good to me. It was just dark, now. I never went near the house, but struck through the woods and made for the swamp. Jim warn't on his island, so I tramped off in a hurry for the crick, and crowded through the willows, red-hot to jump aboard and get out of that awful country— the raft was gone ! My souls, but I was Beared I I couldn't get my breath for most a minute. Then I raised a yell. A voice not twenty-five foot from me, says — ** Good Ian' ! is dat you, honey ? Doan' make no noise." It was Jim's voice— nothing ever sounded so good before. I run along the bank a piece and got aboard, and Jim he grabbed me and hugged me, he was so glad to see me. He says — ** Laws bless you, chile, I 'uz right down sho* you's dead agin. Jack's been heah, he say he reck'n you's ben shot, kase you didn' come home no mo' ; so I's jes' dis minute a startin' de raf down towards de mouf er de crick, so's to be all ready for to shove out en leave soon as Jack comes agin en tells me for certain you is dead. Lawsy,' I's mighty glad to git you back agin, honey." I says — " All right— that's mighty good ; they won't find me, and they'll think I've been killed, and floated down the river— there's something up there that'll help them to think so— so don't you lose no time, Jim, but jurit shove off for the big water aa fast as ever you can. " I never t^.; .^usy till the raft was two mile below there and out in the middle of the Missr 'Dpi Then we hung up our signal lantern, and judged that we was free and safe once more. I hadn't had a bite to eat since yesterday ; so Jim he got out some corn-dodgers and buttermilk, and pork and cabbage, and greens- there ain't nothing in the world so good, when it's cooked right— and whilst I eat f i I IDG THE ADVENTURES OF ITTTnKLEBERRT FINN. my supper we talked, and had a good time. I was powerful glad to get away from the feuds, and so was Jim to get away from the swamp. Wo said there warn't no home like a raft, after all. Other places do seem so cramped up and smothery, but a raft don't. You feoi mighty free and easy and conafortable on a raft. A T liM XIX •V s — — __ I wo or three days and nights went by ; I reckon I might say they swnm by, they slid along so quiet and smooth and lovely. Here is the way we put in the time. It was a monstrous big river down there — sometimes a mile and a half wide ; we run nights, and lai'l np and hid day-times ; soon niglit was most gone, we stopped navigating and tied up— nearly al- ways ill the dead water under a tow- [ head ; and then cut young cotton- woods and willows and hid the raft with them. Then we set out the lines. Next we slid into the river and had a swim, so as to freshen up and cool off ; then we £et down on the sandy bottom where the water waa about Icnee deep, and watched the daylight come. Not a sound, anywheres —perfectly still— just like the whole world was asleep, only sometimes the bull-frogs a-cluttering, maybe. The first thing to see, looking away ovrr the water, was a kind of dull line— that was the woods < n t'other side— you couldn't make nothing else out ; then a pale place in the sky ; then more paleness, spreading around ; then the river softened up, away off, and wam't black any more, but gray ; you could see little dark spots drifting along, ever m far ^mA» left a mile of wood, behind us'd Zl7 "' ""' "^ '"^ """ « "«> - « paddled o.er to t. tow..ad '::t^:is ::^^:ri blue woolen shirt, and ragged M blu 1! T I"? ^""""^ ''"' '"'' «"" " g""»y and home-init ga««»3-fo, he on"" W te "h 1 T'" '■"» -'' '"'°' *°P»' jeans coat with slick brass buttons flun.. !! i "" °" '""'g-toiled Mae bigfatratty-lookingcarpet-balr ' "™' """^ •""" »' *«» bad le?. fast we all bid off and talked and LT T?. "'"'"''""■^ > After brcrjl obaps didn't know one another '"'« """ ""^ "»' ™ 'bat thel " What got you into trouble p " Hnva +7,. i i^i , " Well, I'd been selling an a;ticl t tl 1 T! ''°"'" """"• ta-^e it off, too, and genjythe enltell^'/wJirt^iri'st^-d t-""' " '""' longer than I ought to, and was just in the Jt If ^ "''°'" °"' "'■«'■' J0» on the trail this side of town and "ou „rd m tt^ °°' "'™ ' "" '""^ me to help you to get off So I *1 T ^ "'"' """"'"^ """1 begged would scatter'out «« you tL , " IL ™ ^^ "»« *-"'"« ■»>-» td "WpII T'^ k ^ "• J-nat s the whole yarn— what's youm ?'» wen, 1 d ben a-runnin' a Uffin ^ j*"""! r -sthepetofthev:o.enXt\tm^^^^^^ T"^ "^^^' '^^"^ ^ -^^' -^ for the rumn.ies, I tell you and taking \ ""'' '"''"' ^' "^^^'^^ "^^'^ cents a head, children Cd nt^L: T:,\^^ '^« ^ ^ ^«"- ^ ^i^^t-ten when somehow or another a imZrlTT "'" ' ^'"'^"' ^" *^^ ^'^^ J Of Puttin' in .y time wifh a p " ^ 1^^^^ ^1' ^1 ""'''' '''' ' ''' ^ ^^^ this momin', and told me thfJ.] ^' ^ "^^^'^ ^^^^^^^ «« out andhorses, a'nd they'd Te ^T^Z^^ ^^ ^'^ ^"'*' ^^"^^^ *^^^^ ^«^« start, and then run me down ifthl ,T ^''' '"^ '^'^"'^ ^"^^ ^^ h«"r's feather me and ridere on :;rs;?Td-';:'^'*'^' ^^^ "^ ^'^^^'^ *- -^^ hungry." "^ ' '"''• ^ ^^^^ ' ^^^t for no breakfast-I wam't 11 .[ I* ;sff f 162 THE ADVENTURES OF IIUCKLEBEEET FINK "Old man," says the young one, "I reckon we might double-team it together ; what do you think ? " ** I ain't undisposed. What's your lino— mainly ? " ** Jour printer, by trade ; do a little in patent medicines ; theatre-actor — tragedy, you know ; take a turn at mesmerism and phrenology when there's a chance ; teach singing-geography school for a change ; sling a lecture, sometimes —oh, I do lots of things — most anything that comes handy, so it ain't work. What's your lay ? " ** I've done considerble in the doctoring way in my time. Layin' on o' hands ia ray best holt— for cancer, and paralysis, and sich things; and I k'n tell a fortune pretty good, when I've got somebody along to find out the facts for he. Preachin's my line, too ; and workin' camp-meetin's ; and missionaryin* wound." Nobody never said anything for a while ; then the young man hove a sigh and Bays — "Alaa!" ** What 're you alassin' about ? " says the baldhead. ** To think I should have lived to be leading such a life, and be degraded down into such company." And he begun to wipe the corner of his eye with a rag. "Dem your skin, ain't the company good enough for you?" says the bald- head, pretty pert and uppish. " Yes, it is good enough for me ; it's as good as I deserve ; for who fetched me so low, when I was so high ? /did myself. I don't blame you, gentlemen — far from it ; I don't blame anybody. I deserve it all. Let the cold world do its worst ; one thing I know — ^there's a grave somewhere for me. The world may go on just a& its always done, and take everything from me — loved ones, property, everything — but it can't take that. Some day I'll lie down in it and forget it all, and my poor broken heart will be at rest." He went on a-wiping. ** Drot your pore broken heart," says the baldhead ; " what are you heav- ing your pore broken heart at us f'r ? We hain't done nothing." ** No, I know you haven't. I ain't blaming you, gentlemen. I brought '^™»»< mk w M i i i a i i i t TBE DUKE OF BRIDGEWATER. 163 myself down — yes, I did it myself. It's right I should suffer — perfectly right — I don't make any moan." " Brought you down from whar ? Whar was you brought down from ? " " Ah, you would not believe me j the world never believes — let it pass — 'tia no matter. The secret of my birth " " The secret of your birth ? Do you mean to say '* " Gentlemen," says the young man, very solemn, "I will reveal it to you, for I feel I may have confidence in you. By rights I am a duke ! " Jim's eyes bugged out when he heard that ; and I reckon mine did, too. Then the bald- head says : ** No 1 you can*t '''*"''-i.-*»«.i. ^ '» I TSE TROUBLES OF ROYALTY. 165 ' ' You ! At your age ! No ! You mean you're the late Charlemagne ; you must be six or seven hundred years old, at the very least." "Trouble has done it, Bilgewater, trouble has done it ; trouble has brung these gray hairs and this premature balditude. Yes, gentlemen, you see before you, in blue jeans and misery, the wan- derin', exiled, trampled-on and Butterin' rightful King of France." Well, he cried and took on Bo, that mo and Jim didn't kuo'./ hardly what to do, we was so sorry — and so glad and proud we'd got him with us, too. So we set in, like we done before with the duke, and tried to comfort liim. But ho said it wam't no use, nothing but to be dead an ^. done with it all could do him any good ; though he said it often made him feel easier and better for a while if people treated him according to his rights, and got down on one knee to speak to him, and always called him "Your Majesty," and waited on him first at meals, and didn't set down in his presence till he asked them. So Jim ;ind me set to majestying him, and doing this and that and t'other for him, and standing up till he told us we might set down. This done him heaps of good, and so he got cheerful and comfortable. But the duke kind of soured on him, and didn't look a bit satisfied with the way things was going ; still, the king acted I'cal friendly towards him, and said the duke's great-grandfather and all the other Dukes of Bilgewater was a good deal thought of by Ms father and was allov.cd to come to " I AH THK I.ATB DAUFHIN." ::| i%' ! ! '•il i 'Il HM: I I.J nil ill. I' 166 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN,. the palace considerable ; but the duke staid huffy a good vhile, till by-and~b/ the king mjn : " Lilo aa not we got to be together a blamed long time, oa this h-fev raft, Bilgewater, and so wiir t's the uso o' your boin' sour ? It'll only make things oncomfortable. It ain't my fr ait I warr.'t bom a duke, it ain't your fault you Warn't born a king — so wL t,t'. the use to worry ? Make the best o' things the way you find 'em, eayy I~— uat's my motto. This ain't no bad thing that we've struck here — plenty grub and an easy life — come, give us your iiand, Duke, and less all be friends." The duke done it, and Jim and me was pretty glad to see it. It took away all tl'O uncomfortableneas, and we felt mighty good over it, because it would a been a miserable business to have any unfriendliness on the raft ; for what you want, above all things, on a raft, is for everybody to be satisfied, and feel right and kind towards the others. It didn't take me long to make up my mind that these liars wam't no kings nor dukes, at all, but just low-down humbugs and frauds. But I never said jfiothing, never let on ; kept it to myself ; it's the best way ; then you don't have no quarrels, and dou't get into no trouble. If they wanted us to call them kings and dukes, I hadn't uo objections, 'long as it would keep peace iu the family ; and it wam't no u^e tc tell Jim, so I didn't tell him. If I never learnt nothing else out of pap, I learut that the best way to get along with his kind of people is to let them have thdir own way. y^ V ASKED us considerable many questions ; wanted to know what avo covered up the raft that way for, and laid by in the day-time instead of running— was Jim a runaway nigger ? Says I — " Goodness sakes, would a runaway nigger run south ? '* No, th-^y allowed he wouldn't. I had to account for things some way, so I says : "My folks was living in Pike County, in Missouri, where I was bom, and they all died off but me and pa and my brother Ike. Pa, he 'lowed he'd break up and go down and livo with "Uncle Ben, who's got a little one- horse place on the river, forty-four mile below Orleans. Pa was pretty poor, and had some debts ; so when he'd squared up there warn't nothing left but sixteen dollars and our nigger, Jim. That warn't enough to take us fourteen hundred mile, deck passage nor no other way. Well, when the river rose, pa had a streak of luck one day ; he ketched this piece of a raft ; so we reckoned we'd go down to Orleans on it. Pa's luck didn't hold out ; a steamboat run over the forrard corner of the raft, one night, and we all went overboard and dove under the wheel ; Jim and me come up, all right, but pa was drunk, and Ike was only four years old, so they never come up ON TBB BAR. i T' I I h I 168 TEE ADVENTURES OF HUOELEBERRT FINK no more. Well, for the next day or two we had considerable trouble, because people was always coming out in skiffs and trying to take Jim away from me, saying they believed he was a runaway nigger. We don't run day-times no more, now ; nights they don't bother us." The duke says — "Leave me alone to cipher out a way so we can run in the day-time if we want to. I'll think the thing over— I'll invent a plan that'll fix it. We'll let it alone for to-day, because of course we don't want to go by that town yonder in day- light—it mightn't be healthy." Towards night it begun to darken up and look like rain ; the heat lightning was squirting around, low down in the sky, and the leaves was beginning to shiver— it was going to be pretty ugly, it was easy to sec that. So the duke and the king went to overhauling our wigwam, to sec what the beds was like. My bed was a straw tick-better than Jim's, which was a corn-shuck tick; there's always cobs around about in a shuck tick, and they poke into you and : urt ; and when you roll over, the dry shucks sound liko you was rolling over in a pile of dead leaves ; it makes such a rustling that you wake up. Well, the duke allowed he would take my bed ; but the king allowed he wouldn't. He says— "I should a reckoned the difference in rank would a sejested to you that a corn-shuck bed wam't just fitten for mo to sleep on. Your Grace'll take the shuck bed yourself." Jim and me was in a sweat again, for a minute, being afraid there was going to be some more trouble amongst them ; so we was pretty glad when the duke says — "'Tismyfate to be always ground into the mire under the iron heel of oppression. Misfortune has broken my once haughty spirit ; I yield, I submit j 'tis my fate. I am alone in the world— let me suffer ; I can bear it." We got away as soon as it was good and dark. The king told us to stand well out towards the middle of the river, and not show a light till we got a long ways below the town. We come in sight of the little bunch of lights by-and-by-that was the town, you know-and slid by, about a half a mile out, all right. When we waa three-quarters of a mile below, we hoisted up our signal lantern ; and T m m \i « iiii' rmtm : LATINO OUT A CAMPAIGN: 169 1 about ten o clock it come on to rain and blow and thunder and lighten like every- thing ; so the king told us to both stay on watch till the weather got better • then h,m and the duke crawled into the wigwam and turned in for the night. It wa. my watch below, till twelve, but I wouldn't a turned in. anyway, if Id hud a bed ; because a body don't see such a storm as that every day in the week, not by a long .ght. My souls, how the wind did scream along ! And every second or two there d come a glare that lit up the white-caps for a half a mile around, and you d see the islands looking dusty through the rain, and the trees thrashing around m the wmd ; then comes a /.-.-a.^Z-bum ! bum I bumble-umble-um bum-bum-bum-bum-and the thunder would go rumbling and grumbling away, and qu,t-and then rip comes another flash and another sockdolager. The waves most washed me off the raft, sometimes, but I hadn't any clothes on, and dincern, up over a penter shop— carpenters and printers all gone to themeetin,,, and no fl<,ors . 'cked. It was a dirty, littered-up i)lucc, aud had ink marks, and handbn's witi pio+^ures of orse -md runaway niggers on them. all over the walls. The duke hed his coat an^ me and thi kinc^ lit out for th caup-mu^ ing. We got tht.e in about a h. I an hour, fairly dripp.. ,, d ho was all right, now. So "t was a most awful III * I r**""T" 173 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRT FINN. hot day. There was as much as a thousand people there, from twenty mile around. The woods was full of teams and wagons, hitched everywheres, foedinf* out of the wagon troughs and stomping to keep oil the Hies. There wfis sheds made out of poles and roofed over with branches, Avhero they liad lemonade and gingerbread to sell, and pilos of waterm Ions and green com and such-like truck. The preaching was going on under tho same kinds of sheds, only they was bigger and held crowds of people. The benches wiii made out of outside slabs of logs, with holes bored in the round side to drive sucks into for legs. They didn't have no backs. Tho preachers had high platforms to stand on, at ono end ui the sheds. The women had on siin- bonncts : and somo had linsey- woolsey frocks, some gingham ones, and a few of the young ones had on calico. Some of the young men was barefooted, and some of the children didn't have on any clothes but just a tow- linen shirt. Some of the old women was knitting, and some of the young folks was courting on the sly. The first shed we come to, the preacher was lining out a hymn. H lined out two lines, everybody sung it, and it was kind of grand to hear it, there was so many of them and they done it in such a rousing way ; then he lined out two more for them to sing— and so on. The people woke up more and more, and sung louder and louder ; and towards the end, some begun to groan, and some begun to .bout. Then the "OOUBTINO ON THB 8LT." J II A PTRATE AT THE CAMP MEETINO. 178 k preacher begun to preach ; and begun in earnest, too ; and went weaving first to one Hide of the phitform and then the other, and then a leaning down over the front of it, with hia arms and his body going all the time, and Hhouting his words out with nil hi.^ migiit ; and every now and then ho would hold up his Bible and spread it ui)en, and kind of pass it around this way and that, shouting, " It's the brazen serpent in the wilderness ! Look upon it and live ! " And people would shout out, " Glory!— A-a-me«/" And so ho went on, and the people groaning and crying and saying amen : "Oh, come to the mourners' bench ! come, black with sin ! {amen I) come, sick and sore ! {amen!) come, lame and halt, and blind ! {amen!) come, pore end needy, sunk in shame ! {a-a-men !) come all that's worn, and soiled, and Buflfering I— come with a broken spirit ! come with a contrite heart ! come in your rags and sin and dirt I the waters that cleanse is free, the door of heaven stands open— oh, enter in and be at rest! " {a-a-men! glonj, glory hallelujah!) And so on. You couldn't make out what the preacher said, any more, on account of the shouting and crying. Folks got up, everywhores in the crowd, and worked their way, just by main strength, to the mourners' bench, with the tears running down their faces ; and when all the mourners had got up tliere to the front benches in a crowd, they sung, and shouted, and flung themselves down on the ^traw, just crazy and wild. Well, the first T knowed, the king got agoing ; and you could hear him over everybody ; and lioxt he went a-charging up on to the platform and the preacher he begged him to speak to the people, and ho done it. He told them he was a pirate— been a pirate for thirty years, out in the Indian Ocean, and his crew was thinned out considerable, last spring, in a tight, and he was home now, to take out some fresh men, and thanks to goodness he'd been robbed last night, and put ashore off of a steamboat without a cent, and he was glad of it, it was the blessedest thing that ever happened to him, because ho was a changed man now, and hui)py for the first time in his life ; and poor as he was, he was going to start right off and work his way back to the Indian Ocean and put in the rest of his life trying to turn the pirates into the tirO path ; for he could do It better than anybody else, being acquainted with all the jurate crews ^1 i'i '.^^ 174 THE ADVENTURES OF EVCKLEBERRT FINN, in that ocean ; and though it would take him a long time to get there, without money, he would get there anyway, and every time he convinced a pirate he would say to him, "Don't you thank me, don't you give me no credit, it all belongs to them dear people in Pokeville camp-meeting, natural brothers and benefactors of the race — and that dear preacher there, the truest friend a pirate ever had ! " And then he busted into tears, and so did everybody. Then some- body sings out, " Take up a collec- tion for him, take up a collection 1 " Well, a half a dozen made a jump to do it, but somebody sings out, " Let Mm pacs the hat around 1 " Then everybody said it, the preacher too. So the king went all through the crowd with his hat, swabbing his eyes, and blessing the people and praising them and thanking them for being so good to the poor pirates away off there ; and every little while the prettiest kind of girls, with £he tears running down their cheeks, would up and ask him would he let them kiss him, for to remember him by ; and he dways done it ; and some of them he hugged and kissed as many as five or six times — and lie was invited to stay a week ; and everybody wanted him to live in their houses, and said they'd think it was an honor ; but he said as this was the last day of the camp-meeting he couldn't do no good, and besides he was in a sweat to get to the Indian Ocean right off and go to work on the pirates. When we got back to the raft and he come to count up, he found he had col- lected eighty-seven dollars and seventy-five cents. And then he had fetched ^ * A PIRATE FOB THIRTY TKARS.' ««*>,«« TEE DURE A& A miNTEIt. 175 away a three-gallon jng of whisky, too, that he found under a wagon when we was starting home through the woods. The king said, take it all around, it laid over any day he'd ever put in in the missionarying line. He said it wam't no use talking, heathens don't amount to shucks, alongside of pirates, to work a camp- meeting with. The duke was thinking Jie^d been doing pretty well, till the king come to show up, but after that he didn't think so so much. He liad set up and printed off two little jobs for farmers, in that printing office— Iiorse bills-and took the money, four dollars. And he had got in ten dollars worth of advertisements for the paper, which he said he would put in for four dollars if they would pay in advance — so they done it. Tho price of the paper was two dol- lars a year, but he took in three subscriptions for half a dollar apiece on condition of them paying hin;. in advance; they were going to pay in cord-wood and onions, as usual, but he said he had just bought the con- cern and knocked down the price as low as he could afford it, and was going to run ic for cash. He set up a little piece of poetry, which he made, him- self, out of his own head— three verses— kind of sweet and sad- dish — the name of it was, "Yes, crush, cold world, this breaking heart"— and he left that all set up and ready to print in the paper and didn't charge nothing for it. Well, he took in nine dollars and a half, and said he'd done a pretty square day's work for it. ANOTHER LITTLB TOB. i! ! l] M r4 III > • 1 1; ii 176 TBE ADvmTmEa or BVOKLmnBRT rim. Then he showed us another little job he'd printed end hadn't charged for, because it was for as. It had a picture of a runaway nigger w.th a bundle on a stick, over his shoulder, and " 1300 reward " under ,t. The readmg was a . about Jim, and just described him to a dot. It sa,d he run 'way from St Jacques- plantation, forty mile below New Orleans, last winter, and hkoly w nt 'orth ana whoeve; would catch him and send him back, he could have the "T^r^Ttt auke, "after to-night we can run in the dayMme if wo want to. Whenever we see anybody coming, we can fe J.m hand and foot with arope, and lay him in the wigwam .mdshow this handtaU and say we capturea himnp th river, ana were too poor to travel on a steamboat, so we got th s little raft on credit from our friends and are going down o ge the reward Handcufls and chains would look still better on Jim, but .t wouldn t go well with the story of us being so poor. Too much like jewelry. Hopes are the cor- reet thing-we must preserve the unities, as we say on the boards. We all said the duke was pretty smart, and tliere couldn't be no trouble about running daytimes. Wc judged we could make miles enough that night to get out of the reach of thepow-wow we reckoned the duke's work in the printing office was going to make in that little town-then we could boom right along, if wo wanted to. ' We laid low and kept still, and never shoved out till nearly ten o clock ; then we slid by, pretty wide away from the town, and didn't hoist our lantern till we was clear out of sight of it. When Jim called me to tabe the watch at four in the morning, he says— - Huck, does you reck'n we gwyne to run acrost any mo' kings on dis trip ? " " No," I says, " I reckon not." " Well," says he, " dat's all right, den. I doan' mine one er two kings, but dat'a enough. Bis one's powerful drunk, en de duke ain' much better." I found Jim had been trying to get him to talk French, so he could hear what it was like ; but he said he had been in this country so long, md had so mucu trouble, he'c. forgot it. ^ 1 I ' L' '""IS" 1^ iK^trXX^ was after sun-up, now, but we went right on, and didn't tie up. The king and the duke turned out, by-and-by, looking pretty rusty ; but after they'd jumped overboard and took a swim, it chippered them up a good deal. After breakfast the king he took a seat on a corner of the raft, and pulled off hia boots and rolled up his britches, and let his legs dangle in the water, so as to be comfortable, and lit his pipe, and went to getting his Romeo and Juliet by heart. When he had got it pretty good, him and the duke begun to practice it together. The duke had to loam him over and over again, how to eay every speech ; and he made him sigh, and put his hand on his heart, and after while he said he done it pretty well; "only," he says, "you mustn't bellow out Romen! that way, like a bull-you m.ust say it soft, and sick, and languishy, so-E-o-o-meo ! that is the idea. ; for Juliet's a dear sweet mer. child of a girl, you know, and she don't bray like a jackass." Well, next they got out a couple of long swords that the duke made out of oak laths, and begun to practice the sword-flght-the duLe called himself Richard III. ; aud the way they laid on, and pranced around the raft was grand to see. But by-and-by the king tripped and full overboard, and after that they f5«A«tle.T PRACTlriNO. I 41 If ■ , » *■»"" '.8*«». 178 THE ADVENTURES OF BUCELEBEREY FINK took a rest, and had a talk about all kinds of adventures they'd had in other times along the river. After dinner, the duke says : *' Well, Capet, we'll want to make this a first-class show, you know, so I guGss we'll add a little more to it. We want a little something to answer encores with, anyway." " What's onkores. Bilge water ? " The duke told him, and then says : *' I'll answer by doing the Highland fling or the sailor's hornpipe ; and you — \ / well, let me see — oh, I've got it — you can do Hamlet's soliloquy." "Hamlet's which?" "Hamlet's soliloquy, you know; the most cel'^brated thing in Shakespeare. Ah, it's sublime, sublime ! Always fetches the house. I haven't got it in the book — I've only got one volume — but I reckon I can piece it out from memory. I'll just walk up and down a minute, and see if I can call it back from recollection's vaults." So he went to marching up and down, thinking, and frown- ing horrible every now and then; then he would hoist up his eye- brows ; next he would squeeze his HAMLBT's BOLiMQUT. jjand ou hls forchcad and stag- ger back and kind of moan ; next he would sigh, and next he'd let on to drop a tear. It was beautiful to see him. By-and-by be got it. He told us to give attention. Then ho strikes a most noble attitude, with one leg shoved forwards, a a i k I do jan and .:*»>*»Ji the king : To be, or not to be i that is Ibc bare boOiia That makes calamity of so long lite ■ For who would fardels bear, tUl Bir^am Wood do come to Dunsinane. iiut that the fear of something after death Murders the innocent sleep, Great nature's second course, And makes us rather sling the arrows of outrageous fortune Than fly to others that we know not of. There's the respect must give us pause : Wake Duncan with thy knocking I I would thou couldst ; For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, The law's delay, and the quietus which his pangs might take. In the dead waste and middle of the night, when churchyards yawn In customary suits of solemn black, But that the undiscovered country from whose bourne no traveler returns, Breathes forth contagion on the world. And thus the native Ijue of resolution, like the poor cat i' the adage, Is sicklied o'er with care, A all the clouds that lowered o'er our housetops, With this regard their currents turn awry, Aad lose the name of action. 'Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished. But soft you, the fair Ophelia : Ope not thy ponderous and marble jaws, But get thee to a nunnery — go I Well, the old man he liked that speech, and he mighty soon got it so he could do It first rate. It seemed like he ^as just born for it ; and when he had his uand m and was excited, i^, was perfectly lovely the way he would rip and tear and rair up behind when he was getting it ofi. ■; ; i 180 THE ADVENTURES OF BUCKLEBERRT FINN. |i The first chance we got, the duke he had some show bills printed ; and after that, for two or three days as we floated along, the raft was a most uncommon lively place, for there warn't nothing but sword-fighting and rehearsing— as the duke called it— going on all the time. One morning, when we was pretty well down the State of Arkansaw, we come in sight of a little one-horse town in a big bend ; so we tied up about three-quarters of a mile above it, in the mouth of a crick which was shut in like a tunnel by the cypress trees, and all of us but Jim took the canoe and went down there to see if there was any chance in that place for our show. We struck it mighty lucky ; there was going to be a circus there that after- noon, and the couniry people was already beginning to come in, in all kinds of old shackly wagons, and on horses. The circus would leave before night, so our show would have a pretty good chance. The duke he hired the court house, and we went around and stuck up our bills. They read like this ; Sh&ksperean Revival I J I Wonderful Attraction I For One Night Only I The world renowned tragedians, David Garriok the younger, of Drury Lane Theatre, London, and Edmund Kean the elder, of the Royal Haymarket Theatre, White. chspel, Pudding Lane, Piccadilly, London, and the Boyal Continental Theatres, in their sublime Shaksperean Spectacle entitled The Balcony Scene in Romeo and .Tuliet lit ^"^^ '•• Mr.Garriok. •^'^^* Mr.Kean, Assisted by the whole strength of the company I New costumes, new scenery, new appointments I \ 3 ■.0¥r- ? Also : The thrilling, masterly, and blood-curdling Broad-sword conflict In Eichard III. Ill Richard III Mr. Garrick. Richmond Mr. I^ean. also : (by special renuest,) Hamlet's Immortal Soliloquy I f By the Illustrious Kean 1 Dons by him 300 consecutive nights in Paris I For One Night Only, On account of imperative European engagements I Admission 25 cents ; children and servants, 10 cents. Then we went loafing anriLfl the town. The store? and houses was most all old Bhackly dried-up frame r.^neerns that hadn't ever been painted ; thoy was set up three or four foot abo\o ,mnnd on stilts, so as to be out of reach of the water when the river was overflovc. The houses had little gardens around them, but they didn't seem to raise hardly anything in them but jimpson weeds, and sun- flowers, and ash-piles, and old curled-up boots end shoes, and pieces of bottles, and rags, and played-out tin-ware. The fences was made of different kinds of boards, nailed on at different times ; and they leaned every which-way, and had gates that didn't generly have but one hinge— a leather one. Some of the fences had been whitewashed, some time or another, but the duke said it was in Clumbus's time, like enough. There was generly hogs in the garden, and people driving them out. All the stores was along one street. They had white-domestic awnings in front, and the country people hitched their horses to the awning-posts. There was empty dry-goods boxes under the awnings, and loafers roosting on them all day long, whittling them with their Barlow knives ; and chaw- ing tobacco, and gaping and yawning and stretching— a mighty ornery lot. They genei-ly had on yellow straw hats most as wide as an umbrella, but didn't wear no coats nor waistcoats ; they called one another Bill, and Buck, ••) .4 ! 'S^ Mri 4 ^1 m 182 JTHff ADVENTURES OF EUCKLEBERBT FINK and Hank, and Joe, and Andy, and talked lazy and drawly, and used con- siderable many cuss-words. There was as many as one loafer leaning up against every awning-post, and he most always had his hands in his britches pockets, except when he fetched them out to lend a chaw of to- bacco or scratch. What a body was hearing amongst them, all the time was — " Gimme a chaw 'v tobacker. Hank." " Cain't— T hain't got but one cbawleft. Ask Bill." Maybe Bill he gives him a chaw ; maybe he lies and says he ain't got none. Some of them kinds of loafers never has a cent in the world, nor a chaw of tobacco of their own. They get all tneir chawing by borrow- ing—they say to a fellow, "I wisht you'd len' me a chaw. Jack, I jist this minute give Ben Thompson the last chaw I had " — which is a lie, pretty much every time ; it don't fool nobody but a stranger ; but Jack ain't no stranger, so he says— "You give him a chaw, did you ? so did your sister's cat's grandmother. You pay me back the chaws you've awready borry'd ofE'n me, Lafe Buckner, then I'll loan you one or two ton of it, and won't charge you no back intrust, nuther." " Well, I did pay you back some of it wunst." "Yes, you did— 'bout six chaws. You borry'd store tobacker and paid back nigger-head." " aUUB A CHAW.' r 1' t0^^ t a Store tobacco is flat black plug, but these fellows mostly chaws the natural leaf twisted. When they, borrow a chaw, they don't generly cut it off with a knife, but they set the plug in between their teeth, and gnaw with their teeth and tug at the plug with their hands till they get it in two— then sometimes the one that owns the tobacco looks mournful at it when it's handed back, and says, sarcastic — " Here, gimme the chaw, and you take the plug." All the streets and lanes was just mud, they warn't nothing else but mud- mud as black as tar, and nigh about a foot deep in some places ; and two or three inches deep in all the pk'^s. The hogs loafed and grunted around, evcrywhercs. You'd see a muddy sow and a litter of pigs come luzying along the street and whollop herself right down in the way, where folks hud to walk around her, and she'd stretch out, and shut her eyes, and wave her ears, whilst the pigs was milking her, and look as happy as if she was on salary. And pretty soon you'd hear a loafer sing out, " Hi I so boy ! sick him, Tige I " and away the sow would go, squealing most horrible, with a dog or two swinging to each ear, and three or four dozen more a-coming j and then you would see all the loafers get up and watch the thing out of sight, and laugh at the fun and look grateful for the noise. Then they'd settle back again till there was a dog-fight. There couldn't anything wake them up all over, and make them happy all over, like a dog-fight — unless it might be putting turDentine on a stray dog and setting fire to him, or tying a tin pan to his tail and see him run laimself to death. On the river front some of the houses was sticking out over the bank, and they was bowed and bent, and about ready to tumble in. The people had moved out of them. The bank was caved away under one comer of some others, and that corner was hanging over. People lived in them yet, but it was dangersome, because sometimes a strip of land as wide as a house caves iu at a time. Sometimes a belt of land a quarter of a mile deep will start in and cave along and cave along till it all caves into the river in one summer. Such a town as that has to be always moving back, and back, and back, because the river's always gnawing at it. t, 'f I J S^-' 184 TEE ADVENTURES OF ffUCRLfSBERRT FmK The nearer it got to noon that lay, the thicker and thicker was thn w gonfl and horses in tlie streets, and more coming all the time. Families fetched their dinners with them, from tlio country, and eat them in the wagon^. There was considerable wliiskey drinking going on, and I seen three fights. By-u..d- by somebody sings out — " Here comes old Boggs 1— in from the country for his little old monthly drunk — here he comes, boys 1 " All the loafers looked glad— I reckoned they was used to having fun out o. Boggs. One of them says — "Wonder who he's a gv/yno to chaw up this time. If he'd a chawed up all the men he's ben a gwy^ - U^ chaw up in the last twenty year, he'd have con- eiderble ruputation, rm- , Another one says, "1 w.^iit old Boggs 'd threaten me, 'cuz then I'd know I warn't gwyne to die for a thousan' year." Boggs comes a-tearing along on his horse, whooping and yelling like an Injun, and singing out — "Cler the track, thar. I'm on the waw-path, and the price uv coffins is a gwyne to raise." He was drunk, and weaving about in his saddle ; he was over fifty year old and had a very red face. Everybody yelled at him, and laughed at him, and sassed him, and he sassed back, and said he'd attend to them and lay them out in their regular turns, but he couldn't wait now, because he'd come to town to kill old Colonel Sherburn, and his motto was, « meat first, and spoon vittles to top off on." ^ He see me, and rode up and says— " Whar'd you come f'm, boy ? You prepared t: die ? " Then he rode on. I was scared ; but a man says— - He don't mean nothing ; he's always a carryin' on like that, when he's drunk. He's the best-naturedest old fool in Arkansaw-never hurt nobodv drunk nor sober." . . Boggs rode up before the biggest store in town and bent his head down so he could see under the curtain of the awning, and yeUa— T OlD nOG08. 185 li<' V gona ched their s. There By-Uiid- l monthly un out Qi ed np all huvc con- d know I %n Injun, >f!ins is a year old, him, and sm out in n to kill )s to top hen he's nobody, n so he T ■■ Come o„t hero, Shcrb, .^ „„t «„,, meet tho man you've swindled. 1ourethohonnTm»ftor, ■ m a gwyno to have you, too '" And «„ ho went on, eall, „erb„rn everything he could luy hi. tongne to, »nd the whole street packed with people listening and laughing and goL on By-and-hy a proud-looking man about fllty-llve-and ho was a heap the best dressed man in that town, t„„-.tei» out of the store, and the crowd drops back on each side to let h,m come. Ho says to Boggs. mighty oa'm and ,l„w-L says- "I m bred of this; but I'll endure it till one o'clock. Till one o'clock mind- A LITTLB MONTHLT SKUNK. no longer. If yon open your mouth against me only once, after that time, yon can't travel so far but I will find you." Then ho tnn>s Mid goes in. The crowd looked mighty sober ; nobody stirred, s temath p.t.fulncss. Now the thing for ym to do, is to droop your tails and go home and crawlin a hole If any real lynching', going to be done, it w.U be done m the dark, Bonthem fashion; and when they come they'll bring their masks, and fetch a «r*rng. No; fe».^and take your half-a-man with you"-toss,ng h.s gun up across his left arm and cocking it, when he says this. The crowd washed back sudden, and then broke all apart and went teanng off eyery which way, and Buck Harkness he heeled it after them lookmg toler- able cheap. 1 could a staid, if I'd a wanted to, but I didn't want to. I weTto the circus, and loafed around the back side till the watchman wen^ b, 21 then dived in under the tent. I had my twenty-dollar gold p.ece nd ■ .1 other money, but I reckoned I bet«r save it, because there a,n't no telhng r- 192 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. how soon you are going to need it, away from Lome and amongst strangers, that way You can't be too careful. I ain't opposed to spending money ou circuses, when there ain't no other way, but there ain't no use in wasting it on them. It was a real bully circus. It was the splendidest sight that ever was, when they all come riding in, two and two, a gentleman and lady, side by side, the men just in their drawers and under-shirts, and no shoes nor stirrups, and resting their hands on their thighs, easy and comfortable-there must a' been twenty of them-and every lady with a lovely complexion, and perfectly beautiful, and looking just like a gang of real sure-enough queens, aud dressed in clothes that cost millions of dollars, and just littered with diamonds. It was a powerful fine Bight ; I never see anything so lovely. And then one by one they got up and Btood and went a-weaving around the ring so gentle and wavy and graceful, the men looking ever so tall and airy and straight, with their heads bobbing and skimming along, away up there under the tent-roof, and every lady's rose-leafy dress flapping soft and silky around her hips, and she looking like the most love- liest parasol. And then faster and faster they went, all of them dancing, first one foot stuck out in the air and then the other, the horses leaning more and more, and the ring-master going round and round the centre-pole, cracking his whip and shouting " hi !— hi ! " and the clown cracking jokes behind him ; and by-and- by all hands dropped the reins, and every lady put her knuckles on her hips and every gentleman folded his arms, and then how the horses did lean over and hump themselves ! And so, one after the other they all skipped off into the ring, and made the sweetest bow I ever see, and then scampered out, and everybody clapped their hands and went just about wild. Well, all through the circus they done the most astonishing things ; and all the time' that clown carried on so it most killed the people. The ring-maater couldn't ever say a word to him but he was back at him quick as a wink with the funniest things a body ever said ; and how he ever could think of so many of them, and so sudden and so pat, was what I couldn't noway understand. Why. I couldn't a thought of them in a year. And by-and-by a drunk man tried to get into the ring-said he wanted to ride ; said he could ride as well as anybody I ) u '% I i* INTOXICATION IN THE RING, 193 that over was. They argued and tried to keep him out, but he wouldn't listen, and the whole show come to a standstill. Then the people begun to holler at him und make liui of him, aud that made him mad, and he begun to rip and tear ; so that stirred up the people, and a lot of men begun to pile down oil of the benches and swarm towards the ring, saying, "Knock him down 1 t^.ow him out ! " and one cr two women begun to scream. So, then, the ring-maater he made a little speech, and said he hoped there wouldn't be no disturbance, and if the man would promise he wouldn't make no more trouble, he would let him ride, if he thought he could stay on the horse. So everybody laughed and said all right, and the man got on. The minute he wus on, the horse begun to rip and tear and jump and cavort around, with two circus men hanging onto his bridle trying to hold him, and the drunk man hanging onto his neck, and his heels flying in the air every jump, and the whole crowd of people standing up shout- ing and laughing till the tears rolled down. And at last, Bure enough, all the circus men could do, the horse broke loose, and away he went like the very nation, round and round the ring, with that sot laying down on him and hang- ing to his neck, with first one leg hanging most to the ground on one side, and then t'other one on t'other side, and the people just crazy, warn't funny to me, though ; I was all of a tremble to see hia danger. 18 UK 8HED 8EVINTEEN fUlTB. It But V t>;-,- H iiii « ; n. !', Ill 104 THE ADVENTURES OF nUCKLEDEnnT FIKTT. pretty Boon he struggled up astraddle and grabbed the bridle, a-reeling this way and that ; and the next minute he sprung up and dropped the bridle and stood I and the horse agoing like a house afire too. He just stood up there, a-sailing around as easy and comfortable as if he warn't ever drunk in his life — and then ho begun to pull off his clothes and sling them. He shed them so thick they kind of clogged up the air, and altogether he shed seventeen suits. And then, taoro he was, slim and handsome, and dressed the gaudiest and prettiest you ever saw, and ho lit into that horse with his whip and made him fairly hum— and finally skipped off, and made his bow and danced off to the dressing-room, and everybody just a-howling with pleasure and astonishment. Then the ring-master ho see how he had been fooled, and he icas the sickest ring-master you ever see, I reckon. Why, it was one of his own men ! He had got up that joke all out of his own head, and never let on to nobody. Well, I felt sheepish enough, to be took in so, but I wouldn't a been in that ring-mas- ter's place, not for a thousand dollars. I don't know ; there may be bullier circuses than what that one was, but I never struck them yet. Anyways it was plenty good enough for me ; and wherever I run across it, it can have all of my custom, every time. Well, that night we had our show ; but there warn't only about twelve people there ; just enough to pay expenses. And they laughed all the time, and that made the duke mad ; and everybody left, anyway, before the show was over, but one boy which was aaleep. So the duke said these Arkansaw lunkheads couldn't come up to Shakspeare ; what they wanted was low comedy — and may be something ruther worse than low comedy, he reckoned. He said he could size their style. So next morning he got some big sheets of wrapping-paper and some black paint, and drawed off some handbills and stuck them up all over the village. The bills said : i- wmmm V ' THE TERILLINO TRAGEDY. 195 AT THE COURT HOUSE ! FOR 3 NIGHTS ONLY ! The World-Renowned Tragedians DAVID GARRICK THE YOUNGER! AND EDMUND KEAN THE ELDER I Of the London and Continental Theatres, In their Thrilling Tragedy o? THE KING'S CAMELOPARD OR THE ROYAL NONESUCH 111 Admission 50 cents. Then at the bottom was the biggest line of all— which said : LADIES AND CHILDREN NOT ADMITTED. "There," su^j he, "if that line don't fetch them, I dout know Arkansawl'* g""**>; ■jut)***.'''"*' " X A«V ,»lld.yhimanat1.cl:mgw.ah«a at it, rigging up a stage, and a cur- tain, and a row of candles for foot- lights ; and that night the house was jam full of men in no time. When the place couldn't hold no more, the duke he quit tending door and went around the back way and come onto the stage and stood up before the curtain, and made a little speech, and praised up this tragedy, and said it was the most thrillingest one that ever was ; and 80 he went on a-bragging about the tragedy and about Edmund Kean the Elder, which waa to play the main principal part in it ; and at last when he'd got everybody's ex- pectations up high enough, he rolled up the curtain, and the next minute the king come a-prancing out on all fours, naked ; and he was painted all over, ring- Btreaked-and-striped, all sorts of colors, as splendid as a rainbow. And— but never mind the rest of his outfit, it was just wild, but it was awful funny. The people most killed themselves laughing ; and when the king got done capering, :.>id capered off behind the scenes, they roared and clapped and stormed and haw- hawed till he come back and done it over again ; and after that, they made him TRIQKDT. 'BOLD: 197 do it another time. Well, it would a made a cow laugh to see the shines that old idiot cut. Then the duke he lets the curtain down, and bows to the people, and says the great tragedy will be performed only two nights more, o'^ accounts of pressing London engagements, where the seats is all sold aready for it in Drury Lane ; and then ho makes them another bow, and says if he has succeeded in pleasing them and instructing them, ho will bo deeply obleeged if they will mention it to their friends and get them to come and see it. Twenty people sings out : " What, is it over ? Is that allV* The duke says yes. Then there was a fine time. Everybody sings out " sold," and rose up mad, and was agoing for that stage and them tragedians. But a big fine-looking man jumps up on a bench, and shouts : "Hold on! Just a word, gentlemen." Thc) stopped to listen. "We are sold -mighty badly sold. But we don't want to be the laughing-stock of this whole town, I reckon, and never hear thc last of this thing as long as we live. No. What we want, is to go out of here quiet, and talk this show up, and sell the rest of the town ! Then we'll all be in thc same boat. Ain't that sensible ?" (" You bet it is !— the jedge is right ! " everybody sings out.) " A; -ight, then —not a word about any sell. Go along home, and advise everybody to come and see the tragedy." Next day you couldn't hear nothing around that town but how splendid that Bhow was. House was jammed again, that night, and we sold this crowd the same way. When me and the king and the duke got home to the raft, we all had a supper ; and by-and-by, about midnight, they made Jim and me back her out and float her down the middle of the river and fetch her in and hide her about two mile below town. The third night the house waa crammed again— and they warn't new-comers, this time, but people that was at the show the other two nights. I stood by the duke at the door, and I see that every man that went in had his pockets bulging, or something muffled up under his coat— and I see it warn't no per- fumery neither, not by a long sight. I smelt sickly eggs by the barrel, and >. 198 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. rotten cabbages, and such things ; and if I know the signs of a dead cat being around, and I bet I do, there was sixty-four of them went in. I shoved in there for a minute, but it was too various for me, I couldn't stand it. Well, when the place couldn't hold no more people, the duke he give a fellow a quarter and told him to tend door for him a minute, and then he started around for the stage door, I after him ; but the minute wo turned the corner and was in the dark, he says : " Walk fast, now, till you get away from the houses, and then shin for the raft like the dickens was after you !" I nil 'l"i li nWUilVV A '^^ 1 'I ^ ^^^^ ^*' ^^^ ^® ^°^® *^® ^^™^' ^^ ll I' \\\ ' ISiyHl P /m Pm i struck the raft at the same time, and in «l '/( nUKHHIk W/m iiJJt. less than two seconds we was gliding down stream, all dark and still, and edging towards the middle of the river, nobody saying a word. I reckoned the poor king was in for a gaudy time of it with the audience ; but nothing of the sort ; pretty soon he crawls out from under the wigwam, and says : . "Well, how'd the old thing pan out this time, Duke?" He hadn't been up town at all. We never showed a light till we was about ten mile below that village. Then we lit up and had a supper, and the king and the duke fairly laughed their bones loose over the way they'd served them people. The duke says : "Greenhorns, flatheads 1 7 knew the first house would keep mum and let the rest of the town get roped in ; and I knew they'd lay for us the third night, and consider it was their turn now. Well, it is their turn, and I'd give some- thing to know how much they'd take for it. I muld just like to know how TBBIB POCKETS BULGKD. 1 i I I »iiini iiininm— I— ni • •mmmm BOfAL COMPARISONS. 199 i IS they're putting in their opportunity. They can turn it into a picnic, if they want to— they brought plenty provisions." Them rapscallions took in four hundred and sixty-five dollars in that three nights. I never see money hauled in by the wagon-loud like that, before. By-and by, when they was asleep and snoring, Jim says : " Don't it 'sprise ^'ou, de way dem kings carries on, Huck ? " "No," I sayi, ' . don't." " Why don't it, Huck ? " "Well, it don't, because it's in the breed. I reckon they're all alike." " But, Huck, dese kings o' ouru is regular rapscallions ; dat's jist what day dey's reglar rapscallions." " Well, that's what I'm a-saying ; all kings is mostly rapscallions, as fur aa I can make out." " Is dat so ? " "You read about them once— you'll see. Look at Henry the Eight; this'n 's a Sunday-School Superintendent to liim. And look at Charles Second, and Louis Fourteen, and Louis Fifteen, and James Second, and Edward Second, and Eichard Third, and forty nioro ; besides all them Saxon heptarchies that used to rip around so in old times and raise Cain. My, you ought to seen old Henry the Eight when he waa in bloom. Ho r:as a blossom. He used to marry a new wife every day, and chop off her head next morning. And he would do it just as indifferent as if he was ordering up eggs. * Fetch up Nell Gwynn,* he says. They fetch her up. Next morning, 'Chop off her headl' And they chop it off. ' Fetch up Jane Shore,' ho says ; and up she comes. Next morning 'Chop off her head'— and they choiy it off. 'Ring up Fair Rosamun.' Fair Rosamun answers the bell. Next morning, ' Chop off her head.' And he made every one of them tell him a tale every night ; and ho kept that up till he had hogged a thousand and one tales that way, and then he put them all in a book, and called it Domesday Book— which was a good name and stated the case. You don't know kings, Jim, but I know them ; and this old rip of oum is one of the cleanest I've struck in history. Well, Henry he takes a notion he wants to get up some trouble with this country. How does he go at it— give notice ? ii f , -' -^' 200 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. —give the country u show ? No. All of u sudden lio heaves all the tea in Boston Harbor overboard, and whacks ov.t a declaration of independence, and dares them to come on. That was Ms style — ^lie never give anybody a chance. He had suspicions of his father, the Duke of Wellington. Well, what did he do ?— ask him to shov/ up ? Nc — drownded him in a butt of mamsey, like a cat. Spose people left money laying around where ho was — what did he do ? He collared it. Spose he contracted to do a thing ; and you paid him, and didn't set down there and sec that ho done it — what did ho do ? Ho always done the other thing. Spose he opened his mouth — what then ? If ho didn't shut it up powerful quick, he'd lose a lie, every time. That's the kind of a bug Henry was ; and if we'd a had him along 'stead of our kings, he'd a fooled that town a heap worso than ourn done. I don't say that ourn is lambs, because they ain't, when you come right down to the cold facts ; but they ain't nothing to that old ram, anyway. All I say is, kings is kings, and you got to make allowances. Take them all around, they're a mighty ornery lot. It's the way they're raised." " But dis one do smell so like de nation, Huck." " Well, they all do, Jim. We can't help the way a king smells ; history don't tell no way." "Nov; de duke, he's a tolcrble likely man, in some ways." " Yes, a duke's different. But not very different. This one's a middling BKNKT TRIi ClOBTI' 'M B08T0K BAnBOII. i ; « : JIM 0ET8 HOMESICK. 201 hard lot, for a duke. When he's drunk, there ain't no near-sighted man could tell him from a king." "Well, anyways, I doan' hanker for no mo' un urn, Huck. Dese is all I kin stan'." " It's the way I feel, too, Jim. But we've got them on our hands, and we got to remember what they are, and make allowances. Sometimes I wish we could hear of a country that's out of kings." What was the use to tell Jim these warn't real kings and dukes ? It wouldn't a done no good ; and besides, it was just as I said ; you couldn't tell them from the real kind. I went to sleep, and Jim didn't call me when it was my turn. He often done that. When I waked up, just at day-break, he was setting there with his head down betwixt his knees, moaning and mourning to himself. I didn't take notice, nor let on. I knowcd what it was about. He was thinking about his wife and his children, away up yonder, and he was low and homesick ; because he hadn't ever been away from home before in his life ; and I do believe he cared just as much for his people as white folks does for their'n. It don't seem natural, but I reckon it's so. He was often moaning and mourning that way, nights, when he judged I v/ao asleep, and saying, " Po' little 'Lizabeth ! po' little Johnny ! its mighty hard ; I spec' I ain't ever gwyne to see you no mo', no mo'I " He was a mighty good nigger, Jim was. But this time I somehow got to talking to him about his wife and young ones; and by-and-by he says : " What makes me feel so bad dis time, 'uz bekase I hear sumpn over yonder on de bank like a whack, er a slam, while ago, en it mine me er de time I treat my little 'Lizabeth so ornery. She warn't on'y 'bout fo' year ole, en she tuck de sk'yarlet-fever, en had a powf ul rough spell ; but she got well, en one day she was a-stannin' aroun', en I says to her, I says : " Shet de do'.' " She never done it ; jis' stood dah, kiner smilin' up at me. It make me mad ; en I say;i agin, mighty loud, I says : " ' Doan' you hear me ?— shet de do' I* _ 'f 202 THE ADVENTURES OF BUCKLEBERRT FINN. I was a-bilin' ! I says : " She jis' stood de same way, kiner smilin' up. " * I lay I make you mine 1 ' " En wid dat I fetch' her a slap side de head dat sont her a-sprawliu'. Den I went into de yuther room, en 'uz gone 'bout ten minutes ; en when I come back, dah was dat do' a-stannin' open yit, en dat chile stannin' mos' right in it, a-lookin' down and mournin', en de tears runnin' down. My, but I wuz mad, I was agwyne for de chile, but jis' den — it was a do' dat open innerds— jis' den, 'long come de wind en slam it to, behine de chile, ker-Uam! — en my Ian', de chile never move' ! My breff mos' hop outer me ; en I feel so — so — I doan' know how I feel. I crope out, all a-trernblin', en crope aroun' en open'de do' easy en slow, en poke my head in behine de chile, sof en still, en all uv a su iden, I says pow ! jis' as loud as I could yell. She never budge ! Oh, Huck, 1 bust out a-cryin' en grab her up in my arms, en say, * Oh, de po' little thing ! de Lord God Amighty f ogive po' ole Jim, kaze he never gwyne to f ogive hisself as long's he live ! ' Oh, she was plumb deef eu dumb, Huck, plumb deef en dumb — en I'd ben a-treat'n her so T' I M "alas, odb poor brotbxb." i' [3 r ' MM 210 THE AnVENTUIiES OF UUCKLEBEUnT FINN. ti I'm Borry, sir, but the best we can do is to toll you where he did live yesterday evening." Sudden U8 winking, the ornery old cretur went all to smash, and fell up against the man, and put his chin on his shoulder, and cried down his back, and says : *• Alas, alas, our poor brother— gone, and we never got to see him j oh, iff too, too hard ! " hen he turns around, blubbering, and makes a lot of idiotic signs to the dnVo on his hands, and blamed if he didn't drop a carpet-bag and bust out If they warn't the beatenest lot, them two frauds, that ever I struck. Well, the mengethered around, and sympathized with them, and said all sorts of kind things to them, and carried their carpet-bags up the hill for them, and let them lean on them and cry, and told the king all about his brother's last moments, and the king he told it all over again on his hands to the duke, and both of them took on about that dead tanner like they'd lost the twelve disciples. Well, if ever I struck anything like it, I'm a nigger. It was enough to make a body ashamed ;>£ the human race. a-cryinp \ \ -V--|^ NEWS was nP over town in two min- utes, and yoi could gee the people tearing down >n the run, from every which way, some of them putting or their coats as th y come. Pretty soop we was in the n iddle of a crowd, and the noise of thi tramping was like a soldier-march. 1 lo windows and door- yards was full; and every minute somebody would sj 7, over a fence : " Is it them f " And somebody otting along with the gang would answer back and say, "You bet it is." When we got to the house, the Btreet in front of it was packed, and the three girls was standing in the ..,,,, „ , ^ooj". Mary Jane -as red-headed, but that don t make no difference, she was most awful beautiful, and her face and her eyes was allla up like glory, she was so glad her uncles was come The kmg he spread his arms, and Mary Jane she jumped for them, and the hare-lip jumped for the duke, and there they Uad it 1 Everybody most, leastways women, cned for joy to see them meet again at last and have such good times Then the king he hunched the duke, private-I see him do it-and then he 'you BBT it IB.' • 1: 212 THE ADVENTURES OF HUGKLEBERRT FINN. I ' looked around and see the coffin, over in the corner on two cimirs ; so then, him and the duke, with a hand across each other's shoulder, and t'other hand to their eyes, walked slow and solemn over there, everybody dropping back to give them room, and all the talk and noise stopping, people saying " Sh ! " and all the men taking their hats off and drooping their heads, so you could a heard a pin fall. And when they got there, they bent over and looked in the coffin, and took one sight, and then they bust out a crying BO you could a heard them to Orlears, most; and then they put their arms around each other's necks, and hung their chins over each other's shoulders ; and then for three minutes, or maybe four, I never see two men leak the way they done. And mind you, everybody was doing the same ; and the place was that damp I never see anything like it. Then one of them got on one side of the coffin, and t'other on t'other side, and they kneeled down and rested their fore heads on the coffin, and let en to pray all to theirselves. Well, Vv'hen it come to that, it worked the crowd like you never see anything like it, and so every- body broke down and went to sobbing right out loud— the poor girls, too ; and every woman, nearly, went up to the girls, without saying a word, and kissed them, solemn, on the forehead, and then put their hand on their head, and looked up towards the sky, with the tears runn'ng down, and then busted out and went off sobbing and swabbing, and give the next woman a show. I never Bee anything so disgusting. Well, by-and-by the king he gets up and comes forward a little, and works himself up and slobbers out a speech, all full of tears and flapdoodle about its LBAKINO. 'i.i- amomo tee " doxolojer." 213 being a sore trial for him and his poor brother to lose the diseased, and to misa seeing diseased alive, after the long journey of four thousand mile, but its a trial that's sweetened and sanctified to us by this dear sympathy and these holy tears, and so he thanks them out of his heart and out of his brother's heart, because out of their mouths they can't, words being too weak and cold, and all that kind of rot and slush, till it was just sickening ; and then he blubbers out a pious goody-goody Amen, and turns himself loose and goes to crying fit to bust. And the minute the words was out of his mouth somebody over in the Cio\7d struck up the doxolojer, and everybody joined in with all their might, and it just warmed you up and made you feel as good as church letting out. Music is a good thing ; and after all that soul-butter and hogwash, I never see it freshen up things so, and sound so honest and bully. Then the king begins to work his jaw again, and says how him and his nieces would be glad if a few of the main principal friends of the family v/ould tuke supper here with them this evening, and help set up with the ashes of the dis- eased ; and says if his poor brother laying yonder could speak, he knows who he would name, for they was names that was very dear to him, and mentioned often in his letters ; and so he will name the same, to-wit, as follows, vizz : — Ecv. Mr. Hobson, and Deacon Lot Hovey, and Mr. Ben Eucker, and Abner Shackleford, and Levi Bell, and Dr. Kobinsou, and their wives, and the widow Bartlsy. Rev. Hobson and Dr. Kobinson was down to the end of the town, a-huntiiig together ; that is, I mean the doctor was shipping a sick man to t'other world, and the preacher was pinting him right. Lawyer Bell was away up to Louisville on some business. But the rest was on hand, and go they all come and shook hands with the king and thanked him and talked to him; and then they shook hands with the duke, and didn't say nothing but just kept a-smiling and bob. bing their heads like a passelof sapheads whilst he made all sorts of signs with his hands and said " Goo-goo — goo-goo-goo," all the time, like a baby that can't talk. So the king he blatted along, and managed to inquire about pretty much everybody and dog in town, by his name, and mentioned all sorts of little things that happened one time or another in the town, or to George's family, or to Peter ; and he always let on that Peter wrote him the things, but that was a lie. % 214 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINK he got every blessed one of them out of that young flathead that we canoed up to the steamboat. Then Mary Jane she fetched the letter her father left behind, and the king he read it out loud and cried over it. It give the dwellmg-house and three thousand dollars, gold, to the girls; and it give the tanyard (which was doing a good business), along with some other houses and land (worth about seven thousand), and three thousand dollars in gold to Harvey and William, and told where the six thousand cash was hid, down cellar. So these two frauds said they d go and fetch it up, and have everything square and above-board ; and told me to come with a candle. We shut the cellar door behind us, and when they found the bag they spilt it out on the floor, and it was a lovely sight, all them yaller- boys. My, the way the king's eyes did shine I He slaps the duke on the shoulder, and says : "Oh, this ain't bully, nor noth'n ! Oh, no, I reckon not I Why, Biljy, it beats the Nonesuch, don't it ! " The duke allowed it did. They pawed the yaller-boys, and sifted them through their fingers and let them jingle down on the floor ; and the king Bays : "It ain't no use talkin' ; bein' brothers to a rich dead man, and representa- tives of furrin heirs that's got left, is the line for you and me. Bilge. Thish-yer comes of trust'n to Providence. It's the best way, in the long run. I've tried 'em all, and ther' ain't no better way." Most everybody would a been satisfifi with the pile, and took it on trust ; but no, they must count it. So they counts it, and it comes out four hundred and fifteen dollars short. Says the king : "Dem him, I wonder what he done with that four hunderd and fifteen dollars?" They worried over that a while, and ransacked all around for it. Then the duke says : "Well, hewafl a pretty sicku^an, and likely he made a mistake— I reckon that's the way of it. The best way's to let it go, and keep still about it. We can spare it." .....:. ga^^H^W^^ } AWFUL SQUARE. 215 " Oh, shucks, yes, we can spare it. I don't k'yer noth'n 'bout that— it'a the count I'm thinkin' about. We want to be awful square and open and above- board, here, you know. We want to lug this h-yer money up stairs and count it before every- body—then ther' ain't noth'n suspicious. But when the dead man says ther's six thous'n dol- lars, you know, we don't want to " "Hold on," says the duke. "Less make up the defiisit" — and ho begun to haul out yaller- boys out of his pocket. ** It's a most amaz'n' good idea, duke — you liave got a rattlin* clever head on you," says the king. "Blest if the old None- such ain't a heppin' us out agin " — and he begun to haul out yaller- jackets and stack them up. It most busted them, but they made up the six thousand clean and clear. " Say," says the duke, " I got another idea. Le's go up stairs and count thi;j money, and then take and give it to the girls." " Good land, duke, lemme hug you I It's the most dazzling idea 'at ever a man struck. You have cert'nly got the most astonishin' head I ever see. Oh, this is the boss dodge, ther' ain'fe no mistake 'bout it. Let 'em fetch along their euspicions now, if they want to— this'U lay 'em out." When we got up stairs, everybody gethered around the table, and the king he counted it and etacked it up, throe hundred dollars in a pile—twenty elegant little piles. Everybody looked hungry at it, and licked their chops. Then they ll MAKINa UP THB " OSmBIT.' /f i i 216 TITE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FIIW. raked it into the bag again, and I see the king begin to swell himself up for another speech. He says : "Friends all, my poor brother that lays yonder, has done generous by them that's left behind in the vale of sorrers. He has done generous by these-yer poor little lambs that he loved and sheltered, and that's left fatherless and motherless. Yes, and we that knowed him, knows that he would a done more generous by 'em if he hadn't ben afeard o' woundin' his dear William and me. Now, wouldn't he ? Ther' ain't no question 'bout it, in my mind. Well, then— what kind o* brothei-s would it be, that 'd stand in his way at sech a time ? And what kind o' uncles would it be that 'd rob— yes, roJ— sech poor sweet lambs as these 'at he loved so, at scch a time ? If I know William — and I thinJc I do — he — well, I'll jest ask him." He turns around and begins to make a lot of signs to the duke with his hands ; f] and the duke he looks at him stupid "^ and leather-headed a while, then all of a sudden he seems to catch hia ^1 meaning, and jumps for the king, goo-gooing with all his might for joy, and hugs him about fifteen times before he lets up. Then the king says, " I knowed it ; I reckon that *11 convince anybody the way he feels about it. Here, Mary Jane, Susan, Joanner, take the money — take it all. It's the gift of him that lays yonder, cold but joyful." Mary Jane she went for him, Susan and the hare-lip went for the duke, and then such another hugging and ^issiiag I never see yet. And everybody crowded up with the tears in their eyes, and most shook the^ hands off of them frauds, saying all the time : eOINO rOB HIM. I sr^^&iuuaBsgaai I FUNERAL OROIES. 217 " You dear good souls !— how lovely!— how could you !" Well, then, pretty soon all hands got to talking about the diceased again, and how good he was, and what a loss he was, and all that ; and before long a big iron-jawed man worked himself in there from outside, nnd stood a listening and looking, and not saying anything ; and nobody saying anything to him eHher, because the king was talking and they was all busy listening. The king was say- ing—in the middle of something he'd started in on— "—they bein' partickler friends o' the d isoased. That's why they're invittd here this evenin' ; but to-morrow we want all to come— everybody ; for ho rerpcctcd everybody, he liked everybody, and so it's fitten that hisf uneral orgiess h'd be public." And so he went a-mooning oa and on, liking to hear himself talk, and every little while he fetched in his funeral orgies again, till the duke he couldn't stand it no more ; so he writes on a little scrap of paper, " obsequies, you old fool," and folds it up and goes to goo-gooing and reaching it over people's heads to him. The king he reads it, and jiuts it in his pocket, j:nd says : "Poor William, afflicted as he is, his heart's aluz righ^. Asks me to invito everybody to come to the funeral— wants mo to make 'cm uU welcome. But he needn't a worried— it was jest what I was at." Then he weaves along again, perfectly ca'm, and goes to dropping in his funeral orgies again every now and then, just like ho done before. And when he done it the third time, he says : " I say orgies, not because it's the common term, because it ain't— obsequies bein' the common term-but because orgies is the right term. Obsequies ain't used in England no more, now— it's gone out. We say orgies now, in England. Orgies is better, because it means the thing you're after, more exact. It's a word that's made up out'n the Greek orgo, outside, open, abroad ; and the Hebrew jeesum, to plant, cover up ; hence inter. So, you see, funeral orgies is an open er public funeral." He was the loorst I ever struck. Well, the iron- jawed man he laughed right in his face. Everybody was shocked. Everybody says, ''Why doctor r'ar,d Abner Shackleford says: "Why, Robinson, hain't you heard the news ? This is Harvey Wnka." 218 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCELEBERRT FINN. The king he smiled eager, and shoyed out his flapper, and says " /s it my poor brother's dear good friend and physician ? I — 'Keep your hands off of me ! " says the doctor. ** You talk like an English- man — donH you ? It's the worse imitation I ever heard. You Peter Wilks's brother. You're a fraud, that's what you are ! " Well, how they all took on ! They crowded around the doctor, and tried to quiet him down, and tried to explain to him, and tell him how Harvey 'd showed in forty ways that he toas Harvey, and knowed every- body by name, and the names of the very dogs, and begged and begged him not to hurt Harvey's feelings and the poor girls' feelings, and all that ; but it warn't no use, he stormed right along, and said any man that pretended to be an Englishman and couldn't imitate the linge no better than what he did, was a fraud and a liar. The poor girls was hanging to the king and crying ; and all of a sudden the doctor ups and turns on them. He says : ** I was your father's friend, and I'm your friend ; and I warn you as a friend, and an honest one, that wants to protect you and keep you out of harm and trouble, to turn your backs on that scoundrel, and have nothing to do with him, the ignorant tramp, with his idiotic Greek and Hebrew as he calls it. He is the thinnest kind of an impostor — ^has come here with a lot of empty names and facts which he has picked up somewheres, and you take them for proofs, and are helped to fool yourselves by these foolish friends here, who ought to know better. Mary Jane Wilks, you know me for your friend, and for your unselfish friend, too. Now listen to me } turn this pitiful rascal out— I beg you to do it. Will you ? " THE DOCTOB. tr ] f I A BAD INVESTMENT. 219 ( Mary Jane straightened herself up, and my, but she was handsome ! She Bays: "iferc is my answer." She hove up the bag of money and put it in the king's hands, and says, " Take this six thousand dollars, and invest for me and my sisters any way you want to, and don't give us no receipt for it." Then she put her arm around the king on one side, and Susan and the hare- lip done the same on the other. Everybody clapped their hands and stomped on the floor like a perfect storm, -whilst the king held up his head and smiled proud. The doctor says : "All right, I wash my hands of the matter. But I warn you all that a time's coming when you're going to feel sick whenever you think of this day"— and away he went. "All right, doctor," says the king, kinder mocking him, "we'll try and get 'em to send for you "—which made them all laugh, and they said it was a prime good hit. THS SAO OF KOMXT. amPPff i I XXVI •v^-^ lli >] I when they was all gone, the king he asks Mary Jane how they was off for spare rooms, and she said she had one spare room, which would do for Uncle William, and she'd give her own room to Uncle Harvey, which was a little bigger, and she would turn into the room with her sisters and sleep on a cot ; and up garret was a little cubby, with a pallet in it. The king said the cubby would do for his valley— mean- ing me. So Mary Jane took us up, and she showed them their rooms, which was plain but nice. She said she'd have her frocks and a lot of other traps took out of her room if they was in Uncle Harvey's way, but he said they warn't. The frocks was hung along the wall, and before them was a curtain made out of calico that hung down to the floor. There was an old hair tnink in one corner, and a guitar box in another, and all sorts of little kmck- knacks and jimcracks around, like girls brisken up a room with. The king said it was all the more homely and more pleasanter for these fixings, and so don't dis- turb them. The duke's room was pretty small, but plenty good enough, and bo was my cubby. That night they had a big supper, and all them men and women was there. THE CUBBT. ; I ■ t WI WW * i A PIOUS KING. 221 and I stood behind the king and the duke's chairs and waited on them, and the niggers waited on the rest. Mary Jane she set at the head of the table, with Susan along eide of her, and said how bad the biscuits was, and how mean the preserves was, and how oniery and tough the fried chickens was— and all that kind of rot, the way women always do for to force out compliments ; and the people all knowed everything was tip-top, and said so— said "Ho.v do you get biscuits to brown so nice ? " and " Where, for the land's sake did you get these amaz'n pick- les?" and all that kind of hum- bug talky-talk, juct the way people always docs at a supper, j^^ you know. And when it was all done, me and the hare-lip had supper in the kitchen off of the leavings, whilst the others was helping the niggera clean up the things. The hare-lip Bhe got to pumping me about England, and blest if I didn't think the ice was getting mighty thin, sometimes. She says : " Did you ever see the king ? " ^^ " Who ? William Fourth ? Well, I bet I have-he goes to our church. I knowed he was dead years ago, but I never let on. So when I says he goes to our church, she says : "What— regular?" "Ycs-regulur. His pew's right over opposite ouru-on 'tother side the pulpit." BUPPER WITH THB HARB-Lr i I i i f ri i 222 TBE ADVENTUHES of nUCKLEBEIillT FINT. "I thought he lived in London ?" ** Well, he does. Where would he live ? " " But I thought you lived in Sheffield ?" I see I was up a stump. I had to let on to get choked with a chicken bone, 80 as to get time to think how to get down again. Then I says : " I mean he goes to our church regular when he's in Sht ftield. That's only in the summer-time, when he comes there to take the sea hatha." " Why, how you talk— Sheffield ain't on the sea." ** Well, who said it was ? " " Why, you did." *' I didn't, nvLther." "You did I" «* I didn't." "You did." " I never said nothing of the kind." " Well, what did you say, then ? " " Said he come to take the sea baths— thaVa what I said." "Well, then I how's he going to take the sea baths if it ain't on the sea ?" " Looky here," I says ; " did you ever see any Congress water ? " "Yes." " Well, did you have to go to Congress to get it ? " "Why, no." "Well, neither does William Fourth have to go to the sea to get a sea bath." "How does he get it, then ?" "Gets it the way people down here gets Congress- water— in barrels. There in the palace at Sheffield they've got furnaces, and he wants his water hot. They can't bile that amount of water away oflf there at the sea. They haven't got no conveniences for it." "Oh, I see, now. You might a said' that in the first place and saved time." When she said that, I see I was out of the woods again, and so I was comfort- able and glad. Next, she says : / THE KINO'S CLEROY. 223 r "Do you go to church, too ?" " Yes — regular." "Where do you set ?" " Why, in our pew." " TfAosepcw ?" " Why, OMrw— your Uncle Harvey's." "Hia'n ? What does he want with a pew ? " " Wants it to set in. Yv'hat did you reckon he wanted with it ?" " Why, I thought he'd be in the pulpit." Rot him, I forgot he was a preacher. I see I was up a stump again, ao I played another chicken bone and got another think. Then I says : " Blame it, do you suppose there ain't but one preacher to a church ? " " Why, what do they want with more ? " " What !-to preach before a king ? I never see such a girl as you. They don't have no less than seventeen." "Seventeen ! My land ! Why, I wouldn't set out such a string as that, not if I never got to glory. It must take 'em a week." " Shucks, they don't all of 'em preach the same day— only one of 'em." " Well, then, what does the rest of 'em do ? " '« Oh, nothing much. Loll around, pass the plate-and one thing or another. But mainly they don't do nothing." " Well, then, what are they /or f " " Why, they're for style. Don't you know nothing ? " " Well, I don't want to know no such foolishness as that. How is servants treated in England ? Do they treat 'em better 'n we treat our niggers ? " " No! A servant ain't nobody there. They treat them worse than dogs.' "Don't they give 'em holidays, the way we do, Christmas and New Year's week, and Fourth of July ?" "Oh, just listen ! A body could tell you hain't ever heen to England, by that. Why, Hare-1-why, Joanna, they never see a holiday from year's end to year's end ; never go to the circus, nor theatre, nor nigger shows, nor nowheres." m *s r 4 224 THE ADVENTURES OF HUOKLEBERRT FINN. "Nor church?" "Nor church." "But you always went to church." Well, I was gone up again. I forgot I was the old man's servant minute I whirled in ^u ut next a kind of an explanation how a valley ■was different from a common servant, and had to go to church whether he wanted to or not, and set with the family, on account of it's being the law. But I didn't do it pretty good, and when I got done I see she waru't satisfied. She says : " Honest injnn, now, '-. hain't you been telling mc a i lot of lies?" " Honest injun," says I. "None of it at all?" " None of it at all. Not a lie in it," says I. " Lay your hand on this book and say it." I see it wam't nothing but a dictionary, so I laid my hand on it and said it. So then she looked a little better satisfied, and says : " Well, then, I'll believe some of it ; but I hope to gracious if I'll believe the rest." "What is it you won't believe, Joe ?" says Mary Jane, stepping in with Susan behind her. " It ain't right nor kind for you to talk so to him, and him a stranger and so far from his people. How would you like to be treated so ? " "honmt injdh." mmm .* -f.**^ I I ' ■■Til " - ■'■^' ' --^ w i 11 SITE AFfKETt ffTR PARDON. 225 -That's always your way, Maim-always sailing in to help Bomebody before they're hurt. I hain't done nothing to him. He's told Bonio stretchers, I reckon ; and I said I wouldn't swallow it all ; and that's every bit and grain I did say. 1 reckon he can stand a little thing like that, can't he ? " " I don't cure whether 'twas little or whether 'twas big, he's here in our house and a stranger, and it wasn't good of you to suy it. If you was in his place it would make you feel ashamed ; and so you oughtn't to say a thing to another person that will make them fed ashamed." " Why, Maim, he said " mt. u • » " It don't make no difference what he sfltrf-that ain't the thing. The thing iB for you to treat him ki„d, and not be suying things to make him remember he ain't in his own country and amongst his own folks." I says to myself, this is a girl that I'm letting that old rcptle ob her of her """ Then Susan ,he waltzed in ; and if you'll believe me, she did give Hare-lip hark from the tomb 1 , . u i * v,«- Says I to myself. And this is another one that I'm letting him rob her of her ""'Then Mary Jane she took another inning, and went in sweet and lovely again-- which was her way-but when sh^ got done there wam't hardly anything left o poor Hare-lip. So she hollered. ^^ « All right, then," says the other girls, "you just ask his pardon. She done it, too. And she done it beautiful, She done it so beautifu it was good to hear ; and I wished I could tell her a thousand lies, so .he could do it ^^Tsays to myself, this is another one that I'm letting him rob her of her money. And when she got through, they all jest laid theirselves out to make me feel at home and know I was amongst friends. I felt so orm ry and low down and mean, that I says to myself, My mind's made up ; I'll hive that money for them or bust. , wi,o« T So then I lit out-for bed, I said, meaning some time or another. When got by myself, I went to thinking the thing over. I says to my.- a, shall I go 16 I v,l — ?'-'Jf^>'- SL 22( THE ADVENTURES OF UTTCELEBEERT FINIT. to that doctor, private, and blow on these frauds ? No-that won t do. Ho might tell who told him ; then the king and the duke would make it warm for me Shall I go, private, and tell Mary Jane ? No-1 daan't do it. Her face would give them a hint, sure ; they've got the money, and they'd slide right out and get away with it. If she was to fetch in help, I'd get mixed up in the business, before it was done with, I judge. No, there ain't no good way but one. TBI DVKB I.OOKS tmDXR TBI BID. I got to steal that money, somehow ; and I got to steal it some way that they won't suspicion that I done it. They've got a good thing, here ; and they ain't agoing to leave till they've played this family and this town for all they're worth, 80 I'll find a chance time enough. I'll steal it, and hide it ; and by-and-by, when I'm away down the river, I'll write a letter and tell Mary Jane where it's hid. But I better hive it to-night, if I can, because the doctor maybe hasn't let up as much as he lets on he has ; he might scare them out of here, yet. So thinks I, I'll go and search them rooms. Up stairs the hall was dark, but 1 ' ETDING IN TEE ROOM. 227 : By I't h, en d. as >ut I found the duke's room, and started to paw around it with my hands ; but I recollected it wouldn't be much like the king to let anybody else take care of that money but his own self ; so then I went to his room and begun to paw around there. But I see I couldn't do nothing without a candle, and I dasn't light one, of course. So I judged I'd got to do the other thing— lay for them, and eavesdrop. About that time, I hears their footsteps coming, and was going to skip under the bed ; I roached for it, but it wasn't where I thought it would be ; but I touched the curtain that hid Mary Jane's frocks, so I jumped in behind that and snuggled in amongst the gowns, and stood there perfectly still. They come in and shut the door ; and the first thing the duke done was to get down and look under the bed. Then I was glad I hadn't found the bed when I wanted it. And yet, you know, it's kind of natural to hide under the bed when you are up to anything private. They sets down, then, and the king says : " Well, what is it ? and cut it middlin' short, because it's better for us to be down there a whoopin'-up the mournin', than up here givin' 'em a chance to talk us over." " Well, this is it, Capet. I ain't easy ; I ain't comfortable. That doctor lays on my mind. I wanted to know your plans. I've got a notion, and I think it's a sound one." "What is it, duke?" " That we better glide out of this, before three in the morning, and clip it down the river with what we've got. Specially, seeing we got it so easy-given back to us, flung at our heads, as you may say, when of course we allowed to have to steal it back. I'm for knocking off and lighting out." That made me feel pretty bad. About an hour or two ago, it would a been a little different, but now it made me feel bad and disappointed. The king rips out and says : " What ! And not sell out the rest o' the property ? March off like a pas- eel o' fools and leave eight or nine thous'n' dollars' worth o' property layin' around jest flttflerin' to be scooped in ?— and all good salable stuff, too." ■Ji ±M 228 THE ADVENTURES OF SUCKLEBERRT FINN. The duke he grumbled ; said the bag o£ gold was enough, aud he d.dn t want to go no deeper-didn't want to rob a lot oJ orphans of evevjthhis they had. .< Why. how you talk 1 " says the king. " We shan't rob 'em of notlung at allbut jest this money. The people that luys the property is the suffrers; because as scon's it's found out 'at we didn't own it-which won't be long after we've slid-the sale won't he valid, and it'll all go hack to the estate These-yer orphans '11 git their house back agin, and that's enough lor them; they re young a^d spry, and k'n easy earn a livin'. They ain't agoing to suflcr. Why, , est thfnk-aere's thcus'n's and thous'u's that ain't nigh so well off. Bless you, Ike, ain't got noth'n to complain of." , .. n • -ui. Well, the king he talked him blind ; so at last he give in, and said all right, but said he believed it was blame foolishness to stay, and that doctor hanging over them. But the king says : „ . ,. , n +v,« -p^^ia « Cuss the doctor ! What do we k'yer for Jdm ? Hain't we got all the fools in town on our side ? and ain't that a big enough majority in any town . So they got ready to go down stairs again. The duke says : « I don't think we put that money in a good place." That cheered me up. I'd begun to think I warn't going to get a hint of no kind to help me. The king says : "Why?" , ^ ^ , - Because Mary Jane '11 be in mourning from this out ; and first yon know the nigger that does up the rooms will get an order to box these duds up and put 'em away ; and do you reckon a nigger can run across money and not borrow some of it ?" ,, , « Your head's level, agin, duke, " says the king ; and he come a fumbling under the curtain two or three foot from where I was. I stuck tight to the wall and kept mighty still, though quivery ; and I wondered what them fellows would say to me if they catched me ; and I tried to think what I'd better do if they did catch me. But the king he got the bag before I could think more than about a half a thought, and he never suspicioned I was around. They took and shoved the bag through a rip in the straw tick that was under the feather bed, and crammed it in a foot or two amongst the straw and said it was all right, now, (' EUOK TAKES TEE MONET. 229 because a nigger only makes up the feather bed, and don't turn over the straw tick only about twice a year, and so it warn't in no danger of getting stole, now. But I knowed better. I had it out of there before they was half-way down stairs. I groped along up to my cubby, and hid it there till I could get a chance to do better. I judged I better hide it outside of the house Bomewheres, because if they missed it they would give the house a good ransacking. I knowed that very well. Then I turned in, with my clothes all on ; but I couldu't a gone to sleep, if I'd a wanted to, I was in such a sweat to get through with the business. By-and-by I heard the king and the duke come up ; so I rolled off of my pallet and laid with my chin at the top of my ladder and waited to see if anything was going to happen. But nothmg did. ^ ^ , , So I held on till all the late sounds had quit and the early ones hadn t begun, yet ; and then I slipped down the ladder. BtrCK TAKES THX HOMST. h] r 4 iiifffiifiiiiina ^! i I ^1 K KV I i^^ crept to their doors and listened; they was snoring, so I tip-toed along, and got down stairs all right. There warn't a sound anywheres. I peeped through a crack of the dining-room door, and see the men that was watch- ing the corpse all sound asleep on their chairs. The door was open into the parlor, where the corpse was laying, and there was a candle in hoth rooms. I passed along, and the parlor door was open; but I see there warn't nobody in there but the remainders of Peter ; so I shoved on by ; but the front door was locked, and the key wasn't there. Just then I heard somebody coming down the stairs, back behind me. I run in the parlor, and took a swift look around, and the only place I see to hide the bag was in the coffin. The lid was shoved along about a foot, showing the dead man's face down in there, with a wet cloth over it, and his shroud on. I tucked the money-bag in under the lid, just down beyond where his hands was crossed, which made me creep, they was so cold, and then I run back across the room and in behind the door. The person coming was Mary Jane. She went to the coffin, very soft, and A CBACK IN THB DINrao-ROOM DOOB. ( ■"'^■^"-■7 THE FUNERAL. 231 kneeled down and looked in ; then she put up her handkerchief and I see she begun to cry, though I couldn't hear her, and her back was to me. I slid out, and as I passed the dining-room I thought I'd make sure thera watchers hadn't seen me ; so I looked through the crack and everything was all right. They hadn't stirred. I slipped up to bed, feeling ruther blue, on accounts of the thing playing out that way after I had took so much trouble and run zo much resk about it. Says I, if it could stay where it is, all right ; because when we get down the river a hundred mile or two, I could write back to Mary Jane, and die could dig him up again and get it ; but that ain't the thing that's going to happen; the thing that's going to happen is, the money '11 be found when they come to screw on the lid. Then the king '11 get it again, and it '11 be a long day beforo he gives anybody another chance to smouch it from him. Of course I wanlcd to slide down and get it out of there, but I dasn't try it. Every minute it was getting earlier, now, and pretty soon some of them watchers would begin to stir, and I might get catched-catcbed with six thousand dollars in my hands that nobody hadn't hired me to take care of. I don't wish to be mixed up in no such business as that, I says to myself. When I got down stairs in the morning, the parlor was shut up, and the watchers was gone. There wam't nobody around but the family and the widow Bartley and our tribe. I watched their faces to see if anything had been happen- ine, but I couldn't tell. . , , . j . v Towards the middle of the day the undertaker eome, with h,B man and the, set the coffin in the middle of the room on a couple of ''^''^•T'^^^^'ll our chairs in rows, and borrowed more from the ncghhors t,ll the hall and the parlor and the dining-room was full. I see the coffin l,d wae the wa, .t was before, but I dasn't go to look in under it, with folks around. Then the people begun to .lock in, and the beats and the g.r^ took seat, m the front row at the head of the coffin, and for a half an hour the people filed around slow, in single rank, and looked down at the dead man's face a mmute, and some dropped in a tear, and it was all very still and solemn, only the girb and the beats holding handkerchiefs to their eyes and keeping their heads bent, '1 ""^ %\ l^( 232 THE ADVENTURES OF HUGKLEBERRT FINN. and sobbing a little. There warn't no other sound but the scraping of the feet on the floor, and blowing noses — because people always blows them more at a funeral than they do at other places except church. When the place was packed full, the undertaker ho slid around in his black gloves with his softy soothering ways, putting on the last touches, and getting people and things all ship- shape and comfortable, and making no more sound than a cat. He never spoke ; he moved people around, he squeezed in late ones, ho opened up passage-ways, and done it all with nods, and signs with his hands. Then he took his place over against the wall. He was the softest, glidingest, stealthiest man I ever sec ; and there warn't no more smile to him than there is to a ham. They had borrowed a mclodeum — a sick one ; and when everything was ready, a young woman set down and worked it, and it was pretty skreeky and colicky, and everybody joined in and sung, and Peter was the only one that had a good thing, ac- cording to my notion. Then the Reverend Hobson opened up, slow and solemn, and begun to talk ; and straight off the most outrageous row busted out in the cellar a body ever heard; it was only one dog, but he made a most powerful racket, and he kept it up, right along; the parson he had to stand there, over the coffin, and wait— you couldn't hear yourself think. It was right down awkward, and nobody didn't Beem to know what to do. But pretty soon they see that long-legged undertaker make a sign to the preacher as much as to say, " Don't you worry — just depend on me." Then he stooped down and begun to glide along the wall, just his shoulders showing over the people's heads. So he glided along, and the pow-wow and racket getting more and more outrageous all the time ; and at last, when he had gone around two sides of the room, he disappears down cellar. Then, in THIS UNTIHRTAKKB. L SATISFYING CURIOSITY. 233 e about two seconds we heard a whack, and the dog he finished up with a most amazing howl or two, and then everything was dead still, and the parson begun his solemn talk where he left ofiF. In a minute or two here comes this under- taker's back and shoulders gliding along the wall again; and so he glided, and glided, around three sides of the room, and then rose up, and shaded his mouth with his hands, and stretched his neck out towards the preacher, over the people's heads, and says, in a kind of a coarse whisper, "He had a rati" Then he droop- ed down and glided along the wall again to his place. You could see it was a great satisfaction to the people, because naturally they want- ed to know. A little thing like that don't cost nothing, and it's just the little things that makes a man to be look- ed up to and liked. There wam't no more popular man in town than what that undertaker was. Well, the funeral sermon was very good, but pison long and tiresome ; and then the king he shoved in and got off some of his usual rubbage, and at last the job was through, and the undertaker begun to sneak up on the coffin with his screw-driver. I was in a sweat then, and watched him pretty keen. But he never meddled at all ; just slid the lid along, as soft as mush, and screwed it down tight and fast. So there I was ! I didn't know whether the money was in there, or not. So, says I, spose somebody has hogged that bag on the sly ?— now how do /know whether to write to Mary Jane or not:' *Spose she dug him up and didn't find nothing— what would she think of me ? Blame it, I says, I might get hunted up and jailed ; I'd better lay low and keej. dark, and not write at all ; the thing's awful mixed, now j trying to better it, I've I HAD A BAXr' i/" 1 234 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLBBBRRY FINN. worsened it a hundred times, and I wish to goodness I'd just let it alone, dad fetch the whole business 1 They buried him, and we come back home, and I went to watching faces again — I couldn't help it, and I couldn't rest easy. But nothing come of it ; the faces didn't tell me nothing. The king he visited around, in the evening, and sweetened every body up, and made himself ever so friendly; and he give out the idea that his congregration over in England would bo in a sweat about him, so he must hurry and settle up the estate right away, and leave for home. He was very sorry he was so pushed, and so was everybody; they wished he could stay longer, but they said they could see it couldn't be done. And he said of course him and William would take the girls home with them ; and that pleased everybody too, because then the girls would be well fixed, and amongst their own relations ; and it pleased the girls, too — tickled them so they clean forgot they ever had a trouble in the world; and told him to sell out as quick as he wanted to, they would bo ready. Them poor things was that glad and happy it made my heartache to sco them getting fooled and lied to so, but I didn't see no safe way for me to chip in and change the general tune. Well, blamed if the king didn't bill the house and the niggers and all the property for auction straight off — sale two days after the funeral ; but anybody could buy private beforehand if they wanted to. So the next day after the funeral, along about noontime, the girls' joy got the first jolt ; a couple of nigger traders come along, and the king sold them the niggers reasonable, for three-day drafts as they called it, and away they went, the two sons up the river to Memphis, and their mother down the river to Orleans. I thought them poor girls and them niggers would break their hearts for grief ; they cried around each other, and took on so it most made mo down sick to see it. The girls said they hadn't ever dreamed of seeing the family separated or sold away from the town. I can't ever get it out of my memory, the sight of them poor miserable girls and niggers hanging around each other's necks and crying ; and I reckon I couldn't a stood it all but would a had to bust out and tell on our gang if I hadn't knowed the sale warn't no account and the niggers would be back home in a week or two. 'i "j SUSPICIOUS OF BUCK 235 The thing made a big stir in the town, too, and a good many come out footed and said it was scandalous to separate the mother and the children way. It injured the frauds some ; but the old fool he bulled right along, spite of all the duke could say or do, and I tell you the duke was powerful uneasy. Next day was auction day. About broad-day in the morn- ing, the king and the duke come up in the garret and woke me up, and I see by their look that there was trouble. The king says : "Was you in my room night before last ?" "No, your majesty"— which was the way I always called him when nobody but our gang wam't around. "Was you in there yister- day er last night ? " "No, your majesty." " Honor bright, now— no lies. " " Honor bright, your majesty, I'm telling you the truth. I hain't been your room since Miss Mary Jane took you and the duke and showed you." The duke says : " Have you seen anybody else go in there ? " " No, your grace, not as I remember, I believe." " Stop and think." flat- that "WAS YOU IN JlY BOOM f" anear it to if ikat. 286 THE ADVENTUnES OF HUCKLEBERIiY FINN. \\\ I studied a while, and see my chance, then I says : ** Well, I see the niggers go in there several times." Both of them give a little jump ; and looked like they hadn't ever expected it, and then like they had. Then the duke says : "What, «ZZ of them ?" •' No— leastways not all at onco. That is, I don't think I ever see them all come out at once but just one time." " Hello— when was that ? " " It was the day wc had the funeral. In the morning. It warn't early, because I overslept. I was just starting down the ladder, and I see them." ** Well, go on, go on— what did they da ? How'd they act ? " ** They didn't do nothing. And they didn't act anyway, much, as fur as I sfie. They tip-toed away; so I seen, easy enough, that they'd shoved in there to do up your majesty's room, or something, sposing you was up; and found you warn't up, and so they was hoping to slide out of the way of trouble without waking you up, if they hadn't already waked you up." " Great guns, this is a go ! " says the king ; and both of them looked pretty sick, and tolerable silly. They stood there a thinking and scratching their heads, a minute, and then the duke he bust into a kind of a little raspy chuckle, and says : " It does beat all, how neat the niggers played their hand. They let on to be sorry they was going out of this region ! and I believed they was sorry. And 80 did you, and so did everybody. Don't ever tell me any more that a nigger ain't got any histrionic talent. Why, the way they played that thing, it would fool anybody. In my opinion there's a fortune in 'em. If I had capital and a theatre, I wouldn't want a better lay out than that — and here we've gone and sold 'em for a song. Yes, and ain't privileged to sing the song, yet. Say, where is that song ?— that draft." •' In the bank for to be collected. Where would it be ?" ** Well, that's all right then, thank goodness." Sa3's I, kind of timid-like : QUICK SALES AND SMALL PROFITS. 237 " Is something gone wrong ? " The king whirls on me and rips out : "None o' your business I You keep your head she t, and mind y'r own affairs — if you got any. Long as you're in this town, don't you forgit that, you hear ? " Tlien he says to the duke, *' We got to jest swaller it, and say noth'n : mum's the word for ws." As they was starting down the ladder, the duke he chuckles again, and says : " Quick sales and small profits ! It's a good business— yes." The king snarls around on him and says , "I was trying to do for the best, in sellin' 'm out so quick. If the profits has MWINO. turned ont to be none, lackin' considable, and none to carry, is it my fault any more'n it's yourn ? " " Well, they'd be in this house yet, and we wouldn't if I could a got my advice listened to." The king sassed back, as much as was safe for him, and then swapped around and lit into me again. He give me down the banks for not coming and telling him I see the niggers come out of his room acting that way— said any fool would f ■i 1 91 [, Ml 'iommt m m 238 TEE ADYENTURE8 OF HUCKLEBERRY FINJT. a knowed something was up. And then waltzed in and cnssed himself a while ; and said it all come of him not laying late and taking his natural rest that morn- ing, and he'd be blamed if he'd ever do it again. So they went off a jawing; and I felt dreadful glad I'd worked it all off onto the niggers and yet hadn't done the niggers no harm by it. ;i le; rn- ,nd lY-and-by it was getting-np time; so I ' come down thn 'adder and started for down stairs, but as I come to the girls' room, the door was open, and I see Mary Jane setting by her old hair trunk, which was open ami she'd been parkinj,^ things in it— getting ready to go to England. But she had stopped now, with a folded gf> in her lap, and had her face in her hands, crying. I felt awful bad tc see it ; of course anybody would. I went in there, and says : " Miss Mary Jane, you can't abear to see people in trouble, and / can't— most always. Tell me about So she done it. And it was the niggers-I just expected it. She said the beautiful trip to England was most about spoiled for her ; she di ll 1 240 THE ADVENTUREf? OF nUCKLEBERRT FINN. " Oh, dear, dear, to think they ain't ever going to see each other any more ! " " But they will — and inside of two weeks — and I know it ! " says I. Laws it was out before I conld think ! — and before I could budge, she throws her arms around my neck, and told me to say it again, say it again, say it again! I see I had spoke too sudden, and said too much, and was in a close place. I asked her to let me think a minute ; and she set there, very impatient and excited, and handsome, but looking kind of happy and eased-up, like a person that's had a tooth pulled out. So I went to stndying it out. I says to myself, I reckon a body that ups and tells the truth when he is in a tight place, is taking considerable many resks, though I ain't had no experience, and can't say for certain ; but it looks so to me, anyway ; and yet here's a case where I'm blest if it don't look to me like the truth is better, and actuly safer, than a lie. I must lay it by in my mind, and think it over some time or other, it's so kind of strange and unregular. I never see nothing like it. Well, I says to myself at last, I'm agoing to chance it ; I'll up and tell the truth this time, though it does seem most like setting down on a kag of powder and touching it off just to see where you'll go to. Then I says : " Miss Mary Jane, is there any place out of town a little ways, where you could go and stay three or four days ? " ** Yes— Mr. Lothrop's. Why?" " Never mind why, yet. If I'll tell you how I know the niggers will see each other again — inside of two weeks-^here in this house — and prove how I know it — will you go to Mr. Lothrop's and stay four days ?" ** Four days ! " she says ; " I'll stay a year ! " "All right," I says, "I don't want nothing more out of you than just your word — I druther have it than another man's kiss-the-Bible." She smiled, and reddened up very sweet, and I says, "If you don't mind it, I'll shut the door— and bolt it." Then I come back and set down again, and says : "Don't you holler. Just set still, and take it like a man. I got to tell the truth, and you want to brace up, Miss Mary, because it's a bad kind, and going to be hard to take, but there ain't no help for it. These uncles of yourn ain't no TBE BRUTE I" 241 nneles at all-they're a couples of frauds-regular dead-beats. There, now we're over the worst of it— you can stand the rest middling easy." It jolted her up like everything, of course j but I was over the shoal water now, so I went right along, her eyes a blazing higher and higher all the timn and told her every blame thing, from where we first struck that young fool going up to the steamboat, clear through to where she flung herself onto the king's breast at the front door and he kissed her sixteen or seventeen times-and then up she jumps, with her face afire like sunset, and says : " The brute ! Come- don't waste a minute- not a second—yfQ'W have them tarred and feathered, and flung iu the river 1 " Says I : *' Oert'niy. But do you mean, before you go to Mr. Lothrop's, or " *' Oh," she says, " what am I t?imki,ig ahoni I " she says, and set right down again. « Don't mind .what I said— please don't— you won't, now, will you ?" Laying her silky hand on mind in that kind of a way that I said I would die first. *' I never thought, I was so stirred up," she says ; *' now go on, and I won't do so any more. You tell me what to do, and whatever you say, I'll do it.'' "Well," I says, "it's a rough gang, them two frauds, and I'm fixed so I got to travel with them a while longer, whether I want to or not— I druther not tell you why— and if you was to blow on them this town would get me out of their claws, and 7'd be all right, but there'd be another person that you don't know about who'd be in big trouble. Well we got to save him, hain't we ? Of course. Well, then, we won't blow on them.'' Saying them words put a good idea in my head. I see how maybe I could get me and Jim rid of the frauds ; get them jailed here, and then leave. But I didn't want to run the raft in day-time, without anybody aboard to answer 16 IMDISNATION. ! M f- 242 THE AnVENTURES OF EUCKLEBEUnY FINK. questions but me ; so I didn't want the plan to begin working till pretty late to-night. I says : *« Miss Mary Jane, I'll tell you what we'll do— and you won't have to stay at Mr. Lothrop's so long, nuther. How fur is it ? " ** A little short of four miles— right out in the country, back here." " Well, that'll answer. Now you go along out there, and lay low till nine or half-past, to-night, and then get them to fetch you home again— tell them you've thought of something. If you get here before eleven, put a candle in this window, and if I don't turn up, wait till eleven, and then if I don't turn up it means I'm gone, and out of the way, and safe. Then you come out and spread the news around, and get these beats jailed." " Good," she says, " I'll do it." " And if it just happens so that I don't get away, but get took up along with them, you must up and say I told you the whole thing beforehand, and you must stand by me all you can." " Stand by you, indeed I will. They sha'n't touch a hair of your head 1 " she says, and I see her nostrils spread and her eyes snap when she said it, too. ** If I get away, I sha'n't be here," I says, " to prove these rapscallions ain't your uncles, and I couldn't do it if I was here. I could swear they was beats and bummers, that's all j' though that's worth something. "Well, there's others can do that better than what I can— and they're people that ain't going to bo doubted as quick as I'd be. I'll tell you how to find tliem. Gimme a pencil and a piece of paper. There — ^ Royal None- such, Bricksville.' Put it away, and don't lose it. When the court wants to find out something about these two, let them send up to Bricksville and say they've got the men that played the Royal Nonesuch, and ask for some witnesses BOW TO riNO TBIM. s saai Biwmiii MART JANE DECIDEB TO LEAVE. 243 — why, you'll have that entire town down here before you can hardly wink. Miss Mary. A.nd they'll come a-biling, too." I judged we had got everything fixed about right, now. So I says : " Just let the auction go right along, and don't worry. Nobody don't have to pay for the things they buy till a whole day after the auction, on accounts of the short notice, and they ain't going out of this till they get that money — and the way we've fixed it the sale ain't going to count, and they ain't going to get no m< • ;' It's just like the way it was with the niggers — it warn't no sale, and the tug^.^^s will be back before long. Why, they can't collect the money for the niggers, yet — they're in the worst kind of a fix, Miss Mary." "Well," she says, "I'll run down to breakfast now, and then I'll start straight for Mr. Lothrop's." "'Deed, that ain't the ticket. Miss ^.^ary Jane," I says, "by no manner of means ; go before breakfast." "Why?" " What did you reckon I wanted you to go at all for. Miss Mary ? '* " Well, I never thought— and come to think, I don't know. What was it ? " " Why, it's because you ain't one of these leather-face people. I don't want no better book that what your face is. A body can set down and read it off like coarse print. Do you reckon you can go and face your uncles, when they come to kiss you good-morning, and never " " There, there, don't ! Yes, I'll go before breakfast— I'll be glad to. And leave my sisters with them ? " « Yes — never mind about thjm. They've got to stand it yet a while. They might suspicion something if all of you was to go. I don't want you to see them, nor "your sisters, nor nobody in this town — if a neighbor was to ask how is your uncles this morning, your face would tell something. No, you go right along. Miss Mary Jane, and I'll fix it with all of them. I'll tell Miss Susan to give your love to your uncles and say you've went away for a few hours for to get a little rest and change, or to see a friend, and you'll be back to-night or early in the morning." " Gone to see a friend is all right, but I won't have mv love given to them." " Well, then, it sha'n't be." It was well enough to tell her so — no harm in it. \i i ! ■ ! 1 244 TEE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. It WM only a little thing to do, and no trouble ; and it's the little things that flinoothes people's roads the most, down here below ; it would make Mary Jane comfortable, and it wouldn't cost nothing. Then I says : "There's one more thing— that bag of money." " Well, they've got that ; and it makes me feel pretty silly to think how they got it." " No, you're out, there. They hain't got it." *' Why, who's got it ? " " I wish I knowed, but I don't. I Md it, because I stole it from them : and I stole it to give to you ; and I know where I hid it, but I'm afraid it ain't there no more. I'm awful sorry. Miss Mary Jane, I'm just as sorry aa I can be ; but I done the best I could ; I did, honest. I come nigh getting caught, and I had to shove it into the first place I come to, and run-and it warn't a good place." " Oh, stop blaming yourself-it's too bad to do it, and I won't allow it-you couldn't help it ; it wasn't you fault. Where did you hide it ? » I didn't want to set her to thinking about her troubles again ; and I couldn't seem to get my mouth to tell her what would make her see that corpse laying in HX WBOTI. the coffin with that bag of money on his stomach. So for a minute I didn't say nothing— then I says : j u • ^ « I'd ruther not tell you where I put it. Miss Mary Jane, if you don t mina letting me off ; but I'll write it for you on a piece of paper, and you can read it along the road to Mr. Lothrop's, if you want to. Do you reckon that'll do ? " (\\\ vpa »> MMM> EVGK PARTING WITH MART JANE. 245 •• So I wrote : " I put it in the coffin. It was in there when you was crying there, away in the night. I was behind the door, and I was mighty sorry for you, Miss Mary Jane." It made my eyes water a little, to remember her crying there all by herself in the night, and them devils laying there right under her own roof, shaming her and robbing her ; and when I folded it up and give it to her, I see the water come into her eyes, too ; and she shook me by the hand, hard, and says : " Good-hye — I'm going to do everything just as you've told me ; and if I don't ever see you again, I sha'n't ever forget you, and I'll think of you a many and a many a time, and I'll pray for you, too ! " — and she was gone. Pray for me ! I reckoned if she knowed me she'd take a job that was more nearer her size. But I bet she done it, just the same— she was just that kind. She had the grit to pray for Judus if she took the notion— there warn't no back- down to her, I judge. You may say what you want to, but in my opinion she had more sand in her than any girl I ever see ; in my opinron she was just full of sand. It sounds like iiattcry, but it ain't no flattery. And when it comes to beauty— and goodness too— she lays over them all. I hain't ever seen her since that time that I see her go out of that door ; no, I hain't ever seen her since, but I reckon I've thought of her a many and a many a million times, and of her Baying she would pray for me ; and if ever I'd a thought it would do any good for me to pray for her, blamed if I wouldn't a done it or bust. Well, Mary Jane she lit out the back way, I reckon ; because nobody see her ffo. When I struck Susan and the hare-lip, I says : * vVhat's the name of them people over on t'other side of the river that you. all goes to see sometimes ? " They says : " There's several ; but it's the Proctors, mainly." , ** That's the name," I says ; " I most forgot it. Well, Miss Mary Jane she told me to tell you she's gone over there in a dreadful hurry— one of them's sick." " Which one ? " " I don't know j leastways I kinder forget ; but I think it's '* % I'VS W W!^PW3mP!^& " How's it a new kind ? " " Because it's mixed up with other things.'* "What other things ? " "Well, measles, and whooping-cough, and erysiplas, and consumption, and yaller janders, and brain fever, and I don't know what all." " My land ! And they call it the mumps 9 " ** That's what Miss Mary Jane said." "Well, what in the nation do they call it the mumps for ? " "Why, because it is the mumps. That's what it starts with." " Well, ther' ain't no sense in it. A body might stump his toe, and take pison, and fall down the well, and break his neck, and bust his brains out, and some- body come along and ask what killed him, and some numskull up and say,* Why, he stumped his toe.' Would ther' be any sense in that ? iVb. And ther' ain't no sense in this, nuther. Is it ketching? " " Is it ketching ? Why, how you talk. Is a harrow catching ?— in the dark ? I&4W. HAITNER WITH THK UrMFfl. I " .. i [ ly feifs-" ', '• liMIHH MUMPS. 247 If you don't hitch onto one tooth, you're bound to on another, ain't you ? And you can't get away with that tooth without fetching the whole harrow along, can you ? Well, these kind of mumps is a kind of a harrow, as you may say— and it ain't no slouch of a harrow, nuther, you come to get it hitched on good." " Well, it's awful, / think," says the hare-lip. " I'll go to Uncle Harvey and " « Oh, yes," I says, " I would. Of course I would. I wouldn't lose no time." " Well, why wouldn't you ? " " Just look at it a minute, and maybe you can see. Iluin't your unclea obleeged to get along home to England as fast as they can ? And do you reckon they'd be mean enough to go off and leave you to go all that journey by your- selves ? You know they^U wait for you. So fur, so good. Your uncle Harvey's a preacher, ain't he ? Very well, then ; is a preacher going to deceive a steamboat clerk ? is he going to deceive a ship clerh f-so as to get them to let Miss Mary Jane go aboard ? Now yot* know he ain't. What mZUie do, then ? Why, he'll Bay, * It's a great pity, but my church matters has got to get along the best way they can ; for my niece has been exposed to the dreadful pluribus-nnum mumps, and 80 it's my bounden duty to set down here and wait the three months it takes to show on her if she's got it.' But never mind, if you think it's best to tell your uncle Harvey " " Shucks, and stay fooling around here when we could all be having good times in England whilst we was waiting to find out whether Mary Jane's got it or not ? Why, you talk like a muggins." " Well, anyway, maybe you better tell some of the neighbors." " Listen at that, now. You do beat all, for natural stupidness. Can't you we that thefd go and tell ? Ther' ain't no way but just to not tell anybody at alV* " Well, maybe you're right— yes, I judge you are right." " But I reckon we ought to tell Uncle Harvey she's gone out a while, anyway, BO he wont be uneasy about her ? " "Yes, Miss Mary Jane she wanted you to do that. She says, 'Tell them to give Uncle Harvey and William my love and a kiss, and say I've run over the river HI il I i 248 THE ADYENTXntES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN'. to see Mr. — Mr. — what is the name of that rich family your uncle Peter used to think so much of ? — I mean the one that " "Why, you must mean the Apthorps, ain't it ?" '* Of course; bother them kind of names, a body can't ever seem to remember them, half the time, somehow. Yes, she said, say she has run over for to ask the Apthorps to be sure and come to the auction and buy this house, because she allowed her un- cle Peter would ruther they had it than anybody else ; and she's going to stick to them till they say they'll come, and then, if she ain't too tired, she's coming home ; and if she is, she'll be home in the morning any- way. She said, don't say nothing about the Proctors, but only about the Apthorps — which'll be perfectly true, because she is going there to speak about their buying the house ; I know it, because she told me so, herself." "All right,'* they said, and cleared out to lay for their uncles, and give them the love and the kisses, and tell them the message. Everything was all right now. The girls wouldn't say nothing because they wanted to go to England ; and the king and the duke would ruther Mary Jane was off working for the auction than around in reach of Doctor Bobinson. I felt very good j I judged I had done it pretty neat— I reckoned Tom Sawyer couldn't TBI AUCTION. TEE OPPOSITION LINE. 249 a done it no neater himself. Of course he would a throwed more stylo into it, but I can't do that very handy, not being brung up to it. Well, they held the auction in the public square, along towards the end of the afternoon, and it strung along, and strung along, and the old man ho was on hand and looking his level pisonest, up there longside of the auctioneer, and chipping in a little Scripture, now and then, or a little goody-goody saying, of 6ome kind, and the duke he was around goo-gooing for sympathy all he kuowcd how, and just spreading himself generly. But by-and-by the thing dragged through, and everything was sold. Every- thing but a little old trifling lot in the graveyard. So they'd got to work that off — I never see euch a girafft as the king was for wanting to swallow everything. Well, whilst they was at it, a steamboat landed, and in about two minutes up comes a crowd a whooping and yelling and laughing and carrying on, and singing- out : " Here^s your opposition line ! here's your two sets o' heirs to old Peter Wilks —and you pays your money and you takes your choice I" It ! i Wj ^ 'I^«.V was fetching a very nice looking old gentleman along, and a nice looking younger one, with his right arm in a eling. And my souls, how the people yelled, and laughed, and kept it up. But I didn't see no joke ahout it, and I judged it would strain the duke and the king some to see any. I reckoned they'd turn pale. But no, nary a pale did they turn. The duke he never let on he suspicioned what was up, hut just went a goo-goo- ing around, happy and satisfied, ^"1 o a jug that's googling out huttermilk; and as for the king, he just gazed and gazed down sorrowful on them new- comers like it give him the stomach-ache in his very heart to think there could he such frauds and rascals in the world. Oh, he done it admirable. Lots of the principal people gethered around the king, to let him see they was on his side. That old gentleman that had just come looked all puzzled to death. Pretty soon he begun to speak, and I see, straight ofE, he pronounced like an Englishman, not the king's way, though the king's was pretty good, for an imitation. I can't give the old gent's words, nor I can't imitate him; but he turned around to the crowd, and says, about like this : « This is a surprise to me which I wasn't looking for; and I'll acknowledge. THB TBUB BB0THKB8. - ; lfe*w^^*B>K*;i** ^ CONTESTED RELATIONhffTP. 251 candid and frank, I ain't very wull fixed to meet it and answer it; for my brother and me has had misfortunes, he's broke liis arm, and our baggage got put off at a town above here, last night in the night by a mistake. I am Peter Wilks's brother Harvey, and this is his brother William, which can't hear nor speak— and can't even make signs to amount to much, now 't he's only got one hand to work them with. We are who we say we are ; and in a day or two, when I get the baggage, I can prove it. But, up till then, I won't suy nothing more, but go to the hotel and wait." So him and the new dummy started off ; and the king he laughs, and blethers out : "Broke his arm— very likely . in't it ?— and very convenient, too, for a fraud that's got to make signs, and hain't learnt how. Lost their baggage 1 That's mighty good 1 —and mighty ingenious — under the circumstances I " So he laughed again ; and so did everybody else, except three or four, or maybe half a dozen. One of these was that doctor ; another one was a sharp looking gentleman, with a carpet-bag of the old-fashioned kind made out of car- pet-stuff, that had just come off of the stoimboat and was talking to him in a low voice, and glancing towards the king now and then and nodding their lieads— it was Levi Bell, the lawyer that was gone up to Louisville ; and another one was a big rough husky that come along and listened to all the old gentleman said, and was listening to the king now. And when the king got done, this husky up and says : " Say, looky here ; if you are Harvey Wilks, when'd you come to this town?" " The day before the funeral, friend," says the king. " But what time o' day ? " "In the evenin'— 'bout an hour er two before sundown." "ffow^d you come ? " "I come down on the Susan Powell, from Cincinnati." " Well, then, how'd you come to be up at the Pint in the mornin'—va. a canoe ? " "I wam't up at the Pint in the mornin'." " It's a lie." M m 'f! '■^ !•:! I'l i ..^an, ~ i l.1.i|m i ftn » l agiMUj. y: --W«(|« li ri 252 T^if ADVENTURma OF TTUCKLJSBEItnY FINN. Several of thtm jumped for him and begged him not to talk tliut way to an old man and a preachor. " Preacher be hanged, he's a fraud and a liar. Ho was up at the T^int that mornin'. I live up there, don't I ? Well, I was up there, and he was up there. I see him there. Ho come in u canoo, along with Tim Collins and a boy. " Tlio doctor he up and suyn : " Would you know the boy again if you was to see him, Hines ? " ** I reckon I would, but I don't know. Why, yonder he is, now. I know him perfectly easy » TBB DOCTOR LEADS HTTCK. It was me he pointed at. The doctor says : "Neighbors, I don't know whether the new couple is frauds or not ; but if these two ain't frauds, I am an idiot, that's all. I think it's our duty to see that they don't get away from liero till we've looked into this thing. Come along, Hines ; come along, the rest of you. We'll take these fellows to the tavern and affront them with t'other couple, and I reckon W(;'ll find out some- thing before we get through." It was nuts for the crowd, though maybe not for the king's friends ; so we all started. It wa* about sundown. The doctor he led me along by the hand, and was plenty kind enough, but he never let go my hand. We all got in a big room in the hotel, and lit up some candles, and fetched in the new couple. First, the doctor says : " I don't wish to be too hnT>i on these two men, but / think they're tm.\ih, and they may have comjlioca t! ^ we don't know nothing about. If they have, won't the complices get avoxy wit, that bag of goUl Peter Wilks k'ft ? It ain't unlikely. If tlii'so men ix'k' Una-' s they won't object to sending for that money ond letting us keep it till t y prove they're all right— ain't that so ?" Everybody agreed to that. So 1 judged they had our gang in a pretty tight place, right at the outstart. But the king he only looked sorrowful, and says : " Gentlemen, I wish the money was there, for I ain't got no disposition to throw anything in the way of a fair, open, out-and-out investigation o' thia misable business ; but alas, the money ain't there ; you k'u send and see, if you want to." "Where is it, then ?" ** Well, when my niece give it to me to Veep for her, I took and hid it inside o' the straw ticko' my bed, not wishin' to bank it for the f(>w days we'd bo here, and considerin' the bed a safe place, wo not bein' used to niggers, and suppos'n' 'em honest, like servants in England. The niggers stole it the very next mornin' after I had went down stairs ; and when 1 sold 'cm, I hadn't missed the money yit, BO they got clean away with it. My servant hero k'n tell you 'bout it gentle- men." The doctor and f- voral said " Shucks 1 " and I ^^ee nobody didn't altogether be- lieve him. One man asked me if I see the niggers steal it. I said no, but I see them sneaking out of the room and hustling away, and I never thought nothing, only I reckoned they was afraid they had waked xip my master and was trying to get away before he made trouble with them. That was all they asked me. Then the doctor whirls on me and says : " Are you English too ? " I says yes ; and him and some others laughed, and said, " Stuff ! " Well, then they sailed in on the general investigation, and there we had it, up and down, hour in, hour out, and nobody never said a word about supper, nor ever seemed to think about it-and so they kept it up, and kept it up ; and it was the worst mixed-up thing you ever see. They made the king tell his yarn, and they made the old gentleman tell his'n ; and anybody but a lot of prejudiced ii . TEE ADVENTURES OF BUCELEBEBRY FINN. chuckleheads would a seen that the old gentleman was spinningtruth and t other one lies. And by-and-by they had me up to tell what I knowed The king he give me a left-handed look out of the eorner of his eye, and so I knowed enough to talk on the right side. I begun to tell about Sheffield, and how we lived there and all about the English Wilkses, and so on ; but I didn't get pretty fur till the doctor begun to laugh; and Levi Bell, the lawyer, says : -Set down, my boy, I wouldn't strain myself, if I was you. I reckon you ain't used to lying, it don't seem to come handy ; what you want is practice. You do it pretty awkward." , . . i. i„f ^w I didn't care nothing for the compliment, but I was glad to be let off, anyway. The doctor he started to say something, and turns and says : " If you'd been in town at first, Levi Bell " The king broke in and reached out his hand, and says : - Why is this my poor dead brother's old friend that he's wrote so often about? " The lawyer and him shook hands, and the lawyer smiled and looked pleased, and they talked right along a while, and then got to one side and talked low ; and at last the lawyer speaks up and says : , ^. ^t. _, " That'll fix it. I'll take the order and send it, along with your brother's, and then they'll know it's all right." . , , , • So they got some paper and a pen, and the king he set down and twisted his head to one side, and chawed his tongue, and scr.wled off something ; and then they give the pen to the duke-and then for the first time, the duke looked sick. But he took the pen and wrote. So then the lawyer turns to the new old gentle- man and says : ,, « You and your brother please write a line or two and sign your names.- . The old gentleman wrote, but r^obody couldn't read it. The lawyer looked powerful astonished, and says : . , . , . j "Well it beats we "-and snaked a lo. of old letters out of his pocket, and examined them, and then examined the old man's writing, and then them again ; and then says : "These old letters is from Harvey Wilks ; and here's these two s handwritings, and anybody can see they didn't write them" (the king and the k 'i. A QUESTION" OF HANDWRITING. 255 > 4 THE DUKE WROTK, duke looked sold and foolish, I tell you, to see how the lawyer had took them in), "and here's this old gentleman's handwriting, and anybody can tell, easy enough, he didn't write them— fact is, the scrat^ches hj makes ain't properly writing, at all. Now here's some letters from " The new old gentleman says : " If you please, let me explain. Nobody can read my hand but my brother there — so he copies for me. It's his hand you've got there, not mine." " Well ! " says the lawyer, "this is a state of things. I've got some of William's letters too; so if you'll get him to write a line or so we can com " *' He canH write with his left hand," says the old gentleman. " If he could use his right hand, you would see that he wrote his own letters and mine too. Look at both, please— they're by the same hand." The lawyer done it, and says : " I believe it's so — and if it ain't so, there's a heap stronger resemblance than I'd noticed before, anyway. Well, well, well ! I thought we was right on the track of a slution, but it's gone to grass, partly. But anyway, one thing is proved— these two ain't either of 'em Wilkses "—and he wagged his head towards the king and the duke. Well, what do you think ?— that muleheaded old fool wouldn't give in then! Indeed he wouldn't. Said it warn't no fair test. Said his brother William was the cussedest joker in the world, and hadn't tried to write— /«e see William was going to play one of his jokes the minute he put the pen to paper. And so he warmed up and went warbling and warbling right along, till he was actuly be- ginning to believe what he was saying, himself— h\x.i pretty soon the new old gentleman broke in, and says : •I ' ii > 1 hi 256 TEE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERBY FINN. « I've thought of something. Is there anybody here that helped to lay out my br-helped to lay out the late Peter Wilks for burying ?" " Yes," says somebody, " me and Ab Turner done it. We're both here." Then the old man turns towards the king, and says : *' Peraps this gentleman can tell me what was tatooed on his breast ? " Blamed if the king didn't have to brace up mighty quick, or he'd a BQUshed down like a bluff bank that the river hm cut under, it took him so sud- den-and mind you, it was a thing that was calculated to make most anybody sqush to get fetched such a solid one as that without any notice-because how waa he going to know what was tatooed on the man? He whitened a little; he couldn't help it ; and it was mighty still in there, and everybody bending a little forwards and gazing at him. Says I to myself. Now he'll throw up the sponge-there ain't no more use. Well, did he? A body can't hardly believe it, but he didn't. I reckon he thought he'd keep the thing up till be tired them people out, so they'd thin out, and him and the duke could break loose and get away. Anyway, he set there, and pretty soon be begun to smile, and says : " Mf ! It's a very tough question, ain't it ! Yes, sir, I k'n tell you what's tatooed on his breast. It's jest a small, thin, blue arrow-thafs what U is ; and if you don't look clost, you can't see it. Now what do you say—hey? " Well, /never see anything like that old blister for clean out-and-out cheek. The new old gentleman turns brisk towards Ab Turner and his pard, and his eye lights up like he judged he'd got the king this time, and says : "There— you've heard what he said ! Waa there any such mark on Peter Wilks's breast ? " Both of them spoke up and says : " We didn't see no such mark." "Goodl" says the old gentleman. "Now, what you did see on his breast was a small dim P, and a B (which is an initial he dropped when he waa young), and a W, with dashes between them, so : P-B-W "-and he marked them that way on a piece of paper. " Come— ain't that what you saw? " Both of them spoke up again, and says : " No, we didnH. We never seen any marks at all." DIGGING UP TEE CORPSE. 257 !;r r E s*..i t:; ".'- - ^ p- - ' ": .. . ! il ! "and everybody was whooping at once, and there waa a rat- rC-oT ButThe U^er h^ iu.p, on the table and yen. and Baya = «' Gentlemen— gentlemen / Hear me just a word-just a single word— if you please! There's one way yet -let's go and dig up the corpse and look." That took them. " Hooray! " they all shouted, and was starting right ofE ; but the lawyer and the doctor sung out : " Hold on, hold on ! Collar all these four men and the boy, and fetch them along, too!" « We'll do it ! " they all shoiited: "and if we don't find them marks we'll lynch the whole gang 1 " I was scared, now, I tell you. But there waru't no getting away, you know. They gripped us all, and inarched us right along, straight for ^^^^^ ^^^ the graveyard, which was a m.le and a ha« down th nv ^^^ ..ourheels,f™^^^^^^^ ^^^ ^^ ^- eaurolTl^ldt - the wink, she'd light out and save me, and blow on our dead-beats. ^^^^y^^g ,^ like wild-cats ; Well, we swarmed ^^^^^ ^7; ^^^ ^^^^^ ,,a the lightning beginning r "kt: fiiriTtk wi /^ aL:;. the leav.. This wa. the ' ::t"troXnd most dangersome I ever was in; and I was k.nder stu.ned ; 17 "GBNTLKMliN-aKNTLESIKNl 'P.' • \r i&*. tpBiam 258 THE ADVENTURES OF EUCKLEBERR7 FINN. everything was going so different from what I had allowed for ; stead of being fixed so I could take my own time, if I wanted to, and see all the fun, and have Mary Jane at my back to save me and set me free when the close-fit come, here was nothing in the world betwixt me and sudden death but just them tatoo- marks. If they didn't find them— I couldn't bear to think about it ; and yet, somehow, I couldn't think about nothing else. It got darker and darker, and it was a beautiful time to give the crowd the slip ; but that big nasky had me by the wrist— Hines— and a body might as well try to give Goliar the slip. He dragged me right along, he was so excited; and I had to run to keep up. When they got there they swarmed into the graveyard and washed over it like an overflow. And when they got to the grave, they found they had about a hundred times as many shovels as they wanted, but nobody hadn't thought to fetch a lantern. But they sailed into digging, anyway, by the flicker of the lightning, and sent a man to the nearest house a half a mile off, to borrow one. So they dug and dug, like everything ; and it got awful dark, and the rain started, and the wind swished and swushed along, and the lightning come brisker and brisker, and the thunder boomed; but them people never took no notice of it, they was so full of this business; and one minute you could see everything and every face in that big crowd, and the shovelfuls . * dirt sailing up out of the grave, and the next second the dark wiped it all out, an i you couldn't see nothing at all. At last they got out the coffin, and begun to unscrew the lid, and then Buch another crowding, and shouldering, and shoving as there was, to scrouge in and get a sight, you never see ; and in the dark, that way, it was awful. Hines he hurt my wrist dreadful, pulling and tugging so, and I reckon he clean forgot I was in the world, he was so excited and panting. All of a sudden the lightning let go a perfect sluice of white glare, and some- body sings out : " By the living jingo, here's the bag of gold on his breast ! " Hines let out a whoop, like everybody else, and dropped my wrist and give a big surge to bust his way in and get a look, and the way I lit out and shinned for the road in the dark, there ain't nobody can tell. BUCK ESCAPES. 259 I had the road all to myself, and I fairly flew — leastways I had it all to myself except the solid dark, and the now-and-then glares, and the buzzing of the rain, and the thrashing of the wind, and the splitting of the thunder ; and sure as you are born I did clip it along ! When I struck the town, I see there wam't nobody out in the storm, so I never hunted for no back streets, but humped it straight through the main one ; and when I begun to get towards our house I aimed my eye and set it. No light there ; the house all dark — which made me feel sorry and disappointed, I didn't know why. But at last, just as I was sailing by, flash comes the light in Mary Jane's window ! and my heart swelled up sudden, like to bust ; and the same second the house and all was behind me in the dark, and wasn't ever going to be before me no more in this world. She was the best girl I ever see, and had the most sand. The minute I was far enough above the town to see I could make the tow- head, I begun to look sharp for a boat to borrow; and the first time the lightning showed me one that wasn't chained, I snatched it and shoved. It was a canoe, and wam't fastened with nothing but a rope. The towhead was a rattling big distance off, away out there in the middle of the river, but I didn't lose no time ; and when I struck the raft at last, I was so fagged I would a just laid down to blow and gasp if I could afforded it. But I didn't. As I sprung aboard I sung out : " Out with you Jim, and set her loose ! Glory be to goodness, we're shut of them I" Jim lit out, and was a coming for me with both arms spread, ^.e was so full of joy; but when I glimpsed him in the lightning, my heart shot up in my mouth, and I went overboard backwards ; for I forgot he was old King Le;ir and a drownded A-rab all in one, and it most scared the livers and lights out of me. But Jim fished me out, and was going to hug me and bless me, and so on, he was so glad I was back and we waa shut of the king and the duke, but I says : **Not now — have it for breakfast, have it foi breakfast 1 Cut loose and let her slide I" I V iiiiiliaaiMlii aai»it!«iiiwfe-- . ■ ;i 260 TEE ABVENTUREa OF EUCKLEBFRRY FFN.m So, in two seconds, away we went, a sliding down the river, and it Hd eeom ■jUl UT OUT. 80 good to be free agaiv and all by ourselves on the big river and nobody to bother af.. I had to skip around a bit, and jump up and crack my heels a few times, I couldn't help it; but about the third crack, I noticed a sound thivt I knowed mighty well — and held my breath and listened and waited — and sure enough, when the next flash busted out over the water, here they come ! — and just a laying to their oars and making their skiff hum I It was the king and the duke. So I wilted right down onto the planks, then, and give up ; and it was all I could do to keep from crying. Chahl er -i^-'a they got aboard, the king went for me, and shook me by the collar, and says : "Tryin' to give us the slip, was ye, you pup ! Tired of our company -hey?" I says : "No, your majesty, we warn't — please don't, your majesty I " " Quick, then, and tell us what toas your idea, or I'll shake the insides out o' you ! " " Honest, I'll tell you everything, just as it happened, your majesty. The man that had aholt of me was very good to me, and kept saying he had a boy about as big as me that died last year, and he was sorry to see a boy in such a dangerous fix ; and when they was all took by surprise by finding the gold, and made a rush for the coffin, he lets go of me and whispers, * Heel it, now, or they'll hang ye, sure! ' and I lit out. It didn't seem no good for me to stay—/ couldn't do nothing, and I didn't want to be hung if I could get away. So I never stopped running till I found the canoe ; and when I got here I told Jim to hurry, or they'd catch me and hang me yet, and said I was afeard you aud the duko wasu't alive, uow, and SBB KIKO 8HAREB HnOK. 262 THE ADVENTURES OF EUOELEBERRY FINN. I was awful sorry, and so was Jim, and was awful glad when we see you coming, you may ask Jim if I didn't. " Jim said it was so ; and the king told him to shut up, and said, " Oh, yes, it's mighty likely ! " and shook me up again, and said he reckoned he'd drownd But the duke says : me. "Leggo the boy, you old idiot 1 Would you a done any different ? Did you inquire around for him, when you got loose ? / don't remember it." So the king let go of me, and begun to cuss that town and everybody in it. But the duke says : "You better a blame sight give yourself & good cussing, for you're the one that's entitled to it most. You hain't done a thing, from the start, that had any sense in it, except coming out so cool and cheeky with that imaginary blue- arrow mark. That was bright — it was right down bully ; and it was the thing that saved us. For if it hadn't been for that, they'd a jailed us till them English- men's baggage come — and then — the penitentiary, you bet ! But that trick took 'em to the graveyard, and the gold done us a still bigger kindness ; for if the excited fools hadn't let go all holts and made that rush to get a look, we'd a slept in our cravats to-night— cravats warranted to wear, too — ^longer thanwe'rf need 'em." They was still a minute— thinking— then the king says, kind of absent- minded like : ** Mf ! And we reckoned the niggers stole it I " That made me squirm ! " Yes," says the duke, kinder slow, and deliberate, and sarcastic, " We did." After about a half a minute, the king drawls out : " Leastways — / did. " The duke says, the same way : ** On the contrary — / did." The king kind of ruflfles up, and says : " Looky here, Bilgewater, what'r you referrin' to P " The duke says, pretty brisk : "When it comes to that, maybe you'll let me ask, what was you XQiet- ring to?" I ^\ A ROTAL ROW. 263 "i:^^!" says the king, very sarcastic; "but/ don't know-xnaybe you was asleep, and didn't know what you was about." The duke bristles right up, now, and says : ^^^^ ^ «0h, let np on this cussed nonsense-do ^f^ *^^1°^ ,f^^ " Don't you reckon /know who hid that money in that coffin ? ^^ 'L sir 1 I know you do know-because you done it youiself ! « S a Ue l»-and the duke went for him. The king sings out : THB OPKB WSNT TOB HIM. ..Take y'r hand, oB 1-leggo n,y throat l-I take it all back !" The duke says : , , ^-ev there, intending .. Well, you just own np, first, that you dul '"4-= *"* T^, „. .^ have it to give me the slip oue of these days, and come back and d,g «P, all to yourself." „„« nnfiation honest and fair ; <.;ait jest a minute, duke-answer me t^^^ ^^ ^^^^^^^^^^ ^^, ^.eback if you didn't put the money there, say it, and 1 11 blieve you, everything I said." „ t /Ri the duk ' took his hands off, and says : " If you ever deny it again, I'll drown you. Ifa well for you to set there and blubber like a baby— it's fitten for you, after the way you'' acted. I never see such ail old ostrich for wanting to gobble e ythij.g— and . n trusting you all the time, like you was my own father. You ought to beeu ashamed of yourself to stand by and hear it saddled onto a lot of pr^r -.iggers and you never bb^ a word for 'em. It makes me feel ridiculous to think I was soft enough to Mieve that rubbage. Cuss you, I can see, now, why you was so anxious to make up the defEesit— you wanted to get what money I'd got out ' the '■ onesuch and one thing or another, and scoop it all!" The king says, timid, and siill a snuffling : "Why, duke, it was you that said make up the deffersit, it warL me." " Dry up ! I don't want to hear no more out of you ! " says the duke. " And now you see what you got by it. They've got all their own money back, and all of ourn but a shekel or two, besides. G'long to bed— and don't you deffersit me no more deffersiis long 's you live ! " So the king sneaked into the wigwam, and took to his bottle for comfort ; and before long the duke tackled Us bottle ; and so in about half an hour they was as thick as thieves again, and the tighter they got, the ^vinger they got ; and \ mw POWERFUL MELLOW. 265 went off a snoring in each other's arms. They both got powc rful mellow, but I noticed the king didn't get mellow enough to forget to remember to not deny about hiding the monc,y-bag again. That made me feel easy and satisfied. Of conrse when they got to sn. >g, we had a long gabble, and I told Jxm every- thing. \ ^ \ da=^n't stop again nt any town, for days and days ; kept right along down the river. Wu was down south in the warm weather, now, and a mighty long ways from homo. We begun to come to trees with Spanish moss on them, hanging down from the limbs like long gray beards. It was the first I ever see it growing, and it made the woods look solemn and dismal. So now the frauds reckoned they was out of danger, and they begun to work thn villages again. First they dono a lecture on temperance ; but they didn't make enough for them both to get drunk on. Then in another village they started a dancing school ; but they didn't know no more how to dance than a kangaroo does ; po the first prance they made, the general public nped in and pranced them out of town. Another time they tried a go at yellocution ; but thej didn't yellocute long till the audience got up and give them a solid good cussing and made them skip out. They tackled missionarying, and mesmerizer- ing, and doctoring, and telling fortunes, and a little of everything ; but they couldn't seem to have no luck. So at last they got just about dead broke, and erANISB MOBB. V k OMINOUS PLANS. 267 laid around the raft, as sho floated along, thinking, and tiiiiiking, and neve.' Baying nothing, by the half a day at a time, and dreadful blue and desperate. And at last they took a change, and begun to lay their hcadw togetlier in the wigwam and talk low and confidential two or three hours at a time. Jim and me got uneasy. We didn't like the look of it. We judged they was studying up some kind of worse deviltry than ever. Wo turned it over and over, and at last wo made up our minds they was going to break into somebody's house or store, or was going into the couuterfeit-money business, or something. So then we was pretty scared, and made up an agreement that we wouldn't have nothing in the world to do with such actions, and if we ever got the least show wo would give them the cold shako, and clear out and leave them behind. Well, early one morning we hid the raft in a good safe place about two mile below a little bit of a shabby village, named Pikesville, and the king he went ashore, and told us all to stay hid whilst ho went up to town and smdt around to see if anybody had got any wind of the Royal Nonesuch there yet. (" House to rob, you mean," says I to myself ; "and when you got through robbin,'^ it you'll come back here and won- der what's become of me and Jim and the raft— and you'll have to take it out in wondering.") And he said if he wii- u't back by midday, the duke and me would know it was nil right, and wo was to come along. So we staid where we was. The duke he fretted and sweated around, and was in a mighty sour way. He scolded us for everything, and we couldn't seem to do nothing right; he fou'd fault with every little thing. Something was a-brewing, sure. I was good and glad when midday come and no king ; we could have a change, anyway— and maybe a chance for the change, on top of it. So me and the duke went up to the village, and hunted around there for the king, and by-and-by we found him in the back room of a little low doggery, very tight, and a lot of loafers bullvraggiug him for sport, and he a cussing and threatening with ! his might, and so tight he couldn't walk, and couldn't do nothing to them. The duke ho begun to abuse him for an old fool, and the king begun to Bass back ; and the minute they was fairly at it, I lit out, and shook the reefs out of my hind legs, and spun down the river road like a deer— for I see our chance ; and I made up my m^ id that it would be a long day before they ever sec nic and ^ i\ ^ , 268 THE ADVENTURES OF nUGKLEBERRY FINN. Jim again. I got down there all out of breath but loaded up with joy, and sung out — " Set her loose, Jim, we're all right, now ! " But there warn't no answer, and nobody come out of the wigwam. Jim was gone I I set up a shout— and then another— and then another one ; and run this way and that in the woods, whooping and screeching ; but it warn't no use— old Jim was gone. Then I set down and cried ; I couldn't help it. But I couldn't fiet still long. Pretty soon I went out on the road, trying to think what I better do, and I run across a boy walking, and asked him if he'd seen a strange nigger, dressed so and so, and he says : " Yes." ** Wherebouts ? " says I. ** Down to Silas Phelps's place, two mile below here. He's a runaway nigger, and they've got him. Was you looking for him ? " ** You bet I ain't 1 I run across him in the woods about an hour or two ago, and he said if I hollered he'd cut my livers out— and told me to lay down and Btay where I was ; and I done it. Been there ever since ; afeard to come out." " Well," he says, "you needn't be afeard no more, becuz they've got him. He run off f'm down South, som'ers." ** It's a good job they got him." "Well, I reckon! There's two hunderd dollars reward on him. It's like picking up money out'n the road." "Yes, it is — and I could a had it if I'd been big enough ; I see him^rs^. Who nailed him ? " " It was an old fellow — a stranger — and he sold out his chance in him for forty dollars, becuz he's got to go up the river and can't wait. Think o' that, now 1 You bet I^d wait, if it was seven year." " That's me, every time," says I. " But maybe his chance ain't worth no more than that, if he'll sell it so cheap. Maybe there's something ain't straight about it." " But it 13, though — straight as a string. I see the handbill myself. It tells all about him, to a dot— paints him like a picture, and tellti the plantation he's \ tiffisuxizmsim- ] I 'PI i NEWS FROM JIM. 269 frum, below l^mxleans, No-sirree-&oi, they ain't no trouble 'bout that specu- lation, you bet you. Say, gimme a chaw tobacker, won't ye ? " I didn't have none, so he left. I went to the raft, and sot down in the wigwam to think. But I couldn't come to nothing. I thought till I wore my head Borc, but I couldn't see no way out of the trouble. After all this long journey, and after all we'd done for them scoun- drels, here was it all come to nothing, everything all busted up and ruined, because they could have the heart to serve Jim such a trick as that, and make him a slave again all his life, and amongst strangers, too, for forty dirty dollars. Once I said to myself it would be a thousand times better for Jim to be a slave at home where his family was, as long as he'd got to be a slave, and so I'd better write a letter to Tom Sawyer and tell him to tell Miss Watson where he was. But I soon give up that notion, for two things : she'd be mad and disgusted at his rascality and ungratefulness for leaving her, and so she'd sell him straight down the river again ; and if she didn't, everybody naturally despises an ungrateful nigger, and they'd make Jim feel it all the time, and so he'd feel ornery and disgraced. And then think of mel It would get all around, that Huck Finn helped a nigger to get his freedom ; and if I was to ever sec anybody from that town again, I'd be ready to "WHO NA0itD Hm »" m w f-) r- get down and lick his boots for shame. That's just the way : a person does a low-down thing, and then he don't want to take no consequences of it. Thinks as long as he can hide it, it ain't no disgrace, ^hat was my fix exactly. The more I studied about this, the more my conscience went to grinding me, and the more wicked and low-down and ornery I got to feeling. And at last, when it hit me all of a sudden that here was the plain hand of Providence slapping me in the face and letting me know my wickedness was being watched all the time from up there in heayen, whilst I was stealing a poor old woman's nigger that hadn't ever done me no harm, and now was showing me there's One that's always on the lookout, and ain't agoing to allow no such miserable doings to go only just so fur and no further, I most dropped in my tracks I was so scared. Well, I tried the best I could to kinder soften it up somehow for myself, by saying I was brung up wicked, and so I wam't so much to blame ; but something inside of me kept say- ing, " There was the Sunday school, you could a gone to it ; and if you'd a done it they'd a learnt you, there, that people that acts as I'd been acting about that nigger goes to everlasting fire." It made me shiver. And I about made up my mind to pray ; and see if I couldn't try to quit being the kind of a boy I was, and be better. So I kneeled down. But the words wouldn't come. Why wouldn't they ? It wam't no use to try and hide it from Him. Nor from me, neither. I knowed very well why they wouldn't come. It was because my heart warn't right ; it was because I wam't square ; is was because I was playing double. I was letting on to give up Bin, but away inside of me I was holding on to the biggest one of all. I was trying to make my mouth say I would do the right thing and the clean thing, and go and write to that nigger's owner and tell where he was ; but deep down in me I knowed it was a lie— and He knowed it. You can't pray a lie— I found thac out. So I was fall of trouble, full as I could be ; and didn't know what to do. At last I had an idea ; and I says, I'll go and write the letter— and then see if I can pray. Why, it was astonishing, the way I felt as light as a feather, right straight off, and my troubles all gone. So I got a piece of paper and a pencil, all glad and excited, and set down and wrote : • Miss Watson your runaway nigger Jim is down here two mile below PikesviUe and Mr. Phelps has got him and he will give him up for the reward if you send. Huck Finn. I felt good and all washed clean of sin for the first time I had ever felt so in my life, and I knowed I could pray now. But I didn't do it straight off, hut laid the paper down and set there thinking— thinking how good it was all this happened so, and how near I come to heing lost and going to hell. And went on thinking. And got to thinking over our trip down the river; and I see Jim before me, all the time, in the day, and in the night- time, sometimes moonlight, sometimes storms, and we a fl .qting along, talking, and ei iging, and laughing. But somehow I couldn't seem to strike no places to harden me against him, but only the other kind. I'd s^e him standing my watch on top of ,. , ,.1, nis'n, stead of calling me, so I could go on sleeping ; and see him how glad he was when I come back out of the fog ; and when I come to him agam in the swamp up there where the feud was ; and such-like times ; and would always call me honey, and pet me, and do everything he could think of for me, and how good he always was ; and at last I struck the time I saved him by telling the men we had small-pox aboard, and he was so grateful, and said I was the host fnend old Jim ever had in the world, and the only one he's got now , and then I happened to look around, and see that paper. ti THINKING. I *i: 1^ jrmiir-jiirii Hriifi'iig 272 THE ADVENTURES OF EUCKZEBERBT FINlf. It was a close place. 1 took it up, and held it in my hand. I was a trembling, because I'd got to decide, forever, betwixt two things, and I knowed it. I studied a minute, sort of holding my breath, and then says to myself : " All right, then, I'll go to hell "—and tore it up. It was awful thoughts, and awful words, but they was said. And I let them stay said ; and never thought no more about reforming. I shoved the whole thing out of my head ; and said I would take up wickedness again, which was in my line, being brung up to it, and the other waru't. And for a starter, I would go to work and steal Jim out of slavery again ; and if I could think up anything worse, I would do that, too ; because as long as I was in, and in for good, I might as well go the whole hog. Then I set to thinking over how to get at it, and turned over considerable many ways in my mind ; and at last fixed up a plan that suited me. So then I took the bearings of a woody island that was down the river a piece, and as soon as it was fairly dark I crept out with my raft and went for it, and hid it there, and then turned in. I slept the night through, a. d got up before it was light, and had my breakfast, and put on my store clotlies, and tied up some others and one thing or another in a bundle, and took the canoe and cleared for shore. Handed below where I judged was Phelps' t; ; lace, and hid my bundle in the woods, and then filled up the canoe with \\ater, and loaded rocks into her and sunk her where I could find her again when I wanted her, about a quarter of a mile below a little steam sawmill that was on the bank. Then I struck up the road, and when I passed the mill I see a sign on it, ** rhelps's Sawmill," and when I come to the farm-houses, two or three hundred yards further along, I kept my eyes peeled, but didn't see nobody around, thougU it was good daylight, now. But I didn't mind, because I didn't want to see nobody just yet— I only wanted to get the lay of '^^he land. According to my plan, I was going to turn up there from the village, not from below. So I just took a look, and shoved along, straight for town. Well, the very first man I see, when I got there, was the duke. He was sticking up a bill for the Royal None- such — three-night performance — like that other time. They had the cheek, I A 8EEEP STORY. 278 them frauds ! I was right on him, before I could shirk. He looked astonished, and says : ' ' llel-Zo / Where'd you come from ? " Then he says, kind of glad and eager, ** "Where's the raft ?— got her in a good place ? " I says : "Why, that's just what I was agoing to ask your grace." Then he didn't look so joyful— and says : "What was your idea for asking me ? " ho says. " Well,'' I says, " when I see the king in that doggery yesterday, I says to my- self, we can't get him home for hours, till he's soberer ; so I went a loafing around town to put in the time, and wait. A man up and offered me ten cents to help him pull a skiff over the river and back to fetch a sheep, and so I went along ; but when we was dragging him to the boat, and the man left me aholt of the rope and went behind him to shove him along, he was too strong for me, and jerked loose and run, and we after him. We didn't have no dog, and so we had to chase him all over the country till we tired him out. We never got him till dark, then we fetched him oTcr, ind I started down for the raft. When I got there and sec it was gone, I saya to myself, 'they've got into trouble and had to leave ; and they've took my nigger, which is the only nigger I've got in the world, and now I'm in a strange country, and ain't got no property no more, nor noth- iii'^, and no way to make my living ; ' so I set down and cried. I slept in the woods all night. But what did become of the raft then ?— and Jim, poor Jim ! " " Blamed if /know— that is, what's become of the raft. That old fool had made a trade and got forty dollars, and when we found him in the doggery the loafers had matched hali dollars with him and got every cent but what he'd spent for whisky ; and -^hx^a i got him home late last night and found the raft gone, we said, * That little rascal has stole our raft and shook us, and run off down the nver. > » " I wouldn't shake my nigger, would I ?— the only nigger I had in the world, and the only property." "We never thought of that. Fact ia, I reckon we'd come to consider him our nigger , yes, we did consider him eo— goodness knows we had trouble enough 18 i' : I ! M:i:il 274 TBE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FHTK for him. So when we see the raft was gone, and wo flat broke, there warn't any- thing for it but to try the Royal Nonesuch another shake. And I've pegged along ever since, dry as a powder- horn. Whore's that ten cents ? Give it here." I had considerable money, so I give him ten cents, but begged him to spend it for something to eat, and give me some, because it was all the money I had, and I hadn't had nothing to eat since yesterday. He never said noth- ing. The next minute he whirls on me and says : "Do you reckon that nigger would blow on us ? We'd skin him if he done that ! " " How can he blow ? Hain't he run off ? " "No! That old fool sold him, and never divided with me, and the money's gone." " Sold him ? " I says, and begun to cry ; " why, he was my nigger, and that was my money. Where is he ? — I want my nigger. " "Well, you can't get your nigger, that's all — so dry up your blubbering. Looky here— do you think you'd venture to blow on us ? Blamed if I think I'd trust you. Why, if you was to blow on us " He stopped, but I never see the duke look so ugly out of his eyes before. I •went on a-whimpering, and says : "I don't want to blow on nobody ; and I ain't got no time to blow, nohow. I got to turn out and find my nigger." HE SATX HIM TEN CENTS. ~? VALUABLE INFORMATION. 275 He looked kinder bothered, and stood there with his bills fluttering on his arm, thinking, and wrinkling up his forehead. At last he says : " I'll tell you something. We got to be here three days. If you'll promise you won't blow, and won't let the nigger blow, I'll tell you where to find him." So I promised, and he says : ** A farmer by the name of Silas Ph " and then he stopped. You see he started to tell me the truth ; but when he stopped, that way, and begun to study and think again, I reckoned he was changing his minu. And so he was. He F BTBIKINa FOR THE BACK COUNTBT. wouldn't trust me ; he wanted to make sure of having me out of the way the whole three days. So pretty soon he says : " The man that bought him is named Abram Foster — Abram G. Foster — and he lives forty mile back here in the country, on the road to Lafayette. " "All right," I says, "I can walk it in three days. And I'll start this very afternoon." "No yon won't, you'll start nov); and don't you lose any time about it, neither, nor do any gobbling by the way. Just keep a tight tongue in your head and move right along, and then you won't get into trouble with U8, d'ye hear ? " 276 TEE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRT FINN. That was the order I wanted, and that was the one I played for. I wanted to be left free to work my plans. ** So clear out," he says ; " and you can tell Mr. Foster whatever you want to. Maybe you can get him to believe that Jim is your nigger — some idiots don't require documents — leastways I've heard there's such down South here. And when you tell him the handbill and the reward's bogus, maybe he'll believe you ■when you explain to him what the idea was for getting 'em out. Go 'long, now, and tell him anything you want to ; but mind you don't work your jaw any between here and there." So I left, and struck for the back country. I didn't look around, but I kinder felt like he was watching me. But I knowed I could tire him out at that. I went straight out in the country as much as a mile, before I stopped ; then I doubled back through the woods towards Phelps's. I reckoned I better start in on my plan straight off, without fooling around, because I wanted to stop Jim's mouth till these fellows could get away. I didn't want no trouble with their kind. I'd seen all I wanted to of them, and wanted to get entirely shut of them. :^' i; . er XXX ; h I got there it was all still and Sunday- like, and hot and sunshiny — the hands was gone to the fields ; and t^ -re was them kind of faint dronings of bugs and flies in the air tliat makes it seem so lonesome and like every- body's dead and gone ; and if a breeze fans along and quivers the leaves, it makes you feel mournful, because you feel like it's spirits whispering — spirits that's been dead ever so many years — and you always think they're talking about 7/OM. As a gen- eral thing it makes a body wish he was dead, too, and done with it all. Phelps's was one of these little one-horse cotton plantations ; and they all look alike. A rail fence round a two-acre yard ; a stile, made out of logs sawed off and up-ended, in steps, like barrels of a different length, to climb over the fence with, and for the women to stand on when they are going to jump onto a horse ; some sickly grass-patches in the big yard, but mostly it was bare and smooth, like an old hat with the nap rubbed oil ; big double log house for the white folks — hewed logs, with the chinks stopped up with mud or mortar, and these mud-stripes been whitewashed some time or another ; round-log kitchen, with a big broad, open but roofed passage joining it to the house ; log smoke-house STILL AND 8UNDAT-LIKB. n \ II i I 278 TEE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. back of the kitchen ; three little log nigger-cabins in a row t'other Bide the Bmuke- house ; one little hut all by itself away down against theback fence, andsome out- buildings down a piece the other side ; ash-hopper, and big kettle to ble soainn, by the little hut ; bench by the kitchen door, with bucket of water and a gourd ; honnd asleep there, in the sun ; more hounds asleep, round about ; about throe shade- trees away off in acorner ; some currant bushes and gooseberry bushes in one place by the fence ; outside of the fence a garden and a water-melon patch ; then the cotton fields begins ; and after the fields, the woods. , , ^ , . I went around and dumb over the back stile by the ash-hopper, and started for the kitchen. When I got a little ways, I heard the dim hum of a spinnmg-wheel wailing along up and sinking along d.. a .gain ; and theni knowed for certain I wished I was dead-for that is the ^ ' .-mest sound in the whole world. I went right along, not fixing up aa j purlicular plan, but just trusting to Prov^ dence to put the right words in my mouLli when the time come ; for Id noticed that Providence always did put the right words in my mouth, if I left it alone. When I got half-way, first one hound and then another got up and went for me, and of course I stopped and faced them, and kept still. And such another pow-wow as they made I In a quarter of a minute I was a kind of a hub of a wheel, as you may say-spokes made out of dogs-circle of fifteen of them packed together around me, with their necks and noses stretched up towards me, a bark- ing and howling ; and more a coming ; you could see them sailing over fences and around corners from everywheres. A nigger woman come tearing out of the kitchen with a rolling-pin in her hand, Binging out, « Begone 1 you Tige ! you Spot ! begone, sah ! » and she fetched first one and then another of them a clip and sent him howling, and then the rest fol- lowed ; and the next second, half of them come back, wagging their tails around me and making friends with me. There ain't no harm in a hound, nohow. And behind the woman comes a little nigger girl and two little nigger boys, without anything on but tow-linen shirts, and they hung onto their mother's gown, and peeped out from behind her at me, bashful, the way they always do. And here comes the white woman running from the house, about forty-five or fifty year old, bareheaded, and her spinning-stick in her hand ; and behind her cornea m MISTAKEN IDENTITY. 279 her little white children, acting the ean.e way > o little niggers was doing. She '?ayi : then grippcfl mo by both hands waa gmiling all over bo she could hardly sta? " It's you, at last 1— ai/iV it ?" 1 out with a " Yes'm," before I though glio gabbed me and hugged me tight and shuok and shook ; and the tears como in her eyes, and run down ov( find she couldn't Bcem to Lig and shake enough, and kept saying, "You don't look as much like your mother as I reckoned you would, but law sakes, I don't care for that, I'm so glad to see you I Dear, dear, it docs seem like I could eat you up 1 Childern, it's your cousin Tom !— tell him howdy." But they ducked their heads, and put their fingers in their mouths, and hid behind her. So she run on : " Lize, hurry up and get him a hot breakfast, right away— or did you get your breakfast on the ""IL I had got it on the boat. So thon she started for the hon,e, Wing me bv the hand, a„d the children tagging after. When we got there, she set me down in a split-bottomed chair, and set her^lf down on a little low stool m front of me, holding both of my hands, and says: .. Now I can have a gmi look at you ; and laws-a-me, I've been hung^ for >t a many and a many a time, all these long years, and it's come at las ! We ten expeotng you a couple of days and more. What'a kep- you ? -'..at got aground ? ■HB BIjaaSD HIX TISBT. w %. na^ .^« IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) 1.0 I.I ^■^ iigg ui lift S 1^ ilM 2.2 1.8 L25 1.4 1.6 < 6" ► PhotDgraphic Sciencer Coiporation 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, N.Y. 14580 (716) 872-4503 i^. 280 TEE ADVENTURES OF EUCKLEBEBRT FINN. "Yes'm— she " , "Don't say yes'm-say Aunt Sally. Wherc'd she get aground ? I didn't rightly know what to say, because I didn't know whether the boat would be coming up the river or down. But I go a good ^eal - — ; and „.y instinct said she would be coming up-from down towards ~^^^* did'nt help me much, though ; for I didn't know the names of bars down that way. I see I'd got to invent a bar, or forget the name of the one we got aground on- or— Now I struck an idea, and fetched it out : . , „r i , ^ " It warn't the grounding-that didn't keep us back but a little. We blowed out a cylinder-head." •* Good gracious 1 anybody hurt ? " "No'm. Killed a nigger." « Well it'B lucky ; because sometimes people do get hurt. Two years ago last Christmas, your uncle Silas was coming up from Newrleans on ^^^olALally Book, and she blowed out a cylinder-head and crippled a man. And I think ho died afterwards. He was a Babtist. Your uncle Silas knowed a family m Baton Rouge that knowed his people very well. Yes, I remember, now he rfirf die. Mortification set in, and they had to amputate him. But it didn't save him. Yes, it was mortification-that was it. He turned blue all over, and died m the hope of a glorious resurrection. They say he was a sight to look at. Your uncle s been up to the town every day to fetch you. And he's gone again, not more n an hour ago ; he'll be back any minute, now. You must a met him on the road, didn't you ?— oldish man, with a " . , . ^ ,. t.^ i « No I didn't see nobody, Aunt Sally. The boat landed pst at daylight, and I left my baggage on the wharf-boat and went looking around the town and out a piece in the country, to put in the time and not get here too soon ; and so I come down the back way." ** Who'd you give the baggage to ? " "Nobody." " Why, child, it'll be stole ! " " Not where I hid it I reckon it won't," I says. " How'd you get your breakfast so early on the boat ? " t t UP A STUMP. 281 'S, It was kinder thin ice, but I snjs : " Tho captain aeo me standing around, and told me I better have sometluog to eat before I went ashore ; so he took me in the texas to the offleers luneh, and give me all I wanted." , i j • ;i «« +T10 I was getting so nnes.y I couldn't listen good. I had m, mmd on the children aU th. time ; I wanted to get them out to one «4«.;-'i P^P f"™ ^ m to and find out who I was. But I couldn't get no show, Mrs. Phelps kept .t up aid run on so. Pretty soon she made the cold chill, streak all down my hack, '"^^Bufir we're a running on this way, and you hain't told me a word about Sis, nor any of them. How I'll rest my works a little, and you start up journ ; justtell mo cverymng-m me all about 'm all-every on o m , and C tW are, and what they're doing, and what they told you to tell me ; and every last thing you can think of.'' ^^^^ ^^ ^,^.^ Well,l8eoIwasnpaBtump-andupitgood. «ovittc „ ., „ ,,=t „, „„ f nr all right, but I was hard and tight aground, now. I see it warn t a b.t of u» X to go ahead-I'd ,a to th^w np my hand. So I says o myself, he^ lo^her Tace where I go' to resk the truth. I opened my mouth to beg,n ; but she nabbed mo and hustled me in behind the bed, and says : " .Che come. > stick your head down lower-there that'll do ; you can ^ seen, now. Don't you let on you're here. I'll play a joko on h.m. Clnldom, 'tri:Li::t;'now. Butltwam'tnonsetoworry; there warn't nothing to do butlust hold still, and try and be ready to stand from under when tho ''';Z;!rl little glimpse of the old gentleman when he come in, then the bed hid him. Mrs. Phelps she jumps for him and says : " Has he come ? " " No," says her husband. „ti,;„ »» "Go^dJl^graciou.!'' she says, "what in tho world.»have.»come^fhm^ " I can't imagine," says the old gentleman ; " and I must say, .t makes me dreadful uneasy." 282 THE ADVENTURES OF EUGKLEBERRT FINN. " Uneasy !" she says, " Tm ready to go distracted I He must a come ; and you've missed him along the road. I know it's so— something tells me so." «* Why Sally, I couldn't miss him along the road— yow know that." «' But oh, dear, dear, what will Sis say 1 He must a come 1 You must a missed him. He " " Oh, don't distress me any more'n I'm already distressed. I don't know what in the world to make of it. I'm at my wit's end, and I don't mind ac- knowledging 't I'm right down scared. But there's no hope that he's come ; for he couldnH come and me miss him. Sally, it's terrible-just terrible-something's happened to the boat, sure ! " « Why, Silas I Look yonder !— up the road !— ain't that somebody coming ?" He sprung to the window at the head of the bed, and that give Mrs. Phelps the chance she wanted. She stooped down quick, at the foot of the bed, and give me a pull, and out I come ; and when he turned back from the window, there she Btood, a-beaming and a-smiling like a house afire, and I standing pretty meek and sweaty alongside. The old gentleman stared, and says : "Why, who's that?" "Who do you reckon 't is ? " " I haint no idea. Who wit?'* " It's Tom Sawyer ! " By jings, I most slumped though the floor. But there wam't no time to swap knives ; the old man grabbed me by the hand and shook, and kept on shaking ; and all the time, how the woman did dance around and laugh and cry ; and then how they both did fire ofE questions about Sid, and Mary, and the rest of the tribe. But if they was joyful, it wam't nothing to what I was ; for it was like being bom again, I was so glad to find out who I was. Well, they froze to me for two hours ; and at last when my chin was so tired it couldn't hardly go, any more, I had told them more about my family— I mean the Sawyer family— than ever happened to any six Sawyer families. And I explained all about how we blowed out a cylinder-head at the mouth of White Eiver and it took us three days to fix it Which was all right, and worked first rate ; because they didn't know but 7t 4" ^p I T' 4* IN A DILEMMA. 283 «f> If I'd a called it a bolt-head it would what it would take three days to fix it. a done just as well. Now I was feeling pretty com- fortable all down one side, and pretty uncomfortable all up the other. Being Tom Sawyer was easy and comfortable ; and it stayed easy and comfortable till by-and-by I hear a steamboat coughing along down the river — then I says to myself, spose Tom Sawyer come down on that boat? — and spose he steps in here, any minute, and sings out my name before I can throw him a wink to keep quiet ? "Well, I couldn't have it that way— it wouldn't do at all. I must go up the road and waylay him. So I told the folks I reckoned I would go up to the town and fetch down my baggage. The old gentleman was for going along with me, but I said no, I could drive the horse myself, and I druther he wouldn't take no trouble about me. ' WHO DO TOU mOKOK IT IB ? " li (r I started for town, in the wagon, and when I was half-way I see a wagon com- ing, and sure enough it was Tom Saw- yer, and I stopped and waited till he come along. 1 says "Hold on!" and it stopped alongside, and his mouth opened up like a trunk, and staid so ; and he swallowed two or three times like a person that's got a dry throat, and then days : "I hain't ever done you no harm. You know that. So then, what you want to come back and ha'nt me for ?" I says : " I hain't come back — I hain't been "IT WA8 TOM BAWTBB." gone, » When ' e heard my voice, it righted him up some, but he warn't quite satis- fied yet. He says : " Don't you play nothing on me, because I wouldn't on you. Honest injun, now, you ain't a ghost ?" " Honest injun, I ain't," I says. " Well — I — I — well, that ought to settle it, of course ; but I can't somehow seem to understand it, no way. Looky here, warn't you ever murdered at dllf" ** No. I warn't ever murdered at all — I played it on them. You come in here and feel of me if you dou't believe me." j A NTOOER STEALER. 286 i f \ So he done it ; and it satisfied him ; and he was that glad to see me again, he didn't know what to do. And he wanted to know all about it right c- ; because it was a grand advonturo.. and mysterious, and so it hit him where he hved. But I said, leave it alone till by-and-by ; and told his driver to wait, and we drove off a littb pieeo, and I told him the kind of a fix I was in, and what did he reckon we better do ? He said, let him alone a minute, and don't disturb him. So he thought and thought, and pretty soon he says : - - It's all right, I've got it. Take my trunk in your wagon, and let on t s your'n ; and you turn back and fool along slow, so as to get to the house about the time you ought to ; and I'll go towards town a piece, and take a fresh s.art and geT there a quarte; or a half an hour after you ; and you needn't let on to know me, at first." " M right ; tat wait a minute. There's one more thing-« vhing fmt no- W, Zi L; but me. And that i., there's a nigger he e that ^ a try.ng t. Ld out of slavery-and his name is Jim-oU Miss Watson's Jim. He says : " What ! Why Jim is " He stopped and went to studying. I says : v„+ „wf ^kno'wwhatyou'llsay. You'll say it's ^-^T l-dow. busine^^^^^^^^ if it is ?-/'m low down ; and I'm agoing to steal him, and I want you to keep mum and not let on. Will you?" His eye lit up, and he says : ** m help you steal him 1 " ., . i.^^:„i,;«« Well I fet go all holts then, like I was shot. It was the most arton shmg JLr hLd-and I'm hound to say Tom Sawyer fell, —able, .n my estimation. Only I couldn't believe it. Tom Sawyer a mgg^r Heahr I " Oh, stacks," I says. " T""'"* )»k™«-" :: ^rti:»MC:'" joking or no ioking, i. you hear anything said about a runlty nSr, don't for^t to'remember that ,o» don't know nothmg about him, and / don't know nothing about him." 286 TEE ADVENTUREa OF HUCKLEBERRY FINIT. Then we took the trunk and put it in my wagon, and he drove off his way, and I drove mine. But of course I forgot all about driving slow, on accounts of being glad and full of thinking ; so I got home a heap too quick for that length of a trip. The old gentleman was at the door, and he says : " Why, this is wonderful. Who ever would a thought it was in that mare to do it. I wish we'd a timed her. And she hain't sweated a hair — not a hair. It's wonderful. Why, I wouldn't tako a hunderd dollars for that horse now; I wouldn't, honest ; and yet I'd a sold her for fifteen before, and thought 'twas all she was worth." That's all he said. He was the innocentest, best old soul I ever see. But it wam't surprising ; because he wam't only just a farmer, he was a preacher, too, and had a little one-horse log church down back of the plantation, which he built it himself at his own expense, for a church and school-house, and never charged nothing for his preaching, and it was worth it, too. There was plenty other farmer-preachers like that, and done the same way, down South. In about half an hour Tom's wagon drove up to the front stile, and Aunt Sally she see it through the window because it was only about fifty yards, and Bays: " Why, there's somebody come I I wonder who 'tis ? Why, I do believe it's a stranger. Jimmy " (thaVs one of the children), "run and tell Lize to put on another plate for dinner." Everybody made a rush for the front door, because, of course, a stranger don't come every year, and so he lays over the yaller fever, for interest, when he does come. Tom was over the stile and starting for the house ; the wagon was spin- ning up the road for the village, and we was all bunched in the front door. Tom had his store clothes on, and' an audience — and that was always nuts for Tom Sawyer. In them circumstances it warn't no trouble to him to throw in an amount of style that was suitable. He wam't a boy to meeky along up that yard like a sheep j no, he come ca'm and important, like the ram. When he got afront of us, he lifts his hat ever so gracious and dainty, like it was the lid of a box that had butterflies asleep in it and he didn't want to disturb them, and says : " Mr. Archibald Nichols, I presume ? " k k SOUTHERN HOSPITALITY. 287 " No, my boy," says the old gentleman, "I'm sorry to say 't your driver has deceived you ; Nichols's place is down a matter of three mile more. Come in, come in." Tom he took a look back over his shoulder, and says, "Too late— he's out of sight." " Yes, he's gone, my son, and you must come in and eat your dinner with us ; and then we'll hitch up and take you down to Nichols's." ** Oh, I canH make you so much trouble ; I couldn't think of it. I'll ■^palk — I don't mind the distance." " But we won't let you walk — it wouldn't bo Southern hospitality to do it. Come right in." "Oh, Jo," says Aunt Sally; "it ain't a bit of trouble to us, not a bit in the world. You must stay. It's a long, dusty three mile, and we canH let you walk. And besides, I've al- ready told 'em to put on another plate, when I see you coming ; so you mustn't disappoint us. Come right in, and make yourself at home." So Tom he thanked them very hearty and handsome, and let himself be per- suaded, and come in ; and when he was in, he said he was a stranger from Hicks- ville, Ohio, and his name was William Thompson— and he made another bow. Well, he run on, and on, and on, making up stuff about Hicksville and every- body in it he could invent, and I getting a little nervious, and wondering how this was going to help me out of my scrape ; and at last, still talking along, he reached over and kissed Aunt Sally right on the mouth, and then settled back again in his chair, comfortable, and was going on talking ; but she jumped up and wiped it oft with the back of her hand, and says : "MB. ARCHIBALD NICHOLS, I FBIBUXB T" 4 288 THE ADVRNTUREa OF EUCKLEBERRT FINN. " You owducious puppy ! " He looked kind of hurt, and says : "I'm surprised at you, m'am." " You're s'l-p— Why, what do you reckon / am ? I've a good notion to take and — say, what do you mean by kissing mo ? " He looked kind of humble, and says : "I didn't mean nothing, m'am. I didn't mean no harm. I — I — thought you'd like it." ** Why, you bom fool ! " She took up the spinning-stick, and it looked like it was all she could do to keep from giving him a crack with it. ** What made you think I'd like it?" ** Well, I don't know. Only, they— they — told me you would." *'They told you I would. Whoever told you 's another lunatic. I never heard the beat of it. Who's they 9 " ** Why — everybody. They all said so, m'am." It was all she could do to hold in ; and her eyes snapped, and her fingers worked like she wanted to scratch him ; and she says : ** Who's * everybody ? ' Out with their names— or ther'U be an idiot short." He got up and looked distressed, and fumbled his hat, and says : *' I'm sorry, and I wam't expecting it. They told me to. They all told me to. They all said kiss her ; and said she'll like it. They all said it — every ono of them. But I'm sorry, m'am, and I won't do it no more — I won't, honest." " You won't, won't you ? Well, I sh'd reckon you won't 1" ** No'm, I'm honest about it ; I won't ever do it again. Till you ask me." " Till I ash you I Well, I never see the beat of it in my bom days ! I lay you'll be the Methusalem-numskull of creation before ever / aak you — or the likes of you." "Well," he says, "it does surprise me so. I can't make it out, somehow. They said you would, and I thought ycu would. But — " He stopped and looked around slow, like he wished he could run across a friendly eye, somewhere's ; and fetched up on the old gentleman's, and says, " Didn't you think she'd like me to kiss her, sir?" A PRETTF LONG BLESSING. 289 " Why, no, I— I— woU, no, I b'liovo I didn't." Theu ho looks on around, the sumo way, to mc— and says : " Tom, didn't you think Aunt Sally 'd open out her arms and say, ' Sid Sawyer ' " "My land!" she says, breaking in and jumping for him, '•'you impudent young rascal, to fool a body so—"' and was going to hug him, but he fended her off, and says : "No, not till you've oskcd mc, first." So she didn't lose no time, but asked him ; and hugged him and kissed him, over and over again, and then turned him over to the old man, and he toolc what was left. And after they got a little quiet again, she says : ** Why, dear mc, I never sec such a surprise. We warn't looking for you, at all, but only Tom. Sis never wrote to mo about anybody coming but him." "It's because it warn't intended for any of us to come but Tom," ho says ; "but I begged and begged, and at the last minute she let mo come, too ; so, com- ing down the river, mo and Tom thought it would be a first-rate surprise for him to come hero to the house first, an 1 "-r me to by-and-by tag along and drop in and let on to bo a stranger. Bul it was a mistake. Aunt Sally. This ain't no healthy place for a stranger to come." " No— not impudent whelps, Sid. You ought to had your jaws boxed ; I hain't been so put out since I don't know when. But I don't care, I don't mind tho terms— I'd be willing to stand a thousand such jokes to have you here. Well, to think of that performance ! I don't deny it, I was most putrified with astonish- ment when you give mo that smack." We had dinner out in that broad open passage betwixt the house and the kitchen ; and there was things enough on that table for seven families— and all hot, too ; none of your flabby tough meat that's laid in a cupboard in a damp cellar all night and tastes like a hunk of old cold cannibal in the morning. Uncle Silas he asked a pretty long blessing over it, but it was worth it ; and it didn't cool it a bit, neither, the way I've seen them kind of interruptions do, lots of times. There was a considerable good deal of talk, all the afternoon, and me and Tom was on the lookout all the time, but it warn't no use, they didn't happen to say 19 I I i J 290 THR ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. nothing about any runaway nigger, and wo was afraid to try to work up to it. But at supper, at night, one of the little boys says : "Pa, mayn't Tom and Sid and me go to the show ?" "No," says the old man, "I reckon there ain't going to beany; and you couldn't go if there was ; because the runaway niggor told Burton and me all A PRITTT LONO BLBSglMO. about that scandalous show, and Burton said he would tell the people; so I reckon they've drove the owdacious loafers out of town before this time." So there it was ! — but / couldn't help it. Tom and me was to sleep in the game room and bed ; so, being tired, we bid good-night and went up to bed, right after supper, and dumb out of the window and down the lightning-rod, and shoved for the town ; for I didn't believe anybody was going to give the king and the duke a hint, and so, if I didn't hurry up and give them one they'd get into trouble sure. On the road Tom he told me all about how it was reckoned I was murdered, and how pap disappeared, pretty soon, and didn t come back no more, and what a stir there was when Jim run away ; and I told Tom all about our Royal None- such rapscallJ^is, and as much of the raft- voyage as I had time to; and as we M it. yon all kon the ight and and into red, vhat one- I we TAR AND FEATTTEltS. 291 fltruck into tho town and np through the middle of it — it was as much as half- after eight, thon — here comes a raging rush of people, with torches, and an awful whooping and yelling, and banging tin pans and blowing horns ; and wo jumped to one Bide to let them go by; and as they went by, I see they had the king and the duke astraddle of a rail — that is, I knowod it was tho king and th- luke, though they was all over tar and feathers, and didn't look like nothing in tho world that was human — just looked like a couple of monstrous big soldier-plumes. Well, it made mo sick to eee it ; and I was sorry for them poor pitiful rascals, it TRAVELLINO BT RAII.. seemed like I couldn't ever feel any hardness against them any more in the world. It was a dreadful thing to see. Human beings can be awful cruel to one another. We see we was too late— couldn't do no good.' We asked some stragglers about it, and they said everybody went to the show looking very innocent ; and laid low and kept dark till the poor old king was in the middle of his cavortings on the stage ; then somebody give a signal, and the house rose up and went for them. So we poked along back home, and I wam't feeling so brash as I was before. Hh lii* ill it 292 THE ADVENTURES OF EUOKLEBERRT FINN. but kind of ornery, and bumble, and to blame, somehow—though 1 hadn't done nothing. But that's always the way; it don't make no difference whether you do right or wrong, a person's conscience ain't got no sense, and just goes for him anyway. If I had a yaller dog that didn't know no more than a person's conscience does, I would pison him. It takes up more room than all the rest of a person's insides, and yet aia't no good, nohow. Tom Sawyer he says the same. one her for )n'8 tof tue. TITTX,Ig. ^ stopped talking, and got to thinking. By-and-by Tom says : " Looky here, Huck, what fools we are, to not think of it before ! I bet I know where Jim is." "No! Where?" "In that hut down by the ash- hopper. Why, looky here. When we was at dinner, didn't you see a nigger man go in there with some vittles?" "Yes." "What did you think the vittles was for ? " "For a dog." "So'd I. Well, it wasn't for a dog." "Why?" " Because part of it was watermelon.'* " So it was — I noticed it. Well, it does beat all, that I never thought about a dog not eating watermelon. It shows how a body can see and don't see at the same time." " Well, the nigger unlocked the padlock when he went in, and he locked it again when he come out. He fetched uncle a key, about the time we got up 294 THE ADVENTURES OF nUGELEBERRY FINK from table — same key, I bet. Watermelon shows man, lock shows prisoner ; and it ain't likely there's two prisoners on such a little plantation, and where the people's all so kind and good. Jim's the prisoner. All right — I'm glad we found it out detective fashion ; I wouldn't give shucks for any other way. Now you work your mind and study out a plan to steal Jim, and I will study out one, too ; and we'll take the one we like the best." What a head for just a boy to have ! If I had Tom Sawyer's head, I wouldn't trade it off to be a duke, nor mate of a steamboat, nor clown in a circus, nor noth- ing I can think of. I went to thinking out a plan, but only just to be doing something ; I knowed very well where the right plan was going to come from. Pretty soon, Tom says : "Ready?" "Yes," I says. "All right — ^bring it out." " My plan is this," I says. " We can easy find out if it's Jim in there. Then get up my canoe to-morrow night, and fetch my raft over from the island. Then the first dark night that comes, steal the key out of the old man's britches, after he goes to bed, and shove off down the river on the raft, with Jim, hiding day- times and running nights, the way me and Jim used to do before. Wouldn't that plan work ? " " Work ? Why cert'nly, it would work, like rats a fighting. But it's too blame' simple ; there ain't nothing to it. Wh-^t's the good of a plan that ain't no more trouble than that ? It's as mild as goose-milk. Why, Huck, it wouldn't make no more talk than breaking into a soap factory." I never said nothing, because I wam't expecting nothing different ; but I knowed mighty well that whenever he got his plan ready it wouldn't have none of them objections to it. And it didn't. He told me what it was, and I see in a minute it ^-as worth fifteen of mine, for style, and would make Jim just as free a man as mine would, and maybe get us all killed besides. So I was satisfied, and said we would waltz in on it. I needn't tell what it was, here, because I knowed it wouldn't stay the way it was. I knowed he would be changing it around, every which way, as we I OUTRAGEOUS. 295 And that went along, and heaving in new bullinesses wherever he got a chance, is what he done. Well, one thing was dead sure ; and that was, that Tom Sawyer was in earnest and was actuly going to help steal that nigger out of slavery. That was the thing that was too many for me. Here was a boy that was respectable, and well brung up ; and had a character to lose ; and folks at home that had characters ; and he was bright and not leather-headed ; and knowing and not ignorant ; and not mean, but kind ; and yet here he was, without any more pride, or Tightness, or feeling, than to stoop to this business, and make himself a shame, and his family a shame, before everybody. I couldn't understand it, no wav at all. It was out- rageous, and I knowed I ought to just up and tell him so ; and so be his true friend, and let him quit the thing right where he was, and save himself. And I did start to tell him ; but he shut me up, and says : " Don't you reckon I know what I'm about ? Don't I generly know what I'm about 5»» "Yes." Didn't I say I was going to help steal the nigger ? '* tt "Yes." « Well then." That's all he said, and that's all I said. It wam't no use to say any more; because when he said he'd do a thing, he always done it. But / couldn't make out how he was willing to go into this thing ; so I just let it go, and never bothered no more about it. If he was bound to have it so, / couldn't help it. When we got home, the house was all dark and still ; so we went on down to the hut by the ash- hopper, for to examine it. We went through the yard, so as to see what the hounds would do. They knowed us, and didn't make no more noise than country dogs is always doing when anything comes by in the night. When we got to the cabin, we took a look at the front and the two sides ; and on the side I wam't acquainted with— which was the north side— we found a square window-hole, up tolerable high, with just one stout board nailed across it. I says: , im 296 THE ADVENTURES OF HUGKLEBERBT FINN. " Here's the ticket. This hole's big enough for Jim to get through, if we wrench off the board." Tom says : ** It's as simple as tit-tat-toe, thrce-in-a-row, and as easy as playing hooky. I Bhould hope we can find a way that's a little more complicated than that, Huck Finn." "Well then," I says, " how'll it do to saw him out, the way I done before I was murdered, that time ?" "That's more like," he says. "It's real mysterious, and troublesome, and good," ho says; "but I bet we can find a way that's twice as long. There ain't no hurry; le's keep on looking around." Betwixt the hut and the fence, on the back side, was a lean-to, tliat joined the hut at the eaves, and was made out of plank. It was as long as the hut, but narrow — only about six foot wide. The door to it was at the south end, and Avas padlocked. Tom he went to the soap kettle, and searched around and fetched back the iron thing they lift the lid with ; so he took it and prized out one of the staples. The chain fell down, and we opened the door and went in, and shut it, and struck a match, and see the shed was only built against the cabin and hadn't no connection with it ; and there warn't no floor to the shed, nor nothing in it but some old rusty played-out hoos, and spades, and picks, and A SIMPLE JOB. - CLIMBINO THE LIOBTNINO ROD. 297 a cnppled plow. The match went out, and so did we, and shoved in the staple again, and tlie door was locked as good as ever. Tom was joyful. He says • " Now we're all right. We'll dig him out. It'll take about a week I '» * Then we started for the house, and I went in the back door-you only have to pull a buckskin latch-string, they don't fasten the doors-but that warn't roman- tical enough for Tom Sawyer : no way would do him but he must climb up the ].ghtnmg.rod. But after he got up half-way about three times, and missed fire and fell every time, and the last time most busted his brains out, he thought he'd got to give It up ; but after ho was rested, he allowed he would give her one more turn for luck, and tliis time ho made the trip. In the morning wo was up at break of day, and down to the nigger cabins to pet the dogs and make friends v.ith the nigger that fed Jim-if it was Jim tliat was bemg fed. The niggers was just getting through breakfast and starting'for the fields; and Jim's nigger was piling up a tin pan with bread and meat and things ; and wliilst the others was leaving, tlie key come from the house. This nigger had a good-natured, chuckle-headed face, and his wool was all tied up m little bunches with thread. Tliat was to keep witches off. He said the Pitches was pestering liim awful, these nights, and making him see all kinds of Btrange things, and hoar all kinds of strange words and noises, and he didn't be- heve he was ever witclied so long, before, in his life. He got so worked up, and got to runinng on so about his troubles, he forgot all about what he'd been affoine to do. So Tom says : ** What's the vittles for ? Going to feed the dogs ? " The nigger kind of smiled around graduly over his face, like when you heave a brickbat in a mud puddle, and he says : "Yes, Mars Sid, a dog. Cur'us dog, too. Does you want to go en look at 'im ?*' "Yes." I hunched Tom, and whispers : " You going, right here in the day-break ? That warn't the plan." "No, it warn't— but it's the plan «oz<;." So, drat him, we went along, but I didn't like it much. When we got in, [|| 298 TEE ABVENTUREB OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. we couldn't hardly Bee anything, it was so dark ; but Jim was there, sure enough, and could see us ; and he sings out : " Why, Huch ! En good larC ! ain' dat Misto Tom ? " I just knowed how it would be ; I just expected it. / didn't know nothing to do ; and if I had, I couldn't a done it ; because that nigger busted in and says : *♦ Why, do gracious sakes ! do he know you genlmen ? " We could see pretty well, now. Tom he looked at the nigger, steady and kind of wondering, and says : " Does wTio know us ? " " Why, dish-yer runaway nigger." " I don't reckon he does ; but what put that into your head ? " " What put it dar ? Didn' he jis' dis minute sing out like he knowed you ? " Tom says, in a puzzled-up kind of way : " Well, that's mighty curious. Who sung out ? When did he sing out ? What did he sing out ? " And turns to me, perfectly c'am, and says, "Did you hear anybody sing out ? " Of course there wam't nothing to be said but the one thing ; so I says : " No ; / ain't heard nobody say nothing." Then he turns to Jim, and looks him oyer like he never see him before j and says : " Did you sing out ? " " No, sah," says Jim ; " I hain't said nothing, sah." " Not a word ? " " No, sah, I hain't said a word." " Did you ever see us before ? " ** No, sah ; not as / knows on.'* So Tom turns to the nigger, which was looking wild and distressed, and says, kind of severe : "What do you reckon's the matter with you, anyway? What made you think somebody sung out ? " " Oh, it's de dad-blame' witches, sah, en I wisht I was dead, I do. Dey*B awluz at it, sah, en dey do mos' kill me, dey sk'yers me so. Please to don't TBOUBLED WITS WITCHES. 299 ugh. ngto rand What hear ; and says, e you tell nobody 'bout it eah, er ole Mars Silas he'll scolo me ; 'kase he say dey ainH no witches. I jis' wish to goodness he was heah now— (Zcw what would he say 1 I jis' bet he couldn' fine no way to git aroun' it Ms time. But it's awluz jis' so ; people dat's sot, stays sot ; dey won't look into notlm' en fine it out f'r deyselves, en when you fine it out en tell urn 'bout it, dey doan' b'lieve you." Tom give him a dime, and said we wouldn't tell no- body ; and told him to buy some more thread to tie up his wool with ; and then looks at Jim, and says : " I wonder if Uncle Silas is going to hang this nigger. If I was to catch a nigger that was ungrateful enough to run away, /wouldn't give him up, I'd hang him." And whilst the nigger stepped to the door to look at the dime and bite it to see if it was good, he whispers to Jim, and says: • " Don't ever let on to know ns. And if you hear any dig- ging going on nights, it's us : we're going to set you free." Jim only had time to grab us by the hand and squeeze it, then the nigger come back, and we said we'd come again some time if the nigger wanted us to ; and he Paid he would, more particular if it was dark, because the witches went for him mostly in the dai-k, and it was good to have folks around then. WIT0HB8. Dey*8 don't I ' ChaJDter XXXV f 'would be most an hour, yet, till breakfast, so wc left, and struck down into the woods ; because Tom said we got to have some light to see how to dig by, and a lantern makes too much, and might get us into trouble ; what we must have was a lot of them rotten chunks that's called fox-fire and just makes a soft kind of a glow when you lay them in a dark place. "We fetched an armful and hid it in the weeds, and set down to rest, and Tom says, kind of dissatisfied : "Blame it, this whole thing is Just as easy and awkard as it can be. And so it makes it so rotten diflScult to get up a diflScult plan. There ain't no watchman to be dragged — now there ought to be a watchman. There ain't even a dog to give a sleeping-mixture to. And there's Jim chained by one leg, with a ten-foot chain, to the leg of his bed : why, all you got to do is to lift up the bedstead and slip off the chain. And Uncle Silas he trusts everybody ; sends the key to the punkin- beaded nigger, and don't send nobody to watch the nigger. Jim could a got out of that window hole before this, only there wouldn't be no use trying to travel ©iwXi's^W. GETTING WOOD. I. ESCAPING PROPERLY. 801 f ' with 11 ten-foot chain on his log. Why, drat it, Huck, it's the stupidest arriingo- ment I ever see. You got to invent all the difficulties. Well, wo can't help it, we got to do tho best we can with the materials we've got. Anyhow, there's ono thing — there's more honor in getting him out through a lot of difficulties and dangers, where there warn't one of them furnished to you by the people who it was their duty to furnish them, and you had to contrive them all out of your own head. Now look at just that one thing of tho lantern. When you come down to the cold facts, wo simply got to let on that a lantern's resky. Why, we could work with a torchlight procession if wo wanted to, I believe. Now, whilst I think of it, we got to hunt up something to make a saw out of, the first chanco we get." ** What do we want of a saw ? " " What do we want of it ? Hain't we got to saw the leg of Jim's bed off, so as to get the chain loose ? " "Why, you just said a body could lift up the bedstead and slip the chain oflf." •* Well, if that ain't just like you, Huck Finn. You can get up the infant- gchooliest ways of going at a thing. Why, hain't you ever read any books at all ?— Baron Trenck, nor Casanova, nor Benvenuto Chelleeny, nor Henri IV., nor none of them heroes ? Whoever heard of getting a prisoner loose in such an old-maidy way as that ? No ; the way all the best authorities does, is to saw the bed-leg in two, and leave it just so, and swallow the sawdust, so it can't be found, and put some dirt and grease around the sawed place so the very keenest seneskal can't see no sign of it's being sawed, and thinks the bed-leg is perfectly sound. Then, the night you're ready, fetch the leg a kick, down she goes ; slip off your chain, and there you are. Nothing to do but hitch your rope-ladder to the battle- ments, shin down it, break your leg in the moat— because a rope-ladder is nineteen foot too short, you know — and there's your horses and your trusty vassles, and they scoop you up and fling you ross a saddle and away you go, to your native Langudoc, or Navarre, or whei^.^r it is. It's gar with it, Huck Finn. All lie's got to do is to write on the plate and throw it out. You don't Jiave to be able to read it. Why, half the time you can't read anything a prisoner writes on a tin plate, or any- where else.'* " Well, then, what's the sense in wasting the plates ? " " Why, blame it all, it ain't the prisoner's plates." " But it's somebody's plates, ain'; •*.?" " Well, spos'n it is ? What doe-^' ti •. »•:' . mer care whose " He broke off there, because we i ? \ b^ brcakfast-hom blowing. So we cleared out for the house. Along during that morning I borrowed a sheet and a white shirt off of the clothes-line ; and 1 found an old sack and put them in it, and we went down and got the fox-fire, and put that in too. I called it borrowing, because that was what pap always called it ; but Tom said it warn't borrowing, it was stealing. He said we was representing prisoners ; and prisoners don't care how they get a thing 80 they get it, and nobody don't blame them for it, either. It ain't no i . m DISiCRJMIKATION IN BTEALINO. ;m5 crime in a prisoner to steal the thing ho needs to got away with, Tom auid ; it'a his right ; and bo, uh lung 03 wo was rcpri'scnting u jiris- oner, wc hud a j)c'rfect right to steal anytliing on this place wo had the least use for, to get ourselves out of prison with. lie said if wo warn't prisoners it would be a very d'tlerent thing, and nobody but a mean ornery •person would steal when he warn't a prisoner. So we allowed we would steal every- thing there was that come handy. And yet he made a mighty fuss, one day, after that, when I stole a water- melon out of the niggpr patch and eat it ; and he made me go and give the niggers a dime, without telling them what it was for. Tom said that what ho meant was, we could steal anything we needed. THB BRKAKrA8T-nORK. Well, I says, I needed the watermelon. Brt he said I didn't need it to get out ol prison with, there's where the difEerenca was. He said if I'd a wanted it to hide a knife in, and smuggle it to Jim to kill the seneskal with, it would a been uil right. So I let it go at that, though I couldn't see no advantage in my representing a prisoner, if I got to set down and chaw over a lot of gold-leaf distinctions like that, every time I see a chance to hog a watermelon. Well, as I was saying, we waited that morning till everybody was settled I: n f\ U2S^ t I down to business, and nobody in sight around the yard ; then Tom he earned the sack into the lean-to whilst I stood ofi a piece to keep watch. By-and-by he come out, and we went and set down on the wood-pile, to talk. He says : "Everything's all right, now, except tools ; and that's easy fixed. <' Tools?" I says. "Yes." " Tools for what ? " ^^ " Why, to dig with. We ain't agoing to gnaw him out, are we ? "Ain't them old crippled picks and things in there good enough to dig a nigger out with ? " I says. He turns on me looking pitying enough to make a body cry, and says : " Huck Finn, did you ever hear of a prisoner having picks and shovels, and all the modern conveniences in his wardrobe to dig himself out with ? Now I want to ask you-if you got any reasonableness in you at all-what kind of a show would that give him to be a hero ? Why, they might as well lend him the key, and done with it. Picks and shovels-why they wouldn't furnish 'em to a king " "Well, then," I says, "if we don't want the picks and shovels, what do wo want?" "A couple of case-knives." " To dig the foundations out from under that cabin with ?" "Yes." " Confound it, it's foolish, Tom.'* " It don't make no difference how foolish it is, it's the right way— and it's the regular way. And there ain't no other way, that ever / heard of, and I've read all the books that gives any information about these things. They always dig out with a case-knife-and not through dirt, mind you ; generly it's through solid rock. A^-d it takes them weeks and weeks and weeks, and for ever and ever. Wly, look at one of them prisoners in the bottom dungeon of the Castle Deef, in the harbor of Marseilles, that dug himself out that way ; how long was he at it, you reckon ? " "I don't know." .. flf^ •iS^iS, A DEEP HOLE. 307 TliaVs the kind. I wish "Well, guess." " I don't know. A month and a half ? " ** Thirty-seven year — and he come out in China, the bottom of this fortress was solid rock." "Jim don't know nobody in China." " What's that got to do with it ? Neither did that other fellow. But you're always a-wandering off on a side issue. Why can't you stick to the main point ? " *'A11 right — / don't care where he comes out, so he comes out ; and Jim don't, either, I reckon. But there's one thing, anyway — Jim's too old to bo dug out with a case-knife. lie won't last." " Yes he will last, too. You don't reckon it's going to take thirty-seven years to dig out through a dirt founda- tion, do you ? " " How long will it take, Tom ?" *' Well, we can't resk being as long as we ought to, because it mayn't take very long for Uncle Silas to hear from down there by New Orleans. He'll hear Jim ain't from there. Then his next move will be to advertise Jim, or some- thing like that. So we can't resk being as long digging him out as we ought to. By rights I reckon we ought to be a couple of years ; but we can't. Things being so uncertain, what I recommend is this : that we really dig right in, as quick as we can ; and after ihat, we can let on, to ourselves, that we was at it thirty-seven years. Then we can snatch him out and rush hiui away the first time there's an alarm. Yes, I reckon that'll be the beet way." KwHQ BMOUCHINO THB KNIVB8. " Now, there's sense in that," I says. " Letting on don't cost nothing ; letting on ain't no trouble ; and if it's any object, I don't mind letting on we was at it a hundred and fifty year. It wouldn't strain me none, after I got my hand iu. So I'll mosey along now, and smouch a couple of case-knives." " Smouch three," he says ; " we want one to make a saw out of." "Tom, if it ain't unregular and irreligious to sejest it," I says, "there's an old rusty saw-blade around yonder sticking under the weatherboarding behind the smoke-house." He looked kind of weary and discouraged-like, and says : " It ain't no use to try to learn you nothing, Huck. Run along and smouch the knives — three of them." So 1 done it. img; e was hand 5'b an ehiud louch XXXVl ^ Boon as wo reckoned everybody was asleep, that ni/^ht, we went down the lightning-rod, and shut ourselves up in the lean-to, and got out our pile of fox-fire, and went to work. We cleared everything out of the way, about four or five foot along the mid- dle of the bottom log. Tom said he was right behind Jim's bed now, and we'd dig in under it, and when we got through there couldn't nobody in the cabin ever know there was any hole there, because Jim's counterpin hung down most to the ground, and you'd have to raise it up and look under to see the hole. So we dug and dug, with the case-knives, till most mid- night ; and then we was dog-tired, and our hands was blistered, and yet you couldn't see we'd done anything, hardly.^ At last I says : " This ain't no thirty-seven year job, this is a thirty-eight year job, Tom Sawyer." He never said nothing. But he sighed, and pretty soon he stopped dig- ging, and then for a good little while I knowed he was thinking. Then he says : eOIMO DOWN THE LTOHTNINO-ROD. J 810 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. *' It ain't no use, Hnck, it ain't agoing to work. If we was prisoners it vould, because then we'd have as many years as we wanted, and no hurry ; and we wouldn't get but a few minutes to dig, every day, while they was changing watches, and so our hands wouldn't gec blistered, and we could keep it up right along, year in and year out, and do it right, and the way it ought to be done. But we can't fool along, we got to rush; we ain't got no time to spare. If we was to put in another night this way, we'd have to knock off for a week to let our dands get well — couldn't touch a caae-knifo with them sooner." " Well, then, what we going to do, lorn ? " " I'll tell you. It ain't right, and it ain't moral, and I wouldn't like it to get tfHt — but there ain't only just the one way; we got to dig him out with the picks, and let on it's case-knives." **iVow you're talking!" I says; *'your head gets leveler and leveler all the time, Tom Sawyer," I says. " Picks is the thing, moral or no moral ; and as for me, I don't care shuckd for the morality of it, nohow. When I start in to steal a nigger, or a watermelon, or a Sunday-school book, I ain't no ways particular how it's done so it's done. What I want is my nigger ; or what I want is my watermelon ; or what I want is my Sunday-school book ; and if a pick's the hand- iest thing, that's the thing I'm agoing to dig that nigger or that watermelon or that Sunday-school book out with ; and I don't give a dead rat what the authori- ties thinks about it nuther." " Well," he says, " there's excuse for picks and letting-on in a case like this ; if it warn't so, I wouldn't approve of it, nor I wouldn't stand by and see the rules broke — because right is right, and wrong is wrong, and a body ain't got no busi- ness doing wrong when he ain't ignorant and knows better. It might answer for you to dig Jim out with a pick, without any letting-on, because you don't know no better ; but it wouldn't for me, because I do know better. Gimme a case- knife." He had his own by him, but I handed him mine. He flung it down, and Bays : ** Gimme a case-knife." I didn't know just what to do — but then I thought. I scratched aroimd EI8 LEVEL BEST. 311 amongst the old tools, and got a pick-ax and give it to him, and he took it and went to work, and never said a word. He was always just that particular. Full of principle. So then I got a shovel, and then we picked and shoveled, turn ahout, and made the lur fly. We stuck to it about a half an hour, which was as long as we could stand up ; but we had a good deal of a hole to show for it. When I got up stairs, I looked out at the window and see Tom doing his level best with the lightning-rod, but he couldn't come it, his hands was so sore. At last he says: ** It ain't no use, it can't be done. What you reckon I better do ? Can't you think up no way ? " "Yes," I says, *'but I reckon it ain't regular. Come up the stairs, and let on it's a lightning- rod." So he done it. Next day Tom stole a pewter Bpoon and a brass candlestick in the house, for to make some pens for Jim out of, and six tallow candles ; and I hung around the nigger cabins, and laid for a chance, and stole three tin plates. Tom said it wasn't enough; but I said nobody wouldn't ever see the plates that Jim throwed out, because they'd fall in the dog-fennel and jimpson weeds under the window-hole— then we could tote them back and he could use them over again. So Tom was satisfied. Then he says : « Now, the thing to study out is, how to get the things to Jim." *' Take them iu through the hole," I says, " when we get it done." BTEALIKa BFOOMB. « A 312 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINK He only just looked scornful, and said something about nobody ever heard of such an idiotic idea, and then he went to studying. By-and-by he said he had ciphered out two or three ways, but there warn't no need to decide on any of them yet. Said we'd got to post Jim first. That night we went down the lightning-rod a little after ten, and took one of the candles along, and listened under the window-hole, and heard Jim snoring ; so we pitched it in, and it didn't wake him. Then wo whirled in with the pick and shovel, and in about two hours and a half the Job was done. We crept in under Jim's bed and into the cabin, and pawed around and found the candle and lit it, and stood over Jim a while, and found him looking hearty and healthy, and then we woke him up gentle and gradual. Ho was so glad to see us he most cried ; and called us honey, and all the pet names he could think of ; and was for having us hunt up a cold chisel to cut the chain off of his leg with, right away, and clearing out without losing any time. But Tom he showed him how un- regular it would be, and set down and told him all about our plans, and how wo could alter them in a minute any time there was an alarm; and not to be the least afraid, because we would see he got away, sure. So Jim he said it was all right, and we set there and talked over old times a while, and then Tom asked a lot of questions, and when Jim told him Uncle Silas come in every day or two to pray with him, and Aunt Sally come in to see if he was comfortable and had plenty to eat, and both of them was kind as they could be, Tom says : '*Now I know how to fix it. We'll send you some things by them." I said, ** Don't do nothing of the kind ; it's one of the most jackass ideas I ever struck ; " but he never paid no attention to me ; went right on. It was his way when he'd got his plans set. So he told Jim how we'd have to smuggle in the rope-ladder pie, and other large things, by Nat, the nigger that fed him, and he must be on the lookout, and not be surprised, and not let Nat see him open them ; and we would put small thin£:s in uncle's coat pockets and he must steal them out ; and we would tie things to aunt's apron strings or put them in her apron pocket, if we got a chance ; and told him what they would be and what they was for. And told him how to keep a journal on the shirt with his blood, and all that. He told him everything. A BEQUEST TO POSTERITY. 313 Jim he couldn't see no sense in the most of it, but he allowed wo was white folks and knowed better than him ; so he was satisfied, and said he would do it all just as Tom said. Jim had plenty com-cob pipes and tobacco ; so wo had a right down good sociable time ; then we crawled out through the hole, and so home to bed, with hands that looked like they'd been chawed. Tom was in high spirits, lie said it was the best fun he ever had in his life, and the most intellectural ; and said if he only could see his way to it we would keep it up all the rest of our lives and leave Jim to our children to get out ; for he believed Jim would come to like it better and better the more he got used to it. lie said that in that way it could be strung out to as much as eighty year, and would be the best time on record. And he said it would make us all celebrated that hud a hand in it. In the morning we went out to the wooG-pile and chopped up the brass candle- stick into handy sizes, and Tom put them and the pewter spoon in his pocket. Then we went to the nigger cabins, and while I got Nat's notice off, Tom shoved a piece of candlestick into the middle of a corn-pone that was m Jim's pan, and we went along with Nat to see how it would work, and it just worked noble ; when Jim bit into it it most mashed all his teeth out ; and there warn't ever any- thiug could a worked better. Tom said so himself. Jim he never let on but what it was only just a piece of rock or something like that that's always gettmg mto bread, you know ; but after that he never bit into nothing but what he jabbed his fork into it in three or four places, first. And whilst we was a standing there in the dimmish light, here comes a couplo of the hounds bulging in, from under Jim's bed ; and they kept on piling in till there was eleven of them, and there warn't hardly room in there to get your breath. By jings, we forgot to fasten that lean-to door. The nigger Nat he only just hollered "witches I" once, and keeled over onto the floor amongst the dogs, and begun to groan like he was dying. Tom jerked the door open and flung out a slab of Jim's meat, and the dogs went for it, and in two seconds ho was out himself and back again and shut the door, and I knowed he'd fixed the other door too. Then he went to work ou the uigger, coaxing him and pettmg 814 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. him, and asking him if he'd been imagining he saw something again. He raised up, and blinked his eyes around, and says : " Mars Sid, you'll say I's a fool, but if I didn't b'lieve I see most a million dogs, er devils, er some'n, I wisht I may die right heah in dese tracks. I did, mos' sholy. Mars Sid, I felt um— I felt um, sah j dey was all over me. Dad fetch it, I jis' wisht I could git my ban's on one er dem witches jis' wunst — on'y jis' wunst — it's all /'d ast. But mos'ly I wisht dey'd lemme 'lone, I does." Tom says: "Well, I tell you what / think. What makes them come here just at this runaway nig- ger's breakfast-time ? It's be- cause they're hungry; that's the reason. You make them a witch pie ; that's the thing for you to do." "But my lan'j Mars Sid, how's / gwyne to make 'm a witch pie ? I doan' know how to make it. I hain't ever beam er eich a thing b'fo.' " "Well, then, I'll have to make it myself." " Will you do it, honey ?— will you ? Ill wusshup de groun' und' yo' foot, I will!" "All right, I'll do it, seeing it'fa you, and you've been good to us ond showed us the runaway nigger. But you got to be mighty careful. When we come around, you turn your back ; and then whatever we've put in the pan, don't you let on you see it at all. And don't you look, when Jim unloads the pan — some- TOH ASTIBES A WITCH riE. I I ■#»■ I A HIGH FIGURE. 315 thing might happen, I don't know what. And above all, don't you handle the witch-things." "ffannel 'm Mars Sid ? What is you a talkin' 'bout ? I wouldn' lay do weight or my finger on urn, not f'r ten hund'd thous'n' billion dollars, I wouldn't." ttfec XXXMI was all fixed. So then wo went away and went to the rubbage-pilo in the back yard where they keep the old boots, and rags, and pieces of bottles, and wore-out tin things, and all such truck, and scratched around and found an old tin wash- pan and stopped up the holes as well as we could, to bake the pie in, and took it down cellar and stole it full of flour, and started fo" breakfast and found a couple of shingle-nails that Tom said would bo handy for a prisoner to scrabble his name and sorrows on the dungeon walls with, and dropped one of them in Aunt Sally's apron pocket which was hanging on a chair, and t'other we stuck in the band of Uncle Silas's hat, which was on the bureau, because we heard the children say their pa and ma was going to the runaway nigger's hour i this morn- ing, and then went to breakfast, and Tom dropped the pewter spoon in Uncle Silas's coat pocket, and Aunt Sally wasn't come yet, so we had to wait a little while. And when she come she was hot, and red, and cross, and couldn't hardly wait for the blessing ; and then she went to sluicing out coffee with one hand and THB RCBBAGE-FILE. I I 'i 1^ TnE LAf^T RniRT. 317 ri cracking the handiest child's head with her thimble with the other, and Bays : "I've hunted high, and I've hunted low, and it does heat all, what lian he- come of your other shirt." My heart fell down amongst my lungs and livers and things, and a hard piece of corn-crust started down my throat after it and got met on the road with a cough and was shot across the table and took one of the children in the eye and curled him up like a Oshing-worm, and let a cry out of him the size of a war-whoop, and Tom he turned kinder hluo around the gills, and it all amounted to a considerable state of things for about a quarter of a minute or as much as that, and I would a sold out for half price if there was a bidd.n-. But after that wo was all right again— it was the sudden surprise of it that knocked ns so kind of cold. Uncle Silas ho says : " It's most uncommon curious, I can't understand it. I know perfectly well I took it off, hecause " " Because you hain't got but one on. Just listen at the man ! / know you took it off, and know it hy a better way than your wool-gethering memory, too, hecause it was on the clo'cs-linc yesterday— I see it there myself. But it's gone— that's the long and the short of it, and you'll just have to change to a red flann'l one till I can get time to make a new one. And it'll be the third I've made in two years ; it just keeps a body on the jump to keep you in shirts ; and whatever you do manage to do with 'm all, is more'n / car make out. A body'd think you would learn to take some sort of care of 'em, at your time of life." " I know it, Sally, and I do try all I can. But it oughtn't to be altogether my fault, hecause you know I don't see them nor have nothing to do with them except when they're on me ; and I don't believe I've ever lost one of them off of me." . .^ ,- « Well, it ain't your fault if you haven't, Silas-you'd a done it if you could, I reckon. And the shirt ain't all that's gone, nuther. Ther's a spoon gone ; and that ain't all. There was ten, and now ther's only nine. ^^The calf got the shirt I reckon, but the calf never took the spoon, that's certain." " "Why, what else is gone, Sully ? " It 818 THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN. "Ther's six mnrf/w gono-that's what. The rata could a got tlio candles and 1 reckon they did ; I wonder they don't walk off with the whole place, the way you're always going to stop their holes and don't do it ; and if they warn't fools they'd sleep in your hair, Moa—you'd never find it out ; but you can't lay the spoon on the rats, and that I know." " Well, Sally, I'm in fault, and I acknowl- edge it; I've been remiss; but I won't let to-morruw go by without stopping up them holes." " Oh, I wouldn't hurry, next year'U do. Matilda Angelina Aruminta Phelps ! " Whack comes the thimble, and the child snatches her claws out of the sugar-bowl without foding around any. Just then, the nigger woman steps onto the passage, and flays : "Missus, dey's a sheet gone." " A sheet gone I Well, for the land's sake ! " "I'll stop up them holes to-day," saya „ Uncles Silas, looking sorrowful. « nf; "^ '"~'P°'' *^' '^*' '°°^ *^' '^''* ■ ^''^^^'^ it gone, Lize ? " Clah to goodness I hain't no notion. Miss Sally. She wuz on de clo's-line yistiddy, but she done gone ; she ain' dah no mo,' now." "I reckon the world is coming to an end. I never see the beat of it in all my born days. A shirt, and a shee^, and a spoon, and six can " ^'Missus," comes a young yaller wench, "dey's a brass cannelstick miss'n." Cier out from here, you hussy, er I'll take a skillet to ye '" Well, she was just a biling. I begun to lay for a chance ; I reckoned I would aneak out and go fur the woods till the weather moderated. She kept a raging 'UlaSDB, DET's A SHBET OONC." M0017TN0 AMWND. 810 riglit along, ninning her insurrection all by herself, and everybody else mighty meek and (luiet ; und ut lust Uncle Silas, looking kind of foolish, lishes uj) thut Bpoou out of his pocket. She stopped, with hor mouth open and her hands up ; and as for mc, I wished I was in Jeruslem or somewheres. But not long ; be- cause she says : ** \V%j%id as I expected. So you had it in your pocket all the time ; and liko as not you've got the other things there, too. How'd it got there ?" "Ireely don't know, Sally," he says, kind of apologizing, •' or you know 1 "would tell. I was a-studying over my text in Acts Seventeen, before breakfast, and I reckon I put it in there, not noticing, meaning to put my Testament in, and it must be so, because my Testament ain't in, but I'll go and s^e, and if tho Testament is where I had it, I'll know I didn't put it in, and that will show that I laid the Testament down and took up tho spoon, and " "Oh, for the land's sake I Give a body a rest! Go 'long now, tho ^^hole kit and biling of ye ; and don't come nigh me again till I've got back my peace of mind." Fd a heard her, if she'd a said it to herself, let alone speaking it out ; and I'd a got up and obeyed her, if I'd a been dead. As wo was passing through the Betting-room, the old man he took up his hat, and tho shingle-nail fell out on the floor, and he just merely picked it up and laid it on the mantel-shelf, and never Bald nothing, and went out. Tom see hir-, do it, and remembered about the spoon, and says : "Well, it ain't no use to send things by him no more, he ain't reliable." Then he says : " But he done us a good turn with the spoon, anyway, without knowing it, and so we'll go and do him one without Myn knowing it — stop up his rat-holcB." There was a noble good lot of them, down cellar, and it took us a whole hour, but we done the job tight and good, and ship-shape. Then we heard steps on the stairs, and blowed out our light, and hid ; and here comes the old man, with a candle in one hand and a bundle of stuff in t'other, looking as absent-minded as year before last. He went a mooning around, first to one vat-hole and then another, till he'd been to them all. Then he stood about five minutes, pick= ^ Ni if 820 THE ADVEN'TU^ES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINIT. tallow-drip off of his candle and thinking. Then he turns off slow and dreamy towards the stairs, saying : " Well, for the life of mo I can't remember when I done it. I coulu ^how her now that I warn't to blame on account of the rats. But never mind — let it go. I reckon it wouldn't do no good." And so he went on a mumbling up stairs, and then we left. He was a mighty nice old man. And always is. Tom was a good deal bothered about what to do for a spoon, but he said we'd got to have it ; so he took a think. When he had ciphered it out, he told me how we was to do ; then we went and waited around the spoon-basket till we see Aunt Sally coming, and then Tom went to counting the spoons and laying them out to one side, and I slid one of them up my sleeve, and Tom says : " Why, Aunt Sally, there ain't but nine spoons, yet." She says : " Go 'long to your play, and don't bother me. I know better, I counted 'm myself." " Well, I've counted them twice. Aunty, and /can't make but nine." She looked out of all patience, but of course she come to count— anybody would. " I declare to gracious ther' ain't but nine ! " she says. *' Why, what in the world— plague take the things, I'll count 'm again." So I slipped back the one I had, and when she got done counting, she says : "Hang the troublesome rubbage, ther's ten, now !" and she looked huffy and bothered both. But Tom says : " Why, Aunty, / don't think there's ten." "You numskull, didn't you see mo count 'm ?" ** I know, but " " Well, I'll count 'm again." So I smouched one, and they come out nine same as the other time. Well, she was in a tearing way— just a trembling all over, she was so mad. But she counted and counted, till she got that addled she'd start to count-in the basket for a spoon, sometimes ; and so, three times they come out right, and three times mMIi ■ ■l lili l i ^i|li[i i r i rr i iv^.>j^ij; .!•,„,! ii.Mfc 326 TEE ADVENTURES OF EUCKLEBERBY FINN. 1 Here a captive heart busted. ^ ^^ , . t..-„ 2. Ze a Ur pr«o«r, f^rml ty * «rf,i »i friend., fretted mt U, "TtTa lonely Heart Ir.lee, and a «« spirit v,ent to its rest, after tUrty- ^erisUd a noble stranger, natural son of Louts XIV. Tom's voice trembled, whilst he was reading them, and he most broke down Whence got done, he couldn't no way make up his mind wh.ch one for J.m to Talble onto the wall, they was all so good ; but at last he allowed ^e -^^d M Mm scrabble them all on. Jim said it would take him a year to scrabb^B such a lot of truck onto the logs with a nail, and he didn't know how to make et^^, besides ; but Tom said he would block them out for him, and then he wouldn t have nothing to do but just follow the lines. Then pretty soon he says : " Come to think, the logs ain't agoing to do ; they don't have log walla m a dungeon : we got to dig the inscriptions into a rock. We'll fetch a rock. Jim said the rock was worse than the logs ; he said it would take him such a pison long time to dig them into a rock, he wouldn't ever get out. But Tom said he would let me help him do it. Then he took a look to see how me and Jim was getting along with the pens. It was most pesky tedious hard work and slow, and didn't give my hands no show to get well of the sores, and we didn't seem to make no headway, hardly. So Tom says : « I know how to fix it. We got to have a rock for the coat of arms and mournful inscriptions, and we can kill two birds with that same rock. There's a gaudy big grindstone down at the mill, and we'll smouch it, and carve the things on it and file out the pens and the saw on it, too." It wam't no slouch of an idea ; and it warn't no slouch of a grindstone nuther • but we allowed we'd tackle it. It wam't quite midnigh:, yet, so we cleared out for the mill, leaving Jim at work. We smouched the grindstone, and set out to roll her home, but it was a most nation tough job. Sometimes, do what we could, we couldn't keep her from falling over, and she come mighty A SKILLED SUPERINTENDENT. 327 near mashing us, every time. Tom said .he was going to get one of us, sure before we got through. We got her half way ; and then we was plun^b played out, and most drownded with sweat. We see it warn't no use, we got to go and fetch Jim. So he raised up his bed and slid the chain off of the bed-leg, and wrapt it round and round his neck, and we crawled out thrm.gh our hole and down there, and Jim and me laid into that grindstone and walked her along like A TOTTGH JOB nothing ; and Tom superintended. He could out-superintend any boy I ever see. He knowed how to do everything. . . Our hole wa. prett, big, but it warn't big enough to S^t the gr,nd^ue through ; but Jim he took the piclc and .000 made .t b,g enough. Then Tom marked out them things on it with the nail, and set Jim to work on them, w^tb the nail for a chisel and an iron bolt fcom tho rubbaso m (he Ican-to for a THE ADVENTURES OF EUCKLEBEBRT FINK. 328 Z^,'^i^^^^l^^^^^^r^. till the rest of his eandle quit on him and then 1 cruld go to bed, and hide the grindstone under his straw t.ck and sleep on it lln we helped him fix his chain baek on the bed-lcg, and was ready for bed our- selves. But Tom thought of something, and says : " You got any spiders in here, Jim ? " « No, sah, thanks to goodness I hain't, Mars Tom." *' All right, we'll get you some." t •• . > „^«« « But 1.L you, honey, I doan' «n^ none. I's afearf un urn. I J.»' b soon have rattlesnakes aroun'." Tom thought a minute or two, and says : I If. „ gooa idea. And I reckon it', teen done. It «■«.' a ''COn done , ,t stands to reason. Yes, if. a prime good idea. Where eould you keep .t ? « Keep what, Mars Tom ? " ""Whv, a rattlesnake.** „v« 4-« .. De goodness graeious alive, Ma« Tom ! Why, it dey was a '"tlf =»«^; J" come in heah, I'd take eu bust right out thoo dat log waU, I would, w>d my "why, Jim, you wouldn't be afraid o( it, alter a little. You eould tame it." " Tame it \" . , . ... ^ „_j " Yc-easy enough. Every animal is grateful for kmdness and pettmg ^d they wouldn't tUnk of hurting a person that pets them Any book ,rfl teU you that. You try-thaf s all I ask ; just try for two or ttoee days Why you can get him so, in a little while, that he'll love you ; and sleep -* J™'^"^ won't stay away from jou a minute ; and will let you wrap lum round your neck and Dut his head in your mouth." '•Please. Mars Tom-■ UNPLEARANT OLORT. 329 " Why, Mars Tom, I doan' xoant no sich glory. Snake take 'n bito Jim's chin off, den whali is de glory ? No, sah, I doan' want no sich doin's." " Blame it, can't you try 9 I only want you to try— you needn't keep it up if it don't work." " But de trouble all done, ef de snake bite me while Fa a tryin' him. Mars Tom, I's willin' to tackle mos' anything 'at ain't onreasonable, but cf you .Sfe^ i BTTTTOKB OS THKIB TAOS. en Huck fetches a rattlesnake in heah for me to tame, I's gwyne to leave, dat'a "Well, then, lot it go, let it go, if you're so bullheaded about it. We can get you some garter-snakes and you can tie some buttons on their tails, and let on they're rattlesnakes, and I reckon that'll have to do." «I k'n Stan' dem, Mars Tom, but blame' 'f I couldn' get along widout urn, I tell you dat. I never knowed b'fo', 't was so much bother and trouble to be a ^"'- Well, it always is, when it's done right. You got any rats around here?" "No, sah, I hain't seed none." « Well, we'll get you some rats." i- , r f i 830 TEE ADVENTURES OF EUCKLEBERRT FINN. *' Why, Mars Tom, I doan' want no rats. Dey's do dad-blamcdcst crcturs to Bturb a body, en rustic roun' over 'im, en bite his feet, when he's tryiu' to sleep, I ever see. No, sah, gimme g'yarter-snakcs, 'f I's got to have 'm, but doan' gimme no rats, I ain' got no use f r um, skasely." " But Jim, you got to have 'em— they all do. So don't make no more fuss ubout it. Prisoners ain't ever without rats. There ain't no instance of it. And they train them, and pet them, and learn them tricks, and they get to be as sociable as flies. But you got to play music to them. You got anything to play music on ? " " I ain' got nuffn but a coase comb en a piece o' paper, en a juice-harp ; but I rcck'n dey wouldn' take no stock in a juice-harp." « Yes they would. They don't care what kind of music 'tis. A jew-sharp's plenty good enough for a rat. All animals likes music— in a prison they dote on it. Specially, painful music ; and you can't get no other kind out of a jews- harp. It always interests them ; they come out to see what's the matter with you. Yes, you're all right ; you're fixed very well. You want to set on your bed, nights, before you go to sleep, and early in the mornings, and play your jews- harp ; play The Last Link is Broken— that's the thing that'll scoop a rat, quicker'n anything else : and when you've played about two minutes, you'll see all the rats, and the snakes, and spiders, and things begin to feel worried about you, and come. And they'll just fairly swarm over you, and have a noble good time." ** Yes, dey will, I reck'n. Mars Tom, but what kine er time is Jim havin' ? Blest if I kin see de pint. But I'll do it ef I got to. I reck'n I better keep de animals satisfied, en not have no trouble in de house." Tom waited to think over, and see if there wasn't nothing else ; and pretty Boon he says : " Oh— there's one thing I forgot. Could you raise a flower here, do you reckon ? " " I doan' know but maybe I could. Mars Tom ; but it's tolable dark in heah, en I ain* got no use fr no flower, nohow, en she'd be a pow'ful sight o* trouble." A TEARFUL SUBJECT. 331 « ' Well, you try it, anyway. Some other prisoners Ims done it." 'One er dcm big cat-tail-lookin' mullen-stalks would grow in heah, Mara Tom, I reck'n, but she wouldn' bo wuth half do trouble she'd coss." " Don't you believe it. We'll fetch you a little one, and you plant it in tho comer, over there, and raise it. And don't call it mullen, call it Pitchiola- that's its right name, when it's in a prison. And you want to water it with your tears." ** Why, I got plenty spring water, Mars Tom." " You don't wmit spring water ; you want to water it with your tears. It's tho way they always do." "Why, Mars Tom, I lay I kin raise one er dem mullen-stalks twysto wid Bpring water whiles another man's a starfn ono wid tears." ** That ain't the idea. You got to do it with tears." *' She'll die on my ban's, Mars Tom, she sholy will ; kase I doau' skasely ever cry." So Tom was stumped. But he studied it over, and then said Jim would have to worry along the best he could with an onion. He promised he would go to the nigger cabins and drop one, private, in Jim's coffee-pot, in the morning. Jim said he would " jis' 's soon have tobacker in his cofEee ; " and found so much fault with it, and with the work and bother of raising the mullen, and Jews-harping the rats, and petting and flattering up the snakes and spiders and things, on top of all the other work he had to do on pens, and , . , „^ inBcriptions, and journals, and things, which made it more trouble and worry and responsibility to be a prisoner than anything he ever undertook, that Tom most IBRIQATION. 832 THE ADVENTURES OF nUCKLEBERRT FINN. lost all pationco with him ; and said he was just leadened down with moro gaudier chances than a prisoner ever had in the world to make a name for him- self, and yet ho didn't know enough to appreciate them, and they was juat about wasted on him. So Jim ho was sorry, and said he wouldn't behave bo no more, and then mo and Tom slioved for bed. (f\\Q.^tev XXXIX In the morning we went up to the villago and bought a wire rat trap and fetch- ed it down, and unstopped the best rat hole, and in about an hour we had fifteen of the buliiost kind of ones ; and tlien we took it and put it in a saf(i place under Aunt Sally's bed. But while we was gone for spiders, little Thomas Franklin Ben- jamin Jefferson Elexander Phelps found it uiere, and opened the door of it to see if the rats w^ould cjrae out, and they did ; and Aunt Sally she come in, and when we got back kIio was a standing on top of the bed raising Cain, and the rats was doing what they could to keep off the dull times for her. So she took and dusted us both with tlie hickry, and wo was as much as two hours catcl.ing another fifteen or six- teen, drat that meddlesome cub, and they iram't the likeliest, nuther, because the first haul was the pick of the flock. I never see a likelier lot of rats than what that first haul was. We got a splendid stock of sorted spiders, and bugs, and frogs, and cater- pillars, and one thing or another ; and we like-to got a hornet'^ nest, but we didn't. The family was at home. We didn't give it right up, but staid with them as long as we could j because wo allowed we'd tire them out or they'd KXEFIMO OFF DULL TIMB8. i.;.i|ll.. l iU, I l4.U |l ». l iWJWJ ' I ' g^aig^g" il I u 834 THE ADVENTURES OF nUCKLEBERRY FINN. got to tiro us out, and they done it. Then wo got allycumpain and rubbed on the places, and was pretty near all right again, but couldn't sot down convenient. And so we went for the snakes, and grabbed a couple of dozen garters and house- snakes, and put them in a bag, and i)ut it in our room, and by that time it was Bupper time, and a rattling good honest day's work ; and hungry ? — oh, no, I reckon not ! And there warn't a blessed snake up there, when we went back — we didn't half tie the sack, and they worked out, somehow, and left. But it didn't matter much, because they was still on the premises somewheres. So we judged we could get some of them again. No, there warn't no real scarcity of snakes about the house for a considci'blc spell. You'd see them dripping from the rafters and places, every now and then ; and they generly landed in your plate, or down the back of your neck, and most of the time where you didn't want them. Well, they was handsome, and striped, and there warn't no harm in a million of them ; but that never made no difference to Aunt Sally, she despised snakes, be the breed what they might, and she couldn't stand them no way you could fix it ; and every time one of them flopped down on her, it didn't make no difference what she was doing, she would just lay that work down and light out. I never see such a woman. And you could hear her whoop to Jericho. You couldn't get her to take aholt of one of them with the tongs. And if she turned over and found one in bed, she would scramble out and lift a howl that you would think the house was afire. She disturbed the old man so, that he said he could most wish there hadn't ever been no snakes created. Why, after every last snake had been gone clear out of the house for as much as a week, Aunt Sally warn't over it yet ; she warn't near over it ; when she was setting thinking about something, you could touch her on the back of her neck with a feather and she would jump right out of her stockings. It was very curious. But Tom said all women was just so. He said they was made that way; for some reason or other. We got a licking every time one of our snakes come in her way ; and she al- lowed these lickings warn't nothing to what she would do if we ever loaded up the place again with them. I didn't mind the lickings, because they didn't amount to nothing; but I minded the trouble we had, to lay in another lot. But we got ,1 LIVELY BED FELLOWS. 335 them laid in, and all the other things ; and you never see a cabin as blithesome as Jim's was when they'd all swarm out for music and go for him. Jim didn't like the spiders, and the spiders didn't like Jim ; and so they'd lay for him and make it mighty warm for him. And he said that between the rats, and the snakes, and the grindstone, there warn't no room in bed for him, skasely ; and when there was, a body couldn't sleep, it was so lively, and it was always lively, he said, be- cause they never all slept at one time, but took turn about, so when the snakes was asleep the rats was on deck, and when the rats turned in the snakes come on watch, so he always had one gang under him, in his way, and t'other gang hav- ing a circus over him, and if he got up to hunt a new place, the spiders would take a chance at him as he crossed over. He said if he ever got out, this time, he wouldn't ever be a prisoner again, not for a salary. Well, by the end of three weeks, everything was in pretty good shape. The shirt was sent in early, in a pie, and every time a rat bit Jim he would get up and write a little in his journal whilst the ink was fresh ; the pens was made, the in- Bcriptions and so on was all carved on the grindstone ; the bed-leg was sawed in two, and we had et up the sawdust, and it give us a most amazing stomach-ache. We reckoned we was all going to die, but didn't. It was the most undigestible sawdust I ever see ; and Tom said the same. But as I was saying, we'd got all the work done, now, at last ; and we was all pretty much fagged out, too, but mainly Jim. The old man had wrote a couple of times to the plantation below Orleans to come and get their runaway nigger, but hadn't got no answer, because there warn't no such plantation ; so he iillowed he would advertise Jim in the St. Louis and New Orleans papers ; and when he mentioned the St. Louis ones, it SAWDUST DIBT. 836 TEE ADVEN1URE8 OF HUCELEBEBRT FINN. give me the cold shivers, and I see we hadn't no time to lose. So Tom said, now for the nonnamous letters. "What's them ? " I says. " Warnings to the people that something is up. Sometimes it's done one way, sometimes another. But there's always somebody spying around, that gives notice to the governor of the castle. When Louis XVI. was going to light out of the Tooleries, a servant girl done it. It's a very good way, and so is the non- namous letters. We'll use them both. And it's usual for the prisoner's mother to change clothes with him, and she stays in, and he slides out in her clothes. We'll do that too." " But looky here, Tom, what do we want to warn anybody for, that some- thing's up ? Let them find it out for themselves— it's their lookout." " Yes, I know; but you can't depend on them. It's the way they've acted from the very start— left us to do everything. They're so confiding and mullet- headed they don't take notice of nothing at all. So if we don' t^ive them notice, there won't be nobody nor nothing to interfere with us, and so after all our hard work and trouble this escape '11 go off perfectly flat: won't amount to noth- ing — won't be nothing to it." " Well, as for me, Tom, that's the way I'd like." " Shucks," he says, and looked disgusted. So I says : " But I ain't going to make no complaint. Anyway that suits you suits me. What you going to do about the servant-girl ?" " You'll be her. You slide in, in the middle of the night, and hook that yaller girl's frock." " Why, Tom, that'll make trouble next morning ; because of course she prob'- bly hain't got any but that one." •* I know ; but you don't want it but fifteen minutes, to carry the nonnamous letter and shove it under the front door." "All right, then, I'll do it ; but I could carry it just as handy in my own togs." "You wouldn't look like a servant-girl then, would you ?" "No, but there won't be nobody to see what I look like, anytvay." TBE STRAW DVMMT. 837 Who's Jim's " That ain't got nothing to do with it. The thing for us to do, is just to do our daty, and not worry about whether anybody sees us do it or not. Hain't you got no principle at all ? " "All right, I ain't saying nothing; I'm the servant-girl, mother?" "I'm his mother. I'll hook a gown from Aunt Sally." "Well, then, you'll have to stay in th' v . i'in when me and Jim leii *>*'/" "Not much. I'll stuff Jim's clothes full of straw and lay it on his bed to re- present his mother in dis- guise, and Jim '11 take the nigger woman's gown off of me and wear it, and we'll all evade together. Wlien a pri- eoncr of style escapes, it's called an evasion. It's al- ways called so when a king escapes, f'rinstance. And the eame with a king's son ; it don't make no difference ■whether he's a natural one or an unnatuial one." So Tom he wrote the nonnamous letter, atid I smouched the yaller wench's frock, that night, and put it on, and shoved it under the front door, the way Tom told me to. It said : Beware. Trouble ia brettnng. Keep a sharp lookout. Unknown Friend. Next night we stuck a picture which Tom drawed in blood, of a skull and CTossbones, on the front door ; and next night another one of a coffin, on the 23 TROXTBLB IS BRBWINO. iiuuiiuwMUUUiiiisim <""!"" 333 THE ADVENTURED OF nUCKLEBERRT FINK back door. I never see a family in such a sweat. They couldn't a been worse scared if the place had a been full of ghosts laying for them behind everything and under the beds and shivering through the air. If a door banged, Aunt Sally Bhc jumped, and said " ouch ! " if anything fell, she jump.d and said "ouch 1" if you happened to touch her, when she warn't noticing, she done the same ; she couldn't face noway and be satisfied, because she allowed there was something behind her every time-so she was always a whirling around, sudden, and saying -ouch," and before she'd get two-thirds around, she'd whirl back again, and say it again ; and she was afraid to go to bed, but she dasn't set up. So the thing was working very well, Tom said ; he said he never see a thing work more satisfactory. He said it showed it was done right. So he said, now for the grand bulge ! So the very next moraing at the streak of dawn we got another letter ready, and was wondering what we better do with it, because we heard them say at supper they was going to have a nigger on watch at both doors all night. Tom he went down the lightning-rod to spy around ; and the nigger at the back door was asleep, and he stuck it in the back of his neck and come back. This letter said : BonH Mray me. I wish to U your friend. TMre is a desprate gang of cutthroats from over in the Ingean Territory going to steal your runaway nigger to-night, and they have been trying to scare you so as you will stay in the house wnd not bother them. I am one of the gang, hut have got religgion and wish to quit it and lead a honest life again, and will betray the helish design. They will sneak down from northarda. along tlie fence, at midnight exact, with a fdse key. and go in the nigger^s cabin to get him. 1 am to be off a piece and blow a tin horn if I see any danger ; but dead of that, I will ba like a sheep soon as they get in and not blow at aU ; then whilst they aro getting his chains loose, you slip there and lock them in, and can kill them at your leamre. Don't do anything but just the way lam teUing you. if you do they will suspicion something and ram iohoopjamboreehoo. 1 do not wish any reward but to know J have done the right thing. Unknown Feiend. XL was feeling pretty good, after break- fast, and took my canoe and went over the river a fishing, with a lunch, £ and had a good time, and took a look at the raft and found her all right, and got home late to supper, and found them in such a sweat and worry they didn't know which end they was standing on, and made us go right off to bed the minute we was done supper, and wouldn't tell us what the trouble was, and never let on a word about the new letter, but didn't need to, because we knowed as much about it as any- body did, and as soon as we was half up stairs and her back was turned, we slid for the cellar cubboard and loaded np a good ' .ch and took it up to our room and went to bed and got up about half-past eleven, and Tom put on Aunt Sally's dress that he stole and was going to start with the lunch, but says : "Where's the butter?" ^^ « I laid oat a hunk of it," I says, " on a piece of a corn-pone. « Well, you left it laid out, then— it ain't here." "We can get along without it," T says. « We can get along m^A it, too," he eays; "just you slide down cellar and PI8HINO. TBS ADrHlfTmtES OF BVCKtBBUmT Fim. 840 ,,. ;. AnTtien mosey right down the lightning-rod and eome along. I'll ;::":; lal'trrinto^i'm's dothos to repre^nt hi» mother in d.sgu.se, and be ready tote like a sheep and shove soon as yon get there So out ho went, and down cellar went I. The hunk of batter, b,g a^ a ™r«,n's m, was whore I had left it, so I took np the slab of eom-pone w.th t ZZl 1 v"d out m, light, and started up stairs, very stealthy, and got up t I; ml nTor dl righl but hero eomes Aunt Sally with a candle, and I clapped the ^k^ly hat! a.;d clapped my hat on m, hcM, and the ne.t second she see me ; and she says : " You been down cellar ?" "Yes'm." " "What yon been doing down there ? " "Notli'n." " Notl'n!" "'. Wet ihcn, what possessed you to go down there, this time of night ? » :":d":t: P Don. answer me that way, Tom, T want to know what rrhat:r,:rdl7r=io.lo thmg, ^nt SaU. I hope to gracious if I ""T reckoned she'd let me go, now, and as a generl thing she would ; but I spoL;" so many strange things going on she --'-;-; "'»''* every little thing that wam't yard-stick stra.ght ^;° j« -J^ ; f f^^. You .^You just march into thatsetting-room and a -^^^ "^ ^^.^ ,^,„„ been up to something you no business to, and I lay 1 11 find ''""stTJl ':«; as I opened the door and walked into the setting-room. My, but th re :: a cro^d the. 1 Fifteen farmers, and every one of them « a ^n^ ^ -r ::ftLt:J^i:":;^::rar;::rZf ^ z. ^^ rS bTi "Sc they warn. ; but I knowed they was, because they THK VIGILANCE COMMITTEE. 841 >va8 always taking off their hats, and putting them on, and scratching their heads and changing their seats, and fumbling with their buttons. 1 waru't easy myself, but I didn't take my hat off, all the same. I did wish Aunt Sally would come, and get done with me, and lick me, u she wanted to, and let me get away and tell Tom how we'd overdone this thing, aid what a thundering hornet's nest we'd got ourselves into, so we could stop BVBBT OHK HAD A QUH. fooling around, rtraightofl, and dear out with Jim boforo thc»o rip» got out of •■"TLTlrira^d hegun .. a., mo question, but I c.uUn't answer t„em BtraiAt, I didn't know wl>ioh end of me was up ; because tl>ese men .as :n sueh I Zet now, that some was wanting to start right «» and lay for them desper- adTand slying it warn't but a fewminutes to midnight ; and o her. was t.7™g rr them to hold on and wait for the sheep-signal; and here was aunt, ^5^g a^y^t tCuestions. and me a shaWing all over and ready to sin down rrLks I was that seared ; and the plaee getting hotter and hotter, and the IZ^L., to melt and run down my neck and behind my cars ; and pretty Boon, when one of them says, "I'm for going and getting in the cabin ;2rs/, and right now, and catching them when they come," I most dropped ; and a streak of butter come a trickling down my forehead, and Aunt Sally she soe it, and turns white as a sheet, and says : " For the land's sake what is the matter with the child I— he's got the brain fever as shore as you're born, and they're oozing out I" And everybody runs to see, and she snatches off my hat, and out comes the bread, and what was left of the butter, and she grabbed me, and hugged me, and Bays : " Oh, what a turn you did give me I and how glad and grateful I am it ain't no worse ; for luck's against us, and it never rains but it pours, and when I see that truck I thought we'd lost you, for I knowed by the color and all, it was just like your brains would be if— Dear, dear, whyd'nt you tell me that was what you'd been down there for, / wouldn't a cared. Now cler out to bed, and don't lemme see no more of you till morning I " I was up stairs in a second, and down the lightning-rod in another one, and Bhinning through the dark for the lea4».to. I couldn't hardly get my words out, I was so anxious; but I told Tom as quick as I coiald, we must jump for it, now, and not a minute to lose— the house full of men, yonder, with guns 1 His eyes just blazed ; and he says : ''No !— is that so ? Ain't it bully ! Why, Huck, if it was to do over again, I bet I could fetch two hundred I If we could put it off till " " Hurry ! hurry ! " I says. " Where's Jim ? " " Bight at your elbow ; if you reach out your arm you can touch him. He'a dressed, and everything's ready. Now we'll slide out and give the sheep- eignal." But then we heard the tramp of men, coming to the door, and heard them begin to fumble with the padlock ; and heard a man say : " I told you we'd be too soon ; they haven't come— the door is locked. Here, I'll lock some of you into the cabin and you lay for 'em in the dark and kill 'em when they come ; and the rest scatter around a piece, and listen if you can hear 'em coming." A LIVELY RUN. 848 I So in thoy come, but couldn't see us in the dark, and most trod on us whilst T7e was hustling to get under the bed. But wo got under all right, and out through the hole, swift but soft — Jim first, mo next, and Tom last, which was according to Tom's orders. Now wo was in the lean-to, and heard trampinga close by outside. So wo crept to the door, and Tom stopped us there and put his eye to the crack, but couldn't make out nothing, it was so dark ; and whispered and said ho would listen for the steps to get further, and when ho nudged us Jim must glide out first, and him last. So he set his ear to the crack and listened, and listened, and listened, and the steps a scraping around, out there, all the time; and at last ho nudged us, and we slid out, and stooped down, not breathing, and not making the least noise, and slipped stealthy towards the fence, in Injun file, and got to it, all right, and me and Jim over it ; but Tom's britches catched fast on a splinter on the top rail, and then he hear the steps coming, so he had to pull loose, which snapped the splinter and made a noise ; and as he dropped in our tracks and started, somebody sings out : ** Who's that ? Answer, or I'll shoot !" But we didn't answer ; we just unfurled our heels and shoved. Then there ■was a rush, and a iang, bang, bang ! and the bullets fairly whizzed around us 1 We heard them sing out : *'Here they are I They've t " ■ '; for the river ! after 'em, boys ! And turn loose the dogs ! " So here they come, full tilt. We could hear them, because they wore boots. SOM CAUQHT OH A BFLIKTHI. I 844 THE ADVENTURES OF EUCKLEBERR7 FINN. and yelled, but wo didn't wcur no boots, and didn't yell. Wo u as in the path to the mill ; and when they got pretty close onto us, we dodged into the bush and let them go by, and then dropped in behind them. They'd had all t!>o doga shut up, 80 they wouldn't scare off the robbers ; but by this time somebody had let them loose, and hero they come, making pow-wow enough for a million ; but they was our dog5 ; so we stopped in our tracks till they catched up ; and when they see iv warn't nobody but us, and no excitement to offer them, they only just suid howdy, and tore right ahead towards the shouting and clattering ; and theii we up steam again and whizzed along after them till we was nearly to the mill, and then struck up through the bush to where my canoo was tied, and hopped in and pulled for dear life towards the middle of the river, but didn't make no more noiao than we was oblceged to. Then wo struck out, easy and comfortable, for the island where my raft was ; and wo could hear them yelling and barking at each other all up and down the bank, till we was ho far away the bounds got dim and died out. And when we stepped onto the raft, I says : *'Now, old Jim, you're a free mau again, and I bet you won't ever bo a tslavo no more." " En a mighty good job it wuz, too, Iluck. It 'uz planned bcnutiful, en it 'uz done beautiful ; en dey ain't nobody kin git up a pkn dat's mo' mixed-up ca splendid den what dat one wuz." We was all as glad as we could bo, but Tom was the gladdest of all, becauso he had a bullet in the calf of his leg. When me and Jim heard that, we didn't feel so brash as what we did 'before. It was hurting him considerblc, and bleeding ; so vro laid him in the wigwam and tore up one of the duke's shirts for to bandage him, but he says : •'Gimme the rags, I can do it myself. Don't stop, nov/ ; don't fool around here, and the evasion booming along so handsome ; man the sweeps, and set her loose ! Boys, we done it elegant '.—'deed we did. I wish we'd a had tlie handling of Louis XVI., there wouldn't a been no ' Son of Saint Louis, ascend to heaven 1' wrote down in his biography : no, sir, we'd a whooped him over the border— that's what we'd a done with /a"w— and dune it just as slick as nothing at all, too. Man the sweeps— man the sweeps I " I <» JIM ADVISES A nor TOR. 846 But mo and Jim was consulting— f; nd thinking. And after we'd tliought a minute, I says : "Say it, Jim." So he says : ** Well, den, dis is de way it look to me, Huck. Ef it wuz liim dat 'uz bein' sot free, en one er de boys wuz to git shot, would ho say, 'Go on en save mc, uemminc 'bout a doctor f r to save dis one ? Is dat like Mara Tom Sawyer ? Would he say dat ? You bef, he wouldn't ! Well, don, is Jim gwyne to say it ? No, sah— I doan' budge a step out'u dis place, 'dout a dcior; not if it's forty year ! " I knowcd he was white inside, and I reckoned he'd say what he did Buy — so it was all right, now, and I told Tom I was agoing for a doctor, lie raised considerble row about it, but me and Jim stuck to it and wouldn't budge ; so he was for crawl- ing out and setting Hie raft loose himself ; but wo wouldn't let him. Then he give us a piece of his mind —but it didn't do no good. So when he see me getting the car^oe ready, he says : *' Well, then, if you're bound to go, I'll tell you the way to do, when you get to the village. Shut the door, and blindfold the doctor tight and fast, and make him swear to be silent as the grave, aad put a purse full of gold in his hand, and then take and lead him all around the back alleys and everywheres, in ilio dark, and then fetch him here in the cunoe, in a roundabout way amongst the islands. JIM ADVI8E8 A DOCTOR. to Brer Phelps, hifl own self. S'o, what do you think of it, Sister Hotchkiss, s'e ? think OLD KBS. UOTOHKnS. ♦ . SISTER BOTCHKISS. 351 o' what. Brer Phelps, s'l ? think o' that bed-leg sawed ofE that a way, s'e ? tUnh of it, s'l ? I lay it never sawed itself o% e'T— somebody sawed it, s'l ; that's my opinion, take it or leave it, it mayn't be no 'count, s'l, but sich as 't is, it's my opinion, s'l, 'n' if anybody k'n start a better one, s'l, let him do it, s'l, that's all. I says to Sister Dunlap, s'l " " Why, dog my cats, they must a ben a house-full o' niggers in there every night for four weeks, to a done all that work, Sister Phelps. Look at that shirt —every last inch of it kivored over with secret African writ'n done with blood I Must a ben a raft uv 'm at it right along, all the time, amost. Why, Id give two dollars to have it read to me ; 'n' as for the niggers that wrote it, I 'low I'd take 'n' lash 'm fll " *' People to help him, Brother Marples ! Well, I reuKon you'd tUnh so, if you'd a been in this house for a while back. Why, they've stole everything they could lay their hands on— and we a watching, all the time, mind you. They stole that shirt right off o' the line ! and as for that sheet they made the rag ladder out of ther' ain't no telling how many times they didn't steal that ; and flour, and candles, and candlesticks, and spoons, and the old warming-pan, and most a thousand things that I disremember, now, and my new calico dress ; and me, and Silas, and my Sid and Tom on the constant watch day mid night, as I was a tell- ing you, and not a one of us could catch hide nor hair, nor sight nor sound of them ; and here at the last minute, lo and behold you, they slides right in under our noses, and fools us, and not only fools iis but the Injun Territory robbers too, and actuly gets aioay with that nigger, safe and sound, and that with sixteen men and twenty-two dogs right on their very heels at that very time ! I tell you, it just bangs anything I ever heard of. Why, sperits couldn't a done better, and been no smarter. And I reckon they must a been sperits — because, you know our dogs, and ther' ain't no better ; well, them dogs never even got on the Irack of 'm, once ! You explain that to me, if you can ! — any of you ! " ** Well, it does beat " *' Laws alive, I never '* "So help me, I wouldn't a be ** ** ifott««- thievei as well m- — " 853 TEE ADVENTURES OF BWELEBERRT FINK " Groodnessgracionssakes, I'd a ben afeard to live in sich a " " 'Fraid to live ! — why, I was that scared I das'nt hardly go to bed, or get np, or lay down, or set down. Sister Ridgeway. Why, they'd steal the very— why, good- ness sakcs, you can guess what kind of a fluster I was in by the time midnight come, last night. I hope to gracious if I warn't afraid they'd steal some o' the family ! I was just to that pass, I didn't have no reasoning faculties no more. It looks foolish enough, now, in the day-time ; but I says to myself, there's my two poor boys asleep, 'way up stairs in that lonesome room, and I declare to good- ness I was that uneasy 't I crep' .'.p there and locked 'em in ! I did. And any- body would. Because, you know, when you get scared, that way, and it keeps run- ning on, and getting worse and worse, all the time, and your wits gets to addling, and you get to doing all sorts o' wild things, and by-and-by you think to your- self, spos'n / was a boy, and was away up there, and the door ain't locked, and you " She stopped, looking kind of wondering, and then she turned her head around slow, and when her eye lit on me— I got up and took a walk. Says I to myself, I can explain better how we come to not bo in that room this morning, if I go out to one side and study over it a little. So I done it. But I dasn't go fur, or she'd a sent for me. And when it was late in the day, the people all went, and then I come in and told her the noise and shooting waked up me and " Sid," and the door was locked, and we wanted to sec the fun, so wo went down the lightning-rod, and both of us got hurt a little, and we didn't never want to try ^7ia# no more. And then I went on and tc'dhor all what I told Uncle Silas before ; and then she said she'd forgive us, ani. maybe it was all right enough anyway, and about what a body might expect of boys, for all boys was a pretty harum-scarum lot, as fur as she could see ; and so, as long as no harm hadn't come of it, she judged she better put in her time being grateful wo was alive and well and she had us still, stead of fretting over what was past and done. Bo then she kissed me, and patted me on the head, and dropped into a kind of a brown study ; and pretty soon jumps up, and says : " Why, lawsamercy, it's most night, and Sid not come yet ! What has become of that boy ? " I see my chance ; so I skips up and says : I 4 t.' ftl \i\ W MUW f !py. i )i,l!li- ■iimw* |ip]|IU,(|«|il»l|.i|, jil • illTiVT' 8 ALLY IN TROUBLE. 353 " I'll run right up to town and get him," I says. " No you won't," she says. " You'll stay right wher' you are ; one's enough to be lost at a time. If he ain't here to supper, your uncle '11 go." Well, he warn't there to supper ; so right after supper uncle went. lie come back about ten, a little bit uneasy ; hadn't run across Tom's track. Aunt Sally was a good deal uneasy ; but Uncle Silas he said there warn't no occa- eion to be — boys will be boys, he said, and you'll see this one turn up in the morning, all sound and right. So she had to be satisfied. But she said she'd set up for him a while, anyway, and keep a light burning, so he could see it. And then when I went up to bed she come up with me and fetched her candle, and tucked me in, and mothered me so good I felt mean, and like I couldn't look her in the face ; and she set down on the bed and talked with me a long time, and said what a splendid boy Sid was, and didn't seem to want to ever stop talking about him ; and kept asking me every now and then, if I reckoned he could a got lost, or hurt, or maybe drownded, and might be laying at this minute, some- wheres, suffering or dead, and she not by him to help him, and so the tears would drip down, silent, and I would tell her that Sid was all right, and would be home in the morning, sure ; and she would squeeze my hand, or maybe kiss me, and tell me to say it again, and keep on saying it; because it done her good, and she was in so much trouble. And when she was going away, she looked down in my eyes, so steady and gentle, and says '-> "The door ain't going to be locked, Tom ; and there's the window and the rod ; but you'll be good, won^t you ? And you won't go ? For my sake." 83 y^/ JtXnur SALLT TALKS TO HCOK. •"'r J . I i MB ii i wwpillli I u 854 THE ADVENTURES OF nUCKLEBERRT FINN. Laws knows I vmnted to go, bad enough, to see about Tom, and wat* all intend- ing to go ; but after that, 1 wouldn't a went, not for kingdoms. But she was on my mind, and Ton; was on my mind ; so I slept very restless. Anii twice I went down the rod, aw:}- in the niglst, and slipped around front, and see her setting there by her candle in the wii dow with her eyes towards the road aud the tears in them ; and I wished I could d -» !?«,rxiethiag for her, but I couldn't, on!* to swear that I wouldn't never do nothji: to grieve her any more. And the third time, I waked up at dawn, and slid down, and s}ie was there yet, and her candle waa most out, and her old gray heaXD. w 354 ing aJ am rot coi Ai an 8h 856 THE ADVENTURES OF BUCELEBERR7 FTIfy. w "Oh, he's dead, he's dead, T know he's dead !" And Tom he turned his head a little, and muttered something or other, which showed he wam't in his riglit mind ; then she flung up her hands, and says : "He's alive, thank God ! And that's enough I » and she snatched a kiss of him, and flew for the house to get the bed ready, and scattering orders right and left at the niggers and everybody else, as fast as her tongue could go, every jump of the way. I followed the men to see what they was going to do with Jim ; and the old doctor and Uncle Silas followed after Tom into the house. The men was very huffy, and some of them wanted to hang Jim, for an example to all the other niggers around there, so they wouldn't be trying to run away, like Jim done, and making such a raft of trouble, and keeping a whole family scared most to death for days and nights. But the others said, don't do it, it wouldn't answer at all, he am't our nigger, and his owner would turn up and make us pay for him, sure. So that cooled them down a little, because the people that's always the most anxious for to hang a nigger that hain't done just right, is always the very ones that ain t the most anxious to pay for him when they've got their satisfaction out of him They cussed Jim considerble, though, and give him a cuff or two, side the head, once in a while, but Jim never said nothing, and he never let on to know me, and they took him to the same cabin, and put his own clothes on him and chained him again, and not to no bed-leg, this time, but to a big staple drove into the bottom log, and chained his hands, too, and both legs, and said he wam't to have nothing but bread and water to eat, after this, till his owner come or he was sold at auction, because he didn't come in a certain length of time, and filled up our hole, and said a couple of farmers with guns must stand watch around about the cabin every night, and a bull-dog tied to the door in the day-time • and about this time they was through with the job and was tapering off with a kind of generl good-bye cussing, and then the old doctor comes and takes a look, and Bays : "Don't be no rougher on him than you're obleeged to, because he ain't a bad nigger. When I got to where I found the boy, I see I couldn't cut the bullet out without some help, and he warn't in no condition for me to leave, to go and get A p other, which and says : ched a kiss of iers right and 0, every jump ; and the old nen was very ' all the other im done, and t to death for !ver at all, he m, sure. So most anxious aes that ain t •ut of him. ;wo, side the t on to know on him, and staple drove lid he warn't come or he le, and filled atch around ly-time ; and with a kind a look, and I ain't a bad le bullet out go and get I THE DOCTORS STORY. 357 help ; and he got a little worse and a little worse, and after a long time he went out of his head, and wouldn't let me come anigh him, any more, and said if I chalked his raft he'd kill me, and no end of wild foolishness like that, and I see I couldn't do anything at all with him ; so I says, I got to have help, somehow ; and the minute I says it, out crawls this nigger from somewheres, and says he'll help, and he done it, too, and done it very well. Of course I judged he must be a runaway nigger, and there I was ! and there I had to stick, right straight along all the rest of the day, and all night. It was a fix, I tell you ! I had a couple of patients with the chills, and of course I'd of liked to run up to town and see them, but I dasn't, because the nigger might get away, and then I'd be to blame ; and yet never a skiff come close enough for me to hail. So there I had to stick, plumb till daylight this morn- ing; and I never see a nigger that was a better nuss or faithf uller, and yet he was resking his freedom to do it, and was all tired out, too, and I see plain enough he'd been worked main hard, lately. I liked the nigger for that ; I tell you, gentlemen, a nigger like that is worth a thousand dollars-and kind treatment, too. I had every- thing I needed, and the boy was doing as well there as he would a done at home -better, maybe, because it was so quiet ; but there I was, with both of 'm on my hands ; and there I had to stick, till about dawn this morning ; then some men in a skiff come by, and as good luck would have it, the nigger was setting by the pallet with his head propped on his knees, sound asleep ; so I motioned them m, quiet, and they slipped up on him and grabbed him and tied him before he TBI DOCTOR 8FIAKI FOB JIM. 358 TEE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINK knowed what ho was about, and we never had no trouble. And the boy being in a kind of a flighty sleep, too, we muffled the oars nud hitclied the raft on, and towed her over very nico and quiet, and the niggo never made the least row nor said a word, from the start. He ain't no bad nigper, gentlemen ; that's what I think about him." Somebody says : *' Well, it sounds very good, doctor, I'm obleeged to Bay." Then the others softened up a little, too, and I was mighty thankful to that old doctor for doing Jim that good turn ; and I was glad it was according to my judgment of him, too ; because I thought he had a good heart in him and was a good man, the first time I see him. Then tliey all agrcod that Jim had acted Tery well, and was deserving to have some notice took of it, and reward. So every one of them promised, right out and hearty, that they wouldn't cuss him no more. Then they come out and locked him up. I hoped they was going to se? he could have one or two of the chains took off, becauc they was rotl i heavy, or could have meat and greens with his bread and water, but they didn't think of it, and I reckoned it wam't best for me to mix in, but I judged I'd get the doctor's yarn to Aunt Sally, somehow or other, as soon as I'd got through the breakers that was laying just ahead of me. Explanations, I mean, of how I forgot t' mention about Sid being shot, when I was telling ho^'^ him and me put in that dratted night ])addling around hunting the runaway ni^ ftr. But I had plenty time. Aunt Sally she stuck to the sick-room all day h ^ «' night ; and every time I see Uncle Silas mooning around, I dodged him. Next morning I heard Tom was a good deal better, and they said Aunt Sally was gone to get a nap. So I slips to the sick-room, and if I found him awake I reckoned we could put up a yarn for the family that would wash. But he was Bleeping, and sleeping very peaceful, too ; and pale, not fire-faced the way he was when he come. So I set down and laid for him to wake. In about a half an hour, Aunt Sally comes gliding in, and there I was, up a stump again I She mo- tioned me to be still, and set down by me, and begun to whisper, and said we could all be joyful now, because all the bymptoms wat; firit rate, and he'd been > I • w \ TOM CONFESSES. 859 Bleei)ing like i iiat for ever so long, and looking better and peacefuUer all the time, and ton to one he'd wake up in his right mind. So wo set there watching, and by-and-by ho stirs a bit, and opened his eyes Tery natural, and takes a look, and says : ' * Hello, why I'm uL home I How's that ? VVhere's the raft ? " " It's all right," I says "And Jim?" " The same," I says, but couldn't suj it pretty brash. But he never noticed, but says : " Good ! Splendid 1 Yow we're all right anu safe 1 Did you tell Aunty ? " 1 was going ( o say , hut she chipped in and says : About what, Sid ? " "Why, ubo' wu" the whole thing was done.'* *' What whuio thin, " Why, the whole thiu^ " -lere ain't but one ; how we set the runaway nig- ger free— me and Tom." ** Good ] =ud ! Set the run— What is the child talking about ! Dear, dear, out of his head again ! " **iVb, I ain't out of my head ; I know all what I'm talking about. W< fJid E 3t him free -me and Tom. We laid out to d ; it, and we done it. And W( ' jae It elegant, t' ^." He'd got a start, and she never checked him up, just set and fit ired and stared, and let him clip along, and I eee it warn't no use for me to put in. " Why, Aunty, it cost us a power of work — we-^ks of it- lOurs and hours, every nght, whilst you was a asleep. And we had to steal candles, and the sheet, and the snirt, and your dress, and e^ oons, and tin ^ ites, and case-knives, and the wf nino-pan, and the grindstone, a i flour, nd jusi > end of things, and you can't tlmk what work it was to m ike .tie saws, and pens, and inscriptions, and one thing or another, and you can' think half the fun t was. And we had to make up the i)ictuio8 of coffins and things, and nonMmous letters from the robbers, and get up and down the lightning-rod, anu dig tl hole into thn cabin, and make the rope-ladder and send it in coked up in a pic aiiu send in spo .1 ■ 4 i - t and things to woi'k ,th, in your apron jckct " f mmm 'J1L'1^....~~ . ■■«._: r 860 THE ADVENTURES OF BUCELEBERRT FINN. *' Mercy sakcs 1" 'und loud up the cabin with rats and snakes and so on, for company for Jim ; and then you kept Tom here so long with the butter in his hat that you come near spiling the whole business, because the men come before we was out of the cabin, and we had to rush, and they heard us and let drive at us, and I got my share, and we dodged out of the path and let them go by, and when the dogs come they warn't interested in us, but went for the most noise, and we got our canoe, and made for the raft, and was all safe, and Jim was u free man, and we done it all by ourselves, and wasn't it bully. Aunty ! " " Well, I never heard the likes of it in all my bom days ! So it was you, you little rapscallions, that's been making all this trouble, and turned everybody's wits clean inside out and scared us all most to death. I've as good a notion as ever I had in my life, to take it out o' you this very minute. To think, hero I've been, night after night, a— you just get well once, you young scamp, and I lay I'll tan the Old Harry out o' both o' ye ! " But Tom, he was so proud and joyful, he just couldn't hold in, and.his tongue just went it— she a-chipping in, and spitting fire all along, and both of them go- ing it at once, like a cat-convention ; and she sajs : " Well, you get all the enjoyment you can out of it now, for mind I tell you if I catch you meddling with him again " ** Meddling with who ? " Tom says, dropping his smile and looking surprised. " With who f Why, the runaway nigger, of course. Who'd you reckon ? '* Tom looks at me very grave, and says : " Tom, didn't you jnst tell me he was all right ? Hasn't he got away ? " " Him f " says Aunt . ^ally ; " the runaway nigger ? 'Deed he hasn't. They've got him back, safe and sound, and he's in that cabin again, on bread and water, and loaded down with chains, till lu .:> claimed or sold ! " Tom rose square up in bed, with his eye hot, and his nostrils opening and shutting like gills, and sings out to me : " They hain't no right to shut him up ! Shove ! — and don't yon lose a minute. Turn him loose ! he ain't noslave ; he's aa free as any creturthat walks this earthi" "What does the child mean ? " f t^ AVNT I'OLLT ARRIVES. 361 " I moan every word I say. Aunt Sully, and if somebody don't go, T'll go. I've knowed him all his life, and so haa Tom, there. Old Miss Watson died two months ago, and she was ashamed she ever was going to sell him down the river, and mid so ; and she set him free in her will." ** Then what on earth did yoti want to set him free for, seeing ho was al- ready free ? " " Well, that is a question, I must Bay ; and just like women 1 Why, I wanted the adven'ure of it ; and I'd a waded nock-deep in blood to — good- ness alive, \UNT Polly ! " If she wam't standing right there, just inside the door, looking us sweet and contented as an angel half-full of pie, I wish I may never ! Aunt Sally jump(3d for her, and most hugged the head off of her, and cried over her, and I found a good enough place for mo under the hod, for it was getting pretty sultry torus, seemed to mc. And I peeped out, and in a little while Tom's Aunt Polly shook herself loose and stood there looking across at Tom over her spec aclcs— kind of grinding him into the earth, you know. And then she says : " Yes, you better turn y'r head away— I would if I was you, Tom." " Oh, deary me ! " says Aunt Sally ; " is he changed so ? Why, that ain't Tom it's Sid ; Tom's— Tom's— why, where is Tom ? He was here a minute ago." " You moan whcre's Fuck i^'twn— that's what you mean ! I reckon I hain't raised such a scamp as n Tom all these years, not to know him when I see him. That would be a pretty howdy-do. Come out from underHhat bed, Huck Finn." So I done it. But not feeling brash. Aunt Sally she was one of the mixed-upest looking persons I over see ; except VM Ran iKinARit UP IN BED. r 862 THE ADVENTURES OF EUCKLEBEBBT FINN. one, and that was Uncle Silas, when he come in, and they told it all to him. It kind of made him drunk, as you may say, and he didn't know nothing at all the rest of the day, and preached a prayer-meeting sermon that night that give him a rattling ruputation, because the oldest man in the world couldn't a understood it. So Tom's Aunt Polly, she told all about who I was, and what ; and I had to up and tell how I was in such a tight place that when Mrs. Phelps took me for Tom Sawyer— she chipped in and says, " Oh, go on and call me Aunt Sally, I'm used to it, now, and 'tain't no need to change "—that when Aunt Sally took me for Tom Sawyer, I had to stand it— there warn't no other way, and I knowed he wouldn't mind, because it would be nuts for him, being a mystery, and he'd make an adventure out of it and be perfectly satisfied. And so it turned out, and he let on to be Sid, and made things as soft as he could for me. And his Aunt Polly she said Tom was right about old Miss Watson setting Jim free in her will ; and so, sure enough, Tom Sawyer had gone and took all that trouble and bother to set a free nigger free 1 and I couldn't ever undwstand, before, until that minute and that talk, how he could help a body set a nigger free, with his bringing-up. Well, Aunt Polly she said that when Aunt Sally wrote to her that Tom and Sid had come, all right and safe, she says to herself : " Look at that, now 1 I might haye expected it, letting him go off that way without anybody to watch him. So now I got to go and trapse all the way down the river, eleven hundred mile, and find out what that creetur'sup to, this time ; as long as I couldn't seem to get any answer out of you about it." "Why, I never heard nothing from you," aays Aunt Sally. "Well, I wonder ! Why, I wrote to you twice, to aak you what you could mean by Sid being here." was touc in n< anot that I just "BAKD out THK.J LETTEBB. 'HAND OUT THEM LETTERS." 363 "Well, I never got 'em, Sis." Aunt Polly, she turns around slow and severe, and says : "Yon, Tom!" " Well— w/m^ ? " he says, kind of pettish. " Don't you what me, you impudent thing — hand out them letters." "What letters?" " Tliem letters. I be bound, if I have to take aholt of you I'll " " They're in the trunk. There, now. And they're just the same as they was when I got them out of the office. I hain't looked into them, I hain't touched them. But I knowed they'd make trouble, and I thought if you wam't in no hurry, I'd " "Well, you do need skinning, there ain't no mistake about it. And I wrote another one to tell you I was coming ; and I spose he " " No, it come yesterday ; I hain't read it yet, but it's all right, I've got that one." I wanted to offer to bet two dollars she hadn't, but I reckone('i maybe it was just as safe to not to. So I never said uothing. Tb. >e. first time I catchecl Tom, pri- vate, I asked him what was hia idea, time of the evasion ? — Avhat it was he'd planned to do if the eva- eion worked all right and he man- aged to set a nigger free that was already free before ? And he said, what he had planned in his head, from the start, if we got Jim out all safe, was for us to run him down the river, on the raft, and have advent- ures plumb to the mouth of the river, and then tell him about hia being free, and take him back up home on a steamboat, in style, and pay him for his lost time, and write word ahead and get out all the nig- gers around, and have them waltz him into town with a torchlight procession and a brasr. band, and then he would be a hero, and so would we. IJut I reckened it was about as well the way it was. We had Jim out of the chains in no time, and when Aunt Polly and Uncle Silas and Aunt Sally found out how good he helped the doctor nurse Tom, they made a heap of fuss over him, and fixed him up prime, and give him all he wanted to eat, and a good time, and nothing to do. And we had him up to the OUT or BONBAOS. i\ liM 1 I 1 PAYINO THE CAPTIVE. 365 eick-room ; and had a high talk ; and Tom give Jim forty dollars for being prisoner for us so patient, and doing it up so good, and Jim was pleased most to death, and busted out, and says : ^' Dah, now, Huck, what I tell you ? — what I tell you up dah on Jackson islan' ? I tole you I got a hairy breas', en what's de sign un it ; en I tole you I ben rich wunst, en gwineter to be rich agin ; en it's come true ; en heah she is ! Dah, now I doan' talk to me — signs is sigvis, mine I tell you ; en I krowed jis' 's well 'at I 'uz '/ gwineter be rich agin as I's a stannin' heah dis ' minute 1 " And then Tom ho talked along, and talked along, and says, le's all three slide out of here, ( I one of these nights, and get an outfit, and go for howling adventures amongst the Injuns, over in the Territory, for a couple of weeks or two ; and I says, all right, ,liaf. suits me, but I aint got no money for to buy ,he outfit, and I reckon I couldn't get none from home, because it's likely pap's been back before now, and got it all away from Judge Thatcher and drunk it up. "No he hain't," Tom says; "it's all there, yet— six thousand dollars and i TOX'S LIBBRALITT. •^^"^"^ ,and your pap hain't ever been back since. Hadn't when I come away, r? ■^^emn ■'v) mo', Huck." "■«t.j\o mo'." see IBE ADYBmUBEB OF HmSLBSSBItT Fnm. oomo i. P Well, den, ,o„ k.„ ^, ,„. „„.„, ,,,„ ^„„ ^^^^ .^ ^ ^ ^^^ ^^ t.r ''°'"'' "™' «"' ■""'• »»d g»' h« bullet around his neok on a watoh-suarf for a watch, and . alwa,, seeing what time it is, and so there a,n't nothW m^^ to wnte abont, and I am rotten glad of it, because if I'd a kaowed what7t™b ! .t was to mate a book I wonidn-t a tackled it and ainft agoingTo nl m„ e b« I reckon I got to light out for the Tem'tory ahead of the It beeanse W « n ahe-s going to adopt me and si^li. me and I »n, stand it 'l CthtT^elt BWNl#>t -^ -^ write out all the nig- « *; u, and have them waltz ^nto town with a torchlight would be a hero, and so would we. ^ .1 vae way it was. uue chains in no time, and when Aunt Pollv and Uncle Silas and Aun^ oally found out how good he helped the doctor nurse Tom, they made a heap of fuss over him, and fixed him up prime, and give him all he wanted to eat, and a good time, and nothing tc do. And we had him up to the ^ M iat wuz l\\ i-guard ? more rouble But ; Sally lefore. 'r^ <<4