THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 GIFT OF 
 
 Hugo d e Bussi&res 
 
YANKEE 
 ENCHANT 
 MENTS 
 
TINKER 
 ENCHANT 
 MENTS 
 
 -\ by CHARLES 
 
 B ATT ELL LOO MIS 
 
 Pic- 
 
 tures 
 
 by 
 
 F. Y. 
 CORY 
 
 NEW YORK : McCLURE 
 PHILLIPS & CO. M C M 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1900 
 BY MCCLURE, PHILLIPS & Co. 
 
 GIFT 
 
TO MY CHILDREN, 
 BATTELL, ALFRED AND 
 
 JE872036 
 
PREFACE 
 
 Dear Children : 
 
 DO you think you can stand twenty 
 stories in a bunch ? Wouldn t 
 you better take them one at a 
 time ? I did not write them all at once, 
 so why should you read them all at once ? 
 
 I have tried to make them as true as 
 possible. I will not vouch for all the in 
 cidents, but the children are as true as I 
 could make them. 
 
 I dare say that there are some of you 
 who are too old for fairy stories, and if 
 that is the case I know you will pity me 
 who have been reading them for thirty 
 years and still want more. 
 
 But even though you may have passed 
 beyond the age of fairy tales you certainly 
 
PREFACE 
 
 have not outgrown your love for charming 
 pictures, and the book is full of them. I 
 wish I might have seen the illustrations 
 before I told the stories because then the 
 stories would have been twice as good. 
 
 Oh, by the way, you children who are 
 too old for the stories, won t you please 
 read them out loud to your father and 
 mother and show them the pictures ? 
 
 Tour sincere friend, 
 
 THE AUTHOR. 
 
A rAELE OF THE 
 CONTENTS 
 
 TITLE PAGE 
 
 THE GREEN BOY FROM "HARRAH" i 
 
 THE BEAR THAT BECAME A PRINCE 17 
 
 TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 31 
 
 THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS . 51 
 
 THE CROWS SINGING LESSON . 69 
 THE STRONGEST BOY IN THE 
 
 WHOLE WORLD ... 87 
 
 THE TOUCH OF GOLD ... 99 
 TARKUS AND THE IMITATION 
 
 LIQUID AIR . . . .115 
 AMINADAB SKELCH AND His FREE 
 
 LIBRARY . . . 131 
 
 OLIVER S THREE GIFTS . . 151 
 
 JIM AND THE GOLD SPIRIT . . 167 
 THE CAKE OF CHARITY . .181 
 THE BOY WHO MADE A TROLLEY 
 
 CAR igy 
 
 CYRIL AND THE GNOME . . 215 
 
 ix 
 
TITLE PAGE 
 THE BUBBLE BOY . . .231 
 THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS . . 247 
 THE TALE OF THE GOLDEN EGG 269 
 THE BOY WHO REQUIRED WIND 
 ING ..... 285 
 THE BOY WHO TURNED BOOKS 
 
 INTO FOOD .... 301 
 
 SYDNEY AND THE JAR FAIRY . 313 
 
THE GREEN BOY FROM 
 " H A R R A H " 
 
OH, how it rained ! And how the 
 wind blew ! Sandy McMichael 
 stood at the window of his bed 
 room, wondering whether there would be 
 another flood, and rather hoping that there 
 would be because he should like to see the 
 animals going in two by two. It had rained 
 for three days. He had read until he was 
 tired, he had played with his lead soldiers 
 until he had fought three Spanish wars 
 and had never lost an American, and now 
 
 3 
 
THE GREEN BOY FROM "HARRAH" 
 
 he was ripe for the fellowship of any kind 
 of boy. 
 
 He peered up into the sky at the large 
 drops that grew larger as they descended, 
 and wished that he might be a drop of rain 
 to have such a lovely long jump from the 
 clouds to the earth. It would be better 
 than jumping off the rafters in the barn. 
 Hullo ! there was a drop way up that 
 must be the great-grandfather of the rest. 
 How high it was and how it was growing ! 
 Sandy opened the window to watch it bet 
 ter, and the next minute a funny-look 
 ing little boy, with a skin as green as a 
 maple leaf in mid-summer, and wearing 
 a silken cloak of the color of old gold, 
 landed on his feet upon the carpet beside 
 Sandy. 
 
 " I ve done it at last," said he in a pip 
 ing voice that, while not unmusical, was 
 different from any that Sandy had ever 
 heard. 
 
THE GREEN BOY FROM "HARRAH" 
 
 " Where d you come from ? " Sandy 
 asked the little chap. 
 
 " From Harrah," was the reply. 
 
 He was just about Sandy s size, but more 
 slender, and his head was nearly twice as 
 big. His eyes were yellow, and shone like 
 electric lights. His hair was a lighter 
 shade of green than his body, and his lips 
 were straw color, uncanny-looking, and 
 yet not unhandsome; and he was decidedly 
 friendly, for he rubbed Sandy s cheeks with 
 his long slender hands and made a cooing 
 noise that evidently meant " I like you." 
 
 " Where s Harrah ? " asked Sandy; but 
 beyond pointing to the sky, the green boy 
 did not explain. Probably he had come 
 from a star and Harrah was what he called 
 it. It is unlikely that the people who live 
 in the stars know what we call them, and 
 if a man came from Mars and was asked : 
 " Well, how did you leave the folks at 
 Mars ? " he wouldn t understand, and 
 
 5 
 
THE GREEN BOY FROM " H A R R A H 
 
 indeed might answer : " All well, includ 
 ing Ma." 
 
 Sandy, who always took things as they 
 came, said : " Let s play checkers." 
 
 " All right," said the green boy, who 
 certainly spoke good every-day English, 
 although he had what was evidently a 
 Harrahian accent. 
 
 " Oh, dear," said the little visitor sud 
 denly, " I forgot to eat my history lesson 
 before I came down, and if I don t know 
 it to-morrow, my teacher will make me eat 
 more geography than is good for me, just 
 to punish me. Have you a history cake 
 anywhere around ?" 
 
 " A wh-a-at ? " asked Sandy in amaze 
 ment. 
 
 " A history cake. What do you call 
 them ? How would you learn your his 
 tory lesson ? " 
 
 " By studying so hard it would make 
 me hate it," answered Sandy promptly. 
 
 6 
 
He was just taking up Greek history and 
 lost all the good marks that American his 
 tory had earned for him just because he 
 wasn t interested in what a lot of dead 
 Greeks had done. 
 
 " How funny ! " said the green boy. 
 " But I supposed that things would be 
 different up here." 
 
 " You mean down here," said Sandy. 
 
 " No, I don t," said the green boy, 
 suddenly leaping up three feet and sitting 
 in mid air as easily as if he were on a seat. 
 " I came up here from down there," point 
 ing to the sky, " and we learn things down 
 there by eating them. We have a speller 
 that is ten cakes, and a bite is a lesson. 
 There are about a hundred bites to a cake, 
 and when you ve eaten all the cakes, you 
 know how to spell." 
 
 " Oh, don t I wish that I could learn 
 my lessons that way ! Say, what is your 
 name ? " 
 
" Jorroel," said the green boy. 
 
 " Mine is Sandy. Say, Jorroel, how do 
 you sit that way on nothing ? " 
 
 " Why, I make up my mind to do it, 
 and then it comes easy. Down in Harrah 
 we can do whatever we make up our 
 minds to do." 
 
 " But, say/ said Sandy, " do you like 
 to eat those cakes ? " 
 
 " Of course. Our parents think that it 
 is best for us to learn all we can about 
 spelling and reading and typewriting and 
 arithmetic and this far distant planet that 
 lights our night, and so they make the 
 cakes as nice as they can be so that we ll 
 like to learn things. I think that history 
 cake is the best of the lot, because it s so 
 nice and sour; but grammar cake I don t 
 much like, because it s sweet, and boys 
 don t like sweet things." 
 
 " Oh, don t they though ? We earthly 
 boys do. But, say, can t you take me up, 
 
THE GREEN BOY FROM "HARRAH" 
 
 or down, to Harrah and bring me back 
 before bedtime ? " 
 
 u Why, I can if you don t weigh more 
 than fifty pounds. I can make up my 
 mind to go back to Harrah and take you 
 on my back if you re under fifty in weight. 
 If you weigh more than that I can t budge 
 you." 
 
 tc I weigh forty-seven," said Sandy. 
 
 tc Then get on my back," said Jorroel, 
 jumping down from his invisible perch. 
 
 Sandy did so, and then Jorroel climbed 
 up on the window ledge and made up his 
 mind as hard as he could to go back to 
 Harrah. 
 
 The next minute they were rushing 
 through the air at a speed that would have 
 made the Empire State Express turn as 
 green, through envy, as Jorroel was. It 
 may have been five minutes, but it didn t 
 seem more than that many seconds, before 
 they landed at Harrah, in the midst of 
 
 9 
 
an undulating meadow of lovely pink 
 grass. Beautiful butterflies, that flamed 
 like different colored lights and that sang 
 more sweetly than nightingales, flew round 
 and round in circles, until Sandy felt dizzy 
 and said so. Then they turned and flew 
 the other way. He soon found out that 
 this thoughtfulness of other s feelings 
 characterized every living thing in Har- 
 rah, which he imagined to be Mars, al 
 though he had no means of knowing. 
 All around them globular dwellings full 
 of windows floated in the air, and Jorroel 
 told him that this was his native town and 
 was called " Jarratol." 
 
 " Want to see where you came from ? >: 
 he asked Sandy. 
 
 " Sure," said Sandy. I am sorry to say 
 that he had several slang phrases that he 
 would be glad to drop when he grew older 
 and found how burr-like they were and as 
 useless as burrs, too. 
 
" You can wait until night and look at 
 it through a faralan. It s as yellow as my 
 lips. Say, you must be hungry after your 
 long ride. Come up to our house and 
 read some dinner." 
 
 " Read it ! " said Sandy. " You mean 
 eat it." 
 
 Jorroel burst into a shrill laugh that 
 sounded like the noise of a katydid. 
 " We eat what we want to learn," said he, 
 " but we read to keep ourselves from 
 starving. What ll you read ? " 
 
 " Some candy and pie," said Sandy at a 
 venture. 
 
 " That s a good choice, I think. Come 
 up, and we ll get them." 
 
 A few feet above where they were stand 
 ing was a round house, not unlike a bubble, 
 and like a bubble it floated hither and 
 thither, not being fastened to the ground, 
 and yet not going very far in any direc 
 tion. Jorroel explained that the ground 
 
THE GREEN BOY FROM "HARRAH" 
 
 was so fertile that they did not like to 
 waste it by using it to set houses upon, 
 .so the houses were all built in the air. 
 Sandy found that he could walk up on 
 the air to it as easily as he could tread 
 solid ground on the earth, and he ac 
 companied his friend to it. A pretty, 
 green woman, not much bigger than 
 Jorroel, and wearing a cloak made of a 
 crimson, cob-webby stuff, sat at a table 
 reading a book. 
 
 " Mamma, I ve been to Sush at last. I 
 knew I could do it if I made up my mind 
 hard enough. And I ve brought back a 
 little boy from there, and he s hungry and 
 wants to read some dinner." 
 
 Jorroel s mother came over and rubbed 
 Sandy s cheeks, which seemed to be the 
 Harrahian way of saluting one. Then 
 she said, without being surprised that he 
 had come so far : 
 
 " You must be hungry. Read whatever 
 
you want. You ll find the books on the 
 shelf there." 
 
 Sandy stepped over to a book-case and 
 saw a number of books in English. One 
 said <c Roast Beef/ another said " Lemon 
 Pie/ another was marked " Potatoes/ and 
 others bore names that he had never heard 
 of before and were probably those of foods 
 that were peculiar to Harrah. The one 
 marked " Lemon Pie " told how lemon 
 pie was made, who invented it, and so on ; 
 and by the time Sandy had finished the 
 account he felt just the same as if he had 
 eaten a pie, but with this important differ 
 ence he hadn t had the fun of eating it. 
 After lemon pie one doesn t care much 
 about roast beef, so Sandy didn t read any 
 of that. 
 
 It was growing dark. Sandy glanced 
 out of the window and saw the earth just 
 rising and flooding Harrah with lovely 
 earth-light. 
 
" That s where I came from, isn t it ? " 
 he asked. 
 
 " Yes," answered Jorroel, going to a 
 closet and getting out a faralan. 
 
 " We call it the earth," said Sandy, 
 " but I suppose it s your moon ? " 
 
 " Yes," said Jorroel s mother, " but we 
 call your earth Sush." 
 
 Jorroel handed him the faralan, which 
 was much like a telescope, and he found 
 that he could see New York through it. 
 
 " Now, if you want to learn something," 
 said Jorroel s mother, " you might eat 
 some arithmetic that always comes in 
 handy in any planet. Jorroel, get him 
 the multiplication table up to five. I don t 
 believe he knows it very well if he s 
 anything like you." 
 
 Jorroel went to the closet and returned 
 in a moment with four sticks of what 
 looked like candy to Sandy s earthly eyes. 
 He found that they were sour, yet not 
 
unpleasant, but not a bit like candy. 
 When he had eaten the last one, he knew 
 his tables up to five. 
 
 " I really think I must be going. 
 Mamma will worry/ said he. 
 
 " I guess you can find your way back 
 alone," said Jorroel. " Go just as you 
 came, by the Milky Way. And come and 
 see us often. I ll show you lots of things 
 you never saw before, and I d like you to 
 pay us a long visit if your mother doesn t 
 object." 
 
 " Yes," said the mother kindly, and 
 then she rubbed his cheeks again, and he 
 followed Jorroel out doors, or rather out 
 windows, because they don t have doors 
 in Harrah. Jorroel took Sandy by the 
 ankles and hurled him by main strength 
 toward the rising earth, and a few moments 
 of rushing space brought the boy to his 
 window-sill just as his dinner bell was 
 ringing. He was so hungry after his trip 
 5 
 
THE GREEN BOY FROM "HARRAH" 
 
 that he was very glad to think that he 
 would eat, and not read, dinner. On the 
 way down stairs he asked himself how 
 much four times four were, but he couldn t 
 remember ; and by the time he had been 
 helped to everything eatable on the table 
 his trip to Harrah was so hazy and dream 
 like that he said nothing to his parents 
 about it. But he hoped that, if it was a 
 dream, he would dream some more about it. 
 
THE BEAR THAT BECAME 
 A PRINCE 
 
HARRY ST. CLAIR was out 
 walking with his cousin, Joe Gil 
 bert. Joe was two years older 
 than Harry, who was twelve ; but they 
 loved to take walks together because both 
 were interested in botany. Now, don t 
 put the book down and say, " No, thanks ; 
 I ll learn about that when it comes in 
 my school course." Botany is extremely 
 interesting, and I notice that people who 
 take it up seldom drop it; but I never 
 
 9 
 
THE BEAR THAT BECAME A PRINCE 
 
 took it up, so you ve nothing to fear 
 from me. 
 
 Harry lives on Staten Island, not far 
 from New Brighton, and he was one of 
 the first boys to see the " Raleigh" when 
 she came back from Manila. In fact, it was 
 the day after his walk with Joe that she 
 came through the Narrows. But that 
 hasn t anything to do with botany either. 
 
 The two boys walked inland, hunting 
 for specimens of the name escapes me, so 
 you see I m not trying to give you a bot 
 any pill at all. In the course of their 
 walk they came upon a performing bear 
 that was dancing to the music of a hand- 
 organ in the hands of a weather-beaten old 
 Italian. Now, as it happened, Harry had 
 been reading about the prince that was 
 turned into a bear I ve forgotten the 
 title of the tale and he turned and said 
 to Joe, " I wonder if that bear was ever a 
 prince ? " 
 
 20 
 
THE BEAR THAT BECAME A PRINCE 
 
 The bear turned his poor, old, bleared 
 eyes at him, and said, in a muffled voice : 
 
 " Standing here I supplicate, 
 Save me from my dreadful fate." 
 
 Harry rubbed his ears, and again the 
 bear said the same words : 
 
 u Standing here I supplicate, 
 Save me from my dreadful fate." 
 
 Harry was delighted that the bear should 
 have enough confidence in him to ask to 
 be saved, and he said : " Are you a 
 prince ? " 
 
 " I am indeed/ said the bear. " I be 
 long to the royal family of England, and I 
 was turned into a bear to satisfy the grudge 
 of an anarchist. Save me, and grandma 
 will never forget it." 
 
 Harry didn t realize who " grandma " 
 was, although her picture is on millions of 
 coins all over the world. He looked at 
 Joe and then at the organ-grinder. Either 
 
THE BEAR THAT BECAME A PRINCE 
 
 they had not heard, or else they could not 
 understand bear talk. Joe was picking a 
 dandelion, or maybe it was a daisy. I can 
 never tell them apart. I wish I had stud 
 ied botany. Harry gave five cents to 
 the organ-grinder, and said to the bear in 
 an undertone : 
 
 " How can I save you ? " 
 
 " Take your jack-knife and rip my hide 
 down the back, and then wish me back to 
 my former estate. You believe in fairies, 
 and all that sort of thing, don t you ? " 
 
 Now, up to that minute, Harry had not 
 really believed in anything of the sort. 
 He had read the blue fairy book and the 
 red one and Grimm s and Andersen s, but 
 he had supposed they were only meant to 
 amuse one as a sort of antidote to school 
 books but I leave it to you if you 
 wouldn t believe a thoroughly respectable 
 bear who confided his woes to you in per 
 fectly good English ? 
 
THE BEAR THAT BECAME A PRINCE 
 
 " What will the organ-grinder say ? " 
 said Harry. He was a thoughtful boy, 
 and he knew that the bear was of great 
 value to the man ; but after all a right is a 
 right and a wrong is a wrong, and it 
 couldn t be right to keep a prince in such 
 a dusty bear s skin, even if releasing him 
 did ruin the poor Italian. 
 
 " Don t worry about him," said the bear. 
 " He has made a fortune out of me, and 
 as you see, he doesn t give me enough to 
 eat, and often he beats me when it is rainy 
 and business is poor ; so I don t think you 
 need worry on his account." 
 
 Harry s last scruples vanished. The 
 organ-grinder was bent over his organ, 
 changing the tune. Joe was climbing a 
 bank after some red buttercups, and Harry 
 whipped out his knife and opened it in a 
 jiffy, and with as firm a hand as he could 
 master, he ripped the bear s hide down the 
 back, and a young, handsome boy stood 
 23 
 
THE BEAR THAT BECAME A PRINCE 
 
 before him. He was not dressed like a 
 fairy-story prince, because real princes 
 don t dress that way, except at private the 
 atricals ; but he was attired in a modish 
 suit that was becoming and in good taste, 
 and Harry took a liking to him as soon as 
 he saw him. 
 
 When the Italian looked up and saw the 
 young man, he gave a shriek, and then 
 crossed himself. Then he slung his organ 
 over his shoulder and ran off in the direc 
 tion of New Brighton. 
 
 Harry called to Joe, but he had disap 
 peared. He was a very enthusiastic bo 
 tanist, and probably he had found a new 
 breed of violets or something or other, and 
 was busy analyzing them. 
 
 Harry didn t waste any time looking for 
 Joe. He was anxious to do something for 
 the prince at once. He really hadn t bet 
 tered his condition much, because as a bear 
 he was supported by the Italian, but as a 
 24 
 
THE BEAR THAT BECAME A PRINCE 
 
 prince he had only a few coins that had 
 happened to be in his pocket when he was 
 changed into a bear a few months pre 
 vious. 
 
 " Did you say that you were related to 
 Queen Victoria ? " asked Harry. 
 
 " She s my grandma," said the boy, 
 simply. 
 
 " Well, I guess my father can get you 
 home to your folks all right. He has a 
 good deal of influence. He s a lawyer. 
 I know he ll be willing to telegraph over 
 to your grandmother that you have stopped 
 being a bear, and she ll probably send you 
 a ticket home. And I guess you can visit 
 us until she does." 
 
 They walked toward Harry s house, 
 which was about a mile away. Suddenly 
 Harry wheeled around. " Say," said he, 
 " it would be bully fun to send that mes 
 sage ourselves. We can send it collect. 
 Your grandma won t mind, will she ?" 
 
THE BEAR THAT BECAME A PRINCE 
 
 The prince looked a little dubious. " I 
 suppose not," he said. "You see, my 
 name will make it a little expensive." 
 
 " Why, what s your name ? " asked 
 Harry. 
 
 " Edward Albert Patrick Alfred Athel- 
 stan Victor George Alexander Oscar 
 Humbert Nicholas of Wales." 
 
 "Phe-ew!" whistled Harry. "And 
 what do they call you for short ? " 
 
 " Tot." 
 
 " Oh, what a name for a boy ! " shouted 
 Harry, and then, as he saw the prince 
 color, he said : " Oh, I didn t mean 
 anything; but you aren t a tot, you 
 know?" 
 
 And he wasn t a tot by any means, for 
 he was over five feet tall. 
 
 " Well, we ll go over to the telegraph 
 office at New Brighton and let em know 
 you re all right. I guess it won t break 
 your grandmother." 
 
 26 
 
THE BEAR THAT BECAME A PRINCE 
 
 The prince was immensely pleased to 
 think that he was going home so soon. 
 He had been homesick even as a bear, and 
 now that he was a boy again, he was wild 
 to meet his mother and father and sisters 
 and his grandmother. 
 
 Harry and he swapped experiences on 
 their way to the telegraph office, and the 
 former was surprised to learn that the 
 prince had led a good deal of a boy s life 
 after all. He had supposed that no one 
 could speak to a prince in England with 
 out getting down on his knees, but this 
 one might be his schoolmate for all the 
 airs he had. 
 
 Harry wrote the message, and spoiled 
 five blanks in doing it. The prince was 
 glad to leave it to him. The sixth trial was 
 successful, and the cablegram read : 
 " Prince Edward Albert Patrick Alfred 
 Athelstan Victor George Alexander Oscar 
 Humbert Nicholas of Wales has been 
 27 
 
THE BEAR THAT BECAME A PRINCE 
 
 turned into a boy again. Send money for 
 his return. Collect. Answer. 
 
 " HARRY." 
 
 " I was afraid to use c Tot,* because it 
 didn t seem to give enough facts. But 
 your name is a regulyer of a railroad train, 
 and they ll know it must be you when 
 they see it," said Harry. 
 
 He addressed the message to " Queen 
 Victoria, London, England." 
 
 " The operator there has probably heard 
 of her," said Harry, smiling. 
 
 The operator never raised an eyebrow 
 when he took the message. Maybe he 
 thought it was in cypher. Maybe he 
 didn t care what it was. 
 
 The message sent, the boys sat down to 
 wait for an answer, and while they were 
 talking together, a hand-organ outside the 
 door struck up " God Save the Queen." 
 At the first tones the prince stepped to the 
 28 
 
THE BEAR THAT BECAME A PRINCE 
 
 door. The organ-grinder was facing the 
 doorway, and he recognized the prince in 
 an instant. It was our old friend, who 
 had decided to stay in the vicinity awhile, 
 in hopes of recovering his bear. As soon 
 as he saw the prince, he said something in 
 Italian and made a pass at him and that 
 I should have to tell it ! the prince turned 
 into a snuffy, dusty, blear-eyed, common 
 place old bear in an instant, and suffered 
 himself to be led away in the direction of 
 the ferry to New York. 
 
 Harry did not notice his absence till he 
 was out of sight, and then, although he 
 traced him to the ferry-boat, he lost him 
 because the boat had gone. 
 
 If any of you who read this see a 
 swarthy Italian with a scar on his right 
 cheek and a fierce black moustache, and if 
 he has a hand-organ and a tired-looking 
 bear, that bear is the prince. 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN 
 HOLIDAYS 
 
IT would have been easy to discover 
 good qualities in Tod Pendleton. 
 He was kind-hearted and brave and 
 good-humored, but he was also greedy. As 
 an illustration of this latter quality let me 
 tell an incident connected with his boyhood 
 that my grandfather told me. Years ago 
 there was a kind of candy known as the 
 "Jackson ball." It was as large around as 
 a crab-apple and as hard as a stone pave 
 ment is when you fall headlong on it. Well, 
 
 33 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 one day Timotheus Pauncefort found a cent 
 in the road, and, as he was a most generous 
 little fellow, he immediately invited Tod 
 to go with him to the little candy-store on 
 the corner, and he d treat him to what 
 ever he wanted. Most boys would have 
 chosen taffy as being easy to divide ; but 
 Tod, never thinking about Timotheus, 
 said he guessed he d take a Jackson ball, 
 and Timotheus bought one they came 
 one for a cent. But, as there is no way 
 to dispose of them but to suck them to 
 their dissolution, Timotheus didn t get a 
 taste. They came out of the candy-store 
 two happy boys Timotheus happy be 
 cause he had provided a feast for his 
 friend, and Tod happy because it had 
 been provided without costing him any 
 thing. 
 
 It was when Tod was eleven years old 
 that his greed caused trouble to the whole 
 of the United States on two very import- 
 
 34 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 ant days. Just what year it was, I cannot 
 say, but your great-grandfather may re 
 member. His parents took him to a bal 
 loon ascension at Rockeford Park, a place 
 where they hold fairs and poultry-shows 
 every fall. 
 
 It is not for me to say how he managed 
 to do it. I don t think he was ever clear 
 in his own mind how it came about, but it 
 is a well-known fact that when you cut 
 the rope that holds a balloon to the earth, 
 that balloon is going to escape if it has a 
 spark of animation. I suppose the bal 
 loonist had gone to lunch ; but wherever he 
 was, he was not in the balloon when Tod 
 stepped into the basket to see how the 
 old thing worked ; and as Tod was a per 
 fectly fearless and reckless boy, he did not 
 think of the moral or physical consequen 
 ces, but simply sawed away at the rope 
 with his jack-knife until the balloon sprang 
 up like a lark from its nest in the meadow, 
 
 35 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 and was soon out of hearing of the angry 
 owner. 
 
 My grandfather told me that the farm 
 er s horse began to cut up just as Tom 
 was severing the rope, and that that drew 
 away the attention of the sight-seers. Cer 
 tainly there never was a madder man than 
 the owner of that balloon, and he called 
 the bystanders all sorts of names for not 
 interfering to save his precious balloon. 
 
 As for Tod, he was tickled to death. 
 He waved farewell to the crowds below, 
 sang snatches of songs, and sat on the 
 edge of the basket with his legs dangling 
 over until his mother fainted ; then, as he 
 happened to see her, he drew in his legs: 
 he did not like to occasion unnecessary 
 pain. 
 
 After he had been in the balloon some 
 
 ten hours, and had sailed I don t know 
 
 how many miles, he became very hungry, 
 
 and, seeing land a quarter of a mile above 
 
 3 6 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 him, he decided to leave the balloon and 
 take a short walk for exercise if he could 
 fasten his anchor anywhere. The bal 
 loonist had placed an emergency anchor in 
 the balloon, and if he hadn t, no one would 
 ever have heard of Tod again so my 
 grandfather said. 
 
 He was now some three hundred miles 
 above the earth, higher than any man of 
 science has ever been, and yet he did not 
 feel cold, nor bleed at the ears, nor do 
 any of those unpleasant things that aero 
 nauts seem to consider so necessary. 
 
 That there should be land up in the air 
 struck him as odd at first, and then he re 
 flected that there were many things con 
 nected with the heavens that he knew 
 nothing about, and this land was undoubt 
 edly one of them. 
 
 As he sped past a little cape of land 
 that jutted out into the air, he was able to 
 throw the anchor into a tree, and a mo- 
 
 37 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 ment later the balloon was captive, and 
 he was sliding down the rope to what 
 looked like solid earth. But it was not 
 as solid as it looked. In fact, it was 
 a cloud, and if a handsome little boy, 
 clad in what looked like an autumn 
 sunset, had not stretched out his hand 
 and caught him, Tod would have had a 
 bad fall. 
 
 " Here, drink this, and you ll be able 
 to walk without sinking," said the little 
 stranger. He handed a golden cup to 
 Tod as he spoke, and Tod was only too 
 glad to drink, for he was thirsty after 
 his joo-mile flight. The liquid tasted 
 like all the kinds of soda, water you ever 
 heard of, poured into one glass and flav 
 ored with essence of orange flower. As 
 soon as Tod had drunk it he felt as light 
 as a feather, and walked on the cloud as if 
 it had been terra firma, which, my grand 
 father told me, is Latin for solid ground. 
 38 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 Ask your teacher whether the old gentle 
 man was right. 
 
 "What s the name of this place, and 
 how far is it to the earth, and what s your 
 name, and what do you do up here, and 
 where can I get such a pretty suit? It 
 looks like the view from our verandah 
 when the sun is going down." 
 
 " I can tell you re from the earth by 
 the questions you ask," said the other 
 boy, laughing. He was such a pretty fel 
 low ; very much like the Cupids on val 
 entines. 
 
 " Well, I d never learn anything if I 
 didn t ask questions. Where do you live, 
 and why don t you fall through ? " 
 
 " I m the child of sunset. But say, you 
 haven t learned anything so far by asking 
 questions, for you don t wait for the 
 answers. You only ask to keep your 
 tongue from getting lazy." 
 
 Tod laughed and said : 
 
 39 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 " I bet I can beat you running," 
 " I guess not," said the Sunset Boy, 
 and with that both of them began to run 
 as hard as they could; but, although Tod s 
 feet hardly touched the ground, so easily 
 did he move through cloudland, yet the 
 other boy moved twice as fast, and soon 
 vanished behind a high wall that sur 
 rounded a huge castle that looked like 
 those cloud palaces that rear themselves 
 on June days when you are lying on 
 your back out in the fields and wish 
 ing that the long vacation would begin. 
 It was snowy white, and had towers 
 and minarets, and the wall of salmon 
 pink that surrounded it changed its shape 
 continually. 
 
 While Tod was wondering what castle 
 it was, and whether any giants lived within 
 it, a tall warrior, who looked exactly as if 
 he was fashioned out of a silver cloud, 
 with little flashes of opalescent fire run- 
 4 o 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 ning through him, came to an opening in 
 the wall, and said : 
 
 " What is your name, Earth Boy, and 
 why have you come to the storehouse of 
 the holidays ? " 
 
 Before Tod could answer, his friend, 
 the Sunset Boy, popped out from behind 
 tile wall and said : 
 
 u He s all right. He can run half as 
 fast as I can." 
 
 The warrior seemed astonished. " Why, 
 that is impossible. No one in cloudland 
 can run a quarter as fast as you/ 
 
 " Well, he did. I leave it to him if he 
 didn t. And he s hungry, and he wants 
 to know everything. And say " this in 
 a lower tone " can t you give him seven 
 or eight holidays ? We have such a lot. * 
 
 " But," said the warrior, who all this 
 time had been changing his shape like an 
 April cloud and was by turns a Polar 
 bear, a Hubbard squash, a hippopotamus, 
 
 4 1 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 a load of hay, and an apple tree, " there are 
 just so many holidays. If I let him have 
 some, the earth folk will have to do with 
 out them." 
 
 Tod now spoke up : 
 
 " Say, my father says he wishes there 
 were no such things as holidays. He s so 
 used to working that he never knows 
 what to do on a holiday, and he gets aw 
 ful cross, and he s always glad when night 
 comes. Last Christmas he said he wished 
 Christmas had never been discovered." 
 
 " Well," said the warrior, who now 
 looked like the map of France, and a mo 
 ment later like a teapot, " if that s the case, 
 you can have all the holidays you want. 
 I thought people prized them down 
 there." 
 
 "No, indeed," said Tod. "Why, 
 teacher says they de-de-demoralize the 
 boys and we never do as well the day 
 after a holiday." 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 " Come inside, then, and help yourself. 
 What days do you want ? " 
 
 Tod stepped into the cloud palace, and 
 found himself in the midst of banks of 
 such beautiful colors as you never saw, 
 even when the sun was doing his prettiest 
 bounding billows of purple and saffron 
 and green and crimson and violet. Tod 
 was only a boy, and boys don t go in for 
 that sort of thing very much, but he told 
 his mother afterward that it was all so 
 gorgeous that it made him feel like 
 crying. 
 
 " Take a header into the midst of them, 
 and you ll reach the room where the 
 Christmases are stored." 
 
 Tod dived, and a moment later found 
 himself in a room filled to overflowing 
 with Christmas presents and Christmas 
 trees and Christmas horns and sleigh-bells 
 and yards upon yards of good will. 
 
 " Now," said his guide, who had be- 
 
 43 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 come another being like the Sunset Boy, 
 only older, " take your choice. You can 
 have one Christmas or one Fourth, but 
 you can t have more than one at once. 
 In the next room are Lincoln days, and 
 the room next to that is filled with Grant 
 days." 
 
 " What s a Grant day ? " asked Tod. 
 
 " Oh, that s a holiday that they haven t 
 begun to use yet, but when they do, they ll 
 find me prepared." 
 
 Tod thought he d like one Christmas, 
 and he had no sooner expressed the wish 
 than he found himself and the Sunset 
 Boy on a cloud by themselves surrounded 
 with all the Christmas presents that a boy 
 ever wished for guns, pistols, marbles, 
 books, skates, baseball bats, footballs, 
 fencing foils, double rippers, wheels, ko 
 daks, and a big hand-organ with a grin 
 ning monkey sitting on it; and candy 
 and fruit until you d think of a doctor. 
 
 44 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 He told the Sunset Boy to pitch in, and 
 all that day he ate and read and rode and 
 shot holes in distant clouds, and took 
 snap-shots of the Sunset Boy, and taught 
 him how to box, and by nightfall was the 
 tiredest boy who ever visited a cloud. 
 He had had enough Christmas to last 
 him three years. 
 
 The next morning he woke up in the 
 Fourth of July room, and he wanted to 
 turn over and go to sleep ; but the warrior 
 said that he must choose a holiday, as long 
 as he had been so keen for it. So he 
 chose the Fourth because the warrior had 
 pulled one out of place and he didn t 
 want to disoblige him. 
 
 At sight of the heaps of firecrackers 
 and Union torpedoes and grasshoppers 
 and fiery dragons and cannons, his enthu 
 siasm returned ; and when he found him 
 self with the Sunset Boy on a new cloud 
 with nothing to remind him of Christmas 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 on it, he set out to have fun. But the 
 premature discharge of a bunch of cannon 
 crackers set fire to the cloud on which 
 they were sailing, and when the Sunset 
 Boy had put out the fire with a rain cloud, 
 he found that all the firecrackers were 
 wet, and so the morning was not as noisy 
 as you might have supposed it would be. 
 In the evening Tod did thoroughly enjoy 
 himself. Every set piece you ever heard 
 of was there, and he and the Sunset Boy 
 hung them on the edge of a great bank of 
 clouds that looked portentous and lower 
 ing until it was lighted up, and then it 
 resembled fairyland. One million rockets 
 going off at once make a spectacle that 
 you don t see every day in the year, and 
 there were long articles in the earth papers 
 the day after, telling about the shooting 
 stars that had come ahead of time. But 
 the astronomers were able to give good 
 reasons for their appearance, and not a 
 4 6 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 soul imagined that Tod was at the bot 
 tom, or rather the top, of the display. 
 
 The morning after the Fourth, Tod had 
 a splitting headache, and said he was sick 
 of holidays, and he d like to go down to 
 earth. His two friends bade him good-by, 
 and he stepped into the basket of the bal 
 loon, and thanks to a little help from a 
 heavy wind cloud that he fastened under 
 the basket, he reached the earth in a few 
 minutes, and in the midst of a terrific 
 wind storm. 
 
 When the third of July came the next 
 month, it found people everywhere mak 
 ing preparations for the celebration of the 
 Fourth, but greedy Tod had already cele 
 brated it up in cloudland, and there was 
 no Fourth. People everywhere slept 
 through that day, and there were some 
 who would have blessed Tod, but the 
 small boys were furious. They could not 
 explain it. They went to bed with all 
 
 47 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 their ammunition within reach, and when 
 they woke up they realized that somehow 
 the Fourth had come and gone and they 
 hadn t fired a shot and yet the ammuni 
 tion had all disappeared. 
 
 Tod slept with the rest. But when the 
 Christmas season came along, he hoped 
 that he could celebrate it. His adven 
 ture was now six months back, and six 
 months in a boy s life are a good deal 
 more than half a year. He made his 
 preparations for Christmas as usual, in 
 common with all the rest of the boys, who 
 make much of the great holiday, but it 
 was all to no purpose. As your grand 
 parents may have told you, everybody 
 slept over the glad season and woke the 
 day after with much better digestions, but 
 deeply regretting that they had lost a 
 Christmas that they could never regain. 
 And Tod felt worse than anybody else, 
 and realized what a pig he had been. He 
 4 8 
 
TOD AND THE STOLEN HOLIDAYS 
 
 really cultivated his generosity to good 
 effect for the next few weeks. 
 
 But the following year all the holidays 
 went off with a bang, and I ve heard my 
 grandfather say that he believed it did 
 folks good to go without a holiday once 
 in a while, as they appreciated them bet 
 ter. But I say, a place for each holiday, 
 and every holiday in its place. 
 
THE MILLION SILVER 
 DOLLARS 
 
THERE were just two rooms and 
 an attic in John Allen s house 
 an attic of which the flooring 
 was so insecure that the rats had several 
 times threatened to migrate to a safer 
 house. Just the sort of place for a future 
 President of the United States to choose as 
 his birthplace. But if John Allen ever be 
 comes President, I pity the people of this 
 country. Not because John is bad, but 
 because he is lazy and suspicious, two 
 
 53 
 
THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS 
 
 qualities that would not set well on a ruler 
 of a republic. 
 
 John and his mother were so poor that 
 the rats sometimes felt that it was not very 
 creditable to their rodencies that they con 
 tinued to live off of the hospitality of the 
 poverty-stricken pair; but after all, where 
 there is food there is bound to be some 
 crumbs, and so the rats stayed on; and 
 John and his mother wondered if people 
 could be any poorer than they were and 
 continue to live. 
 
 One day John went out to the spring 
 to get a pail of water for his mother, as 
 boys have done ever since there were 
 mothers, pails, and sons, and that s more 
 years than even you can remember. He 
 lived near Summit, New Jersey, on the 
 Watchung range of hills. 
 
 While he was at the spring and won 
 dering how he could get through the rest 
 of the day without doing any work, a 
 
 54 
 
THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS 
 
 handsome man on horseback rode up and 
 asked John very civilly how far it was to 
 Murray Hill, which is the name of a ham 
 let near Summit. 
 
 " About a mile, sir, said John, who was 
 not the sort of boy to refuse to answer a 
 question, although he liked better to ask 
 them. 
 
 " Thank you, my boy. Would you 
 like a million dollars in silver ? " You see 
 the traveler was not above joking with the 
 lad. 
 
 Well, now, some boys would prompt 
 ly have said no, and would have run 
 home with the water. But John dearly 
 loved to talk ; so he set the pail down by 
 the edge of the spring, and said, " Yes, sir, 
 I would, if I weren t so afraid of being 
 robbed." 
 
 The traveler burst out laughing. 
 
 " Why, have you thought of that part 
 of it already ? That doesn t generally 
 
 55 
 
THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS 
 
 come until after we have secured the mil 
 lions, and then it is a disquieting thought, 
 I ll admit. So you d fear robbers ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir, because the million dollars 
 would tempt them if it was known I had 
 so much money, and I d never dare 
 do anything but guard it day and night. 
 But that wouldn t be so bad, for then I 
 should not have to hoe. I read some 
 thing in a paper that I understood to 
 mean that it is wicked to hoe, and 1 
 don t want to be wicked, and anyhow 
 hoeing makes me tired and slants my 
 brow, mother says ; so I generally let 
 her do it." 
 
 Now what in the world John was driv 
 ing at I don t know, but it only shows 
 that children ought not to be allowed to 
 read the newspapers except the Chil 
 dren s Department. 
 
 The traveler laughed again, and said, 
 " Boy, you ought not to be so suspicious, 
 56 
 
THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS 
 
 I have a hundred millions, and no one 
 ever stole a cent from me." 
 
 John was interested, but not convinced. 
 Because the traveler had been free from 
 thieves, it did not follow that he would be. 
 As for the traveler, although he had started 
 in to chaff the boy, he now decided to try 
 him and see what use he would make of a 
 million dollars and whether it would bene 
 fit him or the reverse. He was in the 
 habit of giving a million dollars to found 
 hospitals and libraries and soup kitchens, 
 as freely as you give five cents to the 
 heathen when your father gives it to you 
 for that purpose. So a million dollars for 
 the poor boy would be nothing to him, 
 and he said : 
 
 " Well, if you will leave that pail of 
 water there and come with me to Summit, 
 I ll give you a million dollars just as soon 
 as I can arrange to have it sent out from 
 New York. Of course, I have not that 
 
 57 
 
THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS 
 
 much with me in silver for my horse is 
 built for speed and not for strength ; and 
 of course, there are certain conditions that 
 go with this money. I never give with 
 out naming some condition. You must 
 bury all the money except what you need 
 for daily use, and you must regularly give 
 to the poor or else you will be sorry." 
 
 John, like most people, hated gifts that 
 had strings to them. The best gift is a 
 free gift, and at first John was tempted to 
 say to the horseman, " Oh, keep your 
 money." But when he reflected that the 
 million dollars would not only buy him a 
 new suit and a bicycle and a new shawl for 
 his mother, and pay for the services of a 
 professional hoeman who didn t care a 
 scrap about his brow, he left the spring and 
 the pail of water and approached nearer to 
 the wonderful stranger. 
 
 " When do you think the money will 
 
 ? 
 
THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS 
 
 The traveler looked at his watch. " It 
 is now twelve. If I telegraph to have it 
 shipped, I ought to get it by four o clock, 
 for I ll have it sent in an express car. If 
 you want it, jump up behind me at once 
 and come along, as I have a directors 
 meeting to attend at two, and I must make 
 haste." 
 
 But now John was suddenly overcome 
 with suspicions. This might be a high 
 wayman who would rob him of his rags ; 
 so he said, not gratefully, but in a tone of 
 doubt, " I don t know you. Suppose " 
 
 But at this the stranger slapped his 
 horse s flank with the flat of his hand and 
 was out of sight in a minute. 
 
 John filled the pail, and went into the 
 house, and told his mother what had hap 
 pened. She was one of the most artless 
 women who ever handled a hoe, and as 
 unsuspicious as John was the opposite, and 
 she was fond of money, if you can be said 
 
 59 
 
THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS 
 
 to be fond of a thing you never have seen; 
 so she was ill pleased at his news. 
 
 "Why, John, you should not have sus 
 pected the good man. I m sure no one 
 ever offered us half as much as that before, 
 and it is not likely that anyone will again. 
 I wish you had gone with him." 
 
 " But, mother, I thought you wanted 
 the water." 
 
 " Oh, child, I was not so thirsty but 
 that I could have waited until we got the 
 million, before I drank. Many men have 
 given up all that made life dear to get a 
 million, and what s a drink of water against 
 a fortune ? " 
 
 These words from his mother made 
 John feel that he had not been wise; so he 
 went out to the spring and waited there 
 for the rest of the day, although there was 
 plenty of work to do around the miserable 
 house. But the stranger did not come 
 back. 
 
 60 
 
THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS 
 
 The next day, at about the same hour, 
 John again took up his station at the 
 spring, and after a wait of an hour, he was 
 rewarded by seeing the stranger riding 
 back, this time from Summit. As soon as 
 John saw him, he ran to meet him. 
 
 " Well, boy, fortune does not often 
 knock twice at a man s door, but as for 
 tune and I are old friends I ve made him 
 do it ; and if you think that you can trust 
 me, I ll take you to Summit and we ll hunt 
 up that million dollars. It s there by 
 now." 
 
 Almost before the words were out of his 
 mouth John had leaped to the horse s 
 back in an ecstacy of joy, and had said, 
 " Go where you will. Mother said I could 
 trust you." 
 
 " Now that was really kind in the lady," 
 said the stranger, with a queer smile. " I 
 will show her that she did not misjudge 
 me. I will confess that it vexed me yes- 
 
 61 
 
THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS 
 
 terday to think that a poor boy like you 
 should be afraid of a millionaire ; but then 
 I thought you probably never saw one be 
 fore, and so I decided not to bear malice. 
 We ll go to Summit, and I ll point out the 
 car, and pay the workmen in advance to 
 help you get it up here, and then you must 
 bury it and use it as I have prescribed, 
 or- -" 
 
 The traveler did not finish the word, but 
 John imagined the worst and sighed. 
 
 The way to Summit was neither hard 
 nor long, and they soon reached the town, 
 riding over a bridge and right down to the 
 freight station. 
 
 The stranger inquired at the office for a 
 freight car that had nothing whatever in it 
 but a million silver dollars. The freight 
 agent, who was very busy, said : " I be 
 lieve that such a car came in, but I ve got 
 so much to attend to that I can t be sure. 
 Go hunt it up and take the money, and 
 62 
 
THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS 
 
 sometime when I m not so busy you can 
 sign a receipt for it." 
 
 So the stranger hitched his horse to a 
 trunk that stood on the platform, and then 
 walked across the track to the side-track on 
 which lay the car. Sure enough, when 
 they opened the door, several hundred 
 dollars rolled out and all over the ground. 
 John did not bother to pick them up, as 
 there were so many more where they came 
 from. The stranger had already hired 
 workmen to cart the money away, and 
 twelve men with coal-carts now appeared 
 on the scene all ready to do the work for 
 which they had been paid. 
 
 The men were not much surprised 
 to see all the money, because they did 
 not for a minute suppose it was real. 
 They thought it was the waste from a 
 tin factory, simply because it was be 
 yond belief that a man would give one 
 million silver dollars to a twelve-year-old 
 63 
 
THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS 
 
 boy, and you can t believe what s un 
 believable. 
 
 The stranger now had to take a train to 
 New York; so he left his horse as a pres 
 ent to John, and shook hands with him, and 
 John was so busy running his hands 
 through the money and letting it drop like 
 sand in an hour-glass from one hand to 
 another, that he actually forgot to thank his 
 benefactor. 
 
 It took the men several hours to empty 
 the car ; and I m sure I don t know what 
 Summit people were doing that they did 
 not notice the million dollars going over 
 the bridge and up the hill into the woods, 
 but they didn t, and in mid-afternoon John 
 arrived without accident at his miserable 
 shanty. Oh, I forgot to say that when he 
 went to get the horse, which had been 
 hitched to the trunk, he found it had eaten 
 the whole top off of that receptacle, much 
 to the disgust of a woman who wanted to 
 
THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS 
 
 take the next train, but who had to go into 
 town and buy a new trunk and pack it on 
 the station platform with the wind blowing 
 her belongings all along the Delaware 
 and Lackawanna road. It never entered 
 John s selfish head to pay her for the dam 
 age the horse had done. His mind was too 
 engrossed with his suddenly acquired 
 wealth. 
 
 His mother came out to meet the cara 
 van, and she nearly went crazy at sight of 
 the money. Imagine twelve coal carts 
 loaded to overflowing with bright, new, 
 gleaming dollars! Why, it would have at 
 tracted attention even in Wall Street, 
 where every man is a millionaire or 
 wishes he were. 
 
 4 Bury it back of the house, John, dear. 
 The earth is softer there, and it will be 
 easier for the men to dig." 
 
 So said his mother; but John replied, " I 
 don t know as I care how hard it is for 
 65 
 
THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS 
 
 them to dig, mother. They ve been paid, 
 so what s the odds ? " 
 
 Well, now, you know there was a good 
 deal of odds. There s no use in piling 
 work on a man or a woman just because 
 you re paying him. All people have feel 
 ings, even men with shovels or hoes. 
 
 And the first digger took a dislike to 
 John right away, and determined to come 
 some dark night and carry off some of the 
 " money " and give it to his children to 
 play store with you see none of them 
 could believe it was real money. 
 
 But John suspected him of having such 
 thoughts, and he said, forgetting the warn 
 ing of the stranger, " I guess I d rather 
 have it where I can have my eyes on it day 
 and night. Just put it up in the attic." 
 
 Of course he was boss, and the men had 
 to obey him ; so the first cart was backed 
 up in front of the attic window which was 
 not more than ten feet from the ground 
 
 66 
 
THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS 
 
 and the men began to shovel the money 
 into the house. At the first shovelful 
 about half fell through the chinks in the 
 floor to the room below, and the rats de 
 serted the house. But disregarding this 
 warning, John bade the men go ahead and 
 shovel it all in. Well, I ll leave you to 
 figure how packed that attic became. One 
 million silver dollars take up a good deal 
 of room and weigh a good deal, as the old 
 house evidently thought. For, just as the 
 last shovelful of dollars was pitched in, 
 the miserable building tottered and fell, 
 and Mrs. Allen barely escaped being 
 hurled under it. 
 
 But the worst of it was that, as John had 
 disobeyed the injunction of the great mil 
 lionaire, the money began to roll and roll 
 through the woods and far away. Some of 
 it went into the brooks, some of it went 
 into woodchuck and snake holes, some of 
 it rolled a mile before it stopped, but like 
 6 7 
 
THE MILLION SILVER DOLLARS 
 
 snow in a hot sun it all disappeared, and a 
 half-hour later John and his mother were 
 as poor as before. 
 
 I wish that I could say that John had 
 learned a lesson and ceased to be suspicious, 
 but he didn t. To this day he haunts the 
 spring, leaving his mother to do all the 
 work. 
 
 But the stranger rides no more. 
 
THE CROWS SINGING 
 LESSON 
 
CROWS are everywhere acknow 
 ledged to be very wise birds, and 
 if there is no proverb " as crafty 
 as a crow," there ought to be. But it is 
 not every crow who can read the news 
 paper, and that is why the leader of the 
 big flock that made things unpleasant for 
 farmers around Norfolk, Connecticut, was 
 called the King of all the Crows in New 
 England. For he could read print like a 
 naturalized voter, and many and many is 
 71 
 
THE CROWS SINGING LESSON 
 
 the scrap of newspaper that he has picked 
 up in his claws and carried away to the 
 top of some high tree, there to read it to 
 a solemn conclave who said few words un 
 til he had finished it, but who then broke 
 into the discordant cawing that farmers 
 hate to hear even more than they hate 
 the tenuous whine of the mosquito. 
 
 It was a ray day in January, and about 
 two hundred big crows had assembled in 
 an oak near the sand lot to hear a paper 
 read by the King, whom the rest called 
 Greyquill, because he had one gray feather 
 in his head, just above his left eye, that 
 gave him a rakish look. 
 
 " Now, if you ll let up on your talking 
 for a minute, I ll begin to read; but the 
 first one to interrupt me with his ugly 
 voice I ll chase clear to Canaan." 
 
 " Stop talking, everybody," yelled each 
 crow to every other until the noise resem 
 bled that in a church fair when the richest 
 
THE CROWS SINGING LESSON 
 
 man in town has gone away without buy 
 ing anything. 
 
 Greyquill made a few vicious jabs at the 
 birds who sat nearest to him on the limb 
 of the big oak that was their hall of as 
 sembly, and which was still decorated with 
 the dried, yellow leaves that winter s 
 storms had been powerless to dislodge, 
 and silence fell on the group of ill-favored 
 birds. 
 
 It so happened that the only boy in 
 Norfolk, or, indeed, in Litchfield County, 
 for that matter, who understood crow lan 
 guage Curtiss Nettleton by name was 
 on his way home from watching the golf 
 ers, and he passed under the tree just as 
 the king crow cleared his throat as much 
 as it is possible for a crow to do such 
 a thing, and began to read. The crows 
 were all so curious to hear what was 
 coming that they did not notice the 
 boy at all. And, indeed, they would 
 
 73 
 
THE CROWS* SINGING LESSON 
 
 not have cared much if they had, for 
 he was one of those rare boys who 
 inspire confidence in all animals. Stray 
 dogs came to him to be petted, vicious 
 bulls had a pleasant look for him, strange 
 cats would jump upon his shoulders, and 
 robins and thrushes would boldly hop 
 into the pockets of his sack-coat to get 
 the crumbs that he always kept there for 
 just such occasions. 
 
 " I don t know what the name of this 
 paper is, as the head line is torn off," said 
 Greyquill, " but I don t suppose that 
 makes very much difference to you. And 
 yet I think I read something in this same 
 paper that was not at all friendly to 
 
 crows." 
 
 " Are you going to read or are you 
 only going to talk ? It s long past lunch 
 time, and I m hungry," said one of the 
 youngest, and, necessarily, one of the pert- 
 est crows. 
 
 74 
 
THE CROWS SINGING LESSON 
 
 Greyquill gave him a glance that made 
 him hop down at least three branches 
 nearer the ground, and then the old crow 
 continued without further interruption. 
 
 " This article is about the song-birds. 
 It says : ( Nothing could be more sense 
 less than to kill or in any way injure the 
 various song-birds that make spring melo 
 dious in New England. What if they 
 help themselves to a bit of corn now and 
 then, or reward themselves for a full- 
 throated concert by picking a cherry here 
 and there ? The good they do in making 
 the world less sad more than balances their 
 tiny thefts, and the man who shoots or 
 snares a song-bird is a man whose heart is 
 so far out of place that no physician on 
 earth has power to set it right. Kill the 
 crows if you will, for, besides stealing, 
 they make a most unmelodious noise ; 
 but spare the little opera singers who 
 make the woodlands merry, and who 
 
 75 
 
THE CROWS* SINGING LESSON 
 
 have contributed to the poetry and litera 
 ture of the world by inspiring the 
 poets and prose writers to emulate their 
 cadenzas/ 
 
 Greyquill read very well indeed for a 
 crow, and Curtiss had no trouble in un 
 derstanding him. Hardly had he made an 
 end when he was assailed with so many 
 questions that you could have heard the 
 crows as far as West Norfolk, and that s 
 three miles at least. 
 
 " Is that why farmers hate us ? " 
 " Where do these other birds get their 
 fine voices ? " " I never thought a bobo 
 link could sing. Sounds like a spring in 
 a clock that had been set a-jangling." 
 " Who thinks I have a harsh voice ? Hear 
 me. Caw, caw, caw." 
 
 Everyone of the two hundred had some 
 thing to say about the article, and said 
 it in the most raucous voice, so that 
 Curtiss instinctively put his hands to 
 7 6 
 
THE CROWS* SINGING LESSON 
 
 his ears, and the involuntary motion 
 caused his presence to become known. 
 
 " Hello, Curtiss. What do you think 
 of this article ? " asked Greyquill, flying 
 down in front of the boy and looking at 
 him with his head perked on one side. 
 
 " Why, I think you d better cultivate 
 your voices," said Curtiss, laughing. 
 
 " That s all right. But who s going to 
 teach us to sing ? " 
 
 " No one can teach me to sing," said 
 one vain crow ; but a companion, with a 
 voice like a broken buzz-saw, said : " Oh, 
 really, Jack, you make me weary. Your 
 voice sounds as if some one had dumped a 
 load of gravel on it. Now, my voice- 
 Here all the birds began talking at once, 
 and more than one farmer in the vicinity 
 said : " We re going to have a curse of 
 crows next summer, I m afraid." 
 
 " I don t know what to tell you," said 
 Curtiss, when the crows stopped for breath. 
 
 77 
 
THE CROWS SINGING LESSON 
 
 " I know a bobolink who used to give 
 singing lessons, but he went away last 
 July, and I don t know where he is 
 now." 
 
 " Probably in South Carolina," said an 
 old bird who had traveled a good deal. 
 " Those bobolinks are great for going 
 South, but a funny thing about em is that 
 you can t get em to sing down there. 
 Either the Southerners don t like their 
 kind of music or else it s too hot to at 
 tempt anything in the song line down 
 there." 
 
 " Yes," said Greyquill, " and what s the 
 consequence ? They shoot em and make 
 pot pies of em down there. That just 
 proves what this fellow says. Mankind 
 like music, and when they don t get it, 
 they get mad and begin to shoot. I be 
 lieve that, if we all learn to sing something 
 that folks will call sweet, the farmers won t 
 begrudge us the little corn we take, and 
 78 
 
THE CROWS SINGING LESSON 
 
 I d give my tail feathers to find out where 
 to get the necessary lessons." 
 
 " I have it," suddenly said Curtiss. 
 " There s a man here in Norfolk who has 
 a mocking-bird, and the mocking-bird can 
 sing any bird s tune he has ever heard. 
 Now, if you want me to ask this one what 
 he d charge to teach you all to sing, I ll 
 do it this afternoon, and if he s willing, I ll 
 bring him down to-morrow." 
 
 " Oh, do. The very thing," said Grey- 
 quill, flapping his wings for joy ; and then 
 there was another deafening clamor, and 
 the birds all circled through the air, just 
 to work off their spirits, and while they 
 were flapping heavily around, Curtiss went 
 home. 
 
 Next day after school, Curtiss went 
 round to the Perkins house, where the 
 mocking-bird was spending the winter. 
 He belonged to some summer people who 
 did not care to bother with a bird in the 
 
THE CROWS SINGING LESSON 
 
 city in the winter. He was called Silver- 
 throat and he could imitate a bobolink, 
 a goldfinch, a robin, a thrush, a canary, a 
 song sparrow, and a half a score of foreign 
 birds whose songs are never heard in these 
 parts, for the city people had once taken 
 him on a voyage around the world and 
 he had caught a new air with each chang 
 ing breeze. 
 
 Curtiss asked him what he would 
 charge for teaching the crows how to sing 
 melodiously. He burst out laughing. 
 
 " Why, I d as soon expect to teach a 
 pig to squeal in tune as to teach a crow 
 to sing. They have absolutely no ear at 
 all." 
 
 " Still, you are so very clever," said 
 Curtiss, " that maybe you could teach 
 them some of the simplest tunes, and I m 
 sure it would make a difference with the 
 farmers, because I know that it is mad 
 dening, after your corn has all been pulled 
 
 So 
 
THE CROWS* SINGING LESSON 
 
 up, to hear a crow cawing as if he was 
 laughing at you instead of singing, I 
 merely took a grain or two to keep my 
 voice in trim/ Come along with me, and 
 we ll talk it over with old Greyquill. 
 He s a very decent sort of a chap, and 
 he knows a lot, and has been every 
 where." 
 
 The mocking-bird, although uncaged, 
 was not in the habit of leaving the Per 
 kins farm, and he welcomed a little change ; 
 so he readily consented to accompany 
 Curtiss after he had preened his feathers 
 a little for birds are almost as vain as 
 human beings, and he wanted to look his 
 best. 
 
 Then, with Silver-throat on his shoul 
 der, Curtiss started off on a dog-trot over 
 to the sand lot. Long before they reached 
 there, they heard the crows chattering as 
 hard as if they were building the tower of 
 Babel. But as soon as they saw the pair 
 
 Si 
 
THE CROWS SINGING LESSON 
 
 they stopped. Greyquill flew forward, and 
 offered a bug to Silver-throat, who ac 
 cepted it with a pretty turn of his head 
 and a little trill like that in the middle of 
 a canary s song. 
 
 " Well, I suppose Curtiss has told you 
 what we want. Can t you give us a little 
 concert, so that we may judge just what 
 sort of music we wish to learn ? " said 
 Greyquill, with as much of an air as if he 
 were a great authority on music, when the 
 fact was he did not know the difference 
 between the song of a robin and that of a 
 bullfinch. 
 
 The mocking-bird was not unwilling to 
 show his powers, and he sang one song 
 after another. The crows sat on the 
 branch around him, and said after each 
 song : " How sweet ! What a dainty 
 little thing!" "That s sweetly pretty." 
 " That s classical, but I understand it." 
 
 Curtiss could hardly keep his face 
 82 
 
THE CROWS SINGING LESSON 
 
 straight. He had attended a musicale in 
 New York the winter before, when he 
 visited his cousin, and the crows acted 
 for all the world like the musical people 
 there. 
 
 " Well, now, let s come to business," 
 said Greyquill. " If you will teach us half 
 a dozen of your best songs, we ll give you 
 a year s supply of corn." 
 
 This arrangement was very satisfactory 
 to Silver-throat, and he immediately formed 
 a class in singing. Naturally, they wanted 
 to learn a regular song before they had 
 learned to run the scale, and of all songs 
 in the bird repertory they chose that of 
 the Patti of the birds, the bobolink. 
 
 " Very well, if you think you can do 
 it," said Silver-throat, with a wise smile. 
 " Bob-o-link, bob-o-link, ting kertang 
 kertink." The mocking-bird sang it as 
 sweetly as any Robert of Lincoln ever did. 
 
 " Cahh, cahh, cahh," grated the crows. 
 83 
 
THE CROWS SINGING LESSON 
 
 " No, no. Bob-o-link, bob-o-link, ting 
 kertang kertink," repeated the mocking 
 bird. 
 
 " Cawer, cawer, cawer," rasped the 
 crows. 
 
 Sweetly and patiently the mocking-bird 
 sang once more. " Bob-o-link, bob-o- 
 link, ting-kertang-kertink." 
 
 " Cuh, cuh, cuh," scraped the crows 
 in despair. 
 
 And then the little mocking-bird shook 
 his head and said : 
 
 " It s no use, my dear friends. You re 
 not a bit musical, and it s simply a waste 
 of time to try to teach music to an unmu 
 sical bird. Your old caw is better than 
 these fearsome attempts at the bobolink s 
 song ; and if you band together and avoid 
 quarrels among yourselves, most of you 
 will escape the farmer s shotgun. But as 
 for singing, I d as soon expect to teach 
 Curtiss how to fly. I can fly, and I can 
 8 4 
 
THE CROWS SINGING LESSON 
 
 sing ; but he can t fly, and you can t sing. 
 I ll sing among you, and when the farmer 
 comes around, you fly, and we ll all be 
 better off." 
 
 Then the crows all fell to talking at 
 once, and under cover of the confusion 
 Curtiss and the mocking-bird came away, 
 laughing so hard that the mocking-bird 
 rasped his throat and couldn t sing any 
 thing more difficult than a Phoebe bird s 
 song all next day. 
 
THE STRONGEST BOY IN 
 THE WHOLE WORLD 
 
LEWIS JACKSON was just eight 
 years old, and to look at him you 
 would not have suspected that he 
 was anything more than a happy, hearty, 
 ordinary country boy. As a matter of fact, 
 however, he was the strongest boy in the 
 world, and all on account of the " iron " 
 greenings. You see, Mr. Jackson, Lewis s 
 father, had a large apple orchard, and right 
 in the middle of it was a tree of greenings, 
 and the day that Lewis was born the old 
 
THE STRONGEST BOY 
 
 man buried a lot of rusty irons and iron 
 barrel-hoops and the scraps of a cast-iron 
 stove at the foot of the tree, because it had 
 never borne an apple and he thought the 
 strength of the iron rust might do it good. 
 That was in December, and early in May 
 that tree was so covered with apple blos 
 soms that it looked as if an immense flock 
 of butterflies had descended on it and were 
 resting preparatory to flying somewhere 
 else. That summer the tree was loaded 
 with greenings, and Lewis s brother, a 
 harum scarum child of six, gave the seven- 
 months-old baby one of the apples to eat 
 not only that, but cut it up for him; and 
 instead of dying in convulsions, the infant, 
 who had been sickly before, thrived upon 
 it. The village physician was called in to 
 look at the child, and he immediately said 
 that he was what is called a pudenza ama- 
 chyrtis that is, one to whom apples are 
 necessary. He advised the-m to throw 
 9 o 
 
IN THE WHOLE WORLD 
 
 away all their milk and let the child eat 
 all the apples he could but only from the 
 one tree. " He is likely to absorb so 
 much iron that he will be the strongest 
 child in the world." He analyzed one of 
 the apples when he got home, and found 
 that it was ninety per cent, iron and only 
 ten per cent, apple; so, of course, any child 
 who ate nothing but these apples would 
 absorb so much iron that his muscles 
 would be hard as anvils. 
 
 Mr. Jackson was one of those men who 
 always think they have the best of every 
 thing. His cattle were the heaviest in the 
 country, his fruit was the finest, his wife 
 made the best cheese, his dog was the best 
 sheep dog, his Sunday hat was the cheap 
 est that any man had ever worn to church. 
 So you can imagine that the chance of 
 having the strongest son in the world ap 
 pealed to him, and he told his wife to 
 make enough apple-butter from those 
 
 9 1 
 
THE STRONGEST BOY 
 
 greenings to supply the baby when the 
 apples themselves were all eaten, or until 
 more apples were ripe. 
 
 As a consequence, when little Lewis 
 was eight years old he was just as strong 
 as a pair of cattle, and he liked nothing 
 better than to show his strength. If he 
 hadn t been good-natured, I m sure I don t 
 know what might have happened, because 
 he could have pulled the schoolhouse to 
 pieces and could uproot saplings of several 
 years growth. 
 
 Of course, it was a great saving to his 
 father to have such a strong son. Lewis 
 would clear a field of rocks in a single day, 
 wrenching them out of the earth and toss 
 ing them over the fence as if they had 
 been pebbles instead of bowlders. Then, 
 too, he did all the ploughing. He d start 
 out in the morning with some apples in 
 his pocket and a plough at his heels, and 
 by noon he d have done the work of a pair 
 92 
 
IN THE WHOLE WORLD 
 
 of cattle, and would have thought it fun, 
 too. But if for any reason he was unable 
 to eat for a few hours, his strength left him 
 and he was just like other boys. He used 
 to carry a supply of apples in his pockets; 
 but one day when he was pulling a load of 
 feed up from the village, he found he had 
 eaten his last apple, and his strength left 
 him, and he had to leave the wagon by 
 the side of the road and run home for 
 an apple. But when he returned, he 
 picked up the shafts and skipped up the 
 hills like a colt in a meadow on a frosty 
 morning. 
 
 There is a high mountain near the 
 Jackson place called Mt. Nomadnettuck. 
 It is twenty miles high, and is considered 
 by some geographers to be the highest 
 mountain in New England, although 
 whether New England extends as far into 
 the air as that is a thing that I rather 
 doubt, so the mountain may not be in 
 
 93 
 
THE STRONGEST BOY 
 
 New England after all. Anyway, the view 
 from the top is fine, and on a clear day 
 you can see the sun from its apex. One 
 summer Mr. Jackson had a houseful of 
 boarders, and they were all crazy to go to 
 the top of this mountain, but he had no 
 horse, and Lewis was too busy with farm 
 work to take them up in the big carryall. 
 " If I get my buckwheat all planted by 
 the Fourth of July, I ll give Lewis a 
 holiday, and he can drag you to the top. 
 It s too far to walk, and the road is too 
 rough for my cattle, but Lewis has been 
 faithful all the spring, and I m willing to 
 let him have a day of pleasure if he wants 
 
 it." 
 
 Fourth of July was a beautiful, clear day. 
 Bright and early in the morning Lewis 
 cleaned the carryall, which would hold 
 twelve persons; then he greased the wheels, 
 and ate five of the largest apples that he 
 could find on the tree. I think I see 
 
 94 
 
IN THE WHOLE WORLD 
 
 some of my readers laughing at me and 
 saying that greenings aren t ripe on the 
 Fourth ; but the " iron " greenings were. 
 After the boy had eaten the apples he felt 
 his muscles, and they were so hard that 
 he cracked pig nuts on them. 
 
 Right after breakfast the picknickers 
 came out and clambered into the wagon. 
 There were three stout old ladies, two fat 
 old gentlemen, three chubby young girls, 
 and four portly young men, besides a huge 
 basket of lunch. 
 
 " Don t forget to put in some iron 
 greenings for me," said Lewis, and then 
 went into the barn to get his harness on. 
 
 Five minutes later they started. cc Be 
 sure to keep strong and be back in time to do 
 the chores," said his father. Lewis trotted 
 off like a young gazelle, and thanks to 
 the five apples under his vest, he soon 
 reached the top, although it was a twenty- 
 mile climb over a rough mountain road. 
 
 95 
 
THE STRONGEST BOY 
 
 The picknickers felt well repaid for his 
 efforts. It was a clear day, and sure 
 enough, they could see the sun as plainly 
 as if it had not been 94,999,980 miles 
 away. After they had looked at the sun 
 until their eyes ached, they were ready for 
 lunch. 
 
 The rest of the party ate such foolish 
 things as pies and cake and sandwiches, 
 and drank milk; but Lewis sniffed at such 
 things, and ate nothing but five greenings. 
 He knew that they would be sufficient to 
 carry him home with full strength. Poor 
 boy, he did not know that a mistake had 
 been made and that ordinary greenings had 
 been brought up. If you ask how there 
 came to be ordinary greenings on the 
 Fourth, I must ask you not to interrupt 
 me. 
 
 Late in the afternoon they climbed into 
 the wagon, and Lewis began backing it 
 down. It was easier than pulling, for there 
 9 6 
 
IN THE WHOLE WORLD 
 
 was no danger of his being run over. He 
 had gone about a mile at a rattling pace 
 when he felt hungry, and his strength left 
 him as quickly as a five-cent piece drops 
 through a hole in your trouser s pocket. 
 He shouted to everybody to jump, but he 
 didn t speak quick enough, and just then 
 the wagon came to a turn in the road and 
 plunged off a sheer precipice seven miles 
 high. 
 
 Brave little Lewis sprang upon the 
 dashboard and determined to go down 
 with his party, but he felt that they were 
 all in a ticklish position, and he wished he 
 had chosen his apples himself. He looked 
 above him in desperation, and saw a bal 
 loonist who had been making a Fourth of 
 July ascension. He made a megaphone of 
 his hat, and called to the aeronaut to come 
 down and help them. Quick as a flash 
 the good-natured balloonist let out gas 
 and dropped alongside of the descending 
 
 97 
 
THE STRONGEST BOY 
 
 picknickers, who were beginning to faint 
 from fright. He made the wagon fast to 
 the basket of the balloon, and then they 
 went down easily enough, and in less than 
 ten minutes they had alighted in a meadow 
 about a mile from the house. Then Lewis 
 thanked the aeronaut and ran home to get 
 some apples. After he had eaten the 
 apples he returned and pulled the wagon 
 load of picknickers back to the farm, 
 where he arrived just at chore time. 
 
 But after that eventful day Lewis always 
 carried a supply of apples in a bag slung 
 over his shoulders. And if it hadn t been 
 for the kind balloonist, the picknickers 
 would have had a nasty fall. It s no joke 
 to drop seven miles. 
 
THE TOUCH OF GOLD 
 
WHEN old Mr. Carpenter died, he 
 left one son, Hugh Carpenter, 
 and that was all he left. His 
 fortune had been swallowed, and Hugh 
 found himself, at twelve years old, father 
 less and penniless. He had made good 
 use of his schooling up to that time, and 
 he knew more than some boys of fifteen, 
 but he was hardly prepared to go out into 
 the big world and earn his living. His 
 father had had many friends when he was 
 
 101 
 
THE TOUCH OF GOLD 
 
 rich, but they did not tumble over each 
 other in their efforts to help Hugh to a 
 position, and I don t know but that he 
 would have had to go out and sell 
 newspapers if Calvin Cuthbert, who 
 lived next door to him, had not offered 
 him a position as cash boy in his ten- 
 cent store. 
 
 Mr. Cuthbert did not do this because 
 he had a kind heart, but because Hugh s 
 extremity was his opportunity, and he got 
 him to work at just half the wages that are 
 generally paid for the same amount of 
 labor. 
 
 The morning that Hugh began, Mr. 
 Cuthbert called him into his private office 
 and said to him : " Hugh, I have done a 
 great deal for you. Your father did less, 
 for he left you poor. I have put you in 
 the way of becoming rich, if you attend to 
 business and come here at 7 in the morn 
 ing and work hard all day until 6 at night, 
 
THE TOUCH OF GOLD 
 
 or 9 on Saturdays and the Christmas 
 holidays, without extra pay for overtime. 
 You will receive one dollar a week, and I 
 hope that, besides trying to earn it, you 
 will always remember that it was I who 
 saved you from starvation." 
 
 Hugh was a simple-hearted boy, and had 
 never been allowed to have much spending 
 money, so that a dollar a week seemed 
 good pay, and he was of so grateful a dis 
 position that he felt he could not do 
 enough to show that he appreciated his 
 neighbor s efforts in his behalf. He was 
 always on time, worked hard at whatever 
 he had to do, and found that by boarding 
 at a cheap place and spending nothing 
 upon foolishness he was only five dollars 
 in debt at the end of the first month. He 
 went to Mr. Cuthbert, and asked him 
 when he could expect a raise. That ben 
 evolent man was exceedingly angry. " Do 
 you think that I am made of money ? If 
 103 
 
THE TOUCH OF GOLD 
 
 you had come to work here in the ordi 
 nary way by answering an advertisement, 
 I might raise your salary at the end of the 
 year; but as I was kind enough to save you 
 from starving, it will be two years before I 
 think of raising it, and I think a long 
 time before I act. Be thankful that you 
 did not starve a month ago." 
 
 " But I have to pay two dollars a week 
 for my board, sir." 
 
 " Hugh, I did not hire you in order to 
 hold dialogues with you. I am busy. Get 
 busy yourself." 
 
 Hugh felt that Mr. Cuthbert was a 
 good man, but this did not make it any 
 easier to see how he was to pay his land 
 lady, and she could not afford to lodge 
 and board him for nothing. 
 
 That morning a tall, thin man, with 
 
 slanting eyebrows and a black mustache 
 
 and goatee, came into the store. He was 
 
 a famous magician, and I dare say that you 
 
 104 
 
THE TOUCH OF GOLD 
 
 have seen him draw forth rabbits and cana 
 ries and goldfish from a stovepipe hat. 
 He saw that Hugh looked downcast, and 
 as he was fond of children, he asked him 
 what the trouble was. Hugh told him, 
 and the magician shook his head and said 
 something about Mr. Cuthbert that was 
 not complimentary. 
 
 " My boy, I can t do anything for you 
 unless I give you the touch of gold." 
 
 " What is that ? " asked Hugh. 
 
 "Why, whatever you touch will turn 
 into gold." 
 
 " And can you do that for me ? " asked 
 Hugh, his eyes glistening. 
 
 " I can try. Come to the soda foun 
 tain." 
 
 Hugh was a little afraid that Mr. Cuth 
 bert would come out and scold him for 
 leaving his post of duty, but he decided to 
 risk it and make it up at lunch time by 
 staying in. 
 
 105 
 
THE TOUCH OF GOLD 
 
 " What ll you have ? " asked the magi 
 cian. 
 
 " I ll take vanilla no, I ll take pine 
 apple no, I guess I ll take lemon." 
 
 " Take all three if you want," said the 
 magician; so Hugh ordered all three. Just 
 before Hugh drank the strange mixture 
 the magician emptied a powder into the 
 glass and passed his wand over it, and it 
 fizzed up much higher than ordinary soda 
 water, and a fountain of parti-colored fire 
 burst from the foam and descended in 
 brilliant sparks upon the marble counter. 
 
 " Drink it, my boy. Don t be afraid," 
 said the magician kindly, and Hugh drank 
 it, and pronounced it the best soda he had 
 ever tasted. 
 
 " Now pay for it," said the magician. 
 
 " I have nothing in my pocket except 
 a button," answered Hugh, quite crest 
 fallen, and the soda-water clerk looked as 
 if he were going to call an officer. 
 
 106 
 
THE TOUCH OF GOLD 
 
 " The button will do very well, I guess/ 
 said the magician, and Hugh drew it forth 
 from his pocket, and it was pure gold. 
 
 The soda clerk was at first afraid to take 
 it, thinking it was brass, but he tested it, 
 and then he wanted to give Hugh change; 
 but the magician said that that was not al 
 lowable, and with that he disappeared. He 
 was near the door, and the door was open, 
 so I suppose he went out into the street ; 
 but he did it more quickly than I could, 
 and Hugh was astonished and vexed be 
 sides, for he wanted to thank the kind 
 magician for the drink and the gift. 
 
 Now, it so happened that that morning 
 one of the sales-girls had to go home sick. 
 She had stood for five days selling baa 
 lambs and dolls for ten cents apiece, and I 
 suppose she felt like sitting down, and of 
 course the only way to do that was to be 
 sick. For Mr. Cuthbert was upright, and 
 he wanted all his clerks to be upright, 
 107 
 
THE TOUCH OF GOLD 
 
 too. So Hugh was put in her place, and 
 told to sell baa-lambs and dolls for ten 
 cents until he dropped, although they 
 didn t word it just that way. 
 
 Now he had kept his hands at his sides 
 after paying for the soda, and consequently 
 had turned nothing more into gold. 
 Whether it came by accident or design I 
 can t pretend to say, but it is a fact that he 
 didn t exercise his new power until a 
 woman came in who wanted a baa-lamb for 
 a three-year-old child. 
 
 " We re all out of those for three-year- 
 olds," said Hugh politely, " but I have 
 some nice ones for a two-year-old and two 
 sizes larger for four-year-olds." 
 
 " I ll take a four-year-old lamb al 
 though I should think it would be a sheep 
 in that case," said the lady, smiling sweetly. 
 There is nothing that makes people smile 
 so sweetly as jokes of their own manufac 
 ture. 
 
 108 
 
THE TOUCH OF GOLD 
 
 Hugh smiled, but not as sweetly as the 
 lady, and then he took hold of the lamb, 
 when it instantly became pure gold. 
 
 He was now in a quandary. He was 
 strictly honest, and he knew that as they 
 ordinarily were the toys were not worth 
 over ten cents. Nothing in a ten-cent 
 store ever is, else it would not remain a 
 ten-cent store very long. But a gold baa 
 lamb is, naturally, worth far more than a 
 dime. 
 
 Seeing the lamb change color and noti 
 cing Hugh s hesitation, the lady said : 
 " Come, little boy, give me my lamb and 
 my change, for I must be going." But he 
 said : " I m afraid I can t sell you this 
 lamb. If you will pick out another for 
 yourself, you may have it; but I have the 
 touch of gold, and I must not handle the 
 toys unless Mr. Cuthbert wants to change 
 this place into another Tiffany s and I 
 have not talked to him about it yet." 
 109 
 
THE TOUCH OF GOLD 
 
 But the lady knew gold when she saw 
 it, and she naturally wanted the greatest 
 bargain in New York, and she began to 
 talk so excitedly that good Mr. Cuthbert 
 came up and said : " Here, Hugh, what is 
 the trouble, and what are you doing be 
 hind the baa-lamb counter ? " 
 
 " I have the touch of gold, sir," said 
 Hugh, " and Miss Dyer was sick, and I 
 took her place, and I ve turned this baa 
 lamb into gold, and so of course it s worth 
 more than ten cents." As he spoke he 
 touched the brass counter rail inadvert 
 ently, and it turned into gold in a twink 
 ling. 
 
 Mr. Cuthbert was a hard-hearted man, 
 but he was touched at Hugh s honesty. 
 He also saw that the boy was more valu 
 able than his whole force of clerks. He 
 told the lady that she might have the baa 
 lamb at ten cents if she would tell all her 
 friends. Then he offered to pay Hugh 
 
 no 
 
THE TOUCH OF GOLD 
 
 five dollars a week if he would stay and 
 turn one or two articles on each counter 
 into gold, so that they would serve as an 
 attraction for customers. 
 
 Hugh thought the matter over during 
 his lunch hour for he forgot and took it, 
 after all. " I have nothing of my own," 
 he argued, "except the clothes on my 
 back, and it won t do me any good to turn 
 things into gold, for they won t be 
 worth any more to me than before. Be 
 cause I turn Mr. Cuthbert s baa-lambs 
 into golden ones, it doesn t follow that they 
 are mine. Five dollars a week is a big 
 sum of money, and Mr. Cuthbert gave me 
 a place when no one else would. I owe 
 him all that I can do for him. I will ac 
 cept his offer." 
 
 During his luncheon Mr. Cuthbert de 
 cided that he would offer Hugh six dollars 
 a week and get him to turn everything 
 into gold. He could then sell out at auc- 
 
THE TOUCH OF GOLD 
 
 tion and realize even more than he did on 
 the ten-cent articles. He felt sure that the 
 extra dollar would hold Hugh, for he was 
 a good judge of character. 
 
 Now, whether the magician heard of it 
 and was vexed that Hugh did not make 
 more of his golden opportunity, I cannot 
 say ; but it is a fact that after the lunch 
 hour Hugh found he had lost his power. 
 He went around touching everything in 
 the place, but he could not make anything 
 worth more than a dime. But although 
 Mr. Cuthbert was close, he was also a man 
 of his word, and having told Hugh that 
 he would pay him five dollars a week, he 
 continued to do so, and Hugh was so 
 diligent that he advanced higher and 
 higher, until at last he was made a partner 
 in the business, and to-day he is so rich 
 and all things he undertakes are so pros 
 perous that people say of him, " He has 
 the touch of gold." 
 
THE TOUCH OF GOLD 
 
 But if he had not been so mindful of 
 Mr. Cuthbert s interests he might still have 
 the veritable touch of gold that he pos 
 sessed for one short hour, and I m free to 
 admit that that would have been far more 
 interesting. 
 
TARKUS AND THE IMITA 
 TION LIQUID AIR 
 
IT is a foolish thing to let a boy have 
 just what he wants. Of course there 
 are some boys who never want any 
 thing they ought not to have, but they 
 are so few in number that it is not worth 
 while to take them into account. One of 
 the main reasons that boys have parents 
 is that the parents may with becoming 
 firmness refuse to let them have the moon 
 and cigars and a night key and other in 
 judicious things desired of young men 
 117 
 
TARKUS AND THE 
 
 from babyhood up. But Mr. Greenwich 
 was old enough to be a grandfather when 
 his first son was born, and as grandfathers 
 are notoriously easy with children, he let 
 Aristarchus for such was the outlandish 
 name that he gave the boy have any 
 thing, in reason or out of reason or in sea 
 son or out of season, that he expressed a 
 wish for. 
 
 Now it was about the time that Aris 
 tarchus was thirteen that liquid air began 
 to be talked about, and after a while it be 
 came possible to buy it in small quantities, 
 with certain restrictions. A man can t 
 rush into a drug store in great haste and 
 say : " Give us a quart of laudanum or 
 strychnine," and get it, you know. The 
 druggist will have a lot of questions to 
 ask. " Do you intend to take it all your 
 self, or will you share some with your 
 family ? " he will say, and, after the in 
 tending purchaser has satisfied him that 
 ii! 
 
IMITATION LIQUID AIR 
 
 he does not want it for himself alone, he 
 lets him have it and takes down his name 
 and address. 
 
 So it is with the liquid-air shops. The 
 fluid is kept in open bottles for you 
 can t pen up liquid air safely, and the 
 clerks in charge won t sell a bit until 
 they are satisfied that you are a reliable 
 person with no mischievous proclivities. 
 Then the clerk makes you sign- a re 
 ceipt for it, and after you have paid a 
 hundred and fifty dollars for a pint, two 
 hundred for a quart, two hundred and 
 fifty for a gallon, and three hundred for a 
 peck if my liquid measure is wrong, it s 
 because I was absent from school with the 
 measles when the class took up liquid 
 measure I say, after the proper payment 
 has been made, the purchaser is allowed 
 to take the bottle out with many cautions 
 against its improper use. 
 
 One day Aristarchus read in a book 
 119 
 
N D 
 
 that liquid air was as cold as 300 degrees 
 below zero. It so happened that the day 
 was insufferably hot. A few lines further 
 on he read something like " sick rooms 
 may be cooled by the use of liquid air." 
 
 He dropped the book, and jumped 
 from the bed where he had been swelter 
 ing. " If sick rooms, why not well rooms 
 any old rooms in fact? I ll make papa 
 buy me a bottle of this air." 
 
 Now if Aristarchus s father had been a 
 man of the normal age for a parent that 
 is, anywhere between twenty-two and fifty- 
 two he would have said " No sirree " 
 when Tarkus (for by that hideous nick 
 name he was known) asked him for a pint 
 bottle of liquid air. But as Mr. Green 
 wich was seventy-two, he smiled pleasantly 
 and said: "I ll get you some next Satur 
 day when I come up again." Tarkus and 
 his mother were boarding for the summer 
 up in the country. 
 
IMITATION LIQUID AIR 
 
 The clerk in charge of the store was all 
 out of liquid air, but he had something 
 else "just as good." So if the effects of 
 this fluid are not according to Tripler, it 
 is no fault of the real liquid air. The 
 clerk was in a hurry to shut up shop it 
 was Saturday afternoon, and he wanted to 
 go to the ball game and he did not ask 
 Mr. Greenwich a single question or make 
 him sign any receipt. He told him not to 
 drop the bottle, and then followed him out 
 to close the shutters and shut up shop. 
 
 Mr. Greenwich hastened to the train, 
 and was soon hurrying up into the coun 
 try. The cars were so hot that he longed 
 to open the bottle and pour a little air 
 on the floor, but he knew that Tarkus 
 wouldn t want any one to use the air but 
 himself, so he refrained. As soon as he 
 reached the boarding-house, Tarkus ran 
 out to the wagon and said : " Did you 
 get my liquid air ? " 
 
TARKUS AND THE 
 
 "Sh! Yes, I did," said the old gentle 
 man in a low tone. He must have felt 
 that the other men who had come up to 
 spend Sunday would feel nervous if they 
 knew that Tarkus was to have a bottle of 
 unlimited mischief about his clothes. 
 
 There were two or three choice spirits 
 known of Tarkus, and with the bottle 
 resting securely in his hip-pocket, he went 
 forth to find them. They were country 
 boys. There were city boys at the board 
 ing-house, but they were fretful, sickly 
 fellows, and Tarkus avoided them when 
 he could. He found Dick Leonard and 
 Billy Mason out behind the Masons 
 .barn, smoking corn-silk cigarettes. 
 
 " Say, fellers, I ve got her. Maybe we 
 won t be hot any more." 
 
 It was intolerably hot. The thermom 
 eter was up in the nineties, and the air was 
 damp and muggy -just the day for a 
 moderate application of liquid air. Tar- 
 
IMITATION LIQUID AIR 
 
 kus had read an article about liquid air 
 to the boys, and he supposed that he had 
 a bottle of the real thing. 
 
 " What say we do -just get cool or try 
 coasting ? " 
 
 " Coasting," yelled Billy ; " you forget 
 you re hot, if you re coasting." 
 
 The Masons pump stood at the brow 
 of a steep hill that ran down in the form 
 of a lane to what they called the " night 
 lot," where the cows were turned after 
 evening milking. 
 
 " Now, you two boys pump for all 
 you re worth, and I ll freeze the water un 
 til we have coated the whole hill with a 
 sheet of ice," said Tarkus. 
 
 The boys threw away their half-smoked 
 cigarettes, and sprang to the pump. The 
 water poured forth in a copious stream, 
 and trickled down the hill, but not nearly 
 fast enough to suit the boys; so they over 
 turned the drinking trough, which was full 
 1*3 
 
TARKUS AND THE 
 
 of water. Then Tarkus poured a little of 
 the imitation liquid air out. If it had been 
 the real thing, it would have rolled out 
 like smoke and would not have frozen the 
 water ; but as it was, the water froze solid 
 so for the boys purposes the imitation 
 was better than the real article. Then 
 they filled the trough once more and again 
 upset it, and after a while the whole hill 
 was a glare of ice. Then Billy got his 
 double-ripper out of the barn, and with 
 loud cries of joy they coasted down hill on 
 ice in midsummer. 
 
 If the affair had ended there, all would 
 have been well and old Mr. Greenwich 
 wouldn t have gotten into trouble ; for the 
 ice would have melted in a little while, the 
 boys would have had their fun, and no 
 one would have been hurt in any way. 
 But Tarkus, instead of putting the bottle 
 in some safe place, carried it in his hip- 
 pocket, and at the fifth or sixth coast he 
 124 
 
IMITATION LIQUID AIR 
 
 tumbled off the sled and broke the bottle. 
 In an instant the mercury in that vicinity 
 dropped a hundred degrees. 
 
 As bad luck would have it, a summer 
 shower had just begun, and the rain turned 
 to hail in a twinkling. The boys gazed at 
 each other in silence for a minute, and 
 then looked at the fields on either side of 
 the lane. On one side had stood tasseled 
 corn, on the other pole beans, while at the 
 extreme foot of the hill was an apple 
 orchard. They would have waited to 
 see the leaves and the corn and fruit 
 blasted in the bitter cold, but they were 
 afraid of getting blasted themselves. They 
 were , freezing, and were almost too be 
 numbed to get up the slippery hill and 
 into Billy Mason s house. 
 
 Mrs. Mason, Billy s mother, was put 
 ting up tomato ketchup, and the perspira 
 tion was rolling from her forehead as she 
 bustled about the hot kitchen, with all the 
 125 
 
N D T H 
 
 windows open and the torrid shrilling of 
 the locusts filling the air. To be con 
 fronted by three blue-lipped boys, who 
 with chattering teeth told her they were 
 freezing to death, was to make her believe 
 that she had gone crazy. And when she felt 
 their poor numb hands and the coldness 
 of their summer shirts, she was sure of it. 
 
 " For the land sakes ! Are you be 
 witched ? Where have you been, and 
 what has happened ? " 
 
 Billy explained that the bottle of liquid 
 air had been broken ; but she was as 
 much in the dark as before, for she had 
 never even heard of such a thing as liquid 
 air. Still she knew what to do in cases of 
 frost-bite, and she soon had the boys 
 hands in basins of cold water and had 
 heated milk for them to drink. 
 
 Then she went to the door to see what 
 had happened. The pump was thick with 
 ice, and long icicles hung from its lips. 
 126 
 
IMITATION LIQUID AIR 
 
 The hired man stepped up to it at that 
 minute, and the next moment he was 
 coasting on his trousers down the lane, 
 and when he picked himself up he began 
 to rub his ears and put for the house as 
 fast as he could. 
 
 In violent contrast to this, she could see 
 people on the piazza of the boarding-house 
 fanning themselves vigorously, while in the 
 hen-yard of the Leonards the hens were 
 walking about with open beaks a sure 
 sign of unusual heat. 
 
 While she stood gazing, there came a 
 sound of an amazed voice from the cow 
 lane, and then Billy s father, his black 
 beard coated with frost, ran in out of the 
 hail, followed by Snip, the collie, covered 
 from head to foot with ice. 
 
 " This beats all/ said Mr. Mason, slap 
 ping his hands. " A blizzard in August. 
 Where s my Pontiac mittens ? " 
 
 It was a full hour before the liquid air 
 127 
 
TARKUS AND THE 
 
 ceased to act, and by that time the fields in 
 the vicinity of the place where the bottle 
 had broken were covered with a foot of hail. 
 
 It didn t take the boys long to recover 
 from their chill, and then they put on 
 warm clothes and went out and had an 
 ice-ball fight. And they yelled to some 
 of the city children to come out and play 
 with them ; but the city children shook 
 their heads, and said mamma wouldn t let 
 them. And they probably would have 
 frozen to death. 
 
 Of course all the boarders were inter 
 ested, and several got their toes and ears 
 frosted; and before the ice was melted 
 people began to come from all over the 
 county, for the news had been telephoned 
 everywhere, and toward night a reporter 
 came out from the city, and Tarkus was 
 pointed out to him as the one who had 
 caused the disturbance. Trees coated 
 with ice in August are an unwonted 
 128 
 
IMITATION LIQUID AIR 
 
 sight, and many a snap shot-was taken of 
 it all. Tarkus found that the reporter 
 was a chummy sort of fellow, and they 
 became friends at once. 
 
 " I m sorry I didn t have a gallon of the 
 stuff, for I could have frosted the whole 
 State just as easy and given you lots of 
 pleasant work writing it up. It s a peachy 
 sight, isn t it ? " said the boy. 
 
 "Yes," said the reporter; "but the 
 joke of it is that it was imitation liquid air." 
 
 " Well, I had just as much fun as if it 
 was real. There wasn t any imitation 
 about the cold, anyhow." 
 
 And there wasn t any imitation about 
 the sum that Mr. Greenwich had to pay 
 for several barrels of frozen apples and 
 corn and beans, and he now feels that 
 there are some things that he ought to re 
 fuse the boy hereafter. And liquid air, 
 imitation or otherwise, heads the list that 
 he has made out. 
 
 129 
 

 AMINADAB SKELCH AND 
 HIS FREE LIBRARY 
 
AMINADAB SKELCH had a de 
 fective moral sense, but you 
 must not blame him for it too 
 harshly. What could any one expect of 
 a boy who, having such a dreadful name 
 as Skelch, had been saddled with Amina- 
 dab when he was too young to protest. 
 Of course the boys called him Dab or 
 Dabby for short, or else Amen, which was 
 just as bad, and he is certainly entitled to 
 some consideration on that account. If 
 133 
 
AMINADAB SKELCH 
 
 he had been called Gaudensius Stewart or 
 Alcibiades Montrose, he might have been 
 a very noble little fellow ; but the name of 
 Aminadab prepared people for the worst. 
 And yet he was not the worst by any 
 means. He had a love for the beautiful, 
 and he liked to do little kindnesses for 
 people, and he was generous to a fault. 
 His chief failing was that he did not 
 know the difference between mine and 
 thine, and it was this that led him 
 into the trouble that I am about to 
 describe. 
 
 One day he went to Philadelphia, and 
 while he was there he saw many fine build 
 ings. Now the little town where he lived, 
 up among the mountains near Plainfield, 
 New Jersey, did not boast of a building 
 more pretentious than a wooden house, 
 and so these great stone buildings seemed 
 to him like fairy palaces, and he deter 
 mined, when he returned to Mullinsville, 
 134 
 
AND HIS FREE LIBRARY 
 
 to build a handsome library and present it 
 to his fellow townsmen. 
 
 It is proper at this point to say that 
 while Aminadab did not boast any ac 
 quaintance with the fairies, he did have 
 a strength that was little short of super 
 natural. He was so strong that he could 
 pull young saplings from the earth with 
 one hand and could raise a six-hundred- 
 pound bag of meal as easily as you could 
 handle a five-pound bag of salt. Beside 
 this he was remarkably handy. He was 
 own cousin on his mother s side to the boy 
 who made a trolley car with a jack-knife 
 as his only tool. 
 
 Now, if Aminadab had possessed a good 
 moral sense, he would have gone to the 
 proprietor of some stone-yard and would 
 have said, " I want enough stone to build 
 a very handsome library. I have not the 
 money to pay for it to-day, and I may 
 never have it, but if you will trust me, and 
 35 
 
AMINADAB SKELCH 
 
 my health does not give out, I will pay 
 you before I die." Most any stone-seller 
 would have given him at least enough for 
 a basement. Then he would have said 
 practically the same thing at the pane-of- 
 glass factory and the store where they sell 
 planks of wood and the nail bazar and the 
 paint depot. But he did none of these 
 things. He said to himself: " Here, I 
 am going to give my fellow townsmen a 
 fine library. I am going to make it all 
 myself, and I don t see why I can t help 
 myself to material wherever I can find it." 
 
 Now, as you and I know, this was very 
 wrong; but I m not telling you what 
 ought to have happened, only what did 
 happen to a little New Jersey boy who 
 didn t know any better. 
 
 First he selected r. plot of ground on 
 
 which to build the library. This was 
 
 next door to the summer residence of a 
 
 man who had gone to New York for the 
 
 136 
 
AND HIS FREE LIBRARY 
 
 winter, and it was part of his land. When 
 people saw Aminadab digging for the 
 foundations, they did not stop him, for it 
 was none of their business, and besides, 
 for all they knew, he had received permis 
 sion from Mr. Hamerton, the owner. 
 As I neglected to say, Aminadab was an 
 orphan and not answerable to anyone. 
 
 Of course, to such a strong and handy 
 boy the work of digging a cellar thirty by 
 fifty feet was not a thing to keep him busy 
 long, and by nightfall of the day he started 
 it, it was all ready for the mason work. 
 
 It would not be very interesting to tell 
 you how he mixed his mortar and did all 
 the other prosy things that go to the 
 making of a house. The remarkable 
 thing is that he got every stone that went 
 into the building of that library from the 
 stone walls of the adjacent country. " A 
 stone here and a stone there will never be 
 missed," said he, and he was right. But, 
 i 37 
 
AMINADAB SKELCH 
 
 although they weren t missed, it was wrong 
 in him to take them without asking. I m 
 not standing up for Dabby by any 
 means. 
 
 There was a very thick evergreen hedge 
 running along the front of the Hamerton 
 place, and no one noticed what was going 
 on behind it, so Dabby was able to give 
 his whole strength to his task without in 
 terruption. And it took a great deal of 
 strength, and the boy ate his meals with a 
 workman s appetite. It was no slight 
 task to carry two or three fifty-pound 
 stones a mile or two, and set them up 
 in place ; but he was a cheerful worker, and 
 he knew that he was building a memorial 
 to himself, and that made the task an easy 
 one. 
 
 An armful of planks from a planing-mill 
 here and there, taken at the noon hour, 
 when the men were off eating their lunch 
 eon, and a few kegs of nails, which he 
 138 
 
AND HIS FREE LIBRARY 
 
 shouldered two at a time, and some 
 quick, deft work, and the floors were laid. 
 And he had only been at work two or 
 three days. I think he must have had a 
 strong natural taste in architecture, for 
 when the building was completed, several 
 New York architects said that it was 
 worthy of Richardson at his best. You 
 ought to know, if you don t, that Richard 
 son was one of the greatest of American 
 architects, and it is a pity that he is not 
 living to-day. 
 
 The panes of glass were harder to get, 
 and I think that the way in which Amin- 
 adab got them was thoroughly reprehen 
 sible, for instead of buying them or even 
 taking them without leave from a glazier, 
 he stole a glazier s diamond and cut the 
 panes out of the various houses in town 
 thus letting in the cold air and putting 
 people to a lot of trouble. You may say 
 that in the end it gave the glazier plenty 
 139 
 
AMINADAB SKELCH 
 
 of work that he would not otherwise have 
 had; but I tell you that a right that comes 
 from a wrong is not the right kind of 
 right. 
 
 At noon of the fourth day the boy had 
 finished everything but the front doors, 
 and he was puzzled where to get them. 
 He wanted something handsome, but he 
 didn t think that he was able to make 
 doors with the few tools at his command, 
 and he knew of no ready-made doors that 
 would do. So he took a day off and 
 went to Philadelphia, and there, on Mar 
 ket Street, or Chestnut, or Arch I can t 
 be more exact, because those are the only 
 Philadelphia streets that I know he saw 
 two mahogany doors, most beautifully 
 carved and evidently very valuable. 
 
 Oh, why did not Aminadab ask per 
 mission to carry those doors away with 
 him ? The owner, who was a rich man, 
 might have granted his request, if the lad 
 
AND HIS FREE LIBRARY 
 
 had been courteous. But poor little 
 Aminadab, the boy with the perverted 
 moral sense, went up the steps, and tak 
 ing a screw-driver from his pocket, began 
 to unscrew the hinges. 
 
 In fewer minutes than you can count, a 
 policeman passed by, and when he saw the 
 boy, he asked him what he was doing. 
 Aminadab had taken one door off and 
 leaned it up against the house, and a 
 flood of keen autumn air swept into the 
 rich hall. 
 
 Now, whatever else Dabby may have 
 been, he was at least truthful, and he said, 
 without hesitating: 
 
 " I am going to take these doors to 
 Mullinsville, to put them in my new free 
 library there. They are just the right size, 
 and I can t make any nearly as good." 
 
 " But, my son," said the policeman, 
 who had children of his own and knew 
 how to speak to boys, " don t you know 
 141 
 
AMINADAB SKELCH 
 
 that it is dishonest to take a man s doors 
 away without his permission ? Suppose 
 Mr. Strawcott, or Lippinbridge, or what 
 ever the name of the gentleman is who 
 lives here, should get pneumonia through 
 the loss of his doors, it would be your 
 fault." 
 
 Aminadab had not thought of that at 
 all. To give a man pneumonia was the 
 last thing he would have wished to do, 
 and his eyes began to fill with tears. 
 While he was trying hard to keep back 
 the sobs, a large, stout, kindly-looking 
 old gentleman came down the broad stair 
 case, and seeing one of his doors off its 
 hinges and a policeman on the steps, 
 said : 
 
 " Hello, what s the matter here ? Is 
 this the way you come in doors by tak 
 ing the doors off? " 
 
 Then Aminadab did what he ought to 
 have done in the first place. He took off 
 142 
 
AND HIS FREE LIBRARY 
 
 his hat, and he made a low bow, and said, 
 in a manly tone : 
 
 " I am building a library at Mullins- 
 ville, New Jersey, which I am going to 
 give to the town, and I needed a pair of 
 doors for it, and, seeing that you must be 
 rich, or else you wouldn t have mahogany 
 doors when black walnut would do just as 
 well, I helped myself to them, and didn t 
 suppose that you d miss them." 
 
 " Didn t suppose that I d miss them ? 
 Hoity, toity! am I so old that I can t see 
 when my front doors are gone? How 
 ever, I am glad to see that you are so 
 public-spirited, and if you and the officer 
 will come inside out of the draught, I d 
 like to talk to you." 
 
 Aminadab motioned to the officer to go 
 in, and then he placed the door in posi 
 tion, and put back the screws. Then he 
 came inside, and sat down in the old gen 
 tleman s drawing-room. 
 143 
 
AMINADA3 SKELCH 
 
 " Now, see here, young man, where did 
 you get the rest of the material for your 
 library ? " 
 
 " I got the stone from the stone walls 
 around the country." 
 
 " And did you have permission ? " 
 
 " Why, no," said Aminadab, wonder- 
 ingly. " What s a stone out of a wall 
 here and there ? " 
 
 The policeman looked at Mr. Lippin- 
 bridge, or Mr. Strawcott, or whatever his 
 name was, and shook his head sadly. To 
 him the boy seemed pretty bad, and if he 
 had had his say he would nave carried him 
 off to the police station. 
 
 But the old gentleman smiled kindly. 
 u And who helped you take all this stone ? 
 Didn t your helpers tell you that it is 
 wrong to steal ? " 
 
 " I had no help, sir," said Aminadab. 
 " I did it all myself." 
 
 " Well, you must be unusually strong. 
 144 
 
AND HIS FREE LIBRARY 
 
 And how were you going to carry my 
 doors back to Mullinsville ? " 
 
 " On my back," said Aminadab, simply. 
 
 " A young Samson," said the old gen 
 tleman, looking over the tops of his glasses 
 at the policeman, who nodded affably. 
 
 " And the glass and timber, where did 
 you get those ? " 
 
 Aminadab told him. Somehow he was 
 not afraid in the presence of this fine, 
 patriarchal old man. He had heard of 
 jails, but he did not believe that the gen 
 tleman was going to punish him. 
 
 Mr. Strawcott if that was his name 
 heard him through, and then he said : 
 " Officer, I don t think that this is a case 
 for you. He has put back my door, and 
 I will deal with him in a way that seems 
 fit." 
 
 The officer rose and bowed, and went 
 out. 
 
 When Aminadab and the old man were 
 
 H5 
 
AMINADAB SKELCH 
 
 alone together, the latter said : " My boy, 
 a little fellow who has so much strength 
 of body and such kindly instincts ought 
 to learn that it is never kind to take things 
 that don t belong to him. Now, I believe 
 that you acted thoughtlessly, and I am 
 not going to punish you, although you 
 committed a crime in taking down my 
 door. Instead I am going to make you 
 a present of the doors, and will have them 
 sent out to Mullinsville; and I will also 
 give you ten thousand books to put on 
 the shelves, for a library without books is 
 like cake without sugar. Only first you 
 must go to each man from whom you er 
 borrowed material, and tell him what 
 you have done, and restore his property, 
 if he objects. And I will make good any 
 stone or glass or timber that is needed." 
 
 Aminadab seized the good man s hand 
 and wrung it, and a few minutes later he 
 was on his way home, and before night- 
 146 
 
AND HIS FREE LIBRARY 
 
 fall he had visited every man who had un 
 knowingly contributed to the new library. 
 And to the glory of the inhabitants of 
 Mullinsville, only one man refused to let 
 Aminadab keep what he had taken, and 
 that one was an old fellow who had miles 
 on miles of stone fences and from whom 
 the boy had taken only one stone. He in 
 sisted on its being returned to him, and as 
 it was the bottom stone in the foundation 
 wall, Dabby had a hard time getting it, 
 and plenty of time to reflect on his mis 
 doings. It is a singular fact that, after the 
 library was dedicated, there was no one 
 who spent so much time in it as this old 
 man who had refused to contribute a 
 single stone towards its erection. 
 
 The day of the dedication was made a 
 holiday in Mullinsville, and every one in 
 town came to see what one small boy had 
 been able to do; and old Mr. Strawcott, 
 or Lippinbridge, told them all that they 
 147 
 
AMINADAB SKELCH 
 
 ought to be proud of Aminadab, on the 
 whole, because while dishonesty was a 
 grievous quality, still it could be repented 
 of and doubtless Aminadab had already 
 repented, but public spirit was a thing so 
 rare that it ought to be encouraged by all 
 possible means. 
 
 Then Aminadab got up and said : u I 
 thought that I was going to give you this 
 library myself; but since my kind friend 
 here has opened my eyes, I see that I had 
 only two things to give you, my labor 
 and what taste I may possess. The rest 
 you have given yourselves, and the books 
 he has given. So I say let s give three 
 cheers for him." 
 
 The cheers were given lustily, and then, 
 much to Aminadab s surprise, Mr. Ham- 
 erton, who had come in late and unex 
 pectedly, rose and said : " Dabby has for 
 gotten that I own the ground on which he 
 built the library, but I cheerfully give it 
 148 
 
AND HIS FREE LIBRARY 
 
 to him to give to you, because I think 
 that he is the most generous and the most 
 public-spirited boy in New Jersey, and 
 after this we will trust him with anything." 
 And Dabby has proved faithful to that 
 trust. 
 
OLIVER S THREE GIFTS 
 
IT was on a bright morning early in 
 June, that Oliver Westinghouse left 
 his home in Thomaston, Connecti 
 cut, to seek his fortune. His mother, poor 
 woman, had nothing to give him but her 
 blessing and three nickels for pocket-pieces. 
 " Go, my son," she said, " and remem 
 ber that, although kind words butter no 
 parsnips, they make your going easier." 
 
 Oliver thanked her and kissed her, and 
 set forth. He paused at the front gate to 
 153 
 
OLIVER S THREE GIFTS 
 
 say : " If I am not back by Saturday with 
 a fortune, it will be because all the fairies 
 are dead." 
 
 His mother, who was blessed with a 
 sense of humor, said in return : " Then 
 I ll prepare dinner for but one next Sun 
 day," and with a tearful smile she waved 
 him a good-bye. 
 
 This was on Monday morning, and the 
 boy journeyed along with a light heart, 
 jingling the three nickels in his pocket. 
 He had not gone far before he came upon 
 a poor scissors-grinder who was walking 
 along under the burden of a heavy grind 
 stone. Oliver walked alongside of him 
 and said, " Good morning, sir. We need 
 
 rain." 
 
 "Don t say that," said the grinder. 
 " The going s bad enough as it is. It s a 
 weary walk to Waterbury, and I m half 
 sick of it." 
 
 " What s the matter with my carrying 
 154 
 
OLIVER S THREE GIFTS 
 
 your grindstone for a mile or two ? I m 
 strong and hearty, and I m on my way to 
 make my fortune before Saturday night." 
 
 " You ll need to work fast to get it made 
 on time, my good friend," said the man. 
 " I ve been tinkering at mine ever since I 
 was your age, and that s forty years, and 
 it s not nearly made yet." 
 
 " Perhaps you were never sure of mak 
 ing it as I am," said Oliver. 
 
 " Well, there s something in that," said 
 the old man. " I was never sure of doing 
 well, and I never have. Enough to eat 
 and a place to sleep and weary miles to 
 walk and the everlasting whirr of the 
 grindstone, with my nose pretty close to it, 
 and there you have my history for the last 
 forty years." 
 
 They had now come to a farmhouse, 
 and a woman ran out and asked the man 
 to sharpen her scissors. He thanked Oli 
 ver for relieving him of his burden, and 
 
THREE GIFTS 
 
 as the boy slung the grindstone off his 
 shoulders, the old man fumbled in his 
 pocket and at last brought out a key, 
 which he handed to the lad. " Take this, 
 my boy. It will open any lock if used 
 honestly." 
 
 " Thanks," said Oliver, " but you must 
 let me pay for it." The old man smiled, 
 and Oliver handed him one of the nickels, 
 and then bade him a cheerful good-day 
 and skipped gayly along the road to 
 Waterbury. 
 
 He listened to the bobolink s tankling 
 notes, and they seemed to say, "You ll 
 surely succeed." 
 
 " I believe you," said Oliver, and ran 
 along as briskly as if he had just been let 
 out of school. 
 
 He had made some two miles when he 
 
 came across a peddler whose cart was stuck 
 
 in a mudhole. His poor horse had not 
 
 strength to pull the wheels clear of the 
 
 156 
 
OLIVER S THREE GIFTS 
 
 mud, and the peddler was trying to coax 
 the animal. 
 
 " Good morning. Don t you believe in 
 the whip ? " said Oliver. 
 
 " No, my horse will do his best for love 
 of me. He ll do no more through fear of 
 me." 
 
 " That s very pretty, and I like you for 
 it," said Oliver. " But put your shoulder 
 to the wheel is worth a dozen kind words. 
 Come, you take one side, and I ll take the 
 other, and we ll put new heart into the 
 horse." 
 
 It was even as he had said. His strong 
 young shoulder and that of the peddler 
 made it an easy matter for the horse to 
 pull the wagon out of the mudhole ; and 
 then, the way being down hill, the peddler 
 climbed into the wagon and invited Oliver 
 to do the same, and the horse ambled 
 along at a decent gait on the road to 
 Waterbury. 
 
 "57 
 
OLIVER S THREE GIFTS 
 
 " What brings you a-tramping ? " said 
 the peddler. 
 
 " Oh, I m going to seek my fortune, 
 and I must find it by Saturday/ 
 
 " And you have but six days ? Why, 
 my boy, I ve been searching for that very 
 thing all my life, and I haven t a clue to it 
 yet." 
 
 " You lacked faith then. I ll go home 
 with a fortune Saturday night, and don t 
 you forget it." 
 
 " Well, I ll say this much. You seem 
 willing to stop in your hunt long enough 
 to help others, and so I m going to give 
 you a little present. It may not be 
 of any use to you, but it may come in 
 handy to guard against savage dogs on 
 the road. It s a bit of a root that my 
 father dug out of the Black Forest, and 
 it will make the wildest animal friendly 
 to you. It has something of the nature of 
 catnip." 
 
 158 
 
OLIVER S THREE GIFTS 
 
 The peddler broke off a piece from a 
 black root that he took out of his pocket, 
 and gave it to Oliver. 
 
 " Thanks, but you must let me pay for 
 it," said Oliver. He handed the man a 
 nickel, and the peddler accepted it with a 
 smile. He had long ago learned that 
 money honestly come by should never be 
 spurned. 
 
 A few miles further on and the peddler 
 turned away from the road to Waterbury, 
 so Oliver pursued his journey alone. His 
 ride had made him glad of a little more leg 
 exercise, and he ran along whistling in a 
 way to make the robins envious. 
 
 About three miles out of Waterbury he 
 overtook a charcoal-burner on his way to 
 town with a load of charcoal. The fellow 
 had cut his thumb while whittling a switch, 
 and it was bleeding profusely when Oliver 
 came up. " What s the matter cut your 
 thumb ? " said Oliver, sympathetically. 
 59 
 
OLIVER S THREE GIFTS 
 
 " I have, and it s a nasty cut. Haven t 
 any court plaster in your shoes, have 
 you ? " said the man to the barefoot boy. 
 
 Oliver laughed. " No," he said, " but 
 my mother says that this is just as good," 
 and with that he stepped to a stone wall 
 and picked two or three cobwebs with the 
 morning dew still upon them. " Wrap 
 your thumb up in those, and it will soon 
 heal." 
 
 The charcoal-burner followed Oliver s 
 advice,and the flow of blood was staunched. 
 
 " Well, woodsman that I am, I never 
 heard of that before," said he. " Where 
 are you going, to Waterbury ? " 
 
 Oliver nodded, and the man invited 
 him to get into the wagon, and the two 
 rolled speedily along toward Waterbury. 
 
 " What brings you this way ? " asked 
 the charcoal-burner. 
 
 " Going to build up a fortune by Satur 
 day night," said Oliver. 
 1 60 
 
OLIVER S THREE GIFTS 
 
 "You must be a master builder, then," 
 said the man. " I ve tried to do a little 
 work in that line ever since I was a kid, 
 but this doesn t look as if I d got much 
 beyond the laying of the corner-stone." 
 
 "You don t believe in yourself enough," 
 said Oliver. 
 
 " Well, that may be so, and I m sure I 
 wish you luck. You seem to have time 
 to help others, and that will make them 
 willing to give you a boost. You did me 
 a good turn, and I m going to let you 
 have something to remember my thumb 
 by." He tugged away at a greasy old 
 wallet, and drew forth a circus ticket. 
 " This was given to me this morning by a 
 feller that used to be in the charcoal busi 
 ness with me, but now he s in the circus 
 that s exhibiting in Waterbury. I d like 
 to see it well enough, but I m pretty busy, 
 and you bein a kid ll like it better n I do, 
 so you re welcome to it." 
 161 
 
OLIVER S THREE GIFTS 
 
 Oliver s eyes sparkled. " You re a 
 brick," he said. " But you must let me 
 pay for it," and with that he gave him the 
 last nickel. 
 
 The man smiled, but he understood the 
 lad s independence, and accepted the coin; 
 and having reached the outskirts of the 
 city, he turned east, after setting Oliver 
 down at the entrance to the circus. The 
 tents lay white and dazzling in the morn 
 ing sun, and Oliver felt that his fortune 
 lay within them. 
 
 It were inexpedient to tell of all the de 
 lights that fell to the boy. Penniless 
 though he was, he was as happy as a king 
 would like to be; and he roamed 
 around, looking at the wild beasts, fond 
 ling the elephant s trunk, and wishing that 
 his mother were along to share his fun. 
 
 When he came to the lion s cage he 
 noticed a great crowd around it, and the 
 lion was growling and roaring in a manner 
 162 
 
OLIVER S THREE GIFTS 
 
 to scare the stoutest hearts. Oliver pushed 
 his way through the crowd, and found that 
 the keeper of the lion had become angry 
 over some slight from the owner of the 
 show, and had left town that morning, 
 taking with him the key of the cage. He 
 had also given the lion something that had 
 aroused all his savage instincts. The beast 
 leaped from end to end of his cage, roar 
 ing in a blood-curdling way and trying to 
 break his bars. 
 
 " I d give a thousand dollars if I could 
 get a lion-tamer this minute ! " 
 
 The trouble with a great many persons 
 who are looking for success is that they 
 don t recognize it when they meet it, but 
 Oliver was not that kind of person. That 
 is why he immediately said to the pro 
 prietor : 
 
 " I ll go in and tame your old lion if 
 you ll pay me a good round sum when I 
 get inside the cage." 
 
 163 
 
OLIVER S THREE GIFTS 
 
 The man smiled in very much the same 
 way that Goliath did when David stepped 
 up to him, but he said : 
 
 " I m a man of my word. Tame that 
 lion, and I ll give you a thousand dollars 
 and a plot of ground in Bridgeport near 
 the winter quarters of our show." 
 
 Oliver shook hands with the man ; then 
 he took out of his pocket the old key 
 that the scissors-grinder had given him 
 and opened the cage door. The lion gave 
 a mighty bound, and would have leaped 
 through the door, but Oliver held the 
 piece of root to his nose, and in a minute 
 the beast was lying on his back, with his 
 paws in the air, in a delirium of joy. It 
 was some kind of catnip probably lion- 
 nip for the king of beasts let Oliver 
 caress him and pat him, and finally sat 
 down in the corner of his cage with the 
 brave boy astride of his back. And purr ! 
 You d have thought all the cats in New 
 164 
 
OLIVER S THREE GIFTS 
 
 York City were having a purring conven 
 tion. 
 
 The manager was better than his word. 
 He gave Oliver $2,000 and a deed for a 
 city lot in Bridgeport, and invited him 
 home to dine with him. 
 
 The show was billed to stay in Water- 
 bury a week, and during that time Oliver 
 gave daily performances in the cage, al 
 ways taking care to keep hold of the root. 
 
 Saturday night, after the show was over, 
 Oliver took the last train up the Nauga- 
 tuck Valley to Thomaston. His mother 
 had gone to bed, but she rose and let him 
 in. 
 
 " Why, my boy ! I didn t expect you," 
 said she. " You ll have to kill a chicken, 
 for I wasn t going to have anything but a 
 cup of tea for my Sunday dinner." 
 
 " You should have had as much confi 
 dence in me as I had in myself, mother 
 dear," said Oliver. Then he told her that 
 165 
 
OLIVER S THREE GIFTS 
 
 he had been engaged at a princely salary 
 to be lion-tamer-in-extraordinary to the 
 circus. 
 
 When he showed her the deed and the 
 two thousand dollars, " For the land 
 sakes ! " said she, and fell weeping on his 
 neck. 
 
JIM AND THE GOLD 
 SPIRIT 
 
JIM CORBIN S grandfather had 
 been a miser, which probably ac 
 counts for the inordinate love of 
 money evinced by the boy. If he made 
 ten cents picking berries, he hid it away in 
 a hole beneath a loose board in the barn 
 floor, and often after school he would go 
 out to the barn and count his money. 
 
 Jim lived with his father in a dingy 
 white house of two stones, near the top of 
 Loudon Hill. His mother had died when 
 169 
 
r 
 
 JIM AND THE GOLD SPIRIT 
 
 he was a child of three, to the great grief 
 of his father, but Jim only remembered 
 her as a sweet-voiced woman who used to 
 caress him a good deal, but for whom he 
 never felt the love that he always had for 
 his father. Mr. Corbin was a man who 
 would have been content with his lot if he 
 had not had a penny, but Jim was always 
 wishing that he was rich, and he was in a 
 fair way of becoming so, for he never spent 
 a cent if he could help it. 
 
 Jim was fond of his father, although he 
 never thought much about it ; but he was 
 decidedly fond of his dog, Snip, a black 
 and white setter or at least it had setter 
 blood in it. When Jim went to register 
 it at the town hall and was asked by the 
 clerk what kind of dog it was, he began : 
 " Its father was a setter and its mother was 
 
 a collie " " Oh, mongrel," said the 
 
 clerk, to Jim s lasting disgust. His dog 
 
 was no mongrel, if it did have mixed blood, 
 
 170 
 
JIM AND THE GOLD SPIRIT 
 
 and he thought as much of the handsome 
 animal as he could well think of anything 
 not connected with money. 
 
 One evening after the chores were done 
 he lighted a lantern, and calling Snip, went 
 out to the barn to count his money. He 
 found that he had $76.78. 
 
 " Not so bad for two years savings," 
 said he to Snip. " Oh, but I do wish that 
 I was awfully rich and had lots of horses 
 and carriages and lived in a castle like 
 Judge Perrine s." 
 
 As he spoke he was startled to see a 
 little man in black, about three feet in 
 height, emerge from under the loose board 
 and take up his stand in front of him. 
 Snip gave a low growl and raised his ruff, 
 but he did not desert Jim. 
 
 As for the boy, although he was startled, 
 he did not show it. He grabbed all his 
 money, and replaced it in the stocking 
 which served as his purse. 
 171 
 
JIM AND THE GOLD SPIRIT 
 
 The little man stared at Jim from under 
 his bushy eyebrows, and said, in a voice 
 that sounded like the clink of gold, " Well, 
 what do you want of me ? " 
 
 " I don t want anything of you that I 
 know of. I suppose you are a fairy ? " 
 
 " As to that, I don t know what you 
 mean," said the little man; "but I can give 
 you riches all you want, if you do as I 
 bid you." 
 
 " And what must I do ? " asked Jim, 
 rising to his feet and eyeing the man with 
 suspicion. 
 
 " Well, you must give a thousand dol 
 lars to the poor every day, or your riches 
 will vanish." 
 
 " And how much do I get every day," 
 asked Jim. He did not wish to make 
 any foolish promises. 
 
 " You ll get two thousand every day, 
 besides a handsome house and barn." 
 
 " All right, I promise," said Jim, " al- 
 172 
 
JIM AND THE GOLD SPIRIT 
 
 though I think it s a good deal, consider- 
 ing." 
 
 " Very well, don t forget. The second 
 thing is, you must kill your dog." 
 
 " Kill Snip ? I guess not," said Jim, 
 patting the dog on the shoulders. Snip 
 looked up at him with a loving glance as 
 much as to say : " You couldn t get along 
 without me no matter how rich you were, 
 could you ? " 
 
 " Well, it s nothing to me," said the 
 little man, turning to go as he had come ; 
 " I don t care whether you are rich or not. 
 Of course, I d like your dog, but he ll be 
 no use to me until he s dead; so if you 
 don t kill him, you get no wealth." 
 
 Jim was trembling all over. He loved 
 Snip. But he loved gold even more. He 
 lifted his hand from the dog s shoulder. 
 
 " Well, what is it ? " said the little man. 
 " The dog will only live a few years at 
 best, while you have forty or fifty years 
 
 73 
 
JIM AND THE GOLD SPIRIT 
 
 before you, and all the wealth that you 
 can wish if you will shorten his life." 
 
 This argument decided Jim. 
 
 "How must I ki kill him?" he 
 asked, breaking into a sweat. 
 
 " Shoot him," said the little man, as if 
 he was talking about the killing of a par 
 tridge. 
 
 Jim walked silently out of the barn. 
 The dog rose to go too, but he sent him 
 back. In a few minutes he came back 
 with a shot-gun. He was a capital shot, 
 but it is one thing to shoot quail or ma 
 rauding crows, and it is quite another 
 thing to shoot a dog who has been as 
 friendly as a dog can be for three or four 
 years of your life. 
 
 " When will I become rich ? " said he. 
 
 " As soon as the dog is dead," said the 
 little man. 
 
 The dog had curled up in his absence 
 and gone to sleep, and this made it a trifle 
 174 
 
JIM AND THE GOLD SPIRIT 
 
 easier for him to shoot him. If the dog 
 had risen and licked his hand, or lifted it 
 with his cold muzzle, Jim would have 
 told the little man to get away with his 
 temptation; but the dog slept soundly, 
 and in a minute he had passed into a 
 dreamless sleep. 
 
 Scarcely had the gun ceased echoing 
 when Jim found himself in a splendid 
 barn, with so much to attract his attention 
 that he did not think of the dog. There 
 were box-stalls in which blooded horses 
 pawed the floor impatiently, great hay 
 lofts, a harness room, a carriage room, and 
 running water, and two grooms. 
 
 The old man had disappeared, and Jim 
 was glad of it. With a whoop and a 
 bound he ran to the house, and found a 
 marble palace even finer than that of 
 Judge Perrine. He bounded up the 
 marble steps and pressed the electric 
 button, and a servant in livery opened 
 75 
 
JIM AND THE GOLD SPIRIT 
 
 the door. " Where s my father P " asked 
 Jim. 
 
 " In the library," answered the servant, 
 bowing. 
 
 As Jim passed a mirror in the hall, he 
 saw that he was dressed like the Hilton 
 boys, who were home from Yale for the 
 holidays ; he had always felt that to be 
 arrayed like one of them would be to at 
 tain perfect happiness. As it was, his col 
 lar cut his neck and his shoes felt tight. 
 He found his father dressed in a tight- 
 fitting frock-coat, and wearing a high col 
 lar and patent-leather shoes, and looking 
 as uncomfortable and forlorn as if he had 
 malaria. 
 
 " Isn t it great, father ? " said Jim, with 
 enthusiasm. 
 
 " Is this your doing, son ? " said the old 
 man, sadly. " I suppose it is. You ve 
 always wished we were rich, and I sup 
 pose we are too rich to ever get over it ;. 
 176 
 
JIM AND THE GOLD SPIRIT 
 
 but, if I could slip on my flannel shirt and 
 go around in my socks, I d give all this 
 fancy work and fixings to somebody who 
 had been brought up to enjoy it. I 
 always thought I was pretty contented, 
 but I can t be contented with this." 
 
 Jim sank into a seat opposite his father. 
 It was soft and yielding, and he bounced 
 up and down on it boylike for a moment 
 or two before he spoke. 
 
 " Yes, sir, I did it, or at least the Spirit 
 of Gold did. We ve got to give a thou 
 sand dollars a day to the poor, or we ll 
 lose all our money." 
 
 " I lost all mine before I was born, and 
 yet I ve always been happy. Still, it will 
 be pleasant to help the poor. How did 
 you get it all ? By fairy connivance P " 
 
 Just then a dog at the farm-house next 
 door howled dismally. Jim s face fell, 
 and he heaved a sigh that you would 
 hardly expect to hear from one so rich. 
 177 
 
JIM AND THE GOLD SPIRIT 
 
 " I had to pay a big price for it, papa," 
 said he. " I had to shoot Snip." 
 
 Mr. Corbin rose from his seat. " You 
 shot your dog our dog ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir. The man said he wouldn t 
 live more than a few years, anyway." 
 
 " None of us will, for that matter. But, 
 boy, that dog was your friend. He trusted 
 you. He went to sleep with his head on 
 your feet night after night, sure that you 
 would not hurt him, and he guarded our 
 house after we had both turned in. And 
 you reward him by killing him. Oh, our 
 wealth will do us no good. Get them to 
 give us back our old home and dog again. 
 Til never be happy with all this starch 
 and flummery, and no dog to jump on me 
 when I come home." 
 
 During the somewhat lengthy speech of 
 the old man Jim s face had been getting 
 more and more crimson, and he now rose 
 to his feet and said : 
 
 178 
 
JIM AND THE GOLD SPIRIT 
 
 " Father, I don t know what possessed 
 me to do what I did. I don t believe I ll 
 like this kind of life one bit. I m afraid 
 of getting a spot on my clothes, the car 
 pets seem too nice to walk on, there isn t 
 anything cozy about it, and if I can only 
 get Snip back again, I ll gladly give it all 
 up." 
 
 He left the library, and ran out of doors 
 and through the spacious courtyard that 
 had been the old muddy barn-yard, to the 
 barn. He found the place where he had 
 stood when he shot the dog. There was 
 a blood mark on the floor, but the dog s 
 body was gone. As he gazed at it, his 
 father came out and joined him. 
 
 " Snippy, Snippy, come back to me. 
 I ll give up all I have to get you back," 
 said Jim. 
 
 Never were words more sincere, and 
 they bore instant fruit. Jim s eyes were 
 unconsciously fixed upon the blood spot, 
 i 79 
 
JIM AND THE GOLD SPIRIT 
 
 and as he looked at it, it grew large and 
 black, and at last turned into the sem 
 blance of a dog, and then at the word 
 " Snip " from Jim it became his old dog. 
 
 At the same time the big, palatial mod 
 ern barn was changed to the old ram 
 shackle one that needed shingling so 
 badly, and instead of ten blooded horses 
 there was only knee-sprung Jessie. 
 
 Snip bounded upon Jim and rubbed his 
 honest head against the boy s breast. Old 
 Mr. Corbin stroked the faithful beast s 
 silky ears. Then son and father together 
 turned their heads from side to side as if 
 to ease them after the choking linen col 
 lars, and Jim said: 
 
 " Good riddance to the money, papa. 
 We have Snip and each other, and what 
 more do we want ? " 
 
 i -O 
 
THE CAKE OF CHARITY 
 
HARRY ADAMS was in the habit 
 of taking long walks by himself 
 in order to become acquainted 
 with his native city, New York. Country 
 boys generally know all the points of 
 interest for miles around their homes, but 
 city children often grow up without know 
 ing much about their town beyond the 
 few blocks that lie in their neighborhood. 
 This is certainly to be regretted in a city 
 like New York, which is full of the most 
 183 
 
THE CAKE OF CHARITY 
 
 interesting localities. But Harry knew 
 New York from the Battery to Harlem. 
 
 One day he was out walking on Fifth 
 Avenue, which, as you all know, is the 
 most famous street of residences in 
 America. There are few shops on upper 
 Fifth Avenue, and so when Harry passed 
 a bakery at the corner of Sixty-fifth Street, 
 he was much surprised and turned back. 
 He had passed the spot hundreds of times 
 before, but had never noticed the shop. 
 He happened to have some spending 
 money in his pocket, and he went in. 
 
 " What sort of cake have you, if you 
 please ? " Harry was extremely courteous. 
 He always took off his cap when he met 
 an acquaintance in the street, and he often 
 took it off in the house without being 
 asked to by his mother and if you have 
 any younger brothers, you will appreciate 
 that statement. 
 
 There was a very tall, thin, young 
 184 
 
THE CAKE OF CHARITY 
 
 woman behind the counter. She had 
 flaxen hair and pink cheeks and blue eyes, 
 and Harry thought she looked like a doll 
 come to life. The counter was heaped 
 with all sorts of strange-looking cakes of 
 pretty shapes and colors, and all of them 
 were covered with frosting. Cake without 
 frosting is much worse than an egg with 
 out salt, and this young woman knew it. 
 
 " I have charity cake, malice cake, good 
 nature tarts, and so forth." 
 
 Harry thought the names very amus 
 ing, and he bought two of each kind of 
 cake mentioned. 
 
 " Are they wholesome ? " said he, which 
 was a funny question for a live boy to 
 ask. 
 
 "Very," answered the girl, as she 
 wrapped them up in a sheet of pink paper 
 with a beautiful fairy story on one side of 
 it. " If you re stingy, the charity cake will 
 make you generous. If you are cross, the 
 185 
 
THE CAKE OF CHARITY 
 
 good-nature cake will make you pleasant ; 
 but the malice cake is not good for chil 
 dren, and if you like, I ll buy it back. I ll 
 give you five cents a cake for it." 
 
 As Harry had paid but a cent apiece for 
 the cakes, he was only too glad to sell the 
 malice cakes at a profit of four cents. Boys 
 sometimes develop the trading instinct very 
 early. 
 
 After he had sold the cakes, he bought 
 five more malice cakes at a cent apiece, and 
 then she bought them back at five cents 
 apiece, so that he received a quarter for 
 them. 
 
 " How do you expect to make any 
 money if you sell your cakes at so much 
 less than you pay for them?" 
 
 " I don t wish to make money on the 
 malice cakes." 
 
 " Then why do you bake them ? " 
 
 " I don t bake them. My baker bakes 
 them." 
 
 186 
 
THE CAKE OF CHARITY 
 
 " But why does he bake them, if you 
 don t wish to sell them ? " 
 
 " Because he hopes I will sell them." 
 
 " And why don t you sell them ? " 
 
 " Because I don t think they ought to 
 be eaten." 
 
 Harry was just going to ask her why 
 she baked them then when he realized 
 that they would go on talking all day long 
 if he did not stop, so he walked out of the 
 shop with his cakes, after bowing gra 
 ciously to the girl. 
 
 He had read "Alice in Wonderland," 
 that treasure book for all bright children, 
 and so he thought it was best not to eat 
 any of the cakes himself He would try 
 them on the animals in the Park instead. 
 
 The Menagerie is only a short distance 
 from Sixty-fifth Street, and Harry soon 
 found himself in front of the lion s cage. 
 The big beast had the toothache, and 
 he was so out of sorts that he was lashing 
 187 
 
THE CAKE OF CHARITY 
 
 his tail and growling in a way to inspire 
 awe. Harry went over to him and spoke 
 in a low tone, and the lion stopped his tail 
 lashing long enough to look at him and 
 wink, but he was suffering too much 
 to care for any playfellow. So Harry 
 handed him one of the good-nature cakes, 
 and the lion ate it, and in a moment he 
 had forgotten his toothache and was 
 chasing his tail around the cage. 
 
 Harry was pleased to see how the cake 
 worked, and went into the elephant house, 
 where he found one of the elephants eat 
 ing up a whole peanut without offering any 
 to the other elephants. He spoke to him, 
 and the elephant looked ashamed, but 
 went on crunching the peanut. So Harry 
 gave him a piece of the charity cake and 
 another peanut, which he had picked off 
 the ground. If Central Park were to be 
 deserted ten years by people, birds, and 
 beasts, when they returned to it, they 
 
 188 
 
THE CAKE OF CHARITY 
 
 would find where the menagerie and bear- 
 caves and bird-houses had been lofty pea 
 nut trees would be waving their beautiful 
 green limbs. Don t tell me that peanuts 
 don t grow on trees, for I know better. If 
 chestnuts grow on chestnut trees and wal 
 nuts on walnut trees, of course it is reason 
 able to suppose that peanuts grow on pea 
 nut trees. 
 
 As soon as the elephant had eaten the 
 cake, he broke open the peanut and po 
 litely offered half of it to his companion 
 beast. And the latter grabbed it without 
 so much as a thank you. 
 
 Harry had now learned all he wanted to 
 know about the properties of the cakes. 
 He was a little sorry that he hadn t kept a 
 malice cake that he might have given a 
 piece to one of the gentle deer. He was 
 sure that it would have developed the 
 temper of a tiger in a minute. But I m 
 glad he didn t. There are enough tigerish 
 189 
 
THE CAKE OF CHARITY 
 
 tempers in the world without adding to 
 them. 
 
 On Fifth Avenue there dwelt a man 
 who was as rich as a king in a fairy book. 
 And he was as mean as he was rich, and 
 wouldn t give a cent to a poor man even 
 on Christmas day. Harry knew him by 
 reputation, and it had always worried him 
 to think that with so many poor people 
 as there were in the city this man should 
 hang on to his money with such tenacity. 
 There s another big word, but if you sup 
 pose that I am going to give up big words 
 just because you won t need them for a 
 year or two, you re mistaken. A big word 
 is only made up of several little words, 
 and if you learn a few now, you ll have 
 that many less to learn in the years to 
 come. 
 
 This rich old man was as cross as he 
 was mean. He would not let little boys 
 run around in his front yard or play rail- 
 190 
 
THE CAKE OF CHARITY 
 
 road in his balconies. He used to make 
 the servants of his servants drive them off. 
 For, although he was very mean to others, 
 he denied himself nothing that money 
 could buy, and he had servants for his 
 servants, so that his servants would have 
 nothing to do but wait on him. Of course 
 Harry never played on his balconies, 
 because he lived in a flat and had a fire- 
 escape of his own to play on ; but he did 
 think it hard that the poor little raga 
 muffins that sometimes sweep down on 
 Fifth Avenue from the side streets could 
 not have a little innocent fun if they 
 wanted to. 
 
 Harry wanted to give the old man some 
 of the cake, but how to make him eat it 
 he did not know. That afternoon he 
 waited near the palace of the rich man 
 until his coach and eight came up from 
 his office. He had made his money 
 selling soap, and he rode to and from his 
 191 
 
THE CAKE OF CHARITY 
 
 office in greater style than that shown by 
 the President of the United States. He 
 had an opalescent coach drawn by cream- 
 colored horses, and there was nothing 
 on Fifth Avenue that could approach it 
 for elegance. 
 
 At precisely six o clock the rich man 
 drove up to his palace, and three servants 
 in livery dropped from the coach to open 
 the door. Then ten more came from 
 inside the palace with a silken awning 
 upheld on golden poles, which they 
 held aloft so that the great man would 
 not get sunstruck on his way to the 
 house. 
 
 Now, Harry had heard that the only 
 way to the old man s consideration was 
 through his vanity. He had invented his 
 soap himself, and had built his fortune up 
 from one cake which he made and sold 
 when he was a boy, and he liked to think 
 that it was the best soap ever sold. Well, 
 192 
 
THE CAKE OF CHARITY 
 
 of course, you know that all soaps are the 
 best. If you don t believe it read the 
 pretty advertisements at the back of the 
 magazines. 
 
 Harry had a very engaging manner, and 
 when the great man stepped out of his 
 coach, Harry walked up to him, and re 
 moving his cap, he said in a tone of exces 
 sive sweetness, unmixed with servility : 
 
 " Mr. , I have always used your soap, 
 
 and that is why I am such a clean little 
 boy [which was the truth]. Please take 
 a bit of my cake, which is the only way 
 I have of showing how much I like your 
 cakes of soap." 
 
 The millionaire was tickled. The boy 
 had not asked him to give, but to take, and 
 that is always an easy thing to do for 
 some people. The cakes looked so pretty 
 and so fresh that he broke off a large piece 
 from each one. First he ate the good 
 nature cake, and he had no sooner done 
 
 93 
 
THE CAKE OF CHARITY 
 
 so than his face beamed with sweetness, 
 and he patted Harry on the head and said : 
 " My little man, you are a good fellow to 
 be so thoughtful. I never ate such deli 
 cious cake. If you will bring me some 
 more to-morrow I will buy it of you 
 provided you sell it at the wholesale price. 
 Then he took a bite of the charity cake, 
 and in an instant he smote his forehead 
 and said : " Mercy me, what suffering there 
 is in this city. Bring me my bags of gold, 
 and you, boy, jump in with me, and we 
 will visit the poor and do what we can to 
 relieve them." 
 
 Harry was overjoyed. He jumped into 
 the coach. The servants, who were too 
 astonished to speak, hurried out with bags 
 of gold until the floor and the front seat 
 were piled up with them. 
 
 Then the millionaire told the coachman 
 to go where Harry wished, and as the boy 
 was familiar with the quarter of the city 
 194 
 
THE CAKE OF CHARITY 
 
 where alms were most needed, they were 
 soon speeding down town. 
 
 As they came near to the squalid por 
 tion of the town, the old man s face glowed 
 with sweetness. " To think that I never 
 realized what I could do with my money 
 before," said he. " This is better than 
 making soap or selling it, for it will be 
 making happiness by wholesale. Won t 
 it, my boy ? " said he to Harry. 
 
 " Yes, sir," said the lad, and, strange to 
 say, his eyes glistened, although he was 
 anything but a cry-baby. 
 
 Then Harry developed a new power. 
 He found he could tell at a glance who 
 deserved help and who did not. All the 
 evening they drove from house to house, 
 and Harry distributed the money until the 
 last bag was emptied and the last woman 
 had murmured her thanks. 
 
 And if they had done nothing else, the 
 spectacle of the beautiful horses and the 
 
THE CAKE OF CHARITY 
 
 gorgeous coach would have been a good 
 one for the poor people, who seldom saw 
 anything finer than a junk wagon in the 
 way of an equipage. 
 
 The beautiful thing about the cakes was 
 that this effect never wore off. The ele 
 phant to this day divides his peanuts with 
 his companion. The big lion is still good- 
 tempered. And the old man and Harry 
 rode around New York night after night 
 until there was not a worthy poor person 
 in the city who had not been helped. But 
 I think that if the old man had given them 
 all tickets to the country, and a small piece 
 of ground when they got there, he would 
 have done better yet. 
 
 One day I met Harry, and I asked him 
 why he didn t try to get a piece of cake 
 that would make it impossible for people 
 to be poor and miserable, and he imme 
 diately ran off to the bakery to try and 
 find some. But there was no bakery there. 
 196 
 
THE CAKE OF CHARITY 
 
 If he had ever had a chance to get such 
 cake, he had lost it. He thought that the 
 shop-keeper had moved somewhere else, 
 but I think she had given up business. 
 No one can buy at a heavy loss and be 
 successful, and those malice cakes were 
 her ruin. 
 
THE BOY WHO MADE A 
 TROLLEY CAR 
 
GEORGE STARBUCK had al 
 ways lived in the country, which 
 was the best thing that could 
 have happened to him. Have you ever 
 thought, you city child, how little chance 
 you have to become great or famous ? 
 You may become rich, but the chances are 
 that you will never be President, and all 
 because you were unfortunate enough to 
 be born and brought up in the city. 
 
 You have been taught to laugh each 
 
THE BOY WHO MADE A TROLLEY CAR 
 
 week at the poor countryman who is pic 
 tured in the comic weeklies as a sort of 
 cross between a monkey and a sharper, 
 but the countryman learned what neigh- 
 borliness meant when he was a boy, and 
 you will never know its meaning unless 
 you leave the crowded city before it is too 
 late. Go up into the country and learn 
 to be neighborly and self-reliant, and you 
 may get into the history books ; and 
 future little boys will have to learn all 
 about you as you have to learn about 
 George Washington, and General Grant, 
 and Daniel Webster all country boys. 
 
 George Starbuck lived at Gray town, 
 near Worcester, in Massachusetts, and he 
 could make anything that he had ever 
 seen. At seven he made a wagon, whit 
 tling the wheels out of soft pine wood, and 
 his father rode in it a half hour before it 
 fell to pieces and broke his leg. 
 
 So when Mr. Starbuck took George to 
 
THE BOY WHO MADE A TROLLEY CAR 
 
 Boston and showed him trolley cars, or 
 " electrics/ which is the absurd name they 
 give them there, George said : 
 
 " I ll make one when I get home." 
 
 Remember, he was only thirteen. But 
 make one he did. How he knew what 
 kind of timber to use passes me, but at 
 the end of a week he called his father out 
 to his workshop, which had formerly been 
 a wagon shed, and there was a trolley car, 
 life-size, and for all the world like one of 
 those that run out to Cambridge and 
 Arlington. 
 
 Mr. Starbuck was delighted. 
 
 " What are you going to do with it, my 
 son ? " asked he. 
 
 " Well, I had some thoughts of selling 
 it," said George ; " but, after all, money 
 is not everything, so now I think I ll take 
 you and mother and a party of neighbors 
 down to Boston in it; and when I get 
 there, the neighbors can go sight-seeing, 
 
THE BOY WHO MADE A TROLLEY CAR 
 
 and I ll make enough money running it 
 to raise the mortgage that is on this 
 farm." 
 
 When you grow up, you will find that 
 farmers raise a great many things on their 
 farms, but that mortgages are sometimes 
 very hard to raise ; but it is a heap of sat 
 isfaction to raise one. So, you see, George 
 was a good boy to answer his father in 
 that way. 
 
 " There s no time like the present for 
 things that are pleasant," said Mr. Star- 
 buck ; so they decided to take the trolley 
 to Boston the very next day. Now, you 
 may have taken the trolley to Boston 
 yourself but not in the way they took it 
 on a platform car. 
 
 They invited their neighbors to come 
 early next morning and start with them 
 for Boston, and twenty accepted the invi 
 tation. George and his father and mother 
 ran the heavy trolley car upon a low-hung 
 204 
 
THE BOY WHO MADE A TROLLEY CAR 
 
 wagon that they used when they wanted 
 to carry plate-glass to market, and then 
 the neighbors and all piled into the car, 
 and George hitched a pair of cattle which 
 is country for a yoke of oxen to the 
 wagon, and they were drawn down to the 
 station with ease. It was, of course, easier 
 to take the car off the wagon than to put 
 it on. They started the willing oxen home, 
 sure that they would find their way by 
 themselves. Then they all sat down in 
 the car to wait for a freight train to come. 
 In a few minutes a freight train stopped 
 to unload some empty milk cans, and 
 George removed his cap, and politely 
 asked a brakeman if he would help him 
 put his trolley car upon a platform car, as 
 he was going to take it to Boston. The 
 brakeman had been born in the country, 
 and that made him willing to be helpful ; 
 so he jumped down and signaled the en 
 gineer not to start, and then, after the 
 205 
 
THE BOY WHO MADE A TROLLEY CAR 
 
 neighbors had all gotten out of the trolley 
 he, with the help of the Starbucks, put the 
 car upon the platform car. Then George 
 and his parents and all the neighbors 
 stepped inside of the car, and the train 
 started for Boston. 
 
 Pretty soon the conductor, who was a 
 city-bred man, came along and asked them 
 for their fare. 
 
 George s feelings were hurt, and he said : 
 " Why, why should we pay any fare ? I 
 am taking my parents and some neighbors 
 to Boston in my own trolley car. I will 
 pay you freight for the car, but not one 
 cent for car fare." 
 
 The neighbors all cheered these noble 
 words, which sounded very much like the 
 famous sayings of famous men, and the 
 conductor was covered with confusion, and 
 left them to enjoy their trip. In a few 
 hours they ran into the freight yards at 
 Boston, and then the pleasant brakeman 
 
 ao6 
 
THE BOY WHO MADE A TROLLEY CAR 
 
 assisted the three to place their car upon a 
 trolley track, and their journey was ended. 
 You may wonder why the neighbors did 
 not assist. They wanted to the worst 
 way, but George said : 
 
 " No ; this is a holiday trip, and I don t 
 want you to feel that you have any chores 
 to do. Mother and father and I will do 
 all that is necessary, and you must have as 
 good a time as you can, and meet me here 
 at twelve to-night, for I expect to go back 
 then." 
 
 The neighbors gave him three times 
 three and a tiger ; but as he didn t know 
 know what to do with a tiger in Boston, 
 he gave it back to them, and they went 
 away with it. 
 
 George fitted the trolley to the over 
 head wires, and his mother turned on the 
 current and then took her seat inside, and 
 Mr. Starbuck acted as motorman, and 
 they glided up Summer Street as if they 
 207 
 
THE BOY WHO MADE A TROLLEY CAR 
 
 had always done it. I think that George 
 is deserving of a good deal of credit for 
 having made so big a vehicle in a week 
 with no tools but a jack-knife and a 
 scythe. 
 
 At Arch Street they were hailed by a 
 man who was standing on the corner. 
 Mr. Starbuck stopped at once. This 
 naturally puzzled the man on the corner, 
 because as a general thing a trolley car 
 does not stop for passengers. As soon as 
 he stepped on board he asked George, 
 who came around for his fare, why the car 
 stopped. 
 
 " Why, this is father s first trip, and he 
 doesn t know the ropes very well. He 
 thought it would be easier for you to get 
 on the car if it stopped. The fare is ten 
 cents, for you see this is really my private 
 car, and I m trying to raise the mortgage 
 on father s farm." 
 
 The passenger, who had been born in 
 208 
 
THE BOY WHO MADE A TROLLEY CAR 
 
 the country, paid the ten cents at once, 
 but he advised George to stick to the 
 usual five cent fare. " For," said he, 
 " most of these people are city bred, and 
 they won t care a snap about your mort 
 gage. They are not neighborly enough." 
 
 This was the first time that George had 
 heard that city people were not neigh 
 borly, and it grieved him. But the car 
 soon filled up, and even at five cents a 
 head he had a pocket full of nickels. He 
 went out on the front platform, and said 
 to his father : " I guess we can go back 
 to-morrow with the mortgage raised." 
 
 Then his mother came out and joined 
 them. They were going through the 
 shopping district, and could not move any 
 faster than a mile an hour, because there 
 were so many women crossing the tracks 
 to go to the shops. 
 
 " Look here," said Mrs. Starbuck to 
 George, " there s no use letting these peo- 
 209 
 
THE BOY WHO MADE A TROLLEY CAR 
 
 pie ride far for five cents. It s a private 
 car. Why not call out f change cars, and 
 then fill up the car with new passengers ? " 
 
 I fancy that Mrs. Starbuck had a little 
 city blood in her. George was a dutiful 
 son, and he immediately stepped to the 
 door of the car and yelled : " All out ! " 
 and the passengers scrambled out like a 
 flock of sheep, and he was free to fill the 
 car up again. Only the first passenger 
 stayed in, and he said : " That was a 
 clever move." So George said he might 
 ride all day long if he wanted to, and, 
 although he was very busy, he did ride 
 all day long, because such chances don t 
 come very often. 
 
 Along in the afternoon they were pass 
 ing the Hotel Vendome, and the neigh 
 bors came out and hailed the car, not 
 recognizing George. They had been sight 
 seeing, and they had all registered at the 
 hotel in hopes of seeing their names in the 
 
THE BOY WHO MADE A TROLLEY CAR 
 
 newspapers. Of course George would 
 not let them pay a cent, and, as they 
 nearly filled the car and rode way out 
 to Brookline, he didn t make much 
 money that trip. But he left them at 
 Brookline, and ran back quickly to the 
 shopping district, where he soon made up 
 a load. 
 
 One time a stout, prosperous-looking 
 man got upon the car and asked George 
 what line he belonged to. George told 
 him politely that it was a little line of his 
 own. 
 
 Then the prosperous-looking man, who 
 said he was the president of one of the 
 leading car lines, quoted the famous words 
 of General Grant, and said : 
 
 " Do you propose to fight it out on 
 this line all summer ? " 
 
 " No, sir ; as soon as I raise the mort 
 gage I am going to take my car home 
 and make a hen-house out of it." 
 
THE BOY WHO MADE A TROLLEY CAR 
 
 " Are you a country boy ? " asked the 
 man. 
 
 " I am, sir, * said George, proudly. 
 
 " Run all you want, my boy. I give 
 you permission. I was once a country 
 boy myself, and if you can make an hon 
 est penny out of these people, you deserve 
 to raise your mortgage. Only you must 
 give me a dollar to pay for your license." 
 
 George handed him the dollar, and he 
 got off the car. And now I must tell you 
 that the man was not president of any 
 company, but simply a bad man who saw 
 a chance to make a dollar out of simple- 
 hearted George. But George was re 
 warded, as a big theatre party boarded the 
 car and rode five blocks to the theatre. 
 And when they left, he counted up his 
 money, and found that he had just enough 
 to raise the mortgage. 
 
 It was eight o clock, and as none of 
 them had had a bite to eat all day, he ran 
 
THE BOY WHO MADE A TROLLEY CAR 
 
 the car off on a siding, and they took din 
 ner at the Parker House, where they had 
 Parker House rolls and maple-syrup. 
 
 After dinner they went back to the car, 
 and found it full of street boys. " Want a 
 ride ? " asked George, and the street boys 
 shouted yes; so George took them all over 
 the city for nothing. But I am sorry to 
 say that the boys were rude enough to 
 ask him whether the car wasn t home 
 made, and this so incensed Mr. Starbuck 
 that he drove them all out. 
 
 But by this time it was nearly twelve 
 o clock, so they ran down to the freight 
 yard, and were lucky enough to find the 
 same brakeman there. The neighbors 
 had come, too, all tired out and loaded 
 down with handbills and samples of dif 
 ferent foods, for they had been to a food 
 show at the Mechanics Institute. They 
 reached Graytown early in the morning. 
 The faithful oxen had come down to meet 
 213 
 
THE BOY WHO MADE A TROLLEY CAR 
 
 them, and this time all the neighbors 
 helped to lift the car on to the wagon, so 
 it made it easier. 
 
 Then when they reached the Star 
 bucks*, George raised the mortgage as high 
 as he could, and they all cheered and 
 cheered, and told him they had never had 
 so good a time in their lives, and they 
 hoped he d have many happy returns of 
 the day. 
 
 Then George put the trolley car into 
 the hen-yard, and the hens took to it at 
 once. 
 
 As for George, he became a simple 
 country boy once more. But if he had 
 been a city boy, he would have run that 
 trolley car into the ground. 
 
 But there is not a city boy in the 
 United States from Portland, Maine, to 
 Portland, Oregon, who could have built a 
 trolley car inside of a week, inside of a 
 shed, with a jack-knife and a scythe. 
 214 
 
CYRIL AND THE GNOME 
 
THERE was not a doubt about 
 it, the post-box on the lamp 
 post at the corner was be 
 witched. The people in the vicinity were 
 most of them writers and wrote the loveli 
 est stories that you ever read, and they 
 always posted them in the post-box on 
 the corner, and had done so for years ; 
 indeed, some of the very loveliest stories 
 had been posted twenty times in that same 
 box. How they ever came back had often 
 
 217 
 
CYRIL AND THE GNOME 
 
 puzzled the letter-box, who was of an in 
 quisitive turn of mind, but they were cer 
 tainly posted about once in so often. 
 
 That was before the box was bewitched. 
 Now no matter how many stories and 
 poems and riddles and charades were 
 dropped into the aperture, not one could 
 be found when the postman made his 
 rounds. The box was always empty. At 
 first people thought that it was thieves, 
 and a man was placed at the opposite cor 
 ner to look as if he was just passing by ; 
 but although he stood in that attitude for 
 one whole hour after a particularly large 
 batch of literature had been dropped into 
 the box by at least six different writers, 
 and although he watched that box as care 
 fully as a sleepy man could, yet not a soul 
 opened it. But when the postman came 
 around, it was perfectly empty. Perhaps 
 I have not been explicit enough, if you 
 know what that means. Letters posted 
 218 
 
CYRIL AND THE GNOME 
 
 in the daytime were not lost. It was 
 only after dark that the bewitchment took 
 place. 
 
 Now, there was one writer who never 
 wrote anything but fairy stories, and she 
 had a son about ten years old who knew 
 that there were fairies. He pitied children 
 who said with a lofty air, " Oh, yes, when 
 I was a kid I believed in fairies, but I 
 found out long ago that there were none." 
 He used to say to these superior boys and 
 girls : " How do you know there aren t 
 fairies ? The world is a large place, and 
 there are many nights when you sleep from 
 eight until seven next day. How can you 
 be sure that the fairies do not hold revels 
 somewhere at night ? And if anywhere, 
 why not in New York ? " And then the 
 others would say : " Oh, we don t want to 
 argue. Believe in fairies if you want to, 
 and play with blocks and dolls, too ; but 
 we re beyond such things." 
 
 119 
 
CYRIL AND THE GNOME 
 
 Well, now, for my part, I m going on 
 sixty, and yet I wouldn t say there are no 
 fairies, because what would become of the 
 beautiful and authentic history of Cinder 
 ella if it were proved that fairy folk were 
 imaginary ? No, there are fairies, depend 
 upon it, and if we haven t seen them it s 
 our misfortune. I never saw the Cape of 
 Good Hope, but I m sure it s around 
 somewhere. 
 
 This is a good deal of talk, it seems to 
 me, and nothing at all about that post- 
 box. Well, Cyril Merton, who believed 
 in fairies, was sure that a gnome was in 
 the box, and that he was living on letters. 
 He said nothing to any one, but one night 
 after he had gone to bed and all the house 
 was quiet, he arose softly and dressed him 
 self, and left his room by means of a rope 
 which he had concealed there that day. 
 Then he went to the post-box. 
 
 He had small, delicate hands, and he 
 
CYRIL AND THE GNOME 
 
 put one in the aperture and felt for the 
 letters. There was not one. Then he 
 posted an envelope containing nothing but 
 blank paper, and putting his ear to the 
 opening, he listened. He could distinctly 
 hear little jaws champing and paper being 
 torn. He was now perfectly sure that 
 there was a bad little fairy inside the box. 
 So he put his mouth to the aperture and 
 said : 
 
 "Little gnome, little gnome, come from within; 
 To eat up the letters is surely a sin." 
 
 I don t say that the gnome would have 
 minded you or me or any of those children 
 that don t believe in fairies, but I do know 
 that as soon as the gnome heard Cyril s 
 voice he oozed out of the aperture and sat 
 himself down cross-legged on the top. 
 He was about the size of a squirrel, and 
 wore a tight-fitting suit made of woven 
 grasses of different shades of green. A 
 little bit of the envelope of the letter that 
 
CYRIL AND THE GNOME 
 
 Cyril had posted was sticking to his lip, 
 but the rest was evidently eaten. 
 
 Cyril came to business at once. He 
 said : " Don t you know, little gnome, 
 that you re making trouble for a great 
 many people ? Most all who live around 
 here write stories, and they get their living 
 by selling them. If you eat all their 
 stories, after a while they won t have any 
 money to buy food and clothes, and then 
 they will all starve." 
 
 The little gnome grinned, and began to 
 whistle the faintest, highest whistle you 
 ever heard. " I don t care for people," he 
 said, finally. " People are never kind to 
 me. I m after a story ; that s why I eat 
 the letters. You see the king of the 
 gnomes has offered the hand of his daugh 
 ter in marriage to the gnome that can tell 
 the best story ; so I ve been eating these 
 letters steadily for a month now, in hopes 
 of learning one ; but I don t seem to get 
 
CYRIL AND THE GNOME 
 
 one in my head only in my mouth and 
 I m afraid that before I learn one some 
 other gnome will step in ahead of me and 
 marry the princess. She s a beautiful crea 
 ture, as green as a katydid, and her eyes 
 are as red as fire." 
 
 Cyril felt like laughing at the idea of 
 learning a story by eating the paper on 
 which it was written, but he was too courte 
 ous to do so. He said : " Now, Mr. 
 Gnome, you ve gone about this business 
 the wrong way. You ve eaten up a lot of 
 valuable manuscripts, and they haven t 
 done you any good at all ; but I can teach 
 you stories just as fast as you want to learn 
 them, if you ll come up to my house any 
 night." 
 
 The gnome showed his delight in his 
 little green face. "Oh, I ll come all right, 
 only I don t want you to have a crowd 
 there to look at me. I m not fond of 
 human beings. You re the only one that 
 223 
 
CYRIL AND THE GNOME 
 
 was ever civil to me, and I won t forget 
 
 it." 
 
 " Come on now," said Cyril ; so the 
 gnome jumped to the pavement, and 
 skipped along beside Cyril, whistling in 
 his tiny, shrill way, and they soon came to 
 the rope hanging from the window. 
 
 " Here, don t try to climb that," said 
 the gnome, as Cyril twisted the end 
 around his wrists and swung himself off 
 the ground. " I know a way worth two 
 of that. Put your foot on my head." 
 
 " I m afraid of hurting you." 
 
 " Put your foot on my head, I say," 
 said the gnome, in a tone that invited 
 obedience. Cyril placed his foot upor. 
 the little man s head, and felt himself rise 
 to his window as if he were floating on a 
 bit of dandelion down. By the way, why 
 do they call it dandelion down when it s 
 up most of the time ? " 
 
 When Cyril and the gnome were in the 
 224 
 
CYRIL AND THE GNOME 
 
 room, the former threw himself upon the 
 bed, and the latter sat upon the foot 
 board. 
 
 " Now, tell me a story that will please 
 the king." 
 
 So Cyril told him " Puss in Boots," 
 and he was delighted. 
 
 " Say, did you make that up ? " said 
 he, when Cyril had finished. 
 
 " No ; it s older than we are," said the 
 boy. You see he knew a good deal. 
 
 " Not older than I am," said the 
 gnome, decidedly. " I m going on a 
 thousand and two." 
 
 "Phew!" said Cyril. "You don t 
 anywheres near look it." 
 
 " I don t feel a day over nine hundred, 
 but then all my family are very young 
 feeling. My grandfather is four thou 
 sand, and you d never take him to be over 
 three thousand, seven hundred. It s be 
 cause we re very particular not to let the 
 225 
 
CYRIL AND THE GNOME 
 
 sun shine on us. I ve never seen the sun 
 in my life. But I had a cousin who fol 
 lowed the human s proverb, * Early to 
 bed and early to rise/ and the sunshine 
 shriveled him up so that he looks hun 
 dreds of years older than he is. He used 
 to go to bed at seven in the evening, and 
 get up at six in the morning, and we all 
 go to bed at three in the morning and get 
 up at eight in the evening." 
 
 Cyril looked at his clock. It was five 
 minutes to three. 
 
 " I m sorry to hurry you," he said, 
 " but if that s the case, you d better be 
 going." 
 
 " Well," said the gnome, " I thank you 
 for the story, and you may depend upon 
 it I won t eat any more of those inky 
 old letters. They didn t taste good a 
 bit, and if I hadn t loved the king s 
 daughter very much, I wouldn t have 
 eaten one." 
 
 226 
 
CYRIL AND THE GNOME 
 
 " Come again to-morrow ni " began 
 Cyril, but the gnome had vanished. 
 
 He waited a week, but the little imp 
 did not come back. On the other hand 
 no more letters were lost, and the writers 
 were so encouraged that they wrote an un 
 usual number of beautiful stories, and I 
 dare say you may read some of them in 
 the magazines before long. 
 
 Cyril knew that it would be foolish for 
 him to tell his neighbors that he had 
 caught a gnome eating their letters, be 
 cause they were not enlightened enough 
 to believe him ; but he did tell his mother, 
 and she said: 
 
 " Well, I suspected as much. I knew 
 no thieving letter-carrier could have got 
 ten away with them." 
 
 " But he didn t come back," said Cyril, 
 half crying, " and he said that he was 
 going to tell me how the king liked the 
 story he had learned/ 
 227 
 
CYRIL AND THE GNOME 
 
 " Give him time, my dear," said his 
 mother. " I take it as a good sign. If 
 the story hadn t suited, he would have 
 been back for another. I dare say that he 
 is busy getting ready for his marriage." 
 
 And that night the gnome proved that 
 Mrs. Merton had guessed right, for after 
 Cyril had been sleeping some hours, he 
 was awakened by a breath of cold air upon 
 his face, and opening his eyes, he beheld 
 the little gnome sitting upon the pillow 
 by his side. 
 
 " You re a brick ! " were his first words 
 to Cyril. 
 
 Cyril was wide awake in an instant, and 
 he said : " So the king liked it ? " 
 
 He jumped out of bed the better to lis 
 ten. As for the gnome, he leaped to the 
 foot-board and crossed his knees in the 
 drollest way imaginable. 
 
 " Like it ? " said he. " Why, I thought 
 he d never stop laughing. He said that 
 
CYRIL AND THE GNOME 
 
 it was the best story he d ever heard, and 
 he gave me his daughter s hand as he had 
 promised, and I ve been so busy getting 
 ready for the wedding that I .haven t had 
 time to come before. You see, I had to 
 engage a big orchestra of crickets and katy 
 dids and frogs and locusts, and I had to 
 go to Japan for them, because the best in 
 sect musicians are Japanese. It takes time 
 to go to Japan even the way I travel on 
 a moonbeam. We re to be married to 
 morrow night, and I ve brought you a 
 piece of wedding cake and a present. 
 Only don t eat the cake until to-morrow, 
 or it will make you dream. And now I 
 must be going as it s most three o clock." 
 
 Cyril got up and shook hands with the 
 little fellow, sincerely sorry that he was 
 going. 
 
 " Just think," said the gnome, " if you 
 hadn t come that night, I should still be 
 eating those horrid, inky old manuscripts 
 229 
 
CYRIL AND THE GNOME 
 
 and never getting any story at all for the 
 king. Oh, I wish you could see the 
 princess. She s a young little thing only 
 two hundred, but she s so pretty. Well, 
 I must be going. Here s the cake, and 
 here s a pin to remember me by. It s an 
 emerald made out of a real katydid. Bye 
 bye." 
 
 And the gnome vanished. 
 
 In the morning Cyril found a piece of 
 toadstool on his pillow. That was the 
 wedding cake. He did not eat it. But 
 he has the emerald pin to this day. 
 
THE BUBBLE BOY 
 
GEORGE TRUESDELL had 
 been a naughty boy. His 
 mother had said that as soon as 
 his father came home he was to be pun 
 ished. George sat in his little attic room, 
 and looked anxiously out of the window 
 for his father s coming. 
 
 Mr. Truesdell had gone to town with a 
 load of cabbages he was a farmer and 
 George knew that when he came home 
 and heard that he had been naughty, he 
 
THE BUBBLE BOY 
 
 would tell him sorrowfully, but firmly, to 
 go out into the woodshed and he hated 
 to think of what would follow. After 
 that the skies would be clear; but that 
 little five minutes was what bothered him. 
 " I wish I had a twin brother who didn t 
 mind a licking, and then, when I cut up, 
 papa d attend to him and think it was me." 
 What is that speck rising out of the 
 birches, southeast of the road ? Is it a 
 cow ? No, it looks like a bubble as large 
 as a pumpkin and of all the colors of the 
 rainbow. Then a gust of wind blows it 
 into the room. It hits the window-shade 
 cord as it passes it and bursts, and, presto ! 
 there stands a little fellow the exact count 
 erpart of George. 
 
 " Hello," said George, "who are you ? " 
 
 cc I m a boy that loves to be punished. 
 
 I love hard work, I love to study, I love 
 
 to be sent to bed a half hour ahead of 
 
 time 
 
THE BUBBLE BOY 
 
 " Why, then, you re the fellow I m 
 looking for," said George, impulsively, 
 " because I hate all those things. What ll 
 you take to live up here and get punished 
 for me and do all my hard work ? " 
 
 " I ll do it for my board and keep." 
 
 " Bully for you. What s your name ? " 
 said George. 
 
 " Better call me George as long as that s 
 your name. I m only two minutes old, 
 and I hadn t thought of a name. But 
 you understand that your folks are not to 
 know that I m here. Whenever I m 
 needed, you ll hide and I ll take your place. 
 The rest of the time I ll stay up here, and 
 hide under the bed if anybody comes into 
 the room." 
 
 " But won t you be hungry and want ex 
 ercise ? " 
 
 " Oh, I ll exercise at night, and you can 
 smuggle food up to me. I won t need 
 much." 
 
THE BUBBLE BOY 
 
 Just then George looked out of the 
 window and saw his father driving home 
 in the ox cart. His " Gee, haw " floated 
 through the calm of the October after 
 noon in a drowsy tone. But George knew 
 that the tone would be anything but 
 drowsy when his father learned that he had 
 been naughty, and he groaned aloud. 
 
 " What s the matter? " asked his double, 
 the bubble boy. 
 
 " Oh, I ve been bad, and papa s going to 
 flog me." 
 
 " Oh, let me be flogged instead. You 
 don t know how I long to feel a little pain. 
 I think I ll like it as much as you like pie/ 
 
 George looked at him in astonishment. 
 
 " You re a queer fellow. It doesn t 
 seem exactly right, but papa won t know 
 the difference, and I m sorry I was naughty; 
 so you may go down and get punished, 
 and I ll stay up here." 
 
 A few minutes later Farmer Truesdell 
 
THE BUBBLE BOY 
 
 drove his team into the barn-yard, and un 
 yoked the oxen, leaving them to wander off 
 down the lane. Then he came into the 
 kitchen, where his wife was preparing din 
 ner. 
 
 "Hello, Molly. Sold em all early. 
 People seemed hungry for cabbages to-day. 
 Those medicine Indians was on the flat, 
 and I bought a bow an arrow for George. 
 He s be n pesterin me for one, an seein 
 to-morrow s his birthday, I bought em. 
 Where is he ? " 
 
 Mrs. Truesdell shook her head. 
 
 " He s up in his room, where I sent 
 him. He s been very trying to-day. He 
 teased Cynthia, and when I scolded him, 
 he was impertinent to me. And then, to 
 cap all, he broke the pantry window, 
 throwing stones at the chickens, although 
 I told him not to." 
 
 Mr. Truesdell put the bow and arrow 
 into the north pantry. 
 
THE BUBBLE BOY 
 
 " I don t know what gets into that boy 
 sometimes," said he. " I suppose I ll 
 have to flog him." 
 
 " Don t be too hard on him," said his 
 mother. 
 
 " Floggin was good for me, and I guess 
 it s good for him. I won t be any harder 
 than s necessary, an when I m done, it ll 
 be all over as far as I m concerned." 
 
 Seth Truesdell went to the foot of the 
 attic stairs and called : 
 
 " George ! " 
 
 " Yes, sir." 
 
 " Come down." 
 
 " You go," said George, and his double 
 went gleefully down the stairs. 
 
 George took up his station at the 
 window, where he could command a view 
 of the wood-shed. But first he locked 
 the door, for fear his mother might come 
 up and find him. 
 
 The double walked into the kitchen. 
 238 
 
THE BUBBLE BOY 
 
 " My boy/ said Mr. Truesdell, " I m 
 sorry to have to punish you when I come 
 home, but your mother tells me that you 
 have been impertinent and disobedient, so 
 come out into the woodshed." 
 
 George s double, with never a word, 
 walked out to the woodshed. Mr. Trues 
 dell took a birch rod down from its rest 
 ing-place on two nails, and told the boy to 
 hold out his hand. Up in the window 
 George was staring wildly and breathing 
 feverishly. 
 
 Ssswish ! came the rod. Phew, what a 
 resounding thwack ! George heard it dis 
 tinctly. He would have cried out, but his 
 double never winced. Four cuts of the 
 rod, and then the double flung his arms 
 around Mr. Truesdell s neck and hugged 
 him. 
 
 " Thank you, thank you," said he. It 
 had been a pleasure to him. " As good 
 as pie," as he had told George. 
 239 
 
THE BUBBLE BOY 
 
 Mr. Truesdell was somewhat surprised 
 at this outburst, but he was of an affec 
 tionate disposition and loved George 
 dearly, and he was overjoyed to think 
 that the boy could take his punishment 
 in so good a spirit ; so he returned the 
 caress. 
 
 Then the Bubble Boy went into the 
 kitchen and kissed Mrs. Truesdell, and 
 said : " I m sorry I was naughty." 
 
 She had half repented having told her 
 husband about George s misdemeanor, and 
 she patted the boy s shoulder and kissed 
 him, and said : 
 
 " Well, I m sure it won t occur again." 
 
 According to schedule, he should now 
 have gone upstairs to relieve George, who 
 was wondering what was keeping him ; but 
 this Bubble Boy was having too good a 
 time to go up into the hot little room. 
 He saw cake and pies, and he smelt a 
 good chicken dinner cooking, and as he 
 240 
 
THE BUBBLE BOY 
 
 had never eaten in his short life, he deter 
 mined to stay and have something. 
 
 " Dinner most ready ? " asked he. " I m 
 awful hungry." 
 
 " It ll be ready in ten minutes," said his 
 mother. 
 
 Mr. Truesdell had gone out to feed the 
 hens, and the double sat down by the 
 kitchen window and sniffed longingly at 
 some apples. 
 
 " N I have napple?" said he. He 
 seemed to have mastered small-boy dia 
 lect in a surprisingly short space of time. 
 
 His mother she thought she was his 
 mother, although, as we know, he had no 
 mother gave him an apple; and when 
 dinner was served soon after, he ate three 
 times as much as George ever did, and 
 was so jolly withal that Mr. and Mrs. 
 Truesdell didn t know what had come 
 over their boy. 
 
 " George, after dinner I wish you d har- 
 241 
 
THE BUBBLE BOY 
 
 ness up Jack," said the farmer. " I ve 
 got to drive over to Mr. Gage s to get a 
 book on hens that he promised me. I m 
 going to give you some hens and let you 
 see what you can make out of them with 
 the aid of the book. I don t take much 
 stock in hen-books myself. I ve always 
 made em lay without any book, and I 
 don t believe but what hens laid before the 
 first book was printed ; but I ll give you 
 something to be interested in, and you 
 won t be so apt to break windows if your 
 time is more occupied." 
 
 The Bubble Boy smiled, but said noth 
 ing. He was too busy with his third slice 
 of pumpkin pie to talk. After he had 
 finished it, he said : 
 
 " Can I ride over with you ? " 
 
 " I dunno. Kinder late for you. Well, 
 seein to-morrow s your birthday, I ll let 
 you." 
 
 So it happened that a few minutes 
 242 
 
THE BUBBLE BOY 
 
 later George, who had been weeping in his 
 room, not daring to go down and expose 
 the trick he had played upon his father, 
 and yet feeling very hungry and contrite, 
 heard a sound of wheels in the yard 
 and looked out of the window. There 
 in the dusky light he saw the Bubble 
 Boy backing Jack into the Concord 
 wagon. He worked like an old hand, 
 and in a few minutes George s father 
 came out of the house and got into the 
 wagon, and then they rode off, his double 
 driving. 
 
 This was too much for the poor boy. 
 If there was one thing he liked before an 
 other it was a ride with his father, and at 
 night of all things. He cast himself upon 
 the bed, and sobbed as if his heart would 
 break. What a wicked boy his double 
 was ! Here he d offered to board and 
 keep him to take all his troubles off his 
 shoulders, and he was taking his pleasures 
 243 
 
THE BUBBLE BOY 
 
 as well. Oh, how hungry he was ! Cold 
 chicken would taste good. 
 
 He rose from the bed, and walked as 
 noiselessly as he could down the attic 
 stairs. But his mother, who was putting 
 Cynthia to bed, heard him, and called out 
 in an alarmed tone : 
 
 " Who s there ? " 
 
 " It s me," said George in a weak voice. 
 
 " You back so soon ? Why, what s the 
 matter ? " seeing he d been crying. " Has 
 anything happened to your father ? Tell 
 me, child ! " 
 
 tc I didn t go with papa," sobbed George. 
 " That s why I ve been crying." 
 
 " Why, George, I saw you go," said 
 his mother. 
 
 " It wasn t me ; it was a bubble boy 
 that floated in this afternoon." 
 
 His mother looked bewildered. " What s 
 the matter with you ? Are you crazy ? " 
 said she. 
 
 244 
 
THE BUBBLE BOY 
 
 ^ 
 
 At this moment the sound of wheels 
 was heard in the yard, and George said : 
 " There they are. They ll be in in a 
 minute." 
 
 In less than a minute his father came 
 in. " Oh, here you are," he said to 
 George. " You ought not to jump out of 
 the back of the wagon that way in the 
 dark. I stopped and called to you, and 
 you didn t answer, and I thought you were 
 hurt. And then I saw you running to 
 ward the house." 
 
 " That wasn t me ; that was the Bubble 
 Boy." 
 
 His father didn t notice what he said. 
 " Where s that hen-book ? I want to 
 show your mother that picture of the 
 Wyandotte." 
 
 "What hen-book?" asked George, 
 mystified. 
 
 For the next few minutes his answers 
 were so bewildering to both parents that 
 245 
 
THE BUBBLE BOY 
 
 they finally told him sharply to go to 
 bed. 
 
 " It doesn t do to keep a growing boy 
 up late/ said his father. 
 
 As for the double, they wouldn t hear 
 another word about him. 
 
 George went upstairs by way of the 
 pantry, and appeased his appetite some 
 what. When he entered his room, he half 
 expected to see his double. But, as we all 
 know, bubble boys have short lives. He 
 looked out of the window. A silvery moon 
 was riding through steamy clouds, and he 
 thought he saw an iridescent bubble float 
 ing by its side. 
 
 " I guess I ll take my own punishments 
 and my own pleasures after this," said he 
 as he took a bite of drumstick. " I know 
 I don t want any more mean old doubles 
 like that one." 
 
 246 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER 
 EGGS 
 
AJSTIN McKENZIEhadtwo sis 
 ters, both of them as pretty as 
 Easter lilies, and almost as white, 
 which was strange, as they lived in the 
 country and spent a good deal of time out 
 doors. 
 
 Austin had spent an Easter vacation in 
 the city, and when he came home, he gave 
 the girls such a vivid account of the deco 
 rated eggs, and the papier-mache rabbits, 
 and all the other Easter favors that can be 
 
 249 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 seen in the shops, that they were wild to 
 have him decorate some eggs for them 
 when next Easter should come. 
 
 Mr. McKenzie owned a score of hens 
 of various breeds, and Austin, who could 
 draw and paint, asked him whether he 
 could have all the eggs that were laid the 
 week before Easter, so that he might deco 
 rate them, and Mr. McKenzie readily 
 consented, as he was proud of his boy s 
 talent. 
 
 Austin counted on about a hundred 
 eggs; but, to his dismay, the hens stopped 
 laying just one week before Easter. Now, 
 April is the greatest month in the year for 
 eggs, and this action on the part of the 
 hens was quite unaccountable, and in the 
 minds of Marian and Sarah quite unpar 
 donable. 
 
 Austin asked whether they could not 
 buy some eggs ; but Mr. Austin was op 
 posed to this, and besides, all their neigh- 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 bors had their regular customers for eggs, 
 who took all that were laid. 
 
 Austin was greatly disappointed. He 
 had a good deal of talent in drawing and 
 painting, and he had anticipated making 
 pretty and quaint designs on the eggs. A 
 hen that can lay and won t lay should be 
 made to lay ; but it takes several days to 
 do this, and it was Good Friday before 
 Austin gave up all hope of the hens begin 
 ning, and then it was quite too late to do 
 anything in the forcing line. 
 
 He went out to the hen-house to feed 
 them early Saturday morning, and said to 
 them he had a way of talking to dumb 
 beasts as if they could understand : " I 
 don t see why you should stop laying eggs 
 just at this time, when we want them more 
 than ever." 
 
 As he spoke he heard a rustling in the 
 straw, and saw two pink eyes looking at 
 him. Then two long ears were cocked at 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 him, and a rabbit hopped boldly out and 
 laughed at him. Yes, actually laughed at 
 him. The hens did not seem to fear this 
 unusual intruder in the least. In fact, 
 the oldest of all went over to him, and 
 turning her head to one side, said some 
 thing in hen language. And the rabbit 
 answered in Welsh, which is the language 
 of most rabbits in this country. 
 
 Austin thought that there was more in 
 this than met his eye or his ear, and he 
 went out of the hen-house and waited out 
 side for a half hour, for he had the patience 
 of an Indian. At the end of that time he 
 heard a hen cackling, and knew that she 
 had laid an egg. 
 
 " Ah, ha, they ve begun at last," said 
 he, and as he said it out comes Mr. Cot 
 tontail with an egg in his mouth, and hops 
 off across the meadow to the strip of 
 woods that bounded it on the west. 
 
 " That s where they re going, is it? The 
 252 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 hens are supplying the rabbits with eggs, 
 although papa, and not the rabbits, is feed 
 ing them." 
 
 He was about to go into the hen-house 
 when he saw two other rabbits come out 
 of the woods and hop along the runway 
 until they came to the hen-house, which 
 they entered at the hens exit, a small 
 hole cut in the west end. 
 
 Austin stood still to wait further devel 
 opments. He noticed that each rabbit 
 bore in his lips a mouthful of grass, and 
 it struck him that he had wronged them ; 
 that they were paying for their eggs in 
 grass. 
 
 I suppose that the hens thought that 
 the grass that grew in the woods was richer 
 than that which grew in their yard. Peo 
 ple, and animals, too, always prize a thing 
 that comes from afar more than they do 
 something that they can pick up close at 
 hand. That paper-cutter that your aunt 
 253 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 brought from Switzerland does not cut 
 the pages half as well as the back of 
 the fruit-knife does, and yet you value it 
 more. 
 
 The rabbits presumably paid cash or 
 grass and in a few minutes Austin heard 
 two hens cackle, and he knew that two 
 more eggs had been laid. But before he 
 could enter the house the two bunnies 
 hopped off, one with a white Brown Leg 
 horn egg, and the other with a brown 
 White Plymouth Rock egg. Just then 
 he saw his two sisters crossing the orchard. 
 " Come here," he said, " and don t make 
 any noise. Funniest thing that ever hap 
 pened." 
 
 The girls came tiptoeing over to him 
 with the exaggerated steps that are always 
 thought necessary when quiet is the word, 
 and as soon as they were come to him he 
 said : 
 
 " I ve found out why we haven t any 
 254 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 eggs. The rab shh ! Here come some 
 more." 
 
 He pointed as he spoke, and his sister 
 saw four rabbits hopping in Indian file 
 from the woods to the hen-house. They 
 did not seem to see the children, or maybe 
 they knew that they had no violence to 
 fear at their hands, for they disappeared in 
 the hen-house. Then ensued another wait, 
 during which time Austin told the girls 
 what had happened. 
 
 Now came a chorus of cackling, in which 
 they could distinguish four parts with a 
 solo every now and then. The four parts 
 were taken by a Silver Wyandotte, a Buff 
 Cochin, a White Leghorn, and a Black 
 Spanish, and the solo was sung by a Light 
 Brahma rooster, and right well and lustily 
 he sang it. 
 
 " Aren t you going to get them ? " asked 
 Marian. 
 
 " Not this time. Wait," said Austin ; 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 and as he was several years older than his 
 sisters, they waited. A moment later out 
 hopped the four rabbits with four eggs of 
 different sizes and colors, but all equally 
 good for Easter decorating. 
 
 " Don t they look dear ? " said Sarah, 
 clasping her hands unconsciously and look 
 ing " dear " herself. 
 
 " What do you suppose they ll do with 
 them eat them ? " asked Marian. 
 
 " Oh, no," said Austin, with a little 
 tincture of big brotherisrru " They ll paint 
 pictures on them." 
 
 The girls giggled at this, and Sarah 
 said : 
 
 " But, Austin, I suppose they ve been 
 taking them ever since the eggs fell off." 
 
 " Fell off what ? " asked Austin, teas- 
 ingly. 
 
 " Oh, you know what I mean. I think 
 that you ought to stop them from getting 
 any more. I think the hens will stop 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 them by not laying any more. That s 
 seven already this morning, and there 
 are only twenty hens." 
 
 " Well, they must be getting lazy, 
 then," said Marian, " if seven eggs is all 
 they feel able to lay so near Easter." 
 
 " Look," said Sarah, pointing toward 
 the woods, " here come eight rabbits, and 
 they all have roots in their mouths." 
 
 " They are certainly buying those eggs," 
 said Austin. " I m not going to stop 
 them. Say, I have some money in my 
 bank, and I ll go down town and buy 
 some case eggs this evening. They ll do 
 just as well to decorate. And I won t 
 disturb the rabbits at all. Although, I 
 guess this crowd will be fooled they 
 won t get any eight eggs this morning." 
 
 " Isn t it a coincidence," said Marian, 
 " that rabbits should be getting eggs just 
 at Easter time ? " 
 
 Before anyone could answer there arose 
 
 2 57 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 a most cheerful din inside the din that 
 announces the laying of eggs. 
 
 " I guess they are laying twice," said 
 Sarah. 
 
 " No, hens never lay twice in a day," 
 said Marian. It was not very long since 
 she had learned it. 
 
 Here the eight rabbits hopped out of the 
 house and bore away eight nice fresh eggs. 
 
 " Well, that s fifteen. Now they ve all 
 laid except five," said Austin. "I wonder 
 if any more will come. I believe that each 
 rabbit has been a different one." 
 
 " Of course. They couldn t all be the 
 same," answered Marian with a gay little 
 laugh. 
 
 " Rabbits can count ! Here come five 
 more^" cried Sarah. And, sure enough, 
 five big rabbits came hopping along and 
 entered the hen-house. 
 
 " Wait a minute," said Austin, and he 
 ran into the house. He came out in a 
 258 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 moment. " The five big Black Lang- 
 shans are on their nests, and a rabbit is 
 sitting in front of each box/ 
 
 Austin had barely announced this when 
 deep cackles from the Langshans told the 
 children that the eggs were ready for de 
 livery. 
 
 Out and off hopped the five rabbits 
 with five enormous eggs, and every hen 
 had laid. After that, although the rooster 
 did a good deal of talking and seemed to 
 be congratulating the ladies of his house 
 hold on their remarkable record, the hens 
 became silent and devoted themselves to 
 eating the grass and picking at insects on 
 the roots which had been left by the rab 
 bits. 
 
 " Well, if I hadn t seen that, I never 
 would have believed it," said Marian. 
 
 " It only shows," said Sarah, " that 
 animals are more intelligent than we think 
 them." 
 
 159 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 " But it doesn t give us the big day s 
 supply of eggs for decorating,* said Aus 
 tin, ruefully. 
 
 They all went into the house to tell 
 their mother. And the rabbits busied 
 themselves in a way that would have 
 keenly interested the children if they 
 could have seen them. 
 
 As I have indicated, the McKenzies 
 were kind to dumb animals, and this rather 
 unusual proceeding on the part of the 
 rabbits and the hens was part of a pro 
 gramme that the rabbits originally sug 
 gested and the butterflies and hens had 
 eagerly seconded. If you could have 
 been near the rabbit-warrens just a week 
 previous, you would have heard one of a 
 cloud of butterflies of every possible hue 
 saying to a rabbit : 
 
 " We ll gladly do it, if there is a rain 
 bow before Easter ; but you can t expect 
 us to give up the color on our wings, as 
 
 a6o 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 that is our only beauty. But if there is a 
 rainbow, we ll help you gladly, as we can 
 then get all the color we want ; and those 
 children are certainly worth pleasing, be 
 cause they never chase us." 
 
 What it meant it would have puzzled 
 me to explain at that time, but the rabbit 
 evidently understood, and rising upon his 
 hind legs, he sniffed the air and looked at 
 the clouds in a weather-wise way. 
 
 But, although it was April and there 
 were plenty of showers, there were no rain 
 bows up to the time that all the eggs had 
 been gathered by the rabbits, and old Mr. 
 Cottontail, who had managed affairs so far, 
 said to his wife : 
 
 " I m afraid we can t do it after all. To 
 morrow will be Easter." 
 
 Along about five o clock Saturday after 
 noon there came up a heavy shower just 
 as Austin was about saddling Caesar to ride 
 to town, and he was disappointed enough 
 261 
 
THE RABBITS* EASTER EGGS 
 
 when his mother said that he could not go. 
 However, he was a boy who could bear 
 disappointment manfully ; and so, instead 
 of pouting, he went up to his room, and 
 getting out a lot of cards, he began to 
 paint little Easter pictures, to give to the 
 different members of the family at break 
 fast next morning. 
 
 But Marian and Sarah did not take it 
 quite as well. 
 
 " I think the rain is just horrid, and so 
 are the rabbits," said Sarah. 
 
 " Our whole Easter will be spoiled/ 
 said Marian. 
 
 " Say, girls," called Austin from his 
 room, " look at that rainbow. And the 
 rain is stopping. I can go, I guess." 
 
 The girls looked, and saw the largest 
 and most vivid rainbow that had ever 
 arched itself in the heavens. And while 
 they watched the glorious colors, two 
 clouds of butterflies, whose hues rivaled 
 262 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 those of the rainbow, flew from its two 
 bases, and following its arch, met at the 
 top, and then flew from it to the western 
 woods and disappeared in its shadows. 
 
 Austin burst into the room. " I say, 
 girls, did you see that ? " 
 
 "Yes. Wasn t it queer ?" said Marian. 
 
 "Wasn t it lovely?" said Sarah. "How 
 could we see them so far ? They seemed 
 to brush the rainbow with their wings." 
 
 " Well, we ve seen enough strange and 
 pretty things to-day to reconcile us to the 
 loss of the Easter eggs," continued Sarah, 
 as her eyes watched the rapidly fading 
 rainbow. 
 
 "Especially, as we ve gotten along with 
 out them every Easter so far," added 
 Marian. 
 
 " Well, we won t have to this time," 
 said Austin. " I know mamma will let 
 me go down, now that it has stopped rain- 
 
 ing." 
 
 163 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 And in a few minutes he was off on old 
 Caesar, and the girls flew to their mother 
 to see if she could help them make some 
 dyes for coloring some of the eggs. 
 
 But, although Mrs. McKenzie was gen 
 erally a mine of suggestions to her children 
 when they were in a quandary, she had 
 never done any dyeing, and did not know 
 how to go to work to get a single color 
 except by using blueing, and the girls did 
 not think that would make a very pretty 
 shade of blue. They set the table for their 
 mother, and then they put on their rubbers 
 and went out to get some early wild 
 flowers, and while they were in the field 
 they saw Austin returning eggless. 
 
 " It s no use," he called to them. "The 
 fates are against us. They were all out 
 of eggs at both stores. Expected some 
 more this evening, but I couldn t wait. 
 We ll have to get along without." 
 
 I am inclined to think that there was a 
 264 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 tear in Sarah s eye, and another one was 
 all ready to roll out of Marian s eye ; but 
 Marian threw her head up, and Sarah threw 
 her head up, the tears rolled back, and the 
 girls went on picking early wild flowers 
 like sensible children. 
 
 While the family sat at breakfast Easter 
 morning admiring the pretty conceits that 
 Austin s brush had created on cardboard, 
 Mr. Austin noticed a neighbor staring in 
 tently at their front doorway. 
 
 " Do you suppose the house is afire, 
 Margaret ? " said he, calling Mrs. Austin s 
 attention to the man, whose mouth and 
 eyes were wide open. 
 
 All five jumped to their feet and ran to 
 the front door, which Mr. Austin opened. 
 
 There on the front steps and extending 
 down the path to the gate, sat one hundred 
 rabbits, and each rabbit held an egg in his 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 paws as a squirrel holds a nut. But such 
 eggs! 
 
 The butterflies had, indeed, been to the 
 rainbow, and had borrowed colors from it; 
 but how in the world they ever decorated 
 those eggs with the dazzling hues I cannot 
 tell. Such transcendently beautiful eggs 
 you or I never saw at Easter nor at any 
 other time. 
 
 Austin was the first to command his 
 tongue. 
 
 " Are these for us ? " said he to Mr. 
 Cottontail, who was spokesman. 
 
 The rabbit bowed his head solemnly, 
 and the ninety-nine other rabbits bowed 
 their heads too, and then each one in turn 
 went up and handed an egg to one or an 
 other of the children. 
 
 "Quick, get the clothes basket! " said 
 Mrs. McKenzie to her husband, and in 
 truth they needed it, for a hundred eggs 
 take a good deal of room. 
 
 z66 
 
THE RABBITS EASTER EGGS 
 
 When the last rabbit had handed in his 
 egg, they formed a long line and bowed 
 respectfully to the McKenzies. Then 
 each rabbit put a little paw on his heart, 
 and they faced about, and hopped off 
 around the house and away to the woods, 
 followed by admiring and amused ejacula 
 tions from the McKenzies and the neigh 
 bor who had joined them. As the rabbits 
 passed the hen-house the rooster crowed, 
 and all the hens said one thing or another 
 in their own language. 
 
 But those eggs ! If you can imagine 
 Jack Frost s finest work done in seven 
 colors on the ovals, you will have a faint 
 conception of their beauty. 
 
 But what appealed more than anything 
 to tender-hearted Sarah was the fact that 
 the rabbits had thought enough of their 
 human friends to prepare such a gorgeous 
 Easter surprise for them. 
 
 267 
 
THE TALE OF THE 
 GOLDEN EGG 
 
ALL the boys in Oakville had hen 
 fever. I once heard a little boy 
 say, " Hen fever is something 
 like chicken pox and something like scar 
 let fever, but it lasts longer than either," 
 and I guess he was right. But if you who 
 are reading this are so unfortunate as to be 
 a city boy and only know hens as the 
 featherless things they hang up by their 
 legs in the poultry stores, I can tell you 
 that hen fever is very delightful while it 
 
 271 
 
THE TALE OF THE GOLDEN EGG 
 
 lasts, for it means the enthusiastic care of 
 hens which are the birds that lay the eggs 
 of commerce. It means feeding them the 
 right food and rejoicing in their cackling, 
 which is their way of saying, " Watch me 
 lay an egg;" and it means hunts for hid 
 den nests with maybe a dozen eggs in them, 
 and, it may be, a dozen fluffy little chick 
 ens. It means the right food and plenty 
 of water for them, and tucking them into 
 bed at night so they won t catch cold ; and 
 it sometimes means enough pocket money 
 from the sale of eggs and chickens to 
 buy a handsome double-ripper with a pic 
 ture of Dewey winning out at Manila. 
 
 So you see that hen fever doesn t re 
 quire the services of a physician ; and you 
 can catch it at any time of the year, al 
 though March and April are the easiest 
 months in which to get it, for then any old 
 hen at all will lay eggs, and you think she s 
 going to do it all the year round, and you 
 
THE TALE OF THE GOLDEN EGG 
 
 get your father to buy forty of them, and 
 the first thing you know your hens are all 
 on strike and you re buying your eggs at a 
 grocery store. And that sometimes cures 
 hen fever. But it also shows you that 
 you didn t have the right brand of fever 
 or they would have kept on laying. 
 
 The annual Bangtown fair was billed to 
 come off the first Tuesday in October, and 
 ten of the Oakville boys had entered their 
 hens in the hope of winning prizes. Ab 
 bott Lyman was going to send ten black 
 Leghorns, and Philip Wendell was going 
 to ship a crate of white Plymouth Rocks, 
 and Beecher Ward was going to exhibit 
 three black Spanish hens. 
 
 But poor little Bryant Williams felt 
 quite left out because he had nothing to 
 send. He was a little orphan who would 
 have had hen fever in a minute if he could 
 have bought or borrowed any hens, but it 
 was all he could do to get enough clothes 
 273 
 
THE TALE OF THE GOLDEN EGG 
 
 to cover him and sufficient food to keep 
 his internal machinery going, and to buy 
 even one scrub hen would have overtaxed 
 his resources. 
 
 I m rather afraid that Abbott Lyman 
 crowed a little over Bryant. Maybe he had 
 caught it from his hens, and maybe not; 
 but wherever he had caught it, he should 
 have dropped it instanter. He said, in 
 that taunting way of his that made him so 
 unpopular with smaller boys and got him 
 into so many scrapes with bigger ones, 
 "If I was so poor that I couldn t enter any 
 fowls at the fair, I d go jump into the 
 Naugatuck." 
 
 But little Bryant, instead of making an 
 ugly reply, simply turned a handspring 
 and went down the road to help Beecher 
 Ward knock a crate together for his Pekin 
 ducks. 
 
 On the way to Beecher s house he came 
 upon an old woman who had slipped on a 
 274 
 
THE TALE OF THE GOLDEN EGG 
 
 slide and fallen. She had dancing black 
 eyes and a sugar-loaf hat and long straight 
 hair, and her nose was within hailing dis 
 tance of her chin, and she looked a good 
 deal like old Mother Hubbard or Mother 
 Goose or one of the other mothers of nur 
 sery tales. 
 
 Bryant was a helpful chap, and instead 
 of laughing at the old woman, as Abbott 
 would have done, he stopped and said : 
 " Have you hurt yourself? Can I help 
 you ? " 
 
 " Indeed you can, sonny. I think I ve 
 cracked my hip. I didn t see the ice, and 
 the first thing I did see was stars." 
 
 Bryant laughed. Here was an old 
 woman who could make a joke of her 
 trouble, and he was the better pleased to 
 help her, for he was always joking himself. 
 He put his arm around her, and finding 
 her a bag of bones, he lifted her with no 
 trouble at all. 
 
 275 
 
THE TALE OF THE GOLDEN EGG 
 
 " Indeed, but you re a good lad. Once 
 I m on my feet I m good for all day, but 
 when I tumble which I don t often do 
 I m as badly off as a turtle on its back." 
 
 " Are you going far ? " said Bryant. 
 " Can t I carry your basket ? " 
 
 " Thank you kindly if you will," said 
 the old woman. " My hip pains me a 
 good deal. I suppose you ll be going to 
 the Bangtown fair and exhibiting some 
 chickens, like the other boys." 
 
 " No, indeed," said Bryant, ruefully. 
 " I have just enough money to get in 
 myself, and I made that helping Beecher 
 Ward take care of his ducks. I wish I 
 could enter some hens, for I love them, 
 and would like to win a prize." 
 
 " Well, it s a lucky thing that you met 
 me and that I fell, for in my basket 
 I have the hen that laid the golden egg 
 and I will let you have her all day to 
 morrow, if you will promise to return her 
 276 
 
THE TALE OF THE GOLDEN EGG 
 
 to me next day. I live on Black Moun 
 tain." 
 
 And then Bryant knew who it was that 
 he had befriended none other than the 
 witch woman of Watertown, who in win 
 ter lived in Watertown, but in summer 
 lived in a charcoal-burner s abandoned 
 hut on the Mountain. 
 
 " You can win a prize with the hen, and 
 you can sell the golden egg which she 
 will lay at ten in the morning, for a great 
 deal of money, and you can show her in a 
 tent and charge so much admission." 
 
 Did ever a boy find fortune knocking 
 so many times on his door at once ? His 
 eyes filled with tears, and he grasped the 
 old woman s hand and thanked her with 
 all the fervor of a warm nature. 
 
 " I must go and see about getting a 
 tent at once," said Bryant. 
 
 " Now I like that," said the old witch. 
 " Some boys would have expected me to 
 277 
 
THE TALE OF THE GOLDEN EGG 
 
 furnish tent and all myself, but I see that 
 you are willing to help yourself. Go to 
 Lowell Russell, and tell him I sent you, 
 and he will fix you out. Here, take the 
 hen along; but be sure that no one steals 
 her, or she and the thief will disappear 
 entirely." 
 
 Bryant promised, and ran ofF with the 
 basket. While he was waiting for Mrs. 
 Russell to open the door, he lifted the 
 cover pf the basket and looked in. There 
 sat a quiet-looking hen of a bright golden 
 color. Her comb was as red as blood, 
 and she looked exactly as if laying golden 
 eggs was a good thing for her health, 
 which it undoubtedly was, for think how 
 many years it is since she was first discov 
 ered ! 
 
 Bryant told his errand to Mrs. Russell, 
 and she told him that her husband, who 
 was vice-president of the Bangtown Fair 
 Association, had a tent that was to have 
 
THE TALE OF THE GOLDEN EGG 
 
 been used by a man with a five-headed 
 calf, but the calf had lost four of its heads 
 in a railroad accident and was now no 
 better than any calf, so the man didn t 
 need the tent. And then Mr. Russell 
 came in, and proved to be kindness itself. 
 Next morning the fair opened, and it 
 was like all the country fairs that were 
 ever held. And if you never attended 
 one, I can tell you that the chief thing to 
 be seen there is the people people who 
 have come afoot and on horseback, on 
 wheels and between wheels, and some 
 who would have come in balloons rather 
 than miss coming. There is one big tent 
 and a lot of smaller ones, and there are 
 men who sell candy and oysters and soda 
 and whips. The whip-men are really 
 worth while. They sell half a dozen 
 whips, each one worth a dollar, and charge 
 a dollar for the lot and still make money. 
 Now that ought to make a good problem 
 279 
 
THE TALE OF THE GOLDEN EGG 
 
 in arithmetic. If one whip is worth one 
 dollar, and a man sells six such whips for 
 a dollar and makes money on the sale, 
 how much does he make? Do it in long 
 division. Or maybe fractions would be 
 better. But I m sure I don t know how 
 the man does it. 
 
 The poultry show was a fine one ; not 
 only all the boys, but the farmers, for miles 
 around had entered birds. But Bryant 
 took first prize as a matter of course. A 
 hen that lays golden eggs is worth any 
 number of hens with silver feathers. 
 
 Bryant was kept busy taking in the 
 nickels that the people paid to go in and 
 see the hen, in a parrot cage loaned by 
 Mrs. Ward. Mr. Russell had painted a 
 beautiful picture of a hen at least two feet 
 high and with two high feet, and the tent 
 was naturally a magnet of attraction. 
 
 Of course the biggest crowd was in the 
 tent at ten o clock, when the hen was ad- 
 280 
 
THE TALE OF THE GOLDEN EGG 
 
 vertised to lay the egg. The tent had 
 been full before that, but there s always 
 room for more people in a crowd. Those 
 people who happened to be in the ten 
 when the egg was laid had something t 
 talk about for the rest of their lives, and I 
 dare say, if you go up to Oakville, you ll 
 find persons who saw the whole pro 
 ceeding. 
 
 At ten sharp the egg appeared, and the 
 hen began to cackle a silvery lay. Mr. 
 Russell, who stood by Bryant to see fair 
 play, held the egg up, and told the crowd 
 that it was probably worth $300 and any 
 farmer could have it for that price spot 
 cash. While the crowd was laughing at 
 this, for people up Oakville way don t 
 carry many three-hundred-dollar bills 
 around loose in their clothes, a queer thing 
 happened. 
 
 One of the men who ran a wheel of 
 fortune the kind where you pay ten cents 
 281 
 
THE TALE OF THE GOLDEN EGG 
 
 and are sure to get an article worth a tenth 
 of a cent no blanks thought that a hen 
 that laid golden eggs laid over any fortune 
 wheel in the country ; so he told his pal 
 that he was going to steal the hen. 
 
 He was standing on the other side of 
 the hen, and while the crowd was intent on 
 the glistening egg, he seized the enchanted 
 fowl and burst through the crowd and out 
 of the tent as quick as winking. The 
 farmers followed him, crying, "Stop, thief!" 
 but they had not run ten feet when a re 
 markable thing happened. 
 
 That man and the hen disappeared as 
 if they had been swallowed up. There 
 was no place where the man could have 
 hidden. He had simply vanished because 
 he stole the hen. 
 
 And neither the hen nor the man has been 
 seen from that day to this, although it was 
 away back in October. The old witch s 
 prediction had come true. I dare say that 
 
THE TALE OF THE GOLDEN EGG 
 
 she has the hen ; but who has the man, I 
 don t know. And I don t care much. 
 
 As for Bryant, he sold the egg to a 
 banker in Waterbury for $400, and put 
 the money in the savings bank ; and he 
 bought some blooded Wyandotte hens 
 with the gate-money he took in, and now 
 he has one of the best poultry farms in the 
 whole state of Connecticut. 
 
THE BOY WHO REQUIRED 
 WINDING 
 
YOU boys who are wound up to 
 run through a whole lifetime, 
 and whose machinery so seldom 
 gets out of order that is, if you are out 
 of doors a good deal, and don t spend 
 your time reading improbable tales 
 ought to be able to appreciate the sad 
 case of Jimmy Whortleberry of Winches 
 ter, Massachusetts. 
 
 Jimmy looked and acted and felt like 
 other boys, with one exception. He had 
 287 
 
THE BOY WHO REQUIRED WINDING 
 
 to be wound up like a clock every day. 
 Just at the back of his neck there was a 
 little keyhole, and he was wound up with 
 a silver key that fitted into it. 
 
 It s no use for you to ask me to ex 
 plain why, or how, or anything else. Some 
 things have to be taken on trust. If you 
 don t believe this story, the first thing I ll 
 hear is that you haven t believed the oth 
 ers, and then what would become of my 
 confidence in myself? 
 
 Jimmy had a very remarkable mother. 
 She was always thinking of Jimmy s 
 comfort and Jimmy s pleasure, and she 
 was so kind to him that he actually loved 
 her. 
 
 Now a great many mothers have to do 
 a good deal for their boys. They have to 
 remember where the cap was thrown 
 when the boy came home from his play ; 
 they have to know where he left his 
 skates and what became of his top; but I 
 288 
 
THE BOY WHO REQUIRED WINDING 
 
 never knew of any other mother who had 
 to remember to wind her son up every 
 morning before breakfast. You see the 
 keyhole being in the back of his neck, 
 Jimmy couldn t reach it himself. But his 
 mother was only too glad to keep the boy 
 going, for he was such a cheery little lad ; 
 up to mischief and dreadfully naughty 
 sometimes, but well worth winding up for 
 all that. 
 
 It was the funniest performance, his 
 winding-up. I was there on a visit once, 
 and I saw Mrs. Whortleberry wind him. 
 She put the pretty silver key into his 
 neck and began to turn it, and the blood 
 ran through his veins with a sweet crink 
 ling noise that sounded like music-boxes 
 miles and miles away. Jimmy always 
 liked to be wound up. It was like taking 
 a tonic. He would run and jump and 
 sing gaily and act for all the world as if he 
 had been charged with electricity. 
 289 
 
THE BOY WHO REQUIRED WINDING 
 
 Not half the boys in Winchester who 
 played with Jimmy knew that he had to 
 be wound up, for he was just as natural as 
 any boy, and could climb and skate and 
 wrestle with the best of them. 
 
 One day the boys got up a walking race. 
 In this they were aided and abetted by 
 old Mr. Dixon. They were to walk from 
 Winchester to Arlington Center and back 
 again for a silver medal that Mr. Dixon 
 had promised to the winner. Old Mr. 
 Dixon is a silver-haired gentleman whom 
 all the boys like because he is still a good 
 deal of a boy himself, in spite of his sev 
 enty years. 
 
 " I think that Jimmy will win if he 
 doesn t run down," said Mr. Whortle 
 berry. 
 
 " Run down indeed," said Mr. Dixon, 
 hotly. " Jimmy won t run down when 
 he knows it is a walking match. He ll 
 win fair, you may depend upon it." From 
 
 ago 
 
THE BOY WHO REQUIRED WINDING 
 
 which it will be seen that Jimmy was a 
 favorite with the old man. 
 
 The race was to be walked on a Saturday. 
 It so happened that, the night before, Mrs. 
 Whortleberry was taken ill with an attack 
 of grip, and in the morning she was too 
 sick to rise. 
 
 She told the maid to wind Jimmy, but 
 the maid was a rather feather-brained crea 
 ture and forgot all about it, and as for 
 Jimmy, he was so full of the race that he 
 never noticed that he had not been wound. 
 Of course, just as it is with clocks, he 
 could run several hours overtime. So he 
 was able to go down to breakfast, and 
 then run in and kiss his mother good-bye, 
 and tell her that he was sorry that she was 
 too sick to come and see the start. 
 
 Just as he was leaving the room she 
 
 called out, " Are you wound up, Jimmy ? " 
 
 But he was half way downstairs by that 
 
 time, and didn t hear her. He put on 
 
 291 
 
THE BOY WHO REQUIRED WINDING 
 
 his cap, and started off at a dog trot for 
 Mr. Dixon s house, for that was to be the 
 meeting-place for the contestants. 
 
 There were Chelsea Concord and Dor 
 chester Medford and Elgin Waltham and 
 Somerville Newton and his brother, Cen 
 ter Newton. 
 
 Old Mr. Dixon was in tip-top spirits, 
 and gave each of the boys an orange. 
 The start was to be made from the Win 
 chester library, and the course was to be 
 along the line of the trolley road to Arling 
 ton, turning at the railroad station and 
 coming back over the same route. 
 
 Jimmy felt unusually buoyant. He 
 bounded around until Mr. Dixon said : 
 
 " Boy, if you ll save some of that en 
 ergy for the race, I haven t a doubt but 
 you ll win the medal." 
 
 Elgin Waltham knew that Jimmy had 
 to be wound up, and he said : " Did they 
 wind you extra tight, Jimmy ? " 
 
THE BOY WHO REQUIRED WINDING 
 
 Jimmy s face went white as it struck 
 him that he had not been wound at all ; 
 but boylike, he thought he d probably get 
 through all right, so he said nothing. 
 But he stopped jumping, and said: " Let s 
 hurry up and get to the library." 
 
 There was quite a crowd of Winchester 
 people at the library, for the local paper 
 had contained a notice of the coming race, 
 and as it was Saturday nobody in town 
 had anything to do. That is, nobody 
 who counts for anything. I believe some 
 of the grown-ups did have some work to 
 attend to ; but, after all, what are grown 
 ups ? Only children who have outlived 
 their usefulness. You ll have great times 
 when you grow up, and some of you won t 
 regret that you are no longer children; but 
 I tell you that when a fellow is a boy, 
 everything is fresh and new, and he 
 doesn t know it all, even if he sometimes 
 thinks he does. When he grows up he 
 
 293 
 
THE BOY WHO REQUIRED WINDING 
 
 doesn t know it all either, but he certainly 
 does know that he was awfully lucky to 
 have had a boyhood, and the more he 
 keeps his memory on it the better time 
 he will have right up to the end of the 
 chapter. 
 
 At ten o clock old Mr. Dixon started 
 them off. It was to be a square heel and 
 toe walk, and for a block they kept pretty 
 close together. Then Jimmy and Elgin 
 began to walk away from the others, and 
 it began to look as if it were going to lie 
 between them. But it s a long way to 
 Arlington, and some of the boys were re 
 serving their force for the end of the con 
 test ; so there was hope even for plodding 
 Dorchester Medford, who at the end of 
 the first mile was two blocks in the rear of 
 the procession. 
 
 Mr. Dixon had hired a wagon, and he 
 rode along cheering the boys and urging 
 them to do their best. 
 294 
 
THE BOY WHO REQUIRED WINDING 
 
 " Say, this is going to be dead easy," 
 said Jimmy. " It lies between me and 
 you, and I bet I ll win." He and Elgin 
 were neck and neck. 
 
 " You ll have to take an electric to do 
 it, then," said Elgin, with spirit. "Anyhow, 
 a boy that s wound up ought to go faster 
 than a plain every-day boy. I don t think 
 it was fair to let you in." 
 
 Again Jimmy s heart sank What if 
 he should run down ? He felt all right ; 
 but he knew that, when he stopped, he d 
 stop all at once and without any warning. 
 
 " Don t talk, walk," said he shortly, and 
 pegged away, his lithe little legs swinging 
 back and forth with the regularity of pis 
 ton rods. 
 
 When they reached Arlington, Med- 
 ford had crept up to fourth place, and 
 Somerville Newton was neck and neck 
 with Elgin ; but Jimmy had gained the 
 lead, and was steadily increasing it. 
 295 
 
THE BOY WHO REQUIRED WINDING 
 
 Across the tracks they went and around 
 the station and back across the tracks, old 
 Mr. Dixon cheering lustily and growing 
 almost apoplectic with his exertions. 
 
 " It s Jimmy s race," he shouted, and 
 any one could tell that he was glad. Well, 
 Jimmy was a general favorite, and next to 
 winning it himself, I guess every boy would 
 rather have seen Jimmy win it than any 
 one else. 
 
 The pace began to tell on them all on 
 the way back ; but they were game lads, 
 and while the old gentleman rode along as 
 pacemaker, they would not have given up 
 if the way had been ten times as long. 
 They were all Massachusetts boys, and 
 there are no boys to beat those unless it 
 is the boys of the rest of the United 
 States. 
 
 They were within a quarter of a mile of 
 the home stretch when Jimmy began to 
 slacken his pace. This encouraged Med- 
 296 
 
THE BOY WHO REQUIRED WINDING 
 
 ford, who had been gradually working his 
 way up in the procession, and he passed 
 Somerville, who had long ago distanced 
 Elgin, and steadily advanced until he was 
 within a rod of Jimmy. It had been a 
 remarkably close race, and no one had 
 dropped out. 
 
 You should have seen Mr. Dixon s 
 face when he saw his favorite losing ground. 
 As for Elgin, he was so encouraged that 
 he broke into a run and, of course, lost his 
 chance of winning. 
 
 For one brief moment Jimmy thought 
 that he had run down; but when he real 
 ized that he couldn t move a step after the 
 machinery had stopped, he gave a spurt 
 and increased his lead by three feet. 
 There was now just an eighth of a mile 
 left, and the race looked to be Jimmy s, for 
 Medford was walking his prettiest and 
 couldn t gain an inch on the leader. 
 
 The beautiful building of the Winches- 
 297 
 
THE BOY WHO REQUIRED WINDING 
 
 ter library is now in sight. A crowd of 
 Winchester s best citizens are standing 
 there, waving flags and cheering. Jimmy s 
 father is among the number. Jimmy sees 
 him, and wishes that his mother might be 
 there, too. 
 
 Five hundred feet more and Jimmy 
 will be champion. 
 
 But the mechanism had reached its limit 
 of running. The maid had lost the race 
 for him because she had forgotten to wind 
 him. Down in the road he dropped. His 
 arms moved spasmodically once or twice, 
 his legs kicked a little, and he lay an inert 
 mass on the macadam. 
 
 And then Medford did a very noble 
 thing. Disdaining the fact that it was now 
 his race, he dropped out, and stooped to 
 pick Jimmy up, and Somerville Newton 
 walked in over the line and won the medal, 
 amid the perfunctory cheers of the Win- 
 chesterians. 
 
 298 
 
THE BOY WHO REQUIRED WINDING 
 
 A doctor ran up to Jimmy. But Elgin 
 Waltham said, " You re not what he 
 wants; he wants the key." 
 
 The doctor thought he was insane; but 
 Elgin started for Jimmy s house to get 
 the key, and ran plump into Mr. Whortle 
 berry. 
 
 " The key, the key," he gasped. 
 
 Jimmy s father had seen his son fall, and 
 like every other member of the Whortle 
 berry family, he carried a key that would 
 fit the lad s neck. He ran to the boy, 
 and said to the doctor : " I am his father. 
 He only needs winding." 
 
 That doctor was the most astonished 
 physician in eastern Massachusetts, but 
 he said nothing. The bystanders saw Mr. 
 Whortleberry insert the key, and then 
 they heard a fain* and musical sound, 
 which, as I have said, was Jimmy s blood 
 coursing through his veins, and then the 
 boy s legs began to work back and forth 
 299 
 
THE BOY WHO REQUIRED WINDING 
 
 and his arms to pump, and he rose to his 
 feet and went on with the race. 
 
 "Jimmy boy," said his father, sadly, 
 <c the race is over. It would have been 
 yours if only you had been wound up." 
 
 Poor Jimmy realized then what had 
 happened, and being a boy, even if he did 
 have mechanism inside of him instead of 
 vitals, he burst into tears. 
 
 And then occurred a pretty scene. 
 
 Somerville Newton went up to Mr. 
 Dixon, who was hastening to shake hands 
 with Jimmy, and said in a loud voice 
 so that all could hear : " I don t think we 
 ought to call this a race. If I d known 
 Jimmy wasn t wound up, I d never have 
 entered. Say we have it again next Satur 
 day." 
 
 " Hooray," shouted all the boys, in 
 cluding old Mr. Dixon. 
 
THE BOY WHO TURNED 
 BOOKS INTO FOOD 
 
HIS name was John S. Smith, and 
 he lived in a little village among 
 the Berkshires, near Stockbridge. 
 I m not going to tell just where, or you d 
 all be writing letters to him asking him 
 how he did it, and he hates to answer 
 letters. 
 
 John Smith was nine years old on one 
 of his birthdays. He had also been eight 
 and seven and a whole lot of other num 
 bers, but it was when he was nine that he 
 
 33 
 
THE BOY WHO TURNED 
 
 first discovered his peculiar gift. He was 
 sitting in the kitchen reading, while Kate, 
 the hired girl, was making tomato ketchup. 
 Well, you know how hungry the smell of 
 that good condiment makes a fellow, and 
 John, who had not eaten a mouthful since 
 breakfast and it was now nearly nine 
 o clock A. M. was naturally ravenous. 
 He held his book in his two hands, and 
 said to Kate, " I wish I had something 
 good to eat/* Then he felt something 
 soft in his hands, and lo and behold ! his 
 book was a cake. He didn t stop to think 
 of the consequences, but he just ate it, and 
 it was " lickin good, * as his Aunt Penel 
 ope would have said. But after he had 
 finished it, he wanted to read again about 
 the man who wanted to shiver ; for it was 
 Grimm s Fairy Tales he had been reading. 
 But he couldn t do it, for the book was in 
 his little stomach. Kate was astonished 
 to think he could turn it into cake. She 
 
 34 
 
BOOKS INTO FOOD 
 
 was not much of a reader herself, and 
 she hated baking. " Land sakes !" she 
 said, "if I thought I could get rid of 
 baking by turning your pa s books into 
 bread and cake, I d never light the oven 
 again." 
 
 " I don t suppose you can," said John, 
 "but I guess I can." 
 
 " Well, try it," said Kate. 
 John s father was a minister, and he had 
 two or three hundred theological books in 
 his study. He was not at home that 
 morning, having gone to Pittsfield to at 
 tend some convention or other. So John 
 and Kate went into his study, and John 
 said to her, " What do you need ? " 
 
 " Well," said she, " I was going to bake 
 bread this morning as soon as the ketchup 
 was done. You might make me a large 
 loaf of bread." 
 
 " What book ll I take ? " asked John. 
 " Oh, any book. They all look about 
 
THE BOY WHO TURNED 
 
 alike. He ll never miss it, he has so 
 many." 
 
 So John reached up and took down 
 Fox s Book of Martyrs. He held it in 
 one hand, and said : " I wish this was a 
 loaf of bread." And then a remarkable 
 thing happened. Both John and Kate 
 were surprised at it. The book still con 
 tinued to be a book. 
 
 " Why, that s funny," said John. I 
 thought 1 had the power." He grabbed 
 it in both- hands, and again said, " I wish 
 this was a loaf of bread " ; and this time it 
 became a warm, fresh loaf. Kate was 
 delighted. So was John. What boy 
 wouldn t be ? 
 
 It was such a large loaf that Kate 
 wouldn t need another for three days. 
 They had it for dinner, and Mrs. Smith 
 complained that it was heavy ; but what 
 could you expect ? You can t make light 
 bread out of heavy materials. 
 306 
 
BOOKS INTO FOOD 
 
 After that, at every " baking," John 
 converted a theological work into bread 
 for the family, which was what his father 
 had been doing for many years, although 
 not so directly. But after a while the Rev. 
 Mr. Smith noticed that his library was 
 growing beautifully less, and as he never 
 loaned his books, he wondered thereat. 
 At last, one Saturday, after completing his 
 sermon, he lay down upon the sofa to 
 take a nap ; but he was awakened by hear 
 ing light footsteps. Through half-closed 
 lids he saw his son enter the room and 
 take down a copy of " The Growth of 
 Congregationalism in New England " and 
 make a loaf out of it ; and as he was a 
 quick-witted man, he realized what had 
 become of his library, and also fathomed 
 the cause of the late heavy bread. He 
 reprimanded John severely until the boy 
 told him that he had only done it to ease 
 Kate s labors, and then the old gentleman 
 307 
 
THE BOY WHO TURNED 
 
 made her cease her labors entirely and re 
 tire to her own home for an indefinite rest. 
 So she learned that a loaf has to be paid for 
 sooner or later. 
 
 But although John never took any more 
 books to turn into bread, he often amused 
 himself by making pumpkins out of rocks 
 and candy out of twigs; and when the older 
 boys and girls of the village went on an 
 excursion to Bash Bish Falls, they always 
 took the little fellow along, as it saved the 
 bother of putting up lunch. He made 
 lovely chicken sandwiches out of moss. 
 
 One day the Rev. Mr. Smith, his wife, 
 and John went down to New York to see 
 the sights, and among the places that they 
 visited was Central Park. John was very 
 much interested in the ancient pottery and 
 the mummies and things that he saw in 
 the Metropolitan Museum. But as most 
 of them were under glass, he did not do 
 any damage, as he might have done if he 
 308 
 
BOOKS INTO FOOD 
 
 had suddenly become hungry and turned 
 an Egyptian mummy into a Welsh rabbit 
 or a Roman coin into a Neapolitan ice. 
 His father was a little nervous, however, 
 and he breathed a sigh of relief when they 
 got out safely. 
 
 On the way over to the Monkey House 
 John saw the great obelisk that was brought 
 from Egypt a few years ago and set up in 
 the Park. He said to his father : 
 
 " Oh, papa, that s older than you or I, 
 or even Aunt Penelope, isn t it ? " 
 
 "Yes, my son," said his father, and 
 then he told him a lot of interesting facts 
 concerning it that I won t repeat, because 
 this is not a story about ancient times, 
 but about a boy who is still living in 
 Massachusetts. 
 
 Finally John walked up to the obelisk. 
 c Hands off!" said his father nerv 
 ously ; but either the boy didn t hear or 
 else he didn t mind. I prefer to think that 
 
 39 
 
THE BOY WHO TURNED 
 
 he didn t hear. At any rate, he put his 
 hands on the great stone shaft, and said : 
 
 " My, I wish this was a big pyramid of 
 ice-cream. I m awful hungry." 
 
 In an instant, of course, the obelisk 
 turned to ice-cream of different flavors, 
 vanilla at the bottom, chocolate in the 
 middle, and strawberry at the top. 
 
 Now, if it had been winter time, it 
 wouldn t have been so disastrous a thing, 
 because ice-cream will keep indefinitely in 
 the winter. But it happened to be a warm 
 ish day in early spring, and the priceless 
 thing began to melt. John grabbed a 
 handful, and was just going to eat it when a 
 park policeman came running up and said : 
 
 " It s against orders to deface anything 
 in the park, and eating is defacing." 
 
 But that wasn t the worst of it. The 
 hieroglyphics were beginning to run and 
 were changing their meanings already. So 
 Mr. Smith said : 
 
BOOKS INTO FOOD 
 
 " John, clap your hands on the thing 
 and wish it back to stone, if possible. I 
 can t afford to pay for this obelisk." 
 
 John ran up and did as he was bid, and 
 wished with all his might that the obelisk 
 would turn to stone again, and by great 
 good luck it did. Then he licked his 
 fingers on the sly, and promised his father 
 then and there that he would never try to 
 exercise his strange gift again. 
 
 The Rev. Mr. Smith asked the police 
 man not to say a word about the affair, 
 and not a word has been said until to-day; 
 but I think it is too good to keep. 
 
 And now, when you hear learned men 
 say that the action of our climate is wear 
 ing away the stone that stood for ages in 
 Egypt, you will understand that John 
 Smith had a hand in it in fact, a couple 
 of hands in it. And as his Aunt Penelope 
 would have said, " It was lickin good." 
 
SYDNEYAND THE JAR 
 FAIRY 
 
SYDNEY PUFFER was the stupid 
 est boy in the Malburn school. 
 Now some boys are stupid and 
 don t know it : if you were to be led by 
 their opinion of themselves, you would say 
 they were anything but stupid. But Syd 
 knew he was stupid, and wished every day 
 that he could become less so. It is not 
 the custom at the Malburn school for the 
 boys to have any home studies ; all their 
 studying is done in the class-room. But 
 315 
 
SYDNEY AND THE JAR FAIRY 
 
 Syd was so anxious to learn that he would 
 take his geography and his speller home, 
 and would study and study, until he fell 
 asleep over the books. 
 
 And next day in class Miss Greene 
 would say: "Sydney, spell few/ 
 " F-i-e-w," Sydney would say. " Wrong. 
 Spell exasperate/ " " I-g-s-p-a-r-a-i-t." 
 Sydney would spell slowly and painstak 
 ingly, and, then, like as not, Bob Addoms, 
 who had not looked at his lesson, would 
 spell both words as glibly as could be, and 
 poor Sydney would feel utterly disheart 
 ened. 
 
 Then would come the geography les 
 son. " Sydney, where is France ? " 
 
 " France is the capital of England." 
 
 " Yes, but where is it ? " Miss Greene 
 would continue. She really seemed to 
 take pleasure in leading Sydney on. 
 
 " Is it in Ireland ? " he would ask 
 doubtfully. 
 
 316 
 
SYDNEY AND THE JAR FAIRY 
 
 " No, it isn t. What are its chief pro 
 ducts ? " 
 
 " Products " would start Syd off. " Tar, 
 pitch, turpentine, and lumber," he would 
 say with unusual speed ; and amid the 
 laughter of the class, he would sit down. 
 And Bob would get up, and bound France, 
 and tell her chief products and something 
 about her form of government; and yet he 
 had only dipped into his geography be 
 tween classes. 
 
 But it was in reading that Sydney fared 
 worst. He could not read the simplest 
 words without stumbling along. Once 
 Miss Greene gave him this verse from 
 Longfellow : 
 
 The shades of night were falling fast, 
 As through an Alpine village passed 
 A youth, who bore, mid snow and ice, 
 A banner with the strange device, 
 Excelsior! 
 
 Sydney rose at his desk, held the book 
 
 3*7 
 
SYDNEY AND THE JAR FAIRY 
 
 close to his face, for he was near-sighted, 
 opened his eyes wide, and, frightened, 
 dropped his lower lip, and very slowly 
 read : 
 
 The shads of nigt were fall-ing fat 
 As thog an All Pine villag paced 
 A yowt who bore mid snow and ice 
 A baner with the strong device, Ex- 
 Excellent ! 
 
 " Very excellent," said Miss Greene ; 
 " but I m afraid not excellent enough for 
 you to get an c extra in reading." 
 
 When Syd sat down, he was in tears; 
 but that did not cause the sniggers and 
 smiles of his classmates to subside, nor did 
 Miss Greene make any attempt to stop 
 the scholars. 
 
 Little Syd felt humiliated, and hardly 
 knew what happened the rest of the day. 
 He was kept in for an hour, and had to 
 read that stanza out loud fifty times and 
 then write it twenty-five times. 
 318 
 
SYDNEY AND THE JAR FAIRY 
 
 It was late in the afternoon when he 
 finally left school and started for home. 
 His way lay along the seashore, and he 
 shuffled through the damp sand, half wish 
 ing that a big wave would come and bear 
 him away to a land where there was no 
 such thing as school. 
 
 " I wish I could learn. I don t want 
 to grow up a dunce," he said to himself, 
 " but everything is so hard, and Miss 
 Greene doesn t think I can do anything, 
 and then I can t. I read that verse all 
 right to grandma, but she kept stroking 
 my hair, and that made the words look 
 easier." 
 
 So he talked out loud to himself, and 
 shuffled along until his foot unearthed, or 
 rather unsanded, a bronze jar of a very 
 curious shape. Little Syd had never read 
 any fairy stories, of course. Reading was 
 too hard a thing for him to do more in it 
 than he had to do. And his grandmother, 
 319 
 
SYDNEY AND THE JAR FAIRY 
 
 although a lovely old lady and devoted to 
 her little grandson (the only one left of a 
 large family of children and grandchildren), 
 was no believer in fairy tales. " It s a 
 waste of time," she had said to a caller who 
 asked her whether she read " Alice in 
 Wonderland " to Sydney. " It all seems 
 very nonsensical to me. What is the use 
 of filling the poor boy s brain with stories 
 that are not only untrue, but are silly ? 
 It isn t easy for him to learn ; so I believe 
 in reading only those things that will do 
 him good." 
 
 " Yes," the visitor had said, " but if you 
 don t exercise his imagination, you are go 
 ing to give him a cheerless old age." 
 
 But grandma had laughed in her cheery 
 way and said : " Well, I m old enough, 
 conscience knows, and I ve had enough to 
 try me, but I find life pleasant, and that 
 without any fairy stories, either." 
 
 So the caller had changed the subject. 
 320 
 
SYDNEY AND THE JAR FAIRY 
 
 You see, therefore, that Sydney did not 
 immediately wonder, as an imaginative boy 
 would have wondered, what the jar was 
 good for and whether it was one of the 
 kind told about in the Arabian Nights. 
 But it is a peculiar thing about fairies 
 and their ways that it doesn t make a bit 
 of difference to them whether you believe 
 in them or not. If they think that you 
 need them, they will come to you and force 
 you to believe in them. 
 
 As soon as Sydney kicked the jar, he 
 stopped and picked it up, and began rub 
 bing the sand from it, and lo and behold ! 
 a beautiful fairy came out of it, and flew 
 before him like a butterfly, talking as she 
 flew. 
 
 " What do you want of me, my dear ? " 
 she said in the sweetest voice imaginable. 
 
 But Sydney only stared in amazement. 
 
 " You called me, my dear, and here I 
 am. I can do anything for you that you 
 321 
 
SYDNEY AND THE JAR FAIRY 
 
 wish done. Make you rich, make you 
 wise, make you good." 
 
 Now, there are a number of boys in the 
 Malburn school who would have said : 
 " Oh, make me rich," but dear little Syd 
 hardly ever thought of money. He did 
 want to know something, so he said : 
 
 " I wish that I could learn easily. " 
 
 You see, he didn t even ask to know 
 everything without study ; he merely 
 wanted to learn easily, and as he had 
 asked so he received. 
 
 The fairy fluttered up to him and kissed 
 him on each cheek, and he told me after 
 ward that it was as if a warm snowflake 
 had touched him, which was not a bad idea 
 for a fellow like Sydney. 
 
 Then the fairy and the jar vanished, but 
 Sydney walked home as happy as if he 
 had never been bothered at school. He 
 had his school-books under his arm, for 
 he had determined to have good lessons 
 
 3" 
 
SYDNEY AND THE JAR FAIRY 
 
 next day if it took him all night to learn 
 them. 
 
 I think that he fancied his grandmother 
 would not believe that he had met a fairy, 
 so he said nothing to her about it. But 
 eager to test his new power, he sat down at 
 the center table in the sitting-room and 
 began to study his history lesson. The 
 boys had studies far beyond their ages in 
 that school. Sydney was only ten, and as 
 you have seen, he could hardly read, and 
 yet he had history, geography, spelling, 
 arithmetic, grammar, and physiology. 
 
 Well, the history lesson for the next 
 day was about the battle of Concord, and 
 Sydney began to read it out loud, as was 
 his habit, and to his great astonishment he 
 read it as glibly as Bob Addoms, and to 
 his greater astonishment he remembered 
 every word of it, and when he had shut 
 the book up he found himself repeating 
 the whole chapter, word for word, and 
 
 3*3 
 
SYDNEY AND THE JAR FAIRY 
 
 with as much expression as Lorimer Hal- 
 stead put into his reading, and Lorimer 
 was the star " elocutionist " of the school. 
 
 Grandma came into the room just as he 
 was finishing his recitation, and she was 
 astonished enough. " Why, my boy, you 
 are improving a great deal. I always said 
 you had it in you. Your dear father was 
 as smart as a steel trap, and I knew you d 
 inherit some of his smartness. That s an 
 interesting part of history. My grand 
 father was at the battle of Concord. He 
 was a cousin of Paul Revere s. Do you 
 know about Paul Revere ? There are 
 some very pretty verses about him by 
 Longfellow, the poet, in this book. See 
 if you can read them to me." 
 
 She handed a volume of Longfellow s 
 poems to the boy, and he read " Paul Re 
 vere s Ride " as easily as if he had known 
 it by heart. Not only that, he shut the 
 book up and recited it, with appropriate 
 
 3*4 
 
SYDNEY AND THE JAR FAIRY 
 
 gestures; and his grandmother caught 
 him in her arms, and said : " Just like 
 your father. He could recite that so 
 that people always wanted him to repeat 
 it immediately." 
 
 You can imagine how pleased Sydney 
 was at this praise from his grandmother, 
 but he did not allow it to turn his little 
 head. He took his other books and 
 studied each lesson, and he found that one 
 reading fixed it in his mind. He was able 
 to do examples in fractions that had merely 
 given him a headache formerly; and as for 
 geography, before bedtime came he had 
 read the whole book through, from begin 
 ning to end, and could draw maps and 
 color them, and print the names of cities 
 and counties in most beautiful letters. And 
 as he did each thing his grandmother 
 would say : " Your father all over, my 
 dear." 
 
 Some boys would have been eager to 
 
 3*5 
 
SYDNEY AND THE JAR FAIRY 
 
 show off next day to the class, but it never 
 entered little Sydney s head. He was 
 very happy that he was going to be like 
 his father that father who had died when 
 he was a small baby, and he would be 
 glad not to vex Miss Greene any more, 
 but he was not at all anxious to show off. 
 I must say that a little bit of that spirit 
 would have been natural and perhaps 
 commendable, but I am not trying to draw 
 a picture of a boy who might have been, 
 but of a boy who was. 
 
 The first lesson after morning exercises 
 was geography. Bob Addoms was asked 
 to go to the board and draw a map of 
 Africa and to name all the Dutch posses 
 sions. Addoms was the champion map- 
 drawer of the school, and he knew it, and 
 I suppose that that fact made him careless. 
 At any rate, when his map was done and 
 Miss Greene had said, " Excellent, Bob. I 
 will give you two extras," Sydney raised 
 326 
 
SYDNEY AND THE JAR FAIRY 
 
 his hand and said : C Is it quite right at 
 the Cape of Good Hope ? " 
 
 A shout went up from the scholars, and 
 Miss Greene herself smiled. Sydney, who 
 did not know the difference between Eu 
 rope and South America, to be criticising 
 Bob s map ! 
 
 " Perhaps you can draw a better one," 
 said Miss Greene. I do not like the sar 
 castic way in which she talked. Teachers 
 have no business to be sarcastic. 
 
 " I ll try," said Sydney, and he went up 
 to her table and selected crayons of differ 
 ent colors. 
 
 Then he drew such a map as had never 
 been seen on the black-board. It was as 
 accurate as the map in the geography, 
 even to the smallest inlets and tiniest 
 capes. And when he had drawn it, he 
 colored all the divisions, and printed all 
 the names, amid the dead silence of the 
 class. Just as he finished it the door 
 327 
 
SYDNEY AND THE JAR FAIRY 
 
 opened and the Superintendent of the 
 County Board of Education walked in. 
 
 In spite of his coming, the boys and 
 girls clapped their hands at Sydney s work, 
 and Miss Greene said : " Beautiful, Syd 
 ney ! I ll give you ten extras." 
 
 Sydney stood erect, and felt that at last 
 he had come to his own. 
 
 And the Superintendent, who was quite 
 a good draughtsman himself, said : " Miss 
 Greene, I consider that map so remark 
 able that I am going to have the black 
 board removed and sent to the Paris Ex 
 position as a sample of American school 
 work." 
 
 And the scholars rose to their feet and 
 gave three cheers for Sydney, quite un 
 checked. 
 
 Now, if you went to the Paris Exposi 
 tion perhaps you saw Sydney Puffer s 
 map of Africa. But I don t vouch for 
 its having been there. It was drawn 
 
 3 z8 
 
SYDNEY AND THE JAR FAIRY 
 
 under fairy influence, and it may have 
 been withdrawn under the same influence. 
 But this I do know. Sydney Puffer is 
 now the best scholar in Malburn school. 
 Miss Greene says it is awakened ambition, 
 his grandmother says it is his heritage 
 from his father, and Sydney says it is the 
 fairy. 
 
 The End 
 
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