LIBRARY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
 Class 
 
THE BELIEVING YEARS 
 
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 
 NEW YORK BOSTON CHICAGO 
 SAN FRANCISCO 
 
 MACMILLAN & CO., LIMITED 
 
 LONDON BOMBAY CALCUTTA 
 MELBOURNE 
 
 THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD. 
 
 TORONTO 
 
THE BELIEVING YEARS 
 
 BY 
 EDMUND LESTER PEARSON 
 
 Nefa gorfc 
 
 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 1911 
 
 All rightt reserved 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1910, 
 BY THE OUTLOOK COMPANY. 
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1911, 
 BY THE OUTLOOK COMPANY. 
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1911, 
 BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. 
 
 Sej >ip aud electrotyped.- .Putlished October, 1911. 
 
 Norwood Press 
 
 J. S. Gushing Co. Berwick & Smith Co. 
 Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. 
 
EDMUND CARLTON PEARSON 
 (1841-1897) 
 
 E en as he trod that day to God so walked he from his 
 
 birth, 
 In simpleness and gentleness and honor and clean 
 
 mirth." 
 
 223138 
 
NOTE 
 
 A NUMBER of the incidents described in 
 this book have been used in a series of 
 stories published in The Outlook. To The 
 Outlook Company my thanks are due 
 for their courteous permission to retell 
 these stories in an altered form. 
 
 E. L. P. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. MR. COLBURN .... I 
 
 II. THE OLD TOWN . . . .12 
 
 III. MAGIC ...... 26 
 
 IV. NAPOLEON JONES ... 40 
 V. A RUN ON THE BANK . . 57 
 
 VI. HORACE 71 
 
 VII. THE GREAT DAY ... 82 
 
 VIII. THE GREEN CHEST ... 98 
 
 IX. WHITE PEACOCKS . . .113 
 
 X. THE FLIGHT .... 130 
 
 XL UP LIKE A ROCKET . . . 147 
 
 XII. SUSY 160 
 
 XIII. ARMA PUERUMQUE CANO . . 177 
 XIV. WHEN MY SHIP COMES IN . 195 
 XV. THE LUCKY-BUG .... 209 
 XVI. WEST INJY LANE . . . 223 
 XVII. THEIR UNACCOUNTABLE BE 
 HAVIOR ..... 240 
 XVIII. THE SIEGE OF AUNTIE MERRILL 256 
 XIX. ENTERTAINING ALICE . . . 269 
 XX. WHILE THE EVIL DAYS COME NOT 282 
 
THE BELIEVING YEARS 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 MR. COLBURN 
 
 EACH boy in the school-room had fixed 
 his mind on two objects : the calendar 
 and the clock. On the former stood out 
 in big black characters 
 
 June 
 20 
 
 The clock pointed to the hour of three. 
 Exactly sixty minutes separated us from 
 vacation. It was the day of our dreams, 
 the last day of school. 
 
 We had thought of it, thought of it far 
 back when snow still covered the ground ; 
 planned for it, lived in hope of it. To 
 morrow the tyrannical bell should be 
 
2 , . ,; : The* Believing Y.ears 
 
 silent, and no one could say : "Time to 
 start for school ! " 
 
 Many forces had been at work hurry 
 ing this day forward : the first blades of 
 grass, the first leaves on the horse-chest 
 nut trees, the first robin who ran across the 
 grass-plots overlooking the frog pond, the 
 first dandelion that gleamed in the grass. 
 All were signs and symbols of it. 
 
 But in spite of so many omens, the day 
 itself had been outrageously slow to arrive. 
 The robins had abated the enthusiasm of 
 the first few weeks, and become quieter. 
 They were sober householders and family 
 men, now. The golden blossoms of the 
 dandelions were transformed into that 
 shape in which they are useful chiefly to 
 blow upon three times to see at what 
 o clock your mother wants you. The 
 season had arrived for swimming, in 
 deed, it had been here for weeks, Ed 
 Mason and Rob Currier claimed to 
 
Mr. Colburn 3 
 
 have gone in swimming at Four Rocks 
 as early as the last day of April. The 
 fish in Little River needed our careful 
 attention. And in front of Austin s shop 
 had long stood a sign displaying a pink 
 pyramid with a spoon stuck therein, 
 and the seductive words "Ice Cream," 
 a spectacle that made our Fourth of 
 July money stir uneasily in our pockets. 
 In short, all the elements of vacation 
 were here, all but the thing itself. 
 Each morning the summons came at 
 twenty minutes of nine, and each morn 
 ing we trod the dismal path. Pencils 
 squeaked, and slaty smells arose as the 
 slates were covered with figures and then 
 cleaned with damp sponges. The pun 
 gent odor of cedar, from newly sharpened 
 lead-pencils, mingled with the fragrance 
 of pickled limes, smuggled into school 
 and eaten contrary to the orders of Miss 
 Temple, the teacher. Outside, summer 
 
4 The Believing Years 
 
 called us in a dozen different ways. And, 
 uneasy prisoners, we chafed and wriggled 
 in our seats. 
 
 But, somehow, the days had dragged 
 by, and even this final one had nearly 
 gone. At the last moment, when our 
 release was so near at hand, a dismal 
 spectre arose before us to block the way. 
 It was the forbidding form of Mr. Col- 
 burn. 
 
 This was a man who had written an 
 arithmetic, an arithmetic of singular 
 and diabolical ingenuity. He had done 
 this thing long before any of us were born, 
 and then he had passed from the earth. 
 But his work had remained to annoy us. 
 Occasionally, during the last hour of the 
 afternoon session, we wrestled with Mr. 
 Colburn, by request. This was in ad 
 dition to the regular arithmetic lesson in 
 the morning. 
 
 I conceived Mr. Colburn as a tall, 
 
Mr. Colburn 5 
 
 spare man, clad in brown leather. His 
 face was brown and leathery, too, and it 
 was puckered and sour. In one hand he 
 held his famous book, in the other, a 
 big switch. He was full of impertinent 
 curiosity, was Mr. Colburn, and he had 
 no manner of interest in the things that 
 really concerned us. 
 
 I wanted to know if Ed Mason (whose 
 seat was next but one behind mine) 
 were going fishing to-morrow morning. 
 Mr. Colburn wanted to know if 3 fifths 
 of a chaldron of coal cost 8 dollars, what 
 is the whole chaldron worth ? 
 
 I did not care what it was worth, I did 
 not know what a chaldron was, anyway, 
 and I have never found out. But I 
 saw we were in for an uncomfortable hour 
 as soon as Miss Temple said : 
 
 "Take your Colburn s Arithmetics and 
 sit up straight in your seats. . . . Robert, 
 did you throw that ? Well, you may go 
 
6 The Believing Years 
 
 and stand in that corner, with your face 
 to the wall." 
 
 Rob Currier did as he was directed with 
 undisguised delight. By one skilful 
 stroke he had put himself beyond the 
 clutch of Mr. Colburn. The rest of us 
 looked upon him with envy, if we had 
 only been so inspired ! 
 
 It was base of Miss Temple to devote 
 the last hour of school to Colburn s Arith 
 metic. We thought regretfully of an 
 other teacher we had once had. She 
 would have read to us the adventures of 
 "The Prince and the Pauper," and that 
 was altogether better than fretting us 
 about the price of coal. Never in my 
 life have I wished to know the worth of a 
 chaldron of coal, but if ever I have such a 
 wish doubtless the dealer will tell me 
 straight out. 
 
 But that was not the way with the 
 people Mr. Colburn knew, they could 
 
Mr. Colburn 7 
 
 never give you a decent answer about 
 anything. If you asked one of Mr. Col- 
 burn s friends the price of his horse, he 
 would reply that the horse and the saddle 
 together were worth 100 dollars, but the 
 horse was worth 9 times as much as the 
 saddle, and that was all you could get 
 out of him. 
 
 For my part, I privately resolved never 
 to buy horses of any such disagreeable 
 folk, a resolution which I have faith 
 fully kept. 
 
 Miss Temple must have observed my 
 anxiety to speak with Ed Mason, for she 
 promptly called upon me : 
 
 "Samuel, you may take Question 61. 
 Read it." 
 
 " A man bought i ton and 4 fifths of 
 a ton of fustic for 43 dollars, what was 
 that a ton ? " 
 
 I struggled with it for a few moments, 
 vaguely wondering what fustic might be, 
 
8 The Believing Years 
 
 but in the end I was compelled to say 
 that I did not know. Jimmy Toppan 
 and Charley Carter both fell victims to 
 the question. It was finally answered, 
 with some help from Miss Temple, by Joe 
 Carter. The answer did not seem very 
 interesting to us, after it had been found 
 and worked out on the blackboard. 
 
 We were watching the clock. 
 
 Mr. Colburn would not have cared for 
 clocks, unless, indeed, he could have 
 made up some hateful question about 
 them. He did not care for our fishing 
 trips ; he had no interest in the frog 
 pond and its creatures. The warm, sum 
 mer day outside had no attraction for him. 
 
 He wanted to know if cloth 4 quarters 
 wide is worth 8 dollars a yard, what is I 
 yard of the same kind of cloth, that is 5 
 quarters wide, worth ? And his conspir 
 ator, Miss Temple, aided and abetted him 
 in his curiosity. She fired the questions 
 
Mr. Colburn 9 
 
 at us with unremitting vigor. We were 
 called upon to reduce 9y to an improper 
 fraction, though how any one could wish 
 to inject into it any more impropriety 
 than it already seemed to possess, was 
 a matter impossible to understand. 
 
 The long hour wore on. From outside 
 came the drone of insects. A flock of 
 sheep passed the school, driven up 
 Elm Street by men who were probably 
 hurrying them to their fate. We tried to 
 look out the windows and watch the prog 
 ress of the sheep, but we were recalled by 
 Miss Temple, to whom the incident 
 suggested nothing except a chance to 
 try upon us what Mr. Colburn seems to 
 have considered his crowning effort. 
 
 "A man driving his geese to market 
 was met by another, who said, Good 
 morrow, master, with your hundred geese ; 
 says he, I have not a hundred; but if I 
 had half as many more as I now have, 
 
io The Believing Years 
 
 and two geese and a half, I should have 
 a hundred; how many had he?" 
 
 Disheartening as this problem ap 
 peared, together with its inhuman sug 
 gestion of a man carrying half of a goose 
 about with him, it nevertheless proved 
 useful to us. Joe Carter and one or two 
 others (who affected to enjoy Mr. Col- 
 burn) engaged in a long wrangle with 
 each other and with Miss Temple, about 
 the number of geese owned by this pal 
 pable lunatic. We regarded them, at 
 first, with a pity not unmixed with loath 
 ing ; then, as we observed how they were 
 taking up the time, we came to appre 
 ciate the value of the discussion. Ed 
 Mason and Jimmy Toppan, from the 
 depths of a complete ignorance of the 
 subject, managed to interject one or two 
 inquiries that had the happy result of 
 tangling every one up still worse, and 
 thus prolonging the goose argument. 
 
Mr. Colburn n 
 
 To our great joy the problem was still 
 unsolved at five minutes of four. Then 
 Miss Temple was forced to bid us close 
 the books. She made a few perfunctory 
 remarks, wished us a pleasant vacation, 
 and, when a gong sounded throughout 
 the building, dismissed the class. 
 
 We filed to get our hats, filed down 
 stairs, through the hall, and out the door 
 with a concerted and enthusiastic yell. 
 Mr. Colburn and imprisonment lay be 
 hind us ; ahead were vacation and free 
 dom. So we whooped once more, and 
 again, until a scissors-grinder, who had 
 gone to sleep on the grass under a tree, 
 woke up with a start. The old horse who 
 drew Oliver s bakery wagon had been 
 standing sleepily in front of a house on 
 the other side of Elm Street. At our 
 third shout he ambled clumsily off, while 
 Mr. Oliver, with a basket of buns in his 
 hand, pursued him down the street. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 THE OLD TOWN 
 
 ELM STREET, into which we rushed that 
 afternoon, was a broad thoroughfare ex 
 tending from one end of the town to the 
 other. On both sides it was lined with 
 trees, set at the edge of the brick side 
 walks. Mainly fine tall elms, they lent 
 a distinction to the street and made it 
 notable among those which characterize 
 the older towns of New England. In the 
 opinion of all the citizens, Elm Street was 
 beyond comparison. 
 
 Local pride did not exaggerate. Its 
 unusual length, its great, graceful trees 
 and the dignified houses, made the street 
 undoubtedly beautiful. There were 
 houses of every style which has been in 
 
 12 
 
The Old Town 13 
 
 vogue during two hundred years. Roofs 
 which sloped in the rear nearly to the 
 ground, gambrel roofs, and the various 
 less attractive fashions of the nineteenth 
 century, all were there. 
 
 But those of which the owners were 
 most proud, those best suited to the 
 street, were the great, square, three- 
 storied houses, built in the early years of 
 the century. That was the time of the 
 town s prosperity, before a fire had 
 checked its growth, before shifting sands 
 had almost closed its harbor. Ships from 
 the old town sailed every ocean then, and 
 carried our flag into strange, foreign 
 ports. Their captains, or their owners, 
 built many of the big, square houses, so 
 you could often see, on the roof, a little 
 railed platform, where the householder 
 might stand of a morning to sweep the 
 harbor and the ocean with his spy-glass. 
 Charley Carter s father did this regu- 
 
14 The Believing Years 
 
 larly, although the ships in which he was 
 interested sailed to this port no longer, 
 if, indeed, they sailed at all. 
 
 The town was built along one bank of 
 the river, and Elm Street followed the 
 crest of the slope. It was an easy thing, 
 therefore, for any one standing on the 
 roof of one of the houses to get a good 
 view of the river, the salt marshes, the 
 sand-dunes, and the ocean. The ocean 
 spread out there, bright and clear, from 
 the dim blue mountain that rose on the 
 far horizon in Maine, to the low hills of 
 Cape Ann. Sometimes, at night, the 
 east wind brought the rumble of breakers, 
 or the booming sound of a whistling buoy 
 that guarded the harbor. 
 
 The town was long and very narrow. 
 From Elm Street you could look down 
 some of the cross streets to the river, and 
 beyond. On the other side of Elm Street, 
 as soon as you had passed the gardens 
 
The Old Town 15 
 
 that lay behind the big houses, you were 
 almost in open country. There were a 
 few outlying farms, a few shanties, and 
 then bare, scrubby fields, the Common 
 Pasture, rocky knolls and clumps of 
 woods. On one of these farms dwelt Mr. 
 Diggery, a fierce little man, of whom 
 we went in terror. 
 
 So near did the river come to the lower 
 part of the town that a storm often made 
 people who lived in that quarter need 
 high boots to get across the street ; while 
 the country (unexplored wilds to us !) 
 closed up so near on the other side of Elm 
 Street, that owls, woodchucks, and an 
 occasional fox penetrated the gardens. 
 
 It was this nearness of the river and 
 ocean, and of the open country, that made 
 the town such a delightful dwelling-place 
 for us. Even the centre of the town, 
 the neighborhood where Ed Mason and 
 Jimmy Toppan lived, and Rob Currier, 
 
1 6 The Believing Years 
 
 the two Carters, Horace Winslow, Peter 
 Bailey, and I, this was a region thick 
 with the possibilities of adventure. 
 Much of this centred about the frog pond 
 and the Mall. The pond was full of 
 goldfish, and other humbler fish, and 
 toads, frogs, and water-beetles. You 
 were sure to find something interesting 
 whenever you walked around the pond. 
 Many of our neighbors on Elm Street 
 owned large gardens, to which we had 
 entrance either by permission, or by 
 the informal and far more adventurous 
 method of climbing the back fence. 
 
 The owners of the gardens, at that 
 period, were mostly elderly persons, 
 dwelling in great contentment and the 
 most profound quiet. Their lives were 
 comfortable, well-ordered, and precise. 
 They lived mainly in the past. They 
 pondered much on some grandfather, 
 or great-grandfather, who had built up a 
 
The Old Town 17 
 
 fortune through foreign trade, and they 
 heeded not at all the remarks of envious 
 and ill-natured folk who liked to point 
 out that one of the chief commodities of 
 this trade was rum. The principal hall 
 mark of their respectability was a por 
 trait of their ancestor, with very pink 
 cheeks, the sign of an outdoor life, and 
 not necessarily an indication of a taste 
 for port and madeira. 
 
 Beside this venerable portrait would 
 hang a lively representation of the ship 
 Sally B., as she appeared on some mem 
 orable occasion entering the harbor of 
 Singapore, and viewed by one of those 
 artists who invariably happen to be near 
 by when the ship is under full sail and 
 making not less than twelve knots. 
 
 It was a period not so very far removed 
 from our own time, and yet different from 
 it in a number of respects. No thump 
 ing, grinding trolley car disturbed the 
 
1 8 The Believing Years 
 
 quiet of Elm Street that bright June 
 afternoon. Infrequently, an omnibus 
 rambled up and down. By night the dark 
 ness was punctuated here and there by a 
 gas flame at the top of an iron lamp 
 post. Rob Currier s big brother Dick 
 had the proud privilege of going about 
 our neighborhood at sunset, with a 
 ladder and a supply of matches, to set 
 these lamps alight. We used to watch 
 him, and wonder if we should ever get 
 old enough and sufficiently influential 
 to occupy a public position like his. But 
 before we reached the required age and 
 dignity the old lamp-posts had been 
 taken down in favor of electric lights. 
 
 No one had his letters brought to his 
 house. If he wanted his mail, or wished 
 to send a letter, he went to the post- 
 office. The nine o clock parade of citi 
 zens making toward that building was one 
 of the regular features of life in the town. 
 
The Old Town 19 
 
 At nine in the evening a church bell rang 
 the curfew, although it had absolutely 
 no significance. It had always been 
 done : that was reason sufficient for an 
 old and conservative place. When the 
 ringer died, or something else happened 
 to stop its mournful sound, a well-to-do 
 citizen quickly provided funds to con 
 tinue the ringing. The curfew laws, with 
 their reference to children, had not come 
 into vogue, so the bell sounded each 
 evening simply out of regard for an old 
 custom. Few heard it, and to few of 
 these did it make the slightest difference. 
 We did not often hear foreign tongues 
 or see foreign faces on the streets. Once 
 in a while we might overhear two old 
 women, with shawls over their heads, 
 conversing in Irish as they passed along. 
 The Mediterranean peoples had not ar 
 rived, although they had sent a pioneer 
 in the person of Mr. Mazzoni, who pre- 
 
20 The Believing Years 
 
 sided over a little stand at the foot of 
 Main Street, and was an important per 
 sonage to us, because of the peanuts 
 which he sold. 
 
 The boys who went to the parochial 
 school, the Pats and Mikes, were a kind 
 of hostile crew, and when we met it was 
 usually with an exchange of horse-chest 
 nuts or snowballs. This was because 
 of no racial or religious animosity, we 
 were simply two rival gangs, that was all. 
 On one occasion, when Ed Mason and I 
 met a number of the parochial school 
 boys out in the country, there was an 
 exchange of epithets that stopped (as 
 such meetings did not always stop) this 
 side of blows. I was reduced to a state 
 of almost tearful indignation when one 
 of the little Irish boys asserted that I was 
 "a Protestant." 
 
 I denied the charge vehemently, but 
 when I got home and repeated the insult, 
 
The Old Town 21 
 
 I learned that it was only too true. I 
 had never suspected it, and had gone on 
 thinking that I was merely a Unitarian. 
 Alas, it seemed that I was a Protestant 
 as well. 
 
 The charm and quaintness of the past 
 had by no means vanished from the old 
 town. Wooden ships were still built on 
 the river, now and then, and the sea- 
 captains gathered and gossiped in the 
 rooms of the Marine Society. Overhead 
 was a museum of curiosities of the deep, 
 and of foreign lands. Some one of the 
 captains would always be willing to un 
 lock the room for us, and let us inspect 
 the dusty albatross, the dried flying- 
 fishes, the little ships in bottles, and all 
 the other objects of interest. 
 
 One grocery still displayed the sign 
 "E. & W. I. Goods," and more than one 
 citizen walked the streets in a beaver 
 hat. There was old fat Captain Millett, 
 
22 The Believing Years 
 
 who tacked down Main Street every morn 
 ing in summer under an enormous green- 
 lined umbrella, big enough to shelter a 
 family. There was Captain Bannister, 
 who lived alone in his curious little house 
 on West Injy Lane, where he cultivated 
 a garden patch of cinnamon pinks. And 
 there was Mr. Babbitt, the Quaker gen 
 tleman, who used to pass with stately 
 tread, as we played on Elm Street, or 
 about the pond. He was tall and digni 
 fied, and he wore a high hat and a frock 
 coat, I had almost said a surtout, 
 with a shirt collar so high and antiquated 
 that he seemed to belong to the time 
 of Martin Van Buren. He kept on his 
 black velvet ear-caps until summer was 
 well advanced, and he put them on again 
 the first of September. But he was the 
 friend of a great poet, and every one re 
 spected him for that, as well as for his 
 own character. 
 
The Old Town 23 
 
 There was still a town crier, one of 
 the last, or, as he claimed, the very last 
 one in this country. "Squawboo" (as 
 we were told we must not call him), or 
 Mr. Landford (as we were told we ought 
 to call him), walked the streets with a 
 large dinner bell. He would pause at 
 intervals, and ring his bell vigorously. 
 Then, throwing back his head, he would 
 emit a volume of sound which would 
 strike the hearer with astonishment. I 
 have seen strangers paralyzed with amaze 
 ment as they heard for the first time, and 
 unexpectedly, the deep, tremendous tones 
 that issued from his throat. 
 
 "Hear what I have to 
 
 say!" he would begin. "Grand 
 dance at City Hall to-morrow 
 
 evening at eight o clock. 
 Admission fifty cents ladies free ! 
 
 COME, ONE COME, EVERY 
 BODY! !" 
 
24 The Believing Years 
 
 And then he would ring the bell again, 
 and walk on. 
 
 I have stopped, for the most of this 
 chapter, to explain what kind of a town 
 it was in which we passed the believing 
 years, the years which began with us, and 
 continued for a dozen summers or so. 
 But now, if you please, we will return to 
 that afternoon when we dashed out of 
 school, and left Mr. Colburn and Miss 
 Temple behind. We ran into a land of 
 wonder. The first thing for me to learn 
 about was that fishing trip for to-morrow. 
 
 I hastily consulted Ed Mason about it. 
 No; we could not go, it must be post 
 poned. Parts of the necessary tackle 
 were missing, and there were reasons, 
 connected with the approaching Fourth 
 of July, why neither of us desired to make 
 any avoidable expenditures just then. 
 
 But there was another plan, into which 
 I might be admitted, if I could prove 
 trustworthy. 
 
The Old Town 25 
 
 "You won t tell ?" queried Ed Mason. 
 
 "Course not!" 
 
 "Cross your heart ?" 
 
 I crossed my heart and hoped I might 
 die. 
 
 But I could not know just then, I 
 must wait until next morning. 
 
 It was fearful discipline for the soul, but 
 I survived until after breakfast the next 
 day. Then I presented myself at the 
 Masons side yard, their house was 
 within stone s throw of ours. 
 
 Ed had, so I understood, some mys 
 terious recipe, some ceremony to per 
 form that was not only extraordinary in 
 itself, but it was to be rewarded in the 
 most fascinating manner imaginable. 
 
 He came out of the house with a serious 
 face, led me down behind an apple tree, 
 and there, after looking carefully about 
 for eavesdroppers, unfolded the cryptic 
 plot. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 MAGIC 
 
 You took rose-leaves fresh rose- 
 leaves and mixed them with brown 
 sugar. Then you wrapped them in a 
 leaf from a grape-vine, and buried the 
 whole business in the ground. You let 
 them stay for three days. At the end 
 of that time you dug them up and ate 
 them ; ate them with rapture known only 
 to those who have eaten this particular 
 delicacy. For to the natural fragrance of 
 the rose-leaves and the nourishing and 
 delicious properties of brown sugar, that 
 interval of three days in the warm earth 
 had added a new quality. A mysterious 
 alchemy had been at work and trans 
 formed the mixture into something ex- 
 26 
 
Magic 27 
 
 quisite a dish to be envied by great 
 kings and sultans. It had about it odors 
 of the East ; savors of Araby the blest. 
 
 So said Ed Mason s older brother, 
 Billy. And he was nearly thirteen. He 
 did not use all the words which I have 
 used to describe the taste of the rose-leaf 
 compound. He had merely said it was 
 "bully." That was enough for us 
 that, and the charm of the operation 
 itself. He had tried it many times in the 
 far-off days of his youth ; and now we set 
 out to make some for ourselves. 
 
 The rose-leaves were easy to get. We 
 had only to climb over the fence and we 
 were in Auntie Merrill s garden. Auntie 
 Merrill was old, and she seldom came into 
 the garden. She had no one with whom 
 to share it; and the roses budded, 
 bloomed, and dropped their petals un 
 heeded to the path. From this path we 
 gathered some ; but it is likely that others 
 
28 The Believing Years 
 
 were induced, with little effort, to leave 
 the full-blown flowers a day or two in 
 advance of their natural fall. 
 
 Roses are beautiful things, even to 
 boys of eight or nine, but aesthetic con 
 siderations must give way before the 
 stern, practical demands of life. 
 
 We debated whether red or yellow 
 roses were most likely to give good re 
 sults. At last we decided to combine the 
 two colors, and a tempting mixture they 
 made. We put the leaves in my hat, and 
 climbed the fence again into the Masons 
 back yard. 
 
 The next ingredient was brown sugar. 
 Here, again, the matter was simple. A 
 barrel of the pleasing substance lived in 
 a certain dim passage leading from Ed 
 Mason s mother s pantry. It was dark, 
 moist, and a joy forever. It had the 
 crawly habit peculiar to brown sugar, and 
 it came away (when questing hands were 
 
Magic 29 
 
 plunged into the barrel) in lumps that 
 filled the mouth and turned the cares 
 of life to vanity and unimportance. With 
 it, during hard days, we frequently re 
 stored our wasted tissues. 
 
 The rose-leaves were left to themselves 
 while we made a reconnaissance in force 
 toward the place of the sugar barrel. 
 The enemy (one Nora Sullivan, a desper 
 ate character) was reported as engaged 
 in washing dishes in the kitchen. She 
 neglected to station any outposts, so her 
 carelessness w r as our advantage. 
 
 We made the customary investigation 
 for a large gray rat supposed, since a 
 time to which the mind of man runneth 
 not back, to dwell behind the barrel. As 
 usual, he was found missing. 
 
 We seized the sugar and retired in 
 discretion and stickiness to the yard. 
 There we mixed the rose-leaves and the 
 sugar. From the vine that grew on the 
 
30 The Believing Years 
 
 side of the woodshed we picked a large 
 leaf. This was the vine that furnished 
 leaves to be worn inside our hats to pre 
 vent sunstroke on hot days. 
 
 No one knows how many sunstrokes 
 we escaped by means of those grape 
 leaves. 
 
 We wrapped the red and yellow petals, 
 well covered with sugar, in the grape leaf, 
 and secured it with straws and blades 
 of grass. No creeping worm nor brisk 
 beetle was to partake of this food of the 
 gods. 
 
 Next came the rite of burial. There 
 was no doubt that the leaf and its contents 
 must be buried in Auntie Merrill s garden. 
 That was the scene of all mysteries, and 
 the only place where our cache would be 
 reasonably secure from Ed Mason s sister 
 Louise and her friend Jessie Plummer. 
 These were high matters, too great for 
 the feminine intellect. Also, of course, 
 
Magic 31 
 
 we had Auntie Merrill to consider. A 
 place must be discovered where she 
 would not come poking around. 
 
 "Back of the lilies-of-the-valley," said 
 Ed Mason. 
 
 "It s kind of wet there," I objected. 
 
 "What difrence does that make?" 
 
 "Well, it might not work there. I tell 
 you : let s put em in the corner, near 
 Hawkins shed." 
 
 "No; I want em back of the lilies-of- 
 the-valley. It s my mother s brown 
 sugar, and Billy told me how to do it. 
 You wouldn t know anything bout it if 
 I hadn t told you!" 
 
 I succumbed to the force of this argu 
 ment, and we began to excavate back 
 of the lily bed. With shingles (procured 
 from men who were shingling Dr. Macey s 
 barn) we dug the pit and covered the 
 grape leaf with earth. Then, after driv 
 ing away a prowling cat (who probably 
 
3 2 The Believing Years 
 
 recollected funeral services performed over 
 deceased robins in that very garden), we 
 climbed the fence once more and set out 
 to endure the weary interval of three 
 days. 
 
 It was Saturday morning, and ten 
 o clock. Not until Tuesday at the same 
 hour could we unearth the treasure. 
 
 Billy had said so. 
 
 Three days were required, no more and 
 no less. At the end of that time, to the 
 minute, the magic forces that dwelt in 
 the earth would have effected the change, 
 and what we buried as simple brown sugar 
 and the petals of roses would come forth 
 in a new form a form to make epicures 
 sigh with content. 
 
 We walked up the yard, by the wood 
 shed, past the apple tree and the clothes- 
 jack, and out to the street. But some 
 thing had happened. A thick black cloud 
 had descended and covered us. A few 
 
Magic 33 
 
 minutes before, the sun was shining 
 gloriously, and we stood on the moun 
 tain peak of action and expectancy. 
 Now it had all come to an end ; the rose- 
 leaves were buried, and before us in all 
 their hideous length and tediousness 
 stretched those three days. 
 
 Three days ! 
 
 Three years rather ! The face of the 
 heavens was darkened and we wandered 
 in gloom. We made an effort of cheer 
 fulness and started for the pond with a 
 view to catching Lucky-bugs. But we 
 abandoned this almost immediately, and 
 decided to hunt up Jimmy Toppan, who 
 lived next door. Then we remembered 
 that Jimmy had gone to his grandmother s 
 farm in the country for the whole day. 
 By this time the pall that overhung us 
 had become deeper and more insufferable. 
 
 We turned the corner of the street and 
 gazed drearily at Dr. Macey s barn and 
 
34 The Believing Years 
 
 the men at work on its roof. The old 
 shingles were coming down with a clatter, 
 and the odor of the new ones filled the 
 air. 
 
 Perhaps there was hope in shingles ! 
 
 We remembered that it takes but few 
 strokes of a jack-knife, a little cutting and 
 boring, to convert a shingle into a boat. 
 It only needs pointing at the bows and 
 rounding at the stern, the insertion of a 
 mast and the fitting of a paper sail 
 half an old envelope will do. The boats 
 thus fashioned would sail half across the 
 pond until stuck in the lily-pads. 
 
 We chose two shingles and began to 
 whittle. But there was no salt in it. 
 Our minds wandered, and after a few 
 moments Ed dropped his shingle, closed 
 his knife, and put it in his pocket. 
 
 "I m goin into the barn an look for 
 mice," he announced. 
 
 About the chutes which let grain into 
 
Magic 35 
 
 the stalls, mice were known to linger. 
 Once I had caught one in my hands, a 
 feat which I instantly regretted, for the 
 mouse bit my finger and made his escape 
 in short order. Since that time the pur 
 suit of the common drab mouse had been 
 considered a pastime not without the 
 charm of danger and the risk of blood 
 shed. But now the mention of mice 
 only brought my thoughts back as if 
 they needed bringing ! to the subject 
 that possessed us both. 
 
 "Do you think you drove that old cat 
 away?" I asked abruptly. 
 
 Ed understood immediately ; I did not 
 need to specify the cat. 
 
 " I dunno," he said ; " she may be foolin 
 round now. P r aps we ought to go and 
 
 see." 
 
 "Let s," I replied quickly. 
 We crossed the street, cut across the 
 Toppans back yard, and then, by a cer- 
 
36 The Believing Years 
 
 tain fence route, well understood and pre 
 scribed for all important occasions, entered 
 Auntie Merrill s garden. 
 
 A cat slunk off between the box hedges, 
 and a robin flew hurriedly from the fence 
 to the apple tree where he had his nest 
 of mud and dried grass. He uttered three 
 or four excited notes as he flew r . 
 
 The sunlight of a morning in late June 
 fell in patches on the paths, the hedges, 
 and the flower beds. The rose-bushes 
 dropped their petals, and the syringa 
 moved in the breeze. 
 
 That was a garden ! 
 
 It had old-fashioned flowers snap 
 dragons, portulacas (now in full blaze in 
 the sun), and hollyhocks in the days 
 before old-fashioned flowers became new- 
 fashioned again. Orioles hunted their 
 food in the fruit trees to carry it back 
 to their hanging nests in the elms that 
 shaded the street near by. It was firefly- 
 
Magic 37 
 
 haunted at night, and we used to run up 
 and down the paths and try to catch the 
 fireflies in our hats. It was full of long, 
 mysterious vistas, overgrown shrubs break 
 ing in on the paths, and valuable hiding- 
 places. Plums grew there, and pears and 
 cherries and peaches. 
 
 When, on rare occasions, Auntie Mer 
 rill walked slowly down the path, she 
 appeared to be totally unaware that 
 Indians, highway robbers, pirates, cow 
 boys, spies, scouts, and other ruffians 
 were dogging her footsteps from bush to 
 bush. We always thought it best to keep 
 an eye on her. 
 
 It is a perfectly safe place to-day. 
 Auntie Merrill is dead; the shrubs are 
 trimmed, the hedges cut down, the paths 
 covered with asphalt, and the whole gar 
 den a dismal spectacle of precision, order, 
 and expensive simplicity. 
 
 But on the morning when we returned 
 
38 THe Believing Years 
 
 to look after our buried rose-leaves, no 
 one had dreamed of these wretched im 
 provements. Keeping well down below 
 the hedge, we reached the lilies-of-the- 
 valley without encountering any opposi 
 tion. The place of burial was inspected 
 and the earth searched for tracks. 
 
 None appeared. 
 
 Then we stood over the spot and medi 
 tated. A lilac bush sheltered us from 
 inquisitive persons in the house. 
 
 Finally Ed Mason spoke. 
 
 "I wonder how they re gettin on," he 
 said. 
 
 "I wonder!" said I. 
 
 Then there was another pause. I 
 poked my foot among the lilies where we 
 had concealed the shingles we had used 
 as trowels. They were waiting for Tues 
 day morning. 
 
 Ed spoke again. 
 
 "Let s dig em up and look at em !" 
 
Magic 39 
 
 Already I was fishing for the shingles. 
 In half a minute we had brought the 
 grape leaf once more to the light of day. 
 We unfastened it and gazed upon its con 
 tents. 
 
 It was a quarter past ten. Fifteen 
 minutes had passed since we buried the 
 mixture. 
 
 "Don t you suppose they re done?" I 
 queried. 
 
 Ed s only reply was to take a pinch 
 between his fingers and convey it to his 
 mouth. 
 
 I did the same. 
 
 Then we ate the whole lot. It tasted 
 and on this point I will pledge my 
 word it tasted exactly like rose-leaves 
 and brown sugar ! 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 NAPOLEON JONES 
 
 ON an afternoon early in the following 
 week, Jimmy Toppan, Ed Mason, and I 
 were seriously engaged at the frog pond. 
 We had discovered, in the morning, an 
 outlet, through which all the water was in 
 danger of escaping. The town authori 
 ties seemed to have overlooked this 
 channel, but we could not let their neglect 
 cause public suffering. 
 
 To have the pond run dry was too 
 serious to contemplate ! 
 
 "The water wouldn t all go out," as 
 serted Ed Mason, " cos there s a place, 
 back of the Court House, where there 
 ain t any bottom." 
 
 40 
 
Napoleon Jones 41 
 
 "That ain t in this pond," Jimmy cor 
 rected, "it s over in Davenport s." 
 
 But Ed stuck to his opinion. 
 
 "It is here. An there was a volcano 
 here once, an when the volcano dried 
 up, the pond came." 
 
 We looked with considerable interest 
 toward the site of the extinct crater. 
 But all was placid blue water now, and 
 whatever might be concealed beneath the 
 surface remained a secret. 
 
 Our duty was not the less clear, and 
 we set out to build a dam that should 
 keep in the water, volcano or no volcano, 
 bottomless pit or not. 
 
 On the terrace above us sat an old man, 
 who watched our proceedings, chewed 
 tobacco vigorously, and whittled small 
 sticks. We had seen him, sitting on the 
 same bench, in the morning. Indeed, 
 he had been there for days, perhaps weeks, 
 past, until he had become a fixture in the 
 landscape. 
 
42 The Believing Years 
 
 . Ed Mason climbed the terrace to get 
 another armful of stones for the dam. 
 As he was returning, the old man called 
 Ed to him, and offered, as a gift, a little 
 musket whittled out of soft pine. The 
 stones were laid down promptly, the gift 
 accepted, and the two engaged in con 
 versation. Jimmy and I could not hear 
 what was being said, but we observed the 
 incident of the little musket, and our 
 interest in the dam waned. We went up 
 the terrace to see if there were any more 
 muskets to be distributed. 
 
 But when we arrived, the old fellow 
 pointed at Ed with his jack-knife, and 
 addressed us. 
 
 "He wants to know if I ever was in a 
 battle!" 
 
 Evidently the question had been an 
 absurd one. We gathered this from the 
 tone of derision with which it was repeated, 
 and we promptly showed our apprecia- 
 
Napoleon Jones 43 
 
 tion of its absurdity by grinning. We 
 marvelled at Ed s obtuseness. Not to 
 recognize this round-faced old man in the 
 dark-blue suit as the very incarnation of 
 war could only be downright stupidity. 
 
 "Was I ever in a battle ?" he inquired 
 with deliberate sarcasm. "Well, I don t 
 know what you call a battle, but what 
 do you think of a hundred an thirty guns 
 on one hill an eighty guns on another 
 hill, all blazing away at each other like 
 Sancho?" 
 
 We thought well of it. It seemed to 
 us a very respectable battle. But Ed 
 Mason was destined to put his foot in it 
 again. He held up the little pine musket. 
 
 "Guns like this ?" he queried. 
 
 The old fellow looked at Ed for a 
 moment. Then he turned his gaze tow 
 ard Jimmy and me and shook his head 
 sorrowfully. 
 
 "No, not guns like that. Them s what 
 
44 The Believing Years 
 
 the infantry has. A hundred an thirty 
 of them against eighty wouldn t be no 
 battle. Twould be a squeamish. An 
 a darned small one at that. I mean 
 guns. Don t you know what guns 
 be?" 
 
 Jimmy Toppan spoke. 
 
 "Oh, I know ! Cannons. Like the 
 one they fired last Fourth of July, down 
 at the foot of River Street." 
 
 "Yes, that s the kind, I guess. I 
 wa n t there. Dave Hunt was doin 
 that. I see in the paper they called him 
 Gunner David Hunt. I nearly bust 
 over that. Gunne-r David Hunt !" 
 
 He rocked forward and back on the 
 bench, chuckling and repeating, "Gunner 
 David Hunt !" from time to time. 
 
 "Why, where do you think he was durin 
 the whole war ?" 
 
 We could not imagine. 
 
 "Down in Boston Harbor that s 
 
Napoleon Jones 45 
 
 where he was. Why, he never smelled 
 powder in his life!" 
 
 This seemed extraordinary to me. I 
 had seen "Gunner David Hunt" on that 
 Fourth of July, and if he hadn t smelled 
 powder that day, he must have been 
 suffering with a fearful cold. I had 
 smelled it distinctly ; even kept, as I was, 
 at a discreet distance. For Mr. Hunt, 
 working with the greatest activity in the 
 midst of clouds of smoke, not to have 
 detected the odor struck me as amazing. 
 I was incautious enough to point out my 
 impressions to the old fellow in blue. 
 
 He rewarded me with another such 
 look of scorn as that with which he greeted 
 Ed s mistake about the guns. 
 
 "He never smelled powder, I tell yer. 
 That means he never heard a shot fired 
 in anger. He may have fired some of 
 them guns down in that fort in Boston 
 Harbor, at a hogshead floatin in the water, 
 
46 The Believing Years 
 
 jus for practice. But he never stood 
 up against the enemy an give em back 
 shot for shot. An the paper called 
 him Gunner Hunt ! Oh, my Chris - 
 mas!" 
 
 He rocked forward and back again, and 
 laughed long and heartily. As it seemed 
 to be the proper thing to do, all three of 
 us laughed, as well as we could, over the 
 presumption of Mr. Hunt. 
 
 Then the soldier became serious. He 
 took his walking-stick, held it out at arm s 
 length, and pointed across the pond. 
 
 "Do you see that Court House over 
 there?" 
 
 As it was the most prominent object 
 in the landscape, and hardly one hundred 
 yards distant, we instantly admitted that 
 we did see it. 
 
 "An do you see George Washin ton 
 over to the right ?" 
 
 Yes ; George Washington was plainly 
 
Napoleon Jones 47 
 
 visible. There he stood, on his pedestal, 
 with his arm stretched out at his side, as 
 if to smack any small boy who walked on 
 the grass. 
 
 "Well, over beyond George Washin ton 
 was where the enemy s batteries lay 
 they stretched from there up to Joe Pea- 
 body s house." 
 
 "When was this ?" 
 
 We all spoke at once, and in great 
 excitement. Enemy 9 s batteries on Elm 
 Street ! 
 
 The old man looked at us solemnly, 
 and chewed with great deliberation. 
 
 "That s to give you an idea how they 
 lay on the field. This is on a small scale, 
 you see. Our guns were right along this 
 bank, from here to the fourth tree. No, 
 the fifth. And that graveyard back there," 
 he turned around and pointed, "was bout 
 in the same position, only it run down 
 nearer where we are now. Down there 
 
48 The Believing Years 
 
 where the pond is, was near a mile of 
 open wheat-fields and so on. Every 
 thing was mighty quiet bout the middle 
 of the morning, cos we d been fightin for 
 two days, you see. We could see the 
 rebels plain enough, an knew they was 
 up to some deviltry. But we knew the 
 Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte had his 
 eye on em all right." 
 
 Napoleon Bonaparte ! Our eyes opened 
 at this. "Was Napoleon Bonaparte in 
 this battle?" I asked. 
 
 "Was he?" returned the soldier, with 
 great energy. "I guess he come pretty 
 near bein . He was in command of the 
 whole army. Who did yer think was, 
 excep him ?" 
 
 I had not given the matter much 
 thought. But I replied weakly that I 
 supposed Napoleon had lived in France. 
 
 "You did ? Well, you got that out of a 
 book, I s pose ?" 
 
Napoleon Jones 49 
 
 I admitted, with some embarrassment, 
 that I did get it from a book. 
 
 "I thought so. Well, if you re so 
 smart with your books, why don t you tell 
 this instead of me ? P r aps you was in 
 this battle, hey ?" 
 
 My face became uncomfortably warm. 
 I could not think of anything to say. 
 After waiting a little, the soldier con 
 tinued. 
 
 "If this young feller, that knows so all- 
 fired much, ain t goin to tell us how this 
 battle was fought, I might as well go on. 
 As I says before, we could see their guns, 
 an we could see the rebels movin about 
 round em. Some of their guns was in a 
 little patch of woods, over where that team 
 is standin now. It kep on quiet for 
 more n two hours no one firin a shot. 
 Then we see the rebels was gettin ready. 
 They moved some of their batteries. An 
 then the Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte 
 
50 The Believing Years 
 
 rode up to me on his white hoss, an he 
 says, Bring out yer guns ! An so I 
 brought em out ! " 
 
 My doubts vanished. That white horse 
 was conclusive. 
 
 Ed Mason spoke in an awed voice : 
 
 "What did you say?" 
 
 "What did I say ? I says, All right, 
 yer Majesty. An I fetched the guns 
 round to the northwestward." 
 
 "What did Napoleon do then ?" asked 
 Ed. 
 
 "What did he do ? He just sat there 
 on his white hoss an he watched to see if 
 we did it all right. An we lined em up 
 smart, an unlimbered, an back went the 
 hosses, an there we was, all ready in no 
 time. The Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte 
 he says, First-rate, boys; you did that 
 slick as grease ! 
 
 "An then the rebels let off two guns 
 for a signal, an then their whole hundred 
 
Napoleon Jones 51 
 
 an thirty began to once, an so did our 
 eighty. An that kep up for an hour." 
 
 "Did any of their shots hit you ?" in 
 quired Jimmy. 
 
 "Not to speak of. They fired too 
 high. Their shells went plumb over our 
 heads, an over the infantry, who was 
 lyin on the ground behind us, an bust in 
 the cemetary. Some of the gravestones 
 was broke. Some of our men was killed 
 when the caissons blew up." 
 
 We had no idea what caissons were ; 
 but they blew up that was enough for 
 us. 
 
 "Then the Emperor Napoleon Bona 
 parte ordered us to cease firin , one battery 
 at a time. That was where he was foxy. 
 He wanted to make the rebels think our 
 guns had been dismounted, or that we 
 was out of ammunition, so s they would 
 charge. And he fooled em, sure enough, 
 for pretty soon they did charge ! " 
 
$2 The Believing Years 
 
 He paused, and bit off some more 
 tobacco, while we jumped up and down 
 with excitement. Then he pointed again 
 with his cane. 
 
 "Do you see them three trees to the 
 left of the white house ? Well, bearin a 
 little to the right of them is a clump of 
 bushes. There was some woods at that 
 p int of the enemy s position, an they 
 come outer them. We could see em 
 plain as day, a long line of infantry, 
 an the officers on hosses. Some of em 
 was in gray uniforms, but not all. We 
 could see their flags, an the sun shinin 
 on the bayonets. First one long line 
 come, an then another, an then an 
 other. There was close to fifteen thou 
 sand of em more than all the folks 
 in this town !" 
 
 We followed his gaze across the pond, 
 across the mall, to that clump of bushes. 
 At any moment we expected to see the 
 
Napoleon Jones 53 
 
 gray-clad lines break out from behind 
 them and start toward us with loud yells. 
 But we had forgotten how securely we 
 were planted behind the old man s 
 batteries. 
 
 "It didn t take us a minute to open 
 on em. We had our guns trained in no 
 time, an we made it mighty hot for em 
 as they come across that valley. One 
 bunch come right for my guns, but we 
 had loaded with grape an we just blew 
 em to smithereens. They turned round, 
 what was left of em, an run back like 
 Jesse. There was a rebel general on a 
 brown hoss, an his hoss went down, an 
 we nearly got him." 
 
 He stopped. After waiting a moment, 
 we all burst out : 
 
 "What happened then ?" 
 
 "Why, nothin . The battle was over. 
 The rebels had skedaddled. But the 
 Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte, he called 
 
54 The Believing Years 
 
 me round to his tent that night, an he 
 give me this cane." 
 
 "What, that one?" 
 
 "This one. He says, says he: I like 
 the way you worked your guns to-day, an 
 I want you to keep this stick to remem 
 ber me by. I cut it myself. 3 
 
 He let each boy of us take the stick in 
 his hand and examine it reverently. It 
 was a cane of some brown wood, with a 
 round knob at the top, made of ivory 
 or bone. 
 
 Then he took a fat silver watch out of 
 his pocket, and looked at that. 
 
 "It s pretty nigh supper-time, an I m 
 goin along." 
 
 He rose from the bench and walked 
 slowly away, limping slightly, and leaning 
 on the cane the cane that Napoleon had 
 given him ! 
 
 We walked toward our homes, main 
 taining a profound silence. On the other 
 
Napoleon Jones 55 
 
 side of the pond we met Rob Currier, who 
 was catching hornpouts. He addressed 
 us derisively. 
 
 "Was that old Napoleon Jones you 
 were talking with ? He been giving you 
 some of his yarns ? My father says he s 
 cracked. He was in the Civil War, but 
 some one got him all worked up about 
 Napoleon, till he thinks he has seen him." 
 
 If Rob had hit each one of us in the 
 face with a wet hornpout, the effect would 
 have been more agreeable. We encoun 
 tered a realist for the first time when we 
 met Rob that afternoon. We were walk 
 ing through a golden haze of romance, 
 when he suddenly drew this leaden-gray 
 cloud across the sky. 
 
 "You make me sick!" declared Ed 
 Mason ; "didn t he show us the very cane 
 that Napoleon gave him?" 
 
 "Of course he did!" replied Jimmy 
 Toppan. 
 
56 The Believing Years 
 
 And "Of course he did !" I chimed in. 
 
 So we fell on Rob Currier, dragged him 
 down on the turf, and stuffed grass and 
 clover down the back of his neck until he 
 yelled : 
 
 "I take it all back!" 
 
 Then we let him up. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 A RUN ON THE BANK 
 
 IN the garden, at the side of our house, 
 there was an apple tree. There were two 
 routes to the top of it. One, the common 
 everyday path, was obvious and easy, 
 almost like climbing a ladder. You took 
 hold of the large limb nearest the ground, 
 curled one leg and then the other around 
 it, and so wriggled upon its upper side. 
 From that point you could climb from one 
 branch to another, without any difficulty, 
 till you had reached the top of the tree. 
 That was the prosaic method for ordinary 
 occasions. 
 
 But when hard pressed by enemies, 
 when the shrieking Indians were at our 
 
 57 
 
58 The Believing Years 
 
 very heels, or a Bengal tiger with dripping 
 jaws uttered his frightful snarls only three 
 feet behind us, then the circumstances 
 called for a different route. It must be 
 something not only quick, but risky. 
 Time must be saved, seconds were pre 
 cious. More than that, the fitness of 
 things called for an element of danger in 
 the ascent. There was no honor in the 
 adventure if we climbed by the slow, safe 
 path the highroad, so to speak, of com 
 merce and trade. 
 
 Blood was up ; the blast of war blew in 
 our ears. 
 
 So, at such times, we approached the 
 tree from the other side, leaped high in the 
 air to a branch above our heads, and, by 
 a deal of swarming, shinning, pulling, and 
 straining, reached the top. 
 
 Then, from amid the leaves, we could 
 pour down a murderous fire from our 
 trusty rifles, till every Indian lay stretched 
 
A Run on the Bank 59 
 
 on the ground, or the Bengal tiger gave 
 one last bellow and expired. 
 
 It must not be thought, however, that 
 these exciting moments, when the apple 
 tree was an island of refuge, made it 
 altogether a tame and profitless retreat 
 in quieter times. It was enjoyable for 
 rest and recreation, and it formed an ex 
 cellent watch-tower from which to spy 
 out the land. In May the pink and 
 white blossoms turned it into an exqui 
 site bouquet. Later in the summer the 
 big green fruit though not agreeable if 
 eaten raw could be transformed into 
 the highest triumph cooks ever achieved 
 the apple-pie. 
 
 Near the top an almost horizontal 
 branch made a tolerable seat. At about 
 the level of our eyes, as we sat there, 
 another branch stretched its smooth sur 
 face. The bark on it was new, and so 
 plainly adapted to the use of a jack-knife 
 
60 The Believing Years 
 
 that the symbols "E. M.," " J. R. T.," and 
 "S. E.," deeply carven, indicated that 
 Edward Mason, James Rogers Toppan, 
 and Samuel Edwards had left their signs 
 manual upon it. 
 
 On the day of which I speak these gentle 
 men sat on the horizontal branch and 
 devoured the contents of a roll of pepper 
 mint lozenges. I had had a cent that 
 afternoon, and had expended it in this 
 highly satisfactory form of pleasure. r 
 
 You got twelve tiny lozenges for a cent, 
 and that made four apiece all round. In 
 buying them you had to make serious 
 choice between peppermint in yellow 
 wrappers, checkerberry in green wrappers, 
 cinnamon in pink wrappers, clove in 
 brown wrappers (especially alluring be 
 cause reputed to be dangerous cloves 
 having the well-known habit of "drying 
 your blood"), and rose in purple wrap 
 pers a particularly insipid flavor, often 
 
A Run on the Bank 61 
 
 tried in the hope that it would taste dif 
 ferent this time. 
 
 The fun was not all over when you had 
 eaten the lozenges (by a slow process of 
 suction), for there still remained the paper 
 wrapper. This had always printed upon 
 it some legend of more or less interest. 
 The yellow one, that inclosed these pep 
 permint lozenges, bore a few moral and 
 patriotic sentiments concerning the Father 
 of Our Country. 
 
 The three personages in the apple tree 
 thereupon engaged in a discussion on the 
 subject : Who was the greatest man that 
 ever lived ? Jimmy Toppan and I de 
 clared for George Washington, but Ed 
 Mason, for some unexplained reason, 
 brought in a minority report for Amerigo 
 Vespucci. 
 
 Then Jimmy Toppan was moved to 
 relate an anecdote. 
 
 " I heard somewhere that George Wash- 
 
62 The Believing Years 
 
 ington, or pVaps twas Daniel Webster, 
 but anyhow it was some one, when he was 
 a boy, once put a coin in the bark of a 
 tree in his father s orchard. Then, a long 
 time afterward, when he was President of 
 the United States, he came back there, 
 and went right up to the tree and took 
 out his jack-knife and cut away the bark, 
 and there was the piece of money ! You 
 see, the bark had grown over it, and 
 covered it up all those years." 
 
 This was an interesting bit of informa 
 tion ! 
 
 All of us were instantly filled with a 
 desire to follow in the footsteps of the 
 great. Here was the tree, and here was 
 the bark. But the coins were lacking. 
 The only one we had possessed that after 
 noon had gone for peppermint lozenges. 
 Fourth of July money must not be touched. 
 Perhaps, however, a special appeal to 
 the authorities would be successful. We 
 
A Run on the Bank 63 
 
 agreed to make application to the lords 
 of the treasuries, and each to come to 
 morrow provided with a cent. 
 
 The agreement was kept, and the fol 
 lowing morning saw us at work on the 
 bark of the apple tree. Three incisions 
 were made (each one working at that part 
 of the branch nearest his initials) and 
 three copper cents were duly deposited. 
 Then we descended the tree, and left our 
 treasure to the silent years. 
 
 "How long do you suppose it will take 
 the bark to grow over them ?" inquired 
 Ed Mason. 
 
 "Oh, I don t know. Years and years. 
 Washington, or whoever it was, didn t 
 come back till he was an old man." 
 
 "Well, then, we ought not. They 
 ought to be left there for sixty or seventy 
 years, anyhow." 
 
 It was unanimously agreed that not less 
 than seventy years must elapse before the 
 coins should be disturbed. 
 
64 The Believing Years 
 
 We wandered out of the garden, down 
 the street, and through the grounds of the 
 Universalist Church. Drippings from 
 the eaves of that building had unearthed 
 hundreds of pebbles, and Ed Mason began 
 selecting round ones for his sling-shot. 
 Then he took that instrument out of his 
 pocket and discharged the pebbles at a 
 distant fence. But the sling-shot worked 
 indifferently, and Ed pronounced the 
 elastic worn out. 
 
 "You can get a dandy piece for a cent 
 down at Higginson s," I observed. 
 
 Then the significance of the remark 
 struck me, and I glanced guiltily away. 
 There was a pause in the conversation, 
 until the sound of a horn suggested the 
 approaching Fourth of July. 
 
 "Only nine days till the Fourth," 
 declared Jimmy Toppan. "How many 
 bunches you fellers goin to have?" 
 
 We counted on at least fifteen apiece. 
 
A Run on the Bank 65 
 
 "So do I," said Jimmy; "and tor 
 pedoes, and a horn." 
 
 "Horns are foolish," remarked Ed 
 Mason; "girls and babies always have 
 horns." 
 
 "That s all right," retorted Jimmy; 
 "they last. You ll prob ly be round 
 Fourth of July afternoon, when you ve 
 fired off all your fifteen bunches of 
 fire-crackers, wantin to blow on my 
 horn." 
 
 I put in a remark here. 
 
 "I m goin to have six sticks of slow- 
 match, an five boxes of Ajax torpedoes." 
 
 But it did not impress Ed Mason. 
 
 "Ajax ain t half as good as Ironclad," 
 he announced. 
 
 Jimmy Toppan also had preferences. 
 
 "Have you seen those Chinese Aerial 
 Bombs down at Johnson s ? They re the 
 biggest torpedoes you ever saw each 
 one as big as your fist ! Gee ! I d like 
 
66 The Believing Years 
 
 to hear one of em go off ! They cost 
 a cent apiece, an " 
 
 He stopped. 
 
 Somehow the conversation would get 
 around to the subject of things costing 
 a cent. It was most embarrassing. We 
 had invested our capital for seventy years, 
 and were already feeling the pinch. 
 
 The morning wore on, and though I 
 observed both Ed and Jimmy to cast sur 
 reptitious glances toward the apple tree, 
 there were no more references to the 
 subject of cents. 
 
 In the afternoon I went over to Rob 
 Currier s house, and found him engaged 
 with the most fascinating weapon imagin 
 able. It was a pop-gun made from a 
 goose-quill. It shot small pieces of raw 
 potato to a great distance, and did so, with 
 a loud and soul-satisfying pop. 
 
 His uncle had made it for him, said 
 Rob. 
 
A Run on the Bank 67 
 
 He willingly let me experiment with it, 
 but he was not interested to watch me 
 very long. 
 
 "Let s go down and look at the fire 
 crackers in Johnson s window," he sug 
 gested. 
 
 "I d rather stay here and shoot this 
 pop-gun," I declared. 
 
 "I m tired of it," he rejoined. "Sell it 
 to you for a cent." 
 
 Again the cent ! 
 
 I put down the pop-gun and accom 
 panied Rob to Johnson s shop, where we 
 spent twenty minutes with our noses 
 flattened against the pane, choosing what 
 we would take if Mr. Johnson should 
 come out and invite us to help our 
 selves. 
 
 Mr. Johnson did nothing of the sort, 
 however. 
 
 We agreed that our first choice would 
 be a mine, which was described as "send- 
 
68 The Believing Years 
 
 ing to an enormous height nine colored 
 stars, alternately green, purple, and car 
 mine, and then exploding with a rain of 
 golden serpents." 
 
 This point decided, we repaired to the 
 Curriers and spent the afternoon perfect 
 ing our skill with the lasso. 
 
 In the interval that evening, between 
 supper and bedtime, I suffered much 
 uneasiness. 
 
 Some member of my family read from 
 the evening paper that thieves were re 
 ported in town. Instantly, I thought 
 of the three cents in the apple tree. 
 Surely it had been rash to leave them 
 exposed. There was nothing in the story 
 about Washington to tell what he did 
 to protect his coin from thieves. How 
 would he have felt if he had come back, 
 President of the United States, and found 
 that some one had stolen his cent ? 
 
 Moreover, there was always the chance 
 
A Run on the Bank 69 
 
 that I might never become President. In 
 all fairness, I had to consider that. 
 
 Suddenly the thought of Rob Currier s 
 pop-gun recurred to me. I needed that 
 pop-gun. 
 
 Once during the night I got up and 
 looked out of my bedroom window to see 
 if the apple tree were safe. It seemed to 
 be standing serene enough in the moon 
 light, but who could tell what marauders 
 might besiege it ? 
 
 In the morning my mind was made up. 
 As soon as I finished breakfast I hurried 
 out, climbed the tree by the emergency 
 route, and began to cut at the bark where 
 my cent was concealed. 
 
 I had it in an instant. 
 
 As I was working I noticed that the 
 other two cents were gone already. I 
 turned around and looked down Oak 
 Street. Jimmy Toppan, with one fist 
 tightly clutched, was running at full speed 
 
70 The Believing Years 
 
 toward Johnson s and the Chinese Aerial 
 Bomb. 
 
 Ed Mason was nowhere in sight. Ap 
 parently he had withdrawn his deposit 
 even earlier. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 HORACE 
 
 DURING that week before the Fourth of 
 July the days passed with incredible slow 
 ness. One afternoon, to beguile the time, 
 I went over to Horace Winslow s house. 
 
 Horace, from the standpoint of most of 
 us, was entitled to sympathy, he was 
 being "brought up" with so much care. 
 
 Not that any of us were neglected. 
 School was our portion, Mr. Colburn s 
 and other improving but uncomfortable 
 books were our fare through nine months 
 of the year. On Sundays we were duly 
 despatched to the school appropriate to 
 that day. We each carried the tra 
 ditional cent for the contribution box. 
 And, as in the story-books (which are 
 71 
 
72 The Believing Years 
 
 sometimes faithful transcripts from life), 
 it was with difficulty that we passed the 
 traditional drug shop, which displayed 
 the traditional peppermint lozenges and 
 "coltsfoot." 
 
 And, still in the traditional manner, 
 the Tempter s voice was loud sometimes 
 in our ears, so loud that we turned and 
 entered Dr. Dibden s shop, and spent 
 that cent for a roll of lozenges, or a piece 
 of coltsfoot, or of "stick lickrish." 
 
 But if we did this thing, so did Horace 
 Winslow. And if, occasionally, we had 
 to be sent from the dinner-table to re 
 move a few burrs from our coat collars, 
 or to make another attempt with the hair 
 brush, so had Horace. In such matters 
 his experiences were not different from 
 those of the other boys in the neighbor 
 hood. 
 
 His mind was being improved, that 
 was all. 
 
Horace 73 
 
 It had not injured his health to any 
 extent. He presented, on that afternoon, 
 his usual round countenance, and red 
 cheeks. A pleasing plumpness was his 
 most noticeable characteristic, not the 
 lean air of the scholar. 
 
 I found him making a suitable home 
 for his turtles, and I joined in the work 
 with enthusiasm. The turtles had been 
 straying lately, and it was clear that 
 something had to be done. It is distress 
 ing, after you have lavished any amount 
 of attention on a turtle, and have tied 
 him by a long string so as to give him 
 wide liberty, to find in the morning that 
 he has twisted and tangled the string 
 amongst the grass, and then departed, 
 leaving one end of the string buried, as 
 if in derision, in the ground. 
 
 We set out to construct a turtle-proof 
 pen from boards and shingles. 
 
 "I came pretty near losin all the 
 turtles," said Horace. 
 
74 The Believing Years 
 
 "Did they break the strings ?" I asked. 
 
 "No, only one of em. But Aunt 
 said she didn t know but I d have to put 
 em all back in the pond." 
 
 "What for?" 
 
 " Cos I took one of em to bed with me 
 night fore last." 
 
 "Which one?" 
 
 "That big one, with the yuller spots." 
 
 "Did she mind?" 
 
 "Who, Aunt Cora? You bet she 
 did ! I put him in the bath-tub to give 
 him a swim in the mornin , an I forgot 
 him when I went to breakfast, an then 
 right after breakfast I had to go down 
 town to get a yeast-cake, an Aunt found 
 him swimmin round in the tub, an she 
 said twas horrid to have turtles in the 
 tub, an she wanted to know when I put 
 him there, an so she found out I d had 
 him under the pillow all night, an she 
 was awful mad ! I thought she was goin 
 
Horace 75 
 
 to lick me, but she didn t. I didn t 
 dare tell her I d had another one up there 
 the night before, the little black one. 
 He s a jim-dandy, the best turtle I ve 
 got. His name is Pete." 
 
 I agreed that Pete was a very desirable 
 turtle. And I put in a request. 
 
 "Tell me if your Aunt makes you put 
 em back in the pond, will you ?" 
 
 "She won t. She said I could keep 
 em, but I can t bring em inside the 
 house. Gee ! She s been awful cross 
 lately, though. Last night again. An 
 Uncle, too. We went in swimmin out to 
 Four Rocks, I mean I did, an Ben 
 Spauldin , an Harry Fletcher, an " 
 
 "How d you go ?" I interrupted; "out 
 the railroad ?" 
 
 "No, we got a ride on Dole s wagon 
 to the green, an then went out the middle 
 road. While we were in the water, two 
 fellers came along, an grabbed most of 
 
76 The Believing Years 
 
 my clothes, an Ben s, an run up across 
 the track, an chucked em into Mr. 
 Harris shanty, an then run off laughin ; 
 an* I run up to get em, an just as I got 
 up on the road Aunt an Uncle came 
 drivin along with Mr. Benton, an they 
 were mad as hops cos I didn t have any- 
 thin on, an Uncle was goin to make me 
 get into the carriage an get under a robe, 
 till I told him my clothes were in the 
 shanty." 
 
 "What did he say?" 
 
 "He said I d ought to have taken bet 
 ter care of my clothes, an Aunt said 
 it was disgraceful runnin round stark 
 naked on the road, an she was mortified 
 to death, an I couldn t go in swimmin 
 any more if I didn t behave, an oh, 
 darn it all, is that two o clock?" 
 
 It was certainly two. The North 
 Church clock struck the hour dis 
 tinctly. 
 
Horace 77 
 
 "I s pose I ll have to go in, now," he 
 announced sorrowfully. 
 
 I was about to ask the reason, when 
 the voice of Mrs. Vincent, Horace s 
 aunt, came from behind the closed shut 
 ters of a window. 
 
 "Horace!" 
 
 "Oh, I don t want to come in now!" 
 
 "Horace !" 
 
 "Well, I don t, Aunt. Sam Edwards 
 is here, and we ve got to build this turtle- 
 pen." 
 
 "HORACE!" 
 
 "I can t leave Sam here all alone, 
 Aunt. Twouldn t be polite." 
 
 "Horace, come in the house instantly. 
 You may bring Samuel with you." 
 
 "Oh, he don t want to come." 
 
 "Doesn t want to come, you mean. 
 Wouldn t you like to hear me read to 
 Horace, Samuel ?" 
 
 I was greatly interested in the turtles, 
 
78 The Believing Years 
 
 but I was also fond of being read to. 
 Apparently I was going to lose the com 
 pany of Horace, anyhow. Moreover, I 
 was afraid of Horace s aunt. So I meekly 
 said : 
 
 "Yes m." 
 
 But Horace still raised objections. 
 
 "We can t leave the turtles like this 
 Aunt, they ll all get away." 
 
 "Horace, mind what I say this minute. 
 You can make the turtles safe enough. 
 I will give you three minutes longer, and 
 if you are not indoors then, your uncle 
 will punish you this evening." 
 
 We collected the wayward turtles and 
 put them in a garden basket. A few 
 seconds later we presented ourselves be 
 fore Mrs. Vincent, who looked at us omi 
 nously over the top of a book. Horace 
 sat down in one stiff-backed chair, and I 
 in another. He began to screw his face 
 into knots as soon as he saw the book. 
 
Horace 79 
 
 It was unknown to me, and fifteen or 
 twenty years were to elapse before I 
 should know its title. Then, one day, 
 reading Guizot s "History of France," I 
 recognized a passage, and realized with 
 what work we had been regaled, when 
 we wished to build a turtle-pen. 
 
 "Oh, Aunt " 
 
 "Horace, be quiet. Sit up straight in 
 your chair. Put your hand down." 
 
 She looked Horace over critically, and 
 then began to read. 
 
 " The old parliamentarians were 
 triumphant; at the same time as Abbe 
 Terray, Chancellor Maupeou was dis 
 graced, and the judicial system he had 
 founded fell with him. Unpopular from 
 the first, the Maupeou Parliament had 
 remained in the nation s eyes the image 
 of absolute power corrupted and corrupt 
 ing. The suit between Beaumarchais 
 and Councillor Goezman " 
 
8o The Believing Years 
 
 "Oh, Aunt, I don t want" 
 
 "Horace, if you are not still this instant, 
 I will put you to bed !" 
 
 Horace s articulations dissolved into 
 snuffles and whines ; we both hitched and 
 wriggled in our chairs, and the reading 
 went on. We heard what Chancellor 
 Maupeou said to the Duke de La Vril- 
 liere, and what M. Turgot wrote to Louis 
 XVI, if a process in which the brain 
 took almost no part can be called hearing. 
 These personages were strangers to me, 
 but Horace greeted them as familiar ene 
 mies. I judged that he knew and hated 
 them of old time. 
 
 An hour passed, a long hot hour. M. 
 de Malesherbes had gone the way of 
 Turgot, and Horace and I were reduced 
 to a mere coma. Then the book was 
 closed, and we were told that we might 
 return to our turtles. 
 
 We did so with profound joy, and 
 
Horace 81 
 
 Horace, seeing the Tiltons cat hurrying 
 over the fence, remarked that she was 
 Chancellor Maupeou, and threw a green 
 apple at her. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 THE GREAT DAY 
 
 FROM far off came a sound of popping 
 and snapping, some boy, unable to 
 wait, was trying a few fire-crackers. It 
 still lacked a day or two of the Fourth of 
 July, and the strain was telling on us. 
 
 A door that was slammed or a whip 
 that was cracked took on a new signifi 
 cance, while the fish-pedlers horns 
 seemed to have an altogether unusual 
 note. 
 
 Underneath my bed was a box contain 
 ing fifteen bunches of fire-crackers, or 
 dinary size ; three bunches of cannon 
 crackers ; two single gigantic fellows ; 
 and some sticks of slow-match. There 
 were also the five boxes of Ajax torpe- 
 82 
 
The Great Day 83 
 
 does, twisted tight in their red paper, and 
 slumbering now in sawdust, but all ready 
 to explode delightfully when the time 
 came. 
 
 Jimmy Toppan had taken the wrappers 
 from his fire-crackers, and separated the 
 crackers. Slowly and painfully he had 
 disentangled the fuses which some Chinese 
 workman had skilfully braided together. 
 It had taken a whole afternoon to do it, 
 but now he had no one knew how many 
 thousands of crackers, neatly piled in a 
 large cigar-box. 
 
 He was prepared for the morning of 
 the Fourth, when he could sit down in 
 some convenient place, the curbstone, 
 for instance, with a stick of lighted slow- 
 match in one hand, and the cigar-box full 
 of fire-crackers beside him. 
 
 Then, with due deliberation, he could 
 choose a fire-cracker, bring the glowing 
 end of the slow-match to the fuse of the 
 
84 The Believing Years 
 
 cracker, throw the latter into the street 
 as soon as it began to spit out sparks, 
 and wait ecstatically for the explosion. 
 
 As soon as this had occurred he could 
 repeat the whole operation, for hours. 
 
 Untangling the fire-crackers had pulled 
 the fuses out of some of them. These 
 unfortunates were carefully put aside for 
 " cat and dog fights." 
 
 There were one or two green fire 
 crackers in every bunch, and occasionally 
 a yellow one. These he herded by them 
 selves, for use at especially important 
 moments. That they make a louder 
 noise than the red ones is a scientific fact 
 well known to all experts. 
 
 I had not separated my crackers. It 
 was a joy I decided to defer until the great 
 day. There was a pleasure in seeing the 
 bunches intact, and in observing the red 
 wrappers with their gorgeous gilt dragons. 
 You could smell the gunpowdery smell as 
 
The Great Day 85 
 
 well as if the packages had been opened. 
 But I counted those eighteen bunches of 
 crackers every night and every morning, 
 and sometimes during the day. And I 
 had broken the top of one of the torpedo 
 boxes and explored with my fingers in 
 the sawdust. 
 
 There were twelve fat torpedoes in the 
 box, and five boxes, and that made 
 that made (oh ! Mr. Colburn !) it made 
 sixty ! yes, sixty great, big, lovely tor 
 pedoes. Sixty beautiful bangs ! 
 
 But one must be careful with torpe 
 does. They must be fired with care, one 
 at a time, for the proper enjoyment of 
 them. There had been accidents, I 
 had seen one the year before. Little 
 Larry Paine had fired all his crackers be 
 fore ten o clock in the morning. He went 
 into the house to get the last of his stock 
 of explosives, a box of torpedoes. The 
 sawdust had been taken out, and he came 
 
86 The Believing Years 
 
 forth again with a dozen torpedoes loose 
 in the box. As he reached the sidewalk 
 the box slipped, and fell on the bricks with 
 one terrifying crash. All the torpedoes 
 had gone off together. 
 
 It was magnificent, but it was not war. 
 It filled us with joy, but it filled Larry 
 with woe. He lifted up his voice and 
 mourned because they were not. With 
 loud wails he retreated into the house, 
 and his agonized family knew no peace 
 for an hour. 
 
 "My brother Billy s goin to the bon 
 fire at midnight," announced Ed Mason, 
 conscious of the glory reflected upon him 
 by this fact. 
 
 But I was not to be outdone. 
 
 "Poo! that s nothin . My brother s 
 goin to stay up all night ; he an Phil 
 Coombs an Arthur Monroe are goin to 
 sleep in Arthur Monroe s barn an they re 
 goin to the bonfire an they ain t goin 
 
The Great Day 87 
 
 to bed at all. Last Fourth he nearly got 
 arrested for ringin the High School 
 bell!" 
 
 I was determined to leave Ed Mason 
 not a leg to stand on. 
 
 "Well," he remarked weakly, "I m 
 goin to get up at half-past three, any 
 way." 
 
 He had me there. I had parental per 
 mission to get up at four o clock, and 
 I had not expected to be surpassed in 
 this important achievement by my own 
 familiar friend. 
 
 It rankled with me all day, and in the 
 evening I laid the case before my father 
 and mother. For the honor of the family, 
 as well as for my own self-respect, I simply 
 had to get up at half-past three. 
 
 They were in doubt. It was going to 
 be a long and exciting day for me. Aside 
 from the exertion of firing my own supply 
 of crackers and torpedoes, I was going at 
 
88 The Believing Years 
 
 noon to see "Gunner Hunt" fire his 
 annual salute at the foot of River Street. 
 Then there was the flag-raising on the 
 mall at two o clock, and the fireworks 
 at March s Hill in the evening. 
 
 But they finally consented, and once 
 more I could look Ed Mason in the face. 
 
 When the evening of the jd of July 
 came, I went cheerfully to bed at seven 
 o clock, in order to prepare for the labors 
 of the next day. I counted my fire 
 crackers, and found their number com 
 plete. It was rather hard to get to sleep 
 on account of the uproarious sounds from 
 Main Street, cannon crackers, muskets, 
 revolvers, cow-bells, and horns. But 
 finally I dropped off, only to be dis 
 turbed by a dream that Auntie Merrill 
 had come into the room and was making 
 a raid on my fire-crackers. 
 
 It was a hideous nightmare, she 
 vanished out the door with her arms full 
 
The Great Day 89 
 
 of my precious possessions, and I could 
 not do a thing to stop her. When I woke 
 I had to get up and count those fire 
 crackers again. 
 
 Then I climbed back in bed once more 
 and listened to the distant noise. Some 
 body came down our street, dragging a 
 string of cow-bells. The national holi 
 day was being celebrated with diligence. 
 
 Suddenly it struck me that perhaps 
 the morning had already come. In a 
 panic I jumped up, lighted a match, and 
 looked at the clock. It was eight o clock, 
 I had been asleep less than an hour. 
 Listening at the open window I could hear 
 my family talking in the garden below. 
 I remembered that I was to meet Ed 
 Mason and Jimmy Toppan in that gar 
 den at half-past three, and that I had 
 better get to sleep again. 
 
 I lay in bed once more, trying not to 
 hear the din. All at once I became 
 
go The Believing Years 
 
 aware that some one my father was 
 standing at the side of the bed, shaking 
 me. 
 
 " Sam ! Sam ! I thought you were 
 going to get up. It s quarter of four." 
 
 "What?" 
 
 I jumped out, confused. There was 
 a dim light outside, not daylight, by 
 any means. I began to dress, and fumble 
 for the fire-crackers. Things seemed very 
 different, somehow, from what I had 
 expected. 
 
 As I went downstairs jl heard my 
 father say: 
 
 " It s raining, I think, put on your 
 rubber coat." 
 
 Rain ! How would the fire-crackers 
 like that? L] 
 
 Outside I found Ed and Jimmy. They 
 were rather silent, but inclined to be con 
 temptuous because I was late. They 
 had been fiddling around in the garden 
 
The Great Day 91 
 
 for some minutes, waiting for me. Jimmy 
 had an umbrella, and did not look very 
 happy. 
 
 ; We went out to the front of the house, 
 and sat down on the door-steps. Jimmy 
 had his box of fire-crackers (which he 
 managed with difficulty on account of 
 the umbrella), while Ed Mason had his 
 crackers in a canvas bag. Owing to the 
 breeze, which was rather brisk, we had 
 some trouble in lighting the slow-match. 
 Just as we got it going the rain began to 
 fall in a smart shower. 
 
 There was nothing for it but to retreat 
 inside the house once more. This was a 
 pretty sort of Fourth of July ! The pos 
 sibility of such an inconsiderate act on 
 the part of Heaven had never occurred 
 to us. Could it be that they did not 
 know, up there, what day this was ? 
 
 It was a little dull in the house. 
 Jimmy and I both fell asleep, and so, I 
 
92 The Believing Years 
 
 think, did Ed Mason, though he denied 
 it. Fortunately I found some raspberry 
 turnovers in the pantry, and they helped 
 alleviate our sufferings. 
 
 Shortly before breakfast the rain 
 stopped, and the sun came feebly out. 
 We were soon in the street once more, 
 creating a racket that left nothing to 
 be desired. Joe and Charley Carter 
 joined us, and so did Rob Currier and 
 Peter Bailey. Peter had a revolver, and 
 he scorned fire-crackers. The Rev. Mr. 
 Dimmick, who lived across the street, 
 stood on the steps of his dwelling and 
 beamed upon us. He looked as if he 
 would like to celebrate, too. 
 
 Mr. Dimmick was a minister, which 
 was too bad, because he was such a good 
 ball-player. Charley Carter had an enor 
 mous cannon cracker, and when he started 
 to touch it off, Mr. Dimmick called 
 out: 
 
The Great Day 93 
 
 "Wait a minute, you ought to have 
 something to put over that, a box, or a 
 can, or something." 
 
 "I wish I had!" said Charley; "let 
 me take that cigar-box, Jimmy?" 
 
 "I ve got just the thing," shouted the 
 minister; "I ll get it." 
 
 And he vanished into the house. Pres 
 ently he came out again with a shin 
 ing tin box. They lighted the cannon 
 cracker, clapped the box over it, and ran. 
 
 Bang ! went the cracker, and the box 
 shot straight up in the air. 
 
 "Jiminy!" said Joe Carter, " twon t 
 never come down !" 
 
 It looked as if it wouldn t. It went up 
 above the houses, above the trees, even. 
 Then it started to fall, and as it did so a 
 funny thing happened. For the seams 
 of the box had all been blown apart, and 
 only its swift upward rush had kept them 
 together. As soon as it started on its 
 
94 The Believing Years 
 
 downward trip, they flew apart, and the 
 box struck the earth, aflat sheet of tin, 
 flat as a fritter. 
 
 Just then Mrs. Dimmick came to the 
 door. 
 
 "James," she said, "I can t find my 
 new cake tin, have you seen it ?" 
 
 "Er oh, what, my dear ? Yes, Har 
 old has just strayed off, up the street, 
 I think, I ll find him all right." 
 
 And Mr. Dimmick hurried away. 
 
 We spent the morning, after breakfast, 
 in the midst of a delicious cloud of powder 
 smoke. "Dynamite" crackers had not 
 been invented then, and nobody got hurt 
 at all, except Rob Currier, who burned 
 his thumb slightly on a piece of slow- 
 match. Charley Carter s father, a man 
 of untold wealth, bought a dozen bunches 
 of fire-crackers, and fired them a whole 
 bunch at a time! 
 
 We stood around in awe at the de- 
 
The Great Day 95 
 
 lightful noise and the princely extrava 
 gance of it. 
 
 At noon all the church bells rang for an 
 hour, and we went down to the foot of 
 River Street to hear "Gunner Hunt" 
 and his assistants fire a salute. Mr. 
 Jones was there, leaning on his Napoleon 
 cane, and regarding the spectacle with 
 a sarcastic grin. It probably seemed a 
 pretty small business to him, compared 
 with his famous battle. 
 
 We had ice-cream for dinner, and straw 
 berry shortcake, and ginger-ale. There 
 were other things, lamb and green 
 peas, I believe, in which the grown-ups 
 were interested. 
 
 In the afternoon we saw the flag-rais 
 ing on the Mall. The Mayor made a 
 speech, and so did General Cogswell, 
 but the speeches did not appeal to us 
 especially. Luckily a horse ran away, 
 so we found some entertainment. Then 
 
96 The Believing Years 
 
 Dr. Macey treated us all to lemonade, 
 and more ice-cream. 
 
 If we had had any doubts of what 
 the Mayor said about the Declaration of 
 Independence being the most important 
 event in the history of mankind, such 
 doubts would have been removed. 
 
 In the evening, as soon as it began to 
 get dark, we joined the crowds wending 
 down Elm Street toward March s Hill. 
 
 People who lived in that neighborhood, 
 people whose back yards afforded a good 
 view of the fireworks, found themselves 
 suddenly popular. It was astonishing 
 how many friends they had. Acquaint 
 ances whom they had not seen for a year 
 began to invade their gardens, shake hands 
 cordially, and show themselves perfectly 
 willing to sit on their chairs and camp- 
 stools, or even their back door-steps. 
 
 The fireworks passed off in the usual 
 blaze of glory, and about half-past nine 
 
The Great Day 97 
 
 I walked wearily home with my father 
 and mother. Even then, we could see, 
 through the trees of Elm Street, distant 
 rockets streaming up the sky, pausing 
 for an instant, and then vanishing with 
 a far-off "T lock!" 
 
 A shower of sparks hung for a while 
 in the sky, disappeared, and left all quiet 
 and black, except for the twinkling stars. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE GREEN CHEST 
 
 JIMMY TOPPAN was worth knowing for 
 the sake of his grandmothers, if for no 
 other reason. He had two of them. 
 With one, and a great-aunt, he lived on 
 Elm Street. 
 
 The other grandmother was mistress 
 of a farm in the country, to which we 
 often went. There were uncles and aunts 
 there, too, but it was Grandmother Top- 
 pan who seemed best to understand our 
 needs. When we were at the farm she 
 knew the exact hours (about eleven in the 
 morning, and again about half-past four 
 in the afternoon) when a large slice of 
 
 apple pie is most useful. 
 9 8 
 
The Green Chest 99 
 
 Tactfully and unfailingly she adminis 
 tered it at those times. 
 
 Grandmother Bradley, with whom 
 Jimmy lived, ran Grandmother Toppan 
 a very close race. Her favorite remedy 
 for our troubles (certain hollow feelings 
 which often afflicted us) was sugar- 
 gingerbread. I will leave it to any one 
 if it is possible to choose between two 
 such excellent women. 
 
 The farm was, of course, a centre of 
 attractions. Grandmother Bradley s do 
 main, on a principal street of the town, 
 was naturally circumscribed. Yet it con 
 tained one object of overwhelming in 
 terest. 
 
 In the basement stood a green chest. 
 It was bumped and scarred, and, worse 
 than all, it was locked. 
 
 Lovely things dwelt within it, so 
 Jimmy said. 
 
 It had come across the seas with some 
 
ioo The Believing Years 
 
 far-off great-uncle, and it was never 
 opened. But if the cover should ever 
 be raised, he who stood by should be 
 envied of all boys. For inside was a large 
 tank, filled with some liquid, the exact 
 nature of which Jimmy never explained. 
 In this silvery fluid swam or floated all 
 manner of fairy shapes. There were 
 mermaids, tiny golden fishes, and other 
 strange inhabitants of the ocean. Enor 
 mous turtles reposed on the sands at the 
 bottom, and gay little ships with bright 
 rigging sailed overhead. 
 
 All of these delectable objects were 
 made, by the cunning of some foreign 
 workman, out of glass. The golden hair 
 of the mermaids, the scales of the fish, 
 the sand, the sea-shells, the monstrous 
 whales, the sword of the swordfish, the 
 flippers of the turtles, the little lighthouse 
 that stood on the shore, the beautifully 
 colored seaweeds that clustered about the 
 
The (preen Chest : v.oi 
 
 rocks, all of these even the thread 
 like ropes and shrouds of the bobbing 
 vessels all were fashioned from brittle 
 glass. 
 
 Did a boy ever have a more tantalizing 
 vision dancing before his eyes ? 
 
 I stood and gazed at that green chest. 
 A more stolid, unyielding affair cannot 
 be imagined. It was dusty, and the 
 corners of it were worn and rounded. 
 The green paint which had covered it was 
 faded, and in many spots knocked off 
 altogether. Sailors boots had kicked it? 
 perhaps, or it had rocked about some 
 cabin or hold when the waves of the real 
 ocean had started a miniature tempest 
 on the little sea within. What, then, 
 had prevented collisions between the 
 glass ships, or kept the mermaids from 
 being shivered to bits on the reef ? 
 
 Some glass sailor must have steered the 
 ships to safety, while the mermaids had 
 
102 The Believing Years 
 
 plunged beneath the waves to find calmer 
 water below. 
 
 The solution seemed to fit the case, 
 but how was I to prove it ? How was 
 I to look at any of these charming things ? 
 The chest was locked, and locked it was 
 likely to remain. A sort of decree had 
 issued from Jimmy Toppan s great-aunt : 
 no one was to see the inside of the chest. 
 Nay, more, one must not even ask about 
 it. It was locked tight, and there was 
 an end of it. I never heard Jimmy s 
 great-aunt say this ; I never mentioned 
 the chest in her presence. Nor did 
 Jimmy say that the unlocking of the chest 
 was forbidden. He described its con 
 tents in a way to set my imagination 
 aflame. He did not say definitely that 
 he had ever looked in it. But he let it 
 be known that it held such glories that 
 a glimpse therein was a vision of fairy 
 land. And he somehow cast an air of 
 
The Green Chest 103 
 
 mystery and awe about it, till I would 
 no more have asked to have the cover 
 raised than I would have presented 
 myself, snub-nosed and with holes in the 
 knees of my stockings, at the gates of 
 Paradise with a request to be enrolled 
 in the cherubs chorus. 
 
 I never knew why there was such a 
 curse upon the chest. But I gathered, 
 somehow, that the great-uncle, or grand 
 father, or whoever he was, who had 
 brought it from foreign parts, had uttered, 
 with his dying breath, a solemn injunc 
 tion that it was to stay closed. The 
 opening of Pandora s box was to be a 
 holiday recreation compared to opening 
 that green chest. It was no more to be 
 disturbed than Shakespeare s bones. Why 
 he should have transported it such a 
 distance, with such infinite care, and 
 then sealed it up forever, passed my 
 understanding. Did the prohibition ex- 
 
104 The Believing Years 
 
 tend to grown-ups, or was it only for 
 boys ? That, also, I never could find out. 
 
 I used to fancy that Jimmy s great-aunt 
 stole down to the basement in the dark 
 hours of night to gloat over the silver sea 
 and its delicate inhabitants. Once, in 
 the late afternoon, I detected her going 
 chestwards, and I followed with beating 
 heart. I got behind an apple barrel and 
 watched her movements. But she only 
 went to an ice-box, from which she took 
 out a plate of mutton chops. 
 
 The intolerable curiosity aroused in me 
 by Jimmy s account of the chest was 
 equalled only by the fear I had to make 
 any inquiries about it. I was convinced 
 that a painful family secret overhung that 
 green chest. 
 
 Night after night I dreamed that I had 
 been permitted to look within. Some 
 times it was all I had imagined, and more. 
 The ships, the mermaids, the turtles, 
 
The Green Chest 105 
 
 and all the rest were there indeed. And 
 others, new and indescribable forms, 
 floated or swam in that enchanted ocean, 
 glittering, fragile, wonderful. I could 
 take them in my hand, play with them, 
 and set them again in their element. 
 
 They did not merely act the lifeless 
 part of china figures in an aquarium. 
 They moved about with an intelligence of 
 their own ; the ships spread gauzy sails 
 to catch a magic wind, and flew before it. 
 The whales rose to the surface, disported 
 themselves heavily, like true whales, and 
 blew jets of spray into the air. 
 
 In the midst of my rapture I would 
 wake; all the glass toys vanished, and I 
 could have cried to find them gone. In 
 the morning it would be impossible to 
 recall these new figures. I remembered 
 them dimly and more dimly as the hours 
 of the day blurred my dream. The iri 
 descent creatures turned to formless things 
 
106 The Believing Years 
 
 of gray and drab, and then lost them 
 selves, to be found again only in another 
 dream. 
 
 But not all my sleeping experiences 
 were so happy. Sometimes I would seem 
 to approach the chest only to have 
 Jimmy s great-aunt rise from behind it, 
 shaking a broom. At other times I would 
 lift the lid and find inside the chest the 
 crouching figure of the long-departed 
 great-uncle. He would jump out, gibber 
 ing frightfully, and I would scream and 
 wake up. Thus the chest became sur 
 rounded by terrors even when viewed by 
 daylight. Jimmy s great-aunt was like 
 another dragon set over the golden apples. 
 She kept watch by day, while at night 
 the goblin uncle came on duty. 
 
 So we began to steer clear of the green 
 chest and to confine our activities to other 
 parts of the basement. Much has been 
 written of the joy that dwells in old gar- 
 
The Green Chest 107 
 
 rets. The basement is neglected. Yet, 
 if dry and well lighted, it may have its 
 points. 
 
 In this one much importance was at 
 tached to a plate of sand set on a table. 
 This, so Jimmy solemnly averred, was for 
 the purpose of discovering the presence 
 of mice in the basement. If they ran 
 over the sand, their footprints would be 
 tray them, and traps might be set. It 
 did not occur to me to marvel at the oblig 
 ing nature of mice who should be at such 
 great pains to record their arrival. Ob 
 serving that Jimmy s great-aunt often 
 inspected the plate of sand and smoothed 
 its surface over after each inspection, we 
 looked to it that she should never be dis 
 appointed. 
 
 It is not hard to counterfeit small foot 
 prints, such as might be made by a scurry 
 ing mouse. 
 
 In an adjoining room there was a 
 
io8 The Believing Years 
 
 steam-boiler part of the heating appa 
 ratus of the house. The existence of 
 this boiler, the discovery of clay in Daven 
 port s field, and the always present need 
 of marbles, these conditions led to the 
 foundation of an enterprise that occupied 
 a number of days. 
 
 The clay was brought from "Daven 
 port s," and rolled into balls of the proper 
 size. These were placed on shingles and 
 set to bake beneath the boiler. 
 
 Visions of revolutionizing the marble 
 industry spurred us on. We calculated 
 that we could undersell the regular dealers 
 and that profits would accrue. But al 
 though the clay balls were duly left be 
 neath the boiler all night, there were de 
 fects in the finished product. The part 
 that had rested on the shingle obstinately 
 remained flat. We found no way of 
 giving our marbles the glaze necessary 
 to the real thing ; so the dealers continued 
 
The Green Chest 109 
 
 to ask the exorbitant sum of a cent for 
 ten, and did not have to break prices to 
 meet our competition. 
 
 It is possible that the fact that there 
 was no heat in the boiler had something 
 to do with this fiasco. 
 
 After this, to keep our minds from 
 wandering toward the green chest, we 
 started the manufacture of gunpowder 
 on a large scale. The raw material, 
 rotting stone, could be procured from the 
 sand heap and dump, which at that date 
 (before the rise of city improvement asso 
 ciations) adorned the banking at the end 
 of the frog pond. This dump had many 
 attractions, not the least of which were 
 the squash vines which trailed over it. 
 They never got beyond the blossoming 
 stage, but that did not trouble us. The 
 possession of raw squashes would have 
 availed us little. The flowers were inter 
 esting, and I scarcely need to point out 
 
no The Believing Years 
 
 the value of the stems. We cut a slit 
 near one end, and they became in our 
 hands trumpets with which to blow soul- 
 animating strains. It is, of course, neces 
 sary to scrape off the prickles with a jack- 
 knife, or the lips of the performer are apt 
 to suffer. 
 
 But these were by the way. The rot 
 ting stone, red, gray, brown, and black, 
 was the most valuable product of the 
 dump. We carried it to a broad, flat 
 piece of slate which covered a cistern 
 just outside the basement windows. 
 Here, with hard rocks, we ground it fine. 
 It then became, by the chemistry which 
 worked so quickly in those days, gun 
 powder. The black dust was the ordi 
 nary article. Mixed with red or other 
 colors, it was transformed into various 
 high explosives. Then we stored it in 
 packets in the basement, where it might 
 be drawn upon in case of need any 
 
The Green Chest in 
 
 sudden attacks by Indians or pirates, for 
 instance. 
 
 The day on which we stored the powder 
 was not long after the Fourth of July. 
 Our operations in the basement had to 
 come to an end on that day, for Grand 
 mother Bradley and Aunt Josephine were 
 going away for a week. The house was 
 to be closed, and Jimmy would stay with 
 his Grandmother Toppan in the country. 
 
 The last time we entered the basement 
 our eyes wandered toward the green 
 chest. But neither of us spoke about it. 
 I wondered if the chest would be stolen, 
 or be burned up, or should I die and never 
 look inside it ? Already the little glass 
 ships and fishes had become less real, 
 though more beautiful, than the folks 
 of elf-land. What small hope I had ever 
 entertained of seeing them was dwindling 
 to a pin-point. 
 
 I was never troubled by any suspicion 
 
ii2 The Believing Years 
 
 that the tank, the ocean, and the glass 
 creatures existed only in Jimmy s imagina 
 tion. Such doubts did not fret me then, 
 nor afterwards. The green chest remained 
 one of the mysteries of the believing years. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 WHITE PEACOCKS 
 
 DURING the time that Jimmy stayed 
 at his grandmother s farm a period 
 that was lengthened to more than two 
 weeks we were all agitated by the ap 
 proach of a circus. Excitement had 
 reached such a pitch that when, three 
 days before circus-day, Jimmy invited 
 me to make him a visit, I was in some 
 doubt whether I ought to venture so far 
 afield. 
 
 But on a solemn promise from Jimmy s 
 Uncle Will that he would personally con 
 vey me home, behind one of his own 
 horses, at least twenty-four hours before 
 the great event, I thought it might be 
 safe to risk it. Jimmy could stay at the 
 i 113 
 
H4 The Believing Years 
 
 farm (fully two miles away) until the 
 very morning, if he liked. I preferred to 
 be nearer at hand. So to the farm I went. 
 
 Certainly, no other place would have 
 tempted me. It was, to our fancies, 
 perhaps the most fortunate spot on earth. 
 Historians and antiquaries might deny 
 that it had been the scene of a proper 
 Indian raid. We could see the loopholes 
 from which the flintlocks had been fired, 
 and mark the small window whence a 
 dipperful of molten lead was poured, to 
 discourage an Indian whose anxiety to 
 come inside the house made him indiscreet. 
 I have never heard any of the slaves to 
 fact assert that the farm-house might not 
 have seen the tomahawk flashing about 
 its walls and heard the war-whoop ring 
 out. 
 
 It was there in the days of tomahawks 
 and war-whoops. 
 
 If the Indians had been so inconsiderate 
 
White Peacocks 115 
 
 as to pass it by, we were not going to let 
 that trouble us. Certainly, a plough sel 
 dom turned the earth of the adjoining 
 meadow without bringing to light a flint 
 arrow-tip or the head of a stone axe 
 weapons which even the scientific his 
 torian might hesitate to attribute to the 
 ministers and deacons of Puritan times. 
 
 There was the meadow itself, an enor 
 mous tract of land, as it appeared to us. 
 In it, somewhere, dwelt the lord of the 
 herd, a legendary bull whose uncertain 
 temper might be aroused by the sight of 
 a small boy wearing a plaid necktie with a 
 single spot of red in it. He could detect 
 this spot at half a mile, and the boy had 
 better make for the nearest fence, and 
 affect blue neckties exclusively hence 
 forth. Thus the crossing of the meadow 
 had that spice of danger without which 
 life is tasteless. 
 
 There were other reasons for crossing 
 
u6 The Believing Years 
 
 the meadow besides the mere braving of 
 the bull. At its foot was a pond, rich 
 in mud of primeval blackness, and well 
 stocked with turtles and "green-leapers." 
 Farther on was a bog and wood, deep and 
 gloomy as the magic forest of Broceliande, 
 and not less pleasing to us because it 
 went by the more homely name of Pettin- 
 gell s Swamp. Crows built their nests in 
 its trees, and without its borders jack-in- 
 the-pulpit held his springtime services. 
 Beyond this, more meadows salt ones 
 this time ; then the river, the sand-dunes, 
 and the ocean. 
 
 The barns about the farm-house were 
 full of sweet-smelling hay. You could 
 bore long tunnels through this, and come 
 out with your hair full of dust and spiders 
 webs. Certain cocks of salt hay stood 
 outside. By climbing to the top of one 
 of them, sitting down, and sliding to the 
 bottom you could enjoy an exhilarating 
 
White Peacocks 117 
 
 exercise. It is only fair to say, however, 
 that the salt water and occasional bit of 
 mud which gave the hay its slipperiness 
 had an evil effect upon knickerbockers, 
 and furnished relatives with a subject 
 for wearisome jest which dieth never. 
 
 Yet with all these methods of entertain 
 ment, Jimmy and I considered the pea 
 cocks chief among the attractions of his 
 grandmother s farm. They did not really 
 belong on the farm, but were the prop 
 erty of Mr. Bartlett, who lived at some 
 distance. We judged that the owner of 
 such exotic fowls must possess the wealth 
 of Ormus and of Ind. The birds them 
 selves were indifferent in the matter of 
 domicile, and spent most of the day and 
 all the night on the Toppans land. 
 
 Their bedtime was an hour of unusual 
 interest. They gathered about sunset 
 around a large apple tree which stood 
 near one corner of the farm-house. There 
 
n8 The Believing Years 
 
 was much strutting and spreading of tails 
 among the gentlemen of the party; the 
 peahens moved about nervously, but with 
 less ostentation. Both sexes raised dis 
 cordant shrieks from time to time, for no 
 purpose that we could discover. 
 
 When, one by one, they had taken up 
 their roosting-places in the tree, they made 
 an impressive spectacle, especially after 
 night had fallen, and seemed to bring 
 the jungles of Hindustan to our very doors. 
 
 They inspired a feeling of awe and 
 mystery because of their radiant plumage 
 and reputed value. It was the venera 
 tion which we felt toward the whole tribe 
 that turned so quickly to terror in the 
 matter of the white peacock. 
 
 The adventure flashed on us suddenly 
 the morning after my arrival at the farm. 
 
 In a sand-pit beyond the orchard it was 
 the immemorial custom to build fires and 
 roast potatoes and other eatables. Marks 
 
While Peacocks 119 
 
 of fires long dead showed us that the 
 practice extended far back, perhaps to 
 the boys of prehistoric times, or to those 
 whose fathers had shot the arrows whereof 
 the flint heads lay beneath the surface of 
 the meadow. Potatoes and apples were 
 placed in the hot embers, and removed at 
 the end of about twenty minutes. The 
 apples were, by this time, roasted not 
 wisely but too well. The potatoes had 
 an outer region of softness, but at heart 
 were firm and unyielding. Both were 
 so covered with wood ashes that their con 
 sumption left streaks of soot all about the 
 vicinity of the mouth, extending back even 
 to the ears. 
 
 Potatoes and apples, thus prepared, 
 had palled upon us. We sought for 
 variety in the bill of fare, and this morn 
 ing Jimmy proposed eggs. 
 
 "At clam-bakes they roast eggs in hot 
 seaweed," declared Jimmy. 
 
i2o The Believing Years 
 
 The idea was worthy, but eggs were not 
 so easy to procure. A visit to the hen 
 house proved that the day s supply had 
 already been gathered. Then, though 
 Robinson Crusoe would hardly have done 
 it, we applied at the kitchen. But Grand 
 mother Toppan, who might have hu 
 mored our whim, was away from home. 
 The Power temporarily in command 
 dismissed our request brusquely : 
 
 "Ye byes git outer here, now, or I ll 
 be afther takin the paddle to yez." 
 
 We did not know what paddle was 
 referred to, but we understood that we 
 had leave to withdraw. We wondered 
 if Robinson Crusoe ever met with hu 
 miliating rebuffs like that. It was im 
 possible ; no tyrannous cook could lord it 
 over him while he carried that long gun. 
 
 But we had no gun, so, in dejection 
 and despair, we wandered again toward 
 the sand-pit. As we crossed the orchard, 
 
White Peacocks 121 
 
 a startling event occurred. Some large 
 bird rustled off through the grass, and 
 in the little round hollow where she had 
 been sitting gleamed four white objects. 
 It was enough to renew our trust in the 
 gods who favor the romantic in their 
 everlasting encounters with the practical 
 folk of the world. 
 
 For here were eggs ! 
 
 And eggs obtained under conditions 
 that our friend Crusoe need not have 
 scorned. To us the adventure said in no 
 unmistakable tones : Abase yourself not 
 before cooks when your spoil is at hand. 
 Trust Providence, as did the Swiss Family 
 Robinson. 
 
 We hurried to the sand-pit, kindled the 
 fire, and put in the eggs. I refuse to 
 dwell upon their condition when we took 
 them out, or on the difficulty attendant 
 upon eating the two that remained un 
 broken, or what these tasted like. 
 
122 The Believing Years 
 
 People who think that the carnal joy of 
 eating is of much importance at these 
 camp-fires have vulgar, prosaic minds. 
 
 We heard the dinner-bell ringing just 
 as we disposed of the second egg, and 
 we hurried toward the house. 
 
 Ten minutes later (for it takes some 
 time to remove from one s face and 
 hands the evidences of a feast of roasted 
 eggs) we appeared at the dinner-table. 
 It was a long one, with Uncle Will at 
 one end, Uncle Charley at the other. 
 The eggs had not spoiled our appetites, 
 and we ate, with nothing to disturb our 
 pleasure, up to the point when blueberry 
 pie came on. Then Uncle Will, his 
 carving duties over, and his own share of 
 the dinner consumed, leaned back in his 
 chair and addressed Uncle Charley: 
 
 "I was over at Bartlett s last night." 
 
 "That so ?" returned Uncle Charley. 
 "Did you speak about the peacocks ?" 
 
White Peacocks 123 
 
 "About the peahen that s setting in 
 the orchard ? Yes. He knew she had 
 been setting there on nothing for three 
 days. The eggs came from New York 
 yesterday, and he said he was going to 
 send Foley over with them this morning." 
 
 Aunt Ellen showed an interest in the 
 conversation. "Eggs from New York ?" 
 she queried. 
 
 "Yes," replied Uncle Will; "from 
 the Zoo. They re peacocks eggs. White 
 peacocks, too. They cost him ten dollars 
 apiece forty dollars for the four. I 
 told him twas a risky thing to leave them 
 out in the orchard. Said / wouldn t be 
 responsible. Bartlett said the peahen 
 wouldn t set anywhere else. He d have 
 to take the chance. What are you going 
 to do with a man like that ?" 
 
 I glanced out of the corner of my eye 
 at Jimmy Toppan. He was trying to 
 insert a piece of blueberry pie in his 
 
124 The Believing Years 
 
 mouth. Three times he made the at 
 tempt, and each time his aim was poor. 
 I had a feeling as if my chair were sink 
 ing beneath me. The dining-room and 
 the whole family of Toppans revolved 
 about me in a blur. 
 
 Peacocks eggs! Forty dollars! 
 
 I have no recollection of the rest of the 
 meal. The elder Toppans talked to 
 gether, I believe, but on what subject I 
 have not the faintest notion. 
 
 In five or six minutes Jimmy and I were 
 safely over the fence and running across 
 the meadow. We had to stop once or 
 twice for breath, but we covered the dis 
 tance to the wooded swamp in record 
 time. Back of a large oak, where we 
 were nearly covered by ferns, we stopped 
 and panted. 
 
 Jimmy spoke first. 
 
 "They don t hang people under sixteen 
 years old," he said. 
 
White Peacocks 125 
 
 "Are you sure ?" 
 
 "I m sure," he replied. 
 
 "They put ? em in prison, though," I 
 remarked, "for life!" 
 
 " What ll we do ?" asked Jimmy. 
 
 We debated the question from every 
 point of view. Of one thing we were 
 determined : we would never be taken 
 alive. 
 
 "There s the circus," I suggested. 
 "Don t you suppose we could join that ?" 
 
 "Like Toby Tyler? He had a hor 
 rible time !" 
 
 "It s better than stayin all your life in 
 a dungeon on bread and water hollowed 
 out of the living rock," I reminded 
 him. 
 
 "I d have to go home first and get 
 my decalcomania book," Jimmy stipu 
 lated. 
 
 "Well, that will be all right; I ll get 
 my punch." 
 
126 The Believing Years 
 
 About my most cherished possession 
 was a discarded punch, formerly used by 
 a real conductor on a train. It seemed 
 that I ought not present myself to the 
 circus people empty-handed if Jimmy 
 were going to bring his book of decalco- 
 manias. It struck me that I might be 
 especially welcome, as a ticket-taker, if 
 I had a punch. I could work in that 
 capacity while I was learning to ride 
 bareback, or qualifying for the position 
 of ring-master, or perhaps so high 
 do one s air-castles tower that of 
 clown ! 
 
 Why not ? Others had achieved it. 
 
 We decided to leave our refuge in the 
 swamp, sneak up the meadow, pass the 
 farm by a back route, and so to the high 
 road and home. Then, separating long 
 enough to get the decalcomania book and 
 the punch, we could camp for a night or 
 two in Davenport s field, and join the 
 
White Peacocks 127 
 
 circus in the morning. By the time the 
 peacocks eggs were missed we would be 
 far away. 
 
 The first part of the plan was carried 
 out. We crossed the meadow stealthily, 
 creeping a greater part of the way on 
 our hands and knees. Once in a while, 
 when this got tiresome, we would rise 
 and walk in the normal fashion, which 
 was probably just as safe, for there was 
 no one within half a mile. 
 
 As we slunk by. the rear of the barn we 
 came suddenly on Mr. Bartlett and his 
 man, Foley. There was no time to run. 
 Mr. Bartlett addressed us genially. 
 
 " Hullo, boys ! Want to see some 
 thing ? Look in this box. Peacocks 
 eggs white peacocks, too. Very rare. 
 We re going to set them under that pea 
 hen in the orchard. I suppose she s 
 there all right, Foley ?" 
 
 "Yis, sorr. She was at foive o clock 
 
128 The Believing Years 
 
 this marning, sorr. Oi give her four 
 ducks eggs to kape her continted-loike." 
 
 "All right, then. Come on, boys. 
 We ll see how she s getting on. We ll 
 have to set a guard around her while she 
 hatches these out. They re too valuable 
 to risk. Do you suppose she d stand for 
 it if we put up a little tent around her, 
 Foley ? Big nuisance she won t set in 
 some convenient place." 
 
 Mr. Bartlett and Foley walked on 
 ahead, discussing ways and means for 
 protecting the peahen against marauders. 
 We followed, a dozen steps behind. The 
 shadow of the dungeon fell no longer 
 upon our path, and there was no necessity 
 for joining the circus. We did not admit 
 it to each other, but we felt it to be a 
 happy release. 
 
 In a moment we heard Foley s voice. 
 
 "Here she is, sorr. An settin on 
 nothin again. Phwhere s thim ducks 
 
White Peacocks 129 
 
 eggs gone, Oi dunno. Somebody s 
 shtole thim, fir the birrd niver ate thim, 
 shills an all. Twill niver do to lave 
 thim ixpinsive eggs here, sorr ! " 
 
 Jimmy Toppan and I maintained ex 
 pressions of innocent wonder. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 THE FLIGHT 
 
 THE day before the circus found me at 
 home again. Without delay I set out to 
 find Ed Mason, Charley Carter, and any 
 of the others who could give me the latest 
 information on the topic that absorbed 
 us all. 
 
 For, since the Fourth of July, there had 
 been nothing so important as the ap 
 proach of this circus. For two weeks 
 we had studied the posters. Whether 
 the hippopotamus would in very truth 
 have a mouth somewhat larger than the 
 door of the barn to which his portrait 
 was affixed ; whether the head of the 
 giraffe would actually soar above the 
 clouds, as represented ; and whether a 
 130 
 
The Flight 131 
 
 beautiful lady would indeed stand on 
 the tip of an elephant s trunk and airily 
 juggle three baby lions and a Japanese 
 parasol these problems had vexed us 
 for fourteen long days. 
 
 Charley Carter stuck out for the literal 
 accuracy of the posters. 
 
 " Cos if it wasn t so, they wouldn t 
 dare to print em it s against the law." 
 
 This was his argument. Truth to say, 
 none of us were strongly inclined to op 
 pose him. We were more than willing 
 to accept the pictures as photographic. 
 
 This point decided without further dis 
 cussion, we could devote our meditations 
 to the circus itself. We could lay our 
 plans and dream our dreams in all felicity. 
 
 To hear some of these plans I started 
 toward the Carters , and fell in with Ed 
 Mason on the way. In his garden we 
 found Charley Carter, who told us of his 
 own and ether boys projects. 
 
132 The Believing Years 
 
 Rob Currier would rise, it seemed, 
 before three o clock on the morrow, and 
 go with his father to watch the unloading 
 of the circus. Our desire to join in this 
 expedition subsided when Charley related 
 his adventures at a similar treat the year 
 before. It was true that he had observed 
 the dim but mountainous forms of ele 
 phants and camels outlined against the 
 dawn, but he had also slipped on the car 
 track and so sprained his ankle that he 
 had to forego, not only the great street 
 parade at 10 A.M., but the show itself in 
 the afternoon. The possibility of any 
 such tragic occurrence made Ed Mason 
 and me decide to let the circus unload as 
 best it could without our assistance. 
 
 But on this, the very day before the 
 circus would exhibit, we were smitten by 
 an unexpected grief. Charley Carter 
 started the ball of trouble rolling. 
 
 "Are you fellers goin to the side 
 show ?" he asked. 
 
The Flight 133 
 
 And he added, complacently, "/ am." 
 We had not considered the matter. We 
 supposed we were going. The pictures 
 representing the attractions of the side 
 show recurred to us, and straightway it 
 became an imperative necessity that we 
 find out if we were going to see these 
 wonders. 
 
 We repaired to our respective homes, 
 but were soon back at the place of meet 
 ing with dolorous faces. The parental 
 mind in the House of Edwards was at 
 one with that in the House of Mason. 
 The street parade in the morning we 
 should see, and we should be suitably 
 provided with red or green balloons for 
 the more complete enjoyment of the 
 spectacle. To the afternoon performance 
 we should go, pockets filled with the 
 peanuts of Mr. Mazzoni, who sold much 
 better peanuts than the half-baked things 
 supplied by the circus venders. These we 
 
134 The Believing Years 
 
 might share, if we felt so disposed, with 
 the elephants. Pink lemonade we should 
 not imbibe, as it was "miserable stuff." 
 And the side-show we should not enter, 
 as it was "vulgar." 
 
 Such were the terms of the ultimatum. 
 To article one, concerning the street 
 parade and the balloons, we signified our 
 assent. To the second article, concern 
 ing peanuts, we also assented. Article 
 three, which forbade pink lemonade, was 
 accepted with the understanding that we 
 yielded to superior force. But to the 
 final article, prohibiting the side-show, 
 we entered an indignant protest. 
 
 It was promptly overruled. 
 
 Can one conceive a more irrational 
 position ? What was this thing, vul 
 garity, which before now had stood 
 in our path ? Had the extra cost of 
 admission to the side-show been the 
 cause for the refusal, we could have 
 
The Flight 135 
 
 understood, even while regretting, the 
 parental attitude. 
 
 But vulgarity what was it ? 
 
 To us the different exhibits of the show, 
 as portrayed upon the posters, were both 
 curious and wonderful. Were we not 
 men and philosophers, passengers through 
 life, and observers of the human show ? 
 Was it not our bounden duty to see all 
 that was strange and marvelous in this 
 great world ? Well, then, by what right 
 did our tyrants act ? We were of the 
 human race, and held none of its members 
 alien. 
 
 Though it might be questioned if the 
 dog-faced boy, the genuine mermaid, the 
 lady with a body like a serpent, and the 
 man of india-rubber skin, came unre 
 servedly into the category of human 
 creatures still such objections were 
 mere quibbles. A golden opportunity 
 for delight and self-improvement was 
 
136 The Believing Years 
 
 being denied us, and for the flimsiest of 
 reasons, so we straightway raised the 
 standard of revolt and nailed it to the 
 mast. 
 
 "Let s run away !" said Ed Mason. 
 
 Really, it seemed the only possible 
 suggestion. When you have simply got 
 to reduce your hard-hearted parents to 
 contrition, milk-and-water methods are 
 useless. A blow must be struck sharp 
 and decisive. Then they will recognize 
 your value, be properly humbled, and 
 come around to a correct view of things. 
 
 Running away from home is at once 
 the boldest of strokes and the most subtle 
 form of revenge. It asserts your inde 
 pendence at the same time that it reduces 
 your parents to humility. 
 
 We decided upon it, and then and there 
 fixed the hour of five that afternoon as 
 the time of our departure from home and 
 kindred. We would sever all the ties 
 
The Flight 137 
 
 that bound us to civilization, and plunge 
 into the trackless wilds. 
 
 Prompt to the hour, I met the resolute 
 Mason on the farther side of the frog 
 pond. He was simply yet appropriately 
 equipped with a cap-pistol, and two ba 
 nanas for provender while crossing the 
 wilderness. 
 
 I carried a light sling-shot and a pack 
 age of soda-biscuit. Game partridges, 
 antelopes, and other creatures might be 
 slain en route ; while our thirst could be 
 slaked at the brooks and streams. 
 
 We set out in silence, as became our 
 high purpose. In a little over an hour 
 we had penetrated the desert as far as 
 Brown s ice-house, and there we decided 
 to camp for the night. We had encoun 
 tered no antelopes, buffaloes, nor other 
 animals, except a herd of cows belonging 
 to Mr. Haskell. They were being driven 
 home by a small boy. 
 
138 The Believing Years 
 
 In a little grove of trees back of the 
 ice-house we sat down and made our 
 supper of bananas and soda-biscuit. The 
 ice-pond provided water to wash down 
 the meal. We faced the west, and re 
 ceived full in our eyes the rays of the 
 sun, now rapidly approaching the earth. 
 
 For a time we beheld the spectacle of 
 the sunset, though our minds were not 
 upon it. We conversed upon the possi 
 bilities of adventure in the Far West, 
 upon the circus which we were leaving 
 behind, and, most of all, of the excitement 
 probably now rife in our homes. Ed 
 Mason, it appeared, had left a note be 
 hind him to inform his family of our de 
 parture, of the utter folly of any attempt 
 at pursuit, and of the fact that our first 
 stopping-place would be Omaha. 
 
 Why he fixed upon Omaha, except that 
 it is remote from our home on the Atlan 
 tic coast, I am unable to explain. 
 
The Flight 139 
 
 By this time, we agreed, our families 
 had begun to wish that they had treated 
 us better in the matter of that side-show. 
 
 Some low hills rose upon the western 
 horizon, and the sun disappeared behind 
 them not long after we had finished sup 
 per. It cast a golden outline on a strange 
 procession of dark gray clouds which now 
 came out of the north and moved slowly 
 across the place lately occupied by the 
 ball of fire. They followed one after the 
 other like uncouth animals the drome 
 dary with his hump was there, the ele 
 phant, and other figures, longer and 
 lower, like serpents and lizards. 
 
 We watched them without speaking. 
 
 A faint breeze moved the branches of 
 the apple tree over our heads. It was 
 perceptibly darker now, and not easy to 
 make out the details of the fields and 
 meadows. Two men passed along the 
 dusty road on the other side of the stone 
 
140 The Believing Years 
 
 wall. They did not notice us, but we 
 heard them discussing a dog after they 
 had vanished from sight. The sky in the 
 east and north turned rosy, and its colors 
 were reflected in the pond. A man with 
 a lantern moved about Mr. Brown s 
 barnyard for a while, then disappeared 
 indoors, and presently a light shone from 
 one of the windows of the house. 
 
 The glow in the west; the pageant of 
 clouds, whose fiery edges had grown dim 
 mer; the immensity of the overarching 
 sky, still turquoise-colored all these, 
 together with the disappearance of the 
 familiar landscape, conspired to make the 
 two outlaws under the apple tree feel 
 rather diminutive. The swallows had 
 ceased their flight and gone to bed. Two 
 or three robins screamed excitedly for a 
 while, and darted in apparent hurry from 
 tree to tree. Finally they became quiet, 
 except for an occasional outburst of twit- 
 
The Flight 141 
 
 tering. Two bats began to flutter about, 
 with their high, thin, squeaking cries like 
 the opening and shutting of a new pair of 
 scissors. 
 
 The darkness was far advanced ; three 
 or four stars were visible, and the pink 
 tint had faded from the sky. The pond 
 gleamed like silver, but its banks were 
 black and mysterious. 
 
 "We ought to start awful early in the 
 mornin ," said Ed Mason; "p Yaps we 
 better go to bed now." 
 
 He began this remark in a voice that 
 sounded fearfully loud, but said the clos 
 ing words in a whisper. 
 
 "PYaps we had," I agreed, also in 
 a whisper. 
 
 There was no one within hearing : it 
 seemed strange that we should have to 
 whisper. 
 
 In another way, however, it appeared 
 quite proper to whisper. 
 
142 The Believing Years 
 
 I was reflecting that, aside from a night 
 spent in a tent with two or three other 
 boys, in Peter Bailey s garden, I had 
 never slept outdoors. It also occurred to 
 me that we had no bedclothes nor pil 
 lows. We had blankets that night in the 
 tent, and made pillows out of piles of hay. 
 The hay tickled the back of your neck 
 somewhat, but otherwise it was all right. 
 
 "We might sleep in Brown s barn," I 
 suggested. 
 
 "That s so," Ed replied. 
 
 Then an afterthought struck him. 
 
 "No; we couldn t do that." 
 
 "I don t see why not." 
 
 "Why, of course we couldn t. There 
 ain t any barns on the prairies !" 
 
 I had never thought of that. 
 
 The objection was unanswerable. 
 
 "Besides," pursued Ed, with something 
 like a shudder, "tramps sleep in these 
 barns." 
 
The Flight 143 
 
 I abandoned the plan hastily. 
 
 "Could we get some hay from the 
 barn?" I wondered; "there won t be 
 any tramps in there now, will there ?" 
 
 "I guess not. We needn t go all the 
 way in, we can reach some by just 
 openin the door." 
 
 He was on the point of rising when 
 another objection occurred to me. 
 
 "Maybe Mr. Brown wouldn t like 
 
 it." 
 
 "He hasn t any right to say anything 
 bout it. In time of war they take what 
 they want, don t they ? They make a 
 forced levi." 
 
 This subject of the forced "levi" had 
 been discussed amongst us at some length 
 in connection with Mr. Hawkins cher 
 ries. Jimmy Toppan and Rob Currier 
 had the impression that it had something 
 to do with a clothing dealer on Main 
 Street. 
 
144 The Believing Years 
 
 "Anyway," Ed remarked, "we can put 
 the hay back in the morning." 
 
 This seemed to be a reasonable solu 
 tion in order to keep our career as out 
 laws on a moral basis. So we arose and 
 started cautiously for the barn. Before 
 we had taken five steps in that direction, 
 a voice spoke. It was a deep, resonant 
 voice, charged with authority and men 
 ace. The word or phrase that it uttered 
 was not, it seemed to us, especially rele 
 vant, but there could be no mistaking the 
 import of its accent and tone. It came 
 from the earth, from the sky, from no 
 where in particular and from everywhere 
 in general. 
 
 It said: "Ker-r-rum!" 
 
 Having said this, it was instantly silent. 
 The final syllable ended suddenly, but yet 
 with a twang as if some giant had touched 
 the string of a great instrument. 
 
 The hush that ensued was appalling. 
 
The Flight 145 
 
 I had sat down, as if struck to the earth, 
 the moment I heard the awful sound, and 
 now I tried to address Ed Mason, who 
 was leaning faintly against a tree. But I 
 made three efforts before my vocal ap 
 paratus responded. 
 
 "Wh-whatwasit?"Iasked. 
 
 He turned toward me, and said some 
 thing in a whisper, which I could not 
 make out. I sat still for a moment 
 longer, then hitched myself toward him 
 and repeated my question. 
 
 But he could not answer me. 
 
 Neither could he say whence the sound 
 came. That was the horrible part of it 
 the vague immensity of the note. We 
 remained motionless for what we thought 
 a long time. 
 
 Then Ed suggested that we move 
 our camp. Immediately the problem 
 arose : in which direction should we 
 move ? While we deliberated, in whis- 
 
146 The Believing Years 
 
 pers, suddenly again, ominous and 
 terrible : 
 
 "K r-rum!" 
 
 That sufficed. In three seconds we 
 were over the wall and running at full 
 speed along the highway. At the cross 
 roads, an eighth of a mile away, we saw 
 the lights of a buggy. It contained cer 
 tain male relatives. 
 
 "Hello, boys ! Going home ?" 
 
 We admitted that that was our desti 
 nation. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 UP LIKE A ROCKET 
 
 ON the morning following our return 
 from the flight, there was an uncomfort 
 able chill about my house. When I met 
 Ed Mason, I found that he had noticed 
 the same coolness in his home. Nothing 
 was said, no reproaches were cast upon us 
 for our trip towards Omaha and the great 
 West, but I understood, somehow, that 
 I should not be invited to attend the cir 
 cus in the afternoon. The necessary 
 half-dollar did not make its appearance. 
 Ed reported a similar state of affairs. 
 
 This was simply tragic. 
 
 We took counsel, and decided that in 
 Horace Winslow, if anywhere, lay our 
 salvation. He was a person of stratagem, 
 147 
 
148 The Believing Years 
 
 of plans and plots, and he might be able 
 to show us a way out of trouble. More 
 over, he had let drop some mysterious 
 hints of influence which he expected to 
 possess with the circus people. More 
 than a week before he had darkly sug 
 gested that he might be connected in no 
 inconspicuous position with the coming 
 show. 
 
 His utterances returned to us now. 
 
 "Let s go over and see him," I sug 
 gested. 
 
 "All right," Ed Mason agreed; "or, 
 say, you re goin over to stand on the 
 bank steps at ten o clock to see the parade, 
 ain t you ?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Well, we ll see Horace there, sure, 
 he always goes." 
 
 And it was so decided. 
 
 Before ten o clock we all set out for 
 Main Street, Ed Mason, Rob Currier, 
 
Up Like a Rocket 149 
 
 Peter Bailey, and myself, together with 
 an unavoidable convoy of small sisters 
 and other relatives. The streets had 
 that appearance which circus day and no 
 other always brought. Toy balloon men 
 and sellers of paper whirligigs wandered 
 up and down, and strange looking persons, 
 clutching children with one hand and 
 paper bags of luncheon with the other, 
 stood or sat on the grass bankings, edge- 
 stones, and lawns, in front of the houses. 
 
 Through a sort of family privilege 
 enjoyed by Peter Bailey, and always 
 exercised on such occasions, we took up 
 our position on the steps of the Mer- 
 rimack Bank. Mr. Vincent, Horace s 
 uncle, could be seen at his duties inside 
 the bank, but he did not come out. Circus 
 processions did not interest him. 
 
 Horace was unaccountably absent. 
 
 There were two or three false alarms, 
 two or three mistaken announcements 
 
150 The Believing Years 
 
 by members of the crowd: "Here they 
 come!" Twice we thought we heard in 
 the distance the faint blare of brass in 
 struments, as well as a deeper sound 
 which Ed Mason declared to be the roar 
 ing of lions. 
 
 But at last they did come. Majes 
 tically, and with clashing cymbals, they 
 descended Main Street. 
 
 At the head was a gorgeous wagon 
 carrying a brass band. The men were 
 in red coats, and they blew their trom 
 bones and cornets and beat their drums 
 with the utmost vigor. A cavalcade 
 followed, and then came four or five 
 large and gayly painted carts, containing, 
 so the pictures and legends indicated, the 
 blood-sweating behemoth, the laughing 
 hyenas, two Nubian lions, and the man- 
 eating tiger of Bengal. But the carts 
 were all closed, and the blood-sweating 
 behemoth, if he were there, gave no sign. 
 
Up Like a Rocket 151 
 
 Nor did the other animals. We had to 
 be contented with their painted like 
 nesses on the sides of the carts. 
 
 "Do you suppose they re inside there, 
 now?" asked Rob Currier s small sister 
 in a hushed voice. 
 
 "Of course they are," Ed Mason as 
 sured her scornfully; "I saw one of the 
 hyenas through a crack when they went 
 by." 
 
 "Look!" said Peter Bailey. "Here 
 comes the steam calli-ope!" 
 
 Sure enough, there it was. A man in 
 overalls was energetically shovelling coal 
 into the boiler, and a charming lady with 
 very pink cheeks sat at the keys. As the 
 thing came opposite us, she began to play, 
 and every ear in the vicinity was split 
 as with ten thousand steam whistles hoot 
 ing out "Climbing Up Dem Golden 
 Stairs." The noise was deafening, and 
 each boy of us resolved that if he ever 
 
152 The Believing Years 
 
 became rich, the first thing he would buy 
 would be one of those delightful contriv 
 ances. Then he had only to hire a man 
 to shovel coal into it, and he might sit 
 all day and dispense music for miles in 
 every direction. 
 
 The calliope passed, as all beautiful 
 things do, and our attention was dis 
 tracted by a herd of elephants, who 
 slouched along, dusty and morose. Then 
 came some more carts of animals, and 
 then a brilliant zebra led by a boy in a 
 red coat. 
 
 This boy looked up at us, grinned joy 
 fully, and waved his hand. 
 
 "Why, it s Horace Winslow!" some 
 one exclaimed. 
 
 It was indeed Horace. The red coat 
 was evidently intended for a fair-sized 
 man, for it hung below Horace s knees 
 and gave him the appearance of wearing 
 a single garment like a tunic. On his 
 
Up Like a Rocket 153 
 
 head was rakishly perched a small red 
 cap, similar to those affected by the 
 monkeys who travel with hand-organs. 
 Horace s face was warm and perspiring, 
 and a good deal of dust, aroused by the 
 elephants and the carts, had adhered to 
 it. But it was plainly the supreme 
 moment of his life, and no fussy consid 
 erations of cleanliness annoyed him in 
 the least. Was he not a feature in a 
 genuine circus procession, marching with 
 the clown, with real elephants, and lead 
 ing a proud and striped zebra with his 
 own hand ? 
 
 He grinned again, and waved his hand 
 to us once more. We were petrified with 
 amazement and envy. At that moment 
 Mr. Vincent, cool and placid in seersucker 
 clothes, stepped out of the bank. He 
 was going down the street on some busi 
 ness errand, and he paused for a moment 
 and gazed indulgently at the procession. 
 
154 The Believing Years 
 
 "There s Horace, Mr. Vincent!" we 
 all shouted. 
 
 We were determined that he should 
 know of this honor that had come upon 
 his family. It was a fine thing to be 
 cashier of the Merrimack Bank, the 
 trusted guardian of thousands of dollars, 
 but was not this mere dust and ashes 
 compared with leading a zebra in a circus 
 procession ? If each generation of his 
 family were to rise in this manner, where 
 might they not end ? 
 
 Mr. Vincent smiled at us, and said : 
 "What?" 
 
 "There s Horace!" we all screamed, 
 pointing our fingers ; "don t you see him ? 
 Leading the zebra !" 
 
 By this time Mr. Vincent had adjusted 
 his eye-glasses, and as he looked in the 
 direction of his glorified nephew, that 
 personage turned around for one final 
 grin and wave of the hand. The change 
 
Up Like a Rocket 155 
 
 in expression on the visage of the bank- 
 cashier was extraordinary. From mild 
 benignity it turned to purple-faced con 
 sternation. 
 
 "What?" he gasped; "what? My 
 Horace?" 
 
 Then he descended the steps swiftly, 
 and plunged into the crowd on the side 
 walk. Apparently he was bent on over 
 taking his nephew, but the throng blocked 
 his way, and Horace had turned the 
 corner of the next street before his uncle 
 could reach him. 
 
 Ed Mason and I did not waste time 
 watching him, for we were discussing 
 a plan. It seemed to promise success, 
 and we only waited for the end of the 
 procession to pass before putting it into 
 operation. Then we detached ourselves 
 from the others, and hastened through 
 Main Street to HaskelPs Field, where the 
 tents were pitched for the great show in 
 
156 The Believing Years 
 
 the afternoon. The field was nearly 
 a mile distant, and the leaders of the 
 procession had already begun to arrive 
 when we got there. We wormed our 
 selves in between carts and piles of hay, 
 amongst horses, venders of lemonade and 
 peanuts, and dozens of boys and men. 
 Horace and his zebra soon arrived and 
 we sought him out in the crowd. 
 
 "I came out here at five o clock this 
 morning," said he, "an I helped bring 
 water for the ellerphants, an hay for 
 the horses, an then that man over there 
 who took the zebra gave me five cents, 
 an said if I d lead the zebra in the parade 
 he d give me a free ticket for the show 
 this afternoon. Tommy Cheney got in 
 side an helped a man feed the kanga 
 roos, an " 
 
 "Do you s pose we can water the eller 
 phants or anything?" 
 
 " I dunno ; it s nearly twelve o clock 
 
Up Like a Rocket 157 
 
 now, ain t it ? I ve got to go home an 
 get dinner so s to be back here at one, if 
 that man should want anything more, 
 an you can come back with me then, 
 if you want to, an p r aps you can do 
 something an get a ticket." 
 
 We wanted no other invitation than 
 this. We went back to town with Horace, 
 determined to follow his plan. Like 
 him we would demand our dinners early, 
 and return to the circus field at one 
 o clock, under his guidance. Doubtless 
 his influence with the zebra man would 
 be all that was needed. 
 
 Horace had given over the red coat 
 and hat (but not the dust on his face) 
 to the circus men, and he arrived excited 
 and dishevelled at his uncle s house. 
 He left us at the gate, but we paused an 
 instant, for Mrs. Vincent stood on the 
 veranda to welcome him. 
 
 "I want dinner right away, Aunt, 
 
158 The Believing Years 
 
 cos I ve got to get back to the circus 
 by one o clock, an " 
 
 "Horace Winslow, you come into the 
 house this instant, and take off every 
 stitch, and get into the bath-tub. Look 
 at your face ! Get up to the bath-room, 
 quick! The tub is all filled " 
 
 "Oh, Aunt, I can t stop to fool with 
 taking baths, I want dinner, cos I ve 
 got to get back there at one o clock." 
 
 "Get back there indeed ! Not one 
 step out of this house do you go this 
 afternoon. Take off your jacket before 
 you come into the house, did you 
 have it on under that horrible red 
 thing ? Give it to me, it s going to 
 be burned up as quick as I can do it. 
 Quick!" 
 
 "Oh, Aunt, I ve promised the zebra 
 trainer to be back there, why they re 
 dependin on me! I ve got " 
 
 "Not one step ! Do you hear ? Now, 
 
Up Like a Rocket 159 
 
 upstairs with you, and into that bath 
 tub !" 
 
 Horace vanished into the house, fol 
 lowed by his aunt. Ed Mason and I 
 looked disconsolately at each other, and 
 started wearily toward our homes. If 
 any one s influence were going to admit 
 us to the circus, it was not Horace Wins- 
 low s. 
 
 In the parade he had flashed before 
 our eyes like a rocket, and his descent 
 from glory had been as sudden as the 
 stick. He had declined in power; from 
 a magnificent zebra leader he had be 
 come an insignificant atom in a bath-tub. 
 Even before we were out of hearing he 
 uttered a loud howl. 
 
 And this was followed by a monitory 
 voice : 
 
 " Horace I" 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 SUSY 
 
 WE passed the afternoon gloomily. 
 There seemed to be no use in returning 
 to the circus field without the once in 
 fluential Horace. Except for him, we 
 appeared to be almost the only persons 
 who had not gone to the circus. 
 
 Horace, we presumed, would have to 
 spend the whole afternoon in that bath 
 tub. We could imagine his misery. 
 
 The hours wore on, somehow, and 
 about five o clock the fortunate ones 
 began to return. We saw a group of them 
 go into the Carters side yard, and so Ed 
 and I strolled over there to increase our 
 suffering by hearing them recount what 
 they had seen. 
 
 160 
 
Susy 161 
 
 Seven or eight boys and girls were sit 
 ting on the steps of the veranda. Both 
 the Carters were there, and Harry Fletcher, 
 Susy and Minnie Kittredge, Ed Mason s 
 sister Florence, and one or two others. 
 Flossie Mason, being fifteen and grown 
 up, had not been to the afternoon per 
 formance, she was going in the even 
 ing with her mother. 
 
 The eyes of all of them were still wide 
 open, for in their vision mingled strange 
 animals, galloping horses, and tumbling 
 clowns, while the fascinating odors of 
 trampled grass, freshly turned earth, 
 sawdust, pop-corn, and rubber balloons 
 lingered in their nostrils. 
 
 Susy Kittredge, of course, was talking. 
 She was beginning, in retrospect, her tour 
 of the tents. 
 
 "An it rained just before we got to 
 the circus, an the rain went through 
 the tent an washed the stripes all off 
 
1 62 The Believing Years 
 
 the zebra an he was all pinky-streaked, 
 an Dan Rolfe said he wasn t nothin 
 underneath but just a donkey, an " 
 
 "Don t say wasn t nothin , Susy," 
 said Susy s older sister, Minnie. 
 
 Minnie was a prim little girl, with black 
 hair parted in the middle, and drawn 
 into two tight pig-tails. 
 
 "Well, he wasn t," retorted Susy ; "an 
 there were puddles of pink paint all round 
 his feet where the paint washed off, an 
 Rob Currier touched him, an got the end 
 of his finger all red, an Louise Mason 
 said it was zebra blood an it s deadly 
 poison an Rob ll have fits an die!" 
 
 Susy opened her eyes still wider, and 
 regarded us all with the pleasant feeling 
 that accompanies the disclosure of hor 
 rible news. 
 
 "There were a lot of real donkeys next 
 to the zebra, an one of em had on the 
 saddle that the monkey rode on in the 
 
Susy 163 
 
 precession, an he rode him again in 
 the race, too, an next to them was a 
 antelope in a cage, an then a ger-noo " 
 
 "A what ?" inquired Ed Mason, in a 
 tone of deep scorn. 
 
 "A ger-noo," said Susy; "but he was 
 asleep " 
 
 "That ain t ger-noo," Ed returned, 
 "it s noo, just like that." 
 
 "It isn t ! It said Ger-noo or Horned 
 Horse right on the cage. I guess I saw 
 it, Ed Mason, and you weren t there, 
 so what do you know bout it ?" 
 
 "I don t care," replied Ed, doggedly, 
 " tain t ger-noo. " 
 
 Susy puckered up her face and seemed 
 about to cry, but Flossie Mason remarked 
 hurriedly: "Never mind, Susy. What 
 was in the next cage ?" 
 
 "Oh, there was " and then Susy s 
 mind jumped ahead "there was a 
 countryman with a big umbreller ari just 
 
164 The Believing Years 
 
 as the lady was goin to dive into the 
 water he came along right in front of us 
 an said he d give any one three cents for 
 a seat, but of course no one would give 
 him a seat, cos they cost seventy-five 
 cents, an he got into a fight with an 
 other countryman who was sittin in the 
 front row, an tried to pull him out of his 
 seat, an a great, big, fat p liceman came 
 runnin an tried to arrest em both, an 
 they grabbed him an pulled him over 
 to the tank, an all three of em fell into 
 the water, an the tank was all full of 
 em, swimmin round, an they had to 
 stop the circus an get em out!" 
 
 Susy stopped for breath, and Ed 
 Mason found time to ejaculate: 
 
 "Hoh ! that was all made up ! They 
 were clowns, all of em !" 
 
 "They were not clowns. They were 
 dressed up just like men!" 
 
 "That s all right," I put in, "they were 
 
Susy 165 
 
 clowns just the same. They go round 
 with the circus doin that. I saw em 
 do somethin like that last summer, only 
 there wasn t but one countryman, an 
 they drove em off in a wagon with 
 donkeys." 
 
 "They weren t clowns !" Susy stamped 
 her foot. " Clowns have white faces, 
 an funny clothes, an there were two 
 real clowns helpin get these men out, 
 they stopped bein funny an were awful 
 scared cos the p liceman couldn t swim, 
 an he floated round on top of the water, 
 an when he got hold of the rope he was 
 so heavy the clowns couldn t pull him 
 out an they fell in, too." 
 
 "That s so," said Charley Carter, with 
 a serious countenance, as he recalled the 
 catastrophe ; "an a man that sat in front 
 of me said he knew the first countryman, 
 the one with the umbreller he lives 
 over in Rowley." 
 
1 66 The Believing Years 
 
 There was a ring of truth about this 
 which made Ed and me subside, and as 
 Charley Carter had attracted the at 
 tention of the assemblage, he tried to 
 hold the floor. 
 
 "When they got the perliceman out " 
 But Susy had no intention to let any one 
 else tell the story. She took it up at that 
 point. 
 
 " he was all drownded, an they put 
 him down on the ground, an begun to 
 roll him round, an one of the country 
 men went an got a big pop-squirt, oh, 
 ten times bigger than any you ever saw, 
 an filled it with water, an squirted it 
 right in the p liceman s face, an that 
 made him mad, an he jumped up an 
 chased the countryman round the tent 
 with his stick, an at last the countryman 
 ran out through the place where the 
 horses an riders come in, an I don t 
 know whether he caught him or not." 
 
Susy 167 
 
 "What did the other countryman do ?" 
 asked Flossie Mason. 
 
 "I don t know; the chariots came by 
 then, an I didn t see em after that." 
 
 Joe Carter then made his first offering 
 to the conversation. 
 
 "Ben Spaulding drank eight glasses of 
 lemonade, four pink and four yellow." 
 
 The irrelevance of this bit of gossip 
 did not make it any the less interesting 
 to us. Instead, it gave Susy a chance to 
 play once more her favorite role of proph 
 etess of woe. 
 
 "Pink lemonade s made of coachyneel, 
 an that s deadly poison. My mother 
 knew a boy that drank pink lemonade an 
 died of it." 
 
 "I don t believe it," put in Harry 
 Fletcher. 
 
 And he added, in a tremulous tone : 
 "I drank two glasses of it." 
 
 We all turned and looked at Harry, 
 
1 68 The Believing Years 
 
 as at one who would not long be with 
 us. 
 
 "How do you feel?" asked the elder 
 Carter. 
 
 "All right," replied Harry; but he 
 had a sickly expression about the mouth. 
 He turned a little aside, and did not seem 
 to take any further interest in the con 
 versation. 
 
 "I gave two bars of pop-corn to the 
 ellerphants," announced Susy, "but I 
 don t like em very well. They re all 
 covered with dust an they curl their 
 trunks at you. I " 
 
 "An elephant s trunk is called his 
 bosphorus," said Minnie, anxious to 
 grace the occasion by a little learning. 
 
 And she added : "My teacher told me 
 
 so." 
 
 "I just threw the corn at em," con 
 tinued Susy, "an they picked it up out 
 of the hay. One of em held up his trunk, 
 
Susy 169 
 
 an his mouth was right under it, an a 
 man threw peanuts into his mouth, an 
 the ellerphant stood that way an let 
 the man throw peanuts at him ever so 
 long, an we had to go away then, cos 
 the show was goin to begin." 
 
 "You have to be careful of elephants," 
 said Minnie. "Last year there was an 
 elephant in the circus, an he had 
 whiskers on his trunk, an Billy Mason 
 pulled em, an the elephant didn t say 
 anything, an didn t do anything for two 
 or three minutes, an then just as Billy 
 was starting to go he swung his trunk 
 round an if Billy hadn t dodged quick 
 the elephant would have killed him. 
 An there was a man there an he said 
 that if that elephant ever sees Billy 
 again, even if it s a hundred years from 
 now, he ll remember him, an he ll try 
 to hit him again with his trunk." 
 
 Cheerful Susy instantly remarked: 
 
1 70 The Believing Years 
 
 "Billy s goin to the circus to-night. Do 
 you s pose that ellerphant will be there ?" 
 
 Billy s sister tried to take a hopeful 
 view. 
 
 "Oh, this is another circus, tisn t 
 the same one that was here last sum 
 
 mer." 
 
 But nothing could discourage Susy. 
 
 " Perhaps they ve swapped ellerphants," 
 she suggested. 
 
 Harry Fletcher rose from the steps at 
 this moment, and observed in a shaky 
 voice, that he guessed he would go home. 
 He walked up the garden path with rather 
 feeble steps. We watched him, awe 
 struck. 
 
 "Perhaps it s the coachyneel in his 
 insides," whispered Susy. 
 
 We pondered over this suggestion for 
 a few moments, and it certainly seemed 
 reasonable. When Harry disappeared 
 down the street, walking slowly, and 
 
Susy 171 
 
 holding to the fence, we decided that it 
 was only a question of a few hours with 
 him. The incident cast a gloom over us, 
 which was not dispelled until Joe Carter 
 said : 
 
 "Did you go to the side-show?" 
 
 "No," answered Susy; "my mother 
 says side-shows are horrid." 
 
 "They ain t. This was great. There 
 was a lady without any body, just 
 head and shoulders sitting in a glass plate, 
 an there was a man that would let you 
 stick pins in him, an there were some 
 grave-robbing hyenas " 
 
 "Poo !" said Susy, "I saw some hyenas 
 in the animal tent, an we stayed to the 
 
 concert an " 
 
 "Yes, I know," persisted Joe Carter, 
 "but those hyenas in the animal tent 
 weren t grave-robbing ones. Now these, 
 " and he entered into some grewsome 
 details about the hyenas that made Susy 
 
172 The Believing Years 
 
 regretfully admit that the side-show must 
 have had its good points. 
 
 "But there was a sea-lion," she re 
 flected, "havin his supper when we came 
 out of the concert, an he sat up on a 
 board, an the man tossed him fish, an 
 he roared lots louder than the lions, an 
 we saw the giraffes " 
 
 "That s nothin " said Joe; "so did I." 
 
 Susy paid no attention, she was in 
 full swing of narration. 
 
 "An there was a Happy Fam ly of a 
 monkey, an a armadillo, an a dog, an 
 a kangaroo, an a porcupine, all livin 
 together in one cage, an when the monkey 
 would try to tease the kangaroo, he d 
 just roll himself up in a ball an " 
 
 "Who would ?" interrupted Ed Mason. 
 
 "The kangaroo, course just like the 
 picture of South America in the geog 
 raphy." 
 
 But the cynic voice of Mason was not 
 stilled. 
 
Susy 173 
 
 "Kangaroos don t roll themselves up in 
 balls." 
 
 "This one did." 
 
 "No ; that was the armadillo you were 
 lookin at." 
 
 "My mother said it was a kangaroo, 
 an it was a kangaroo, an you d better 
 keep quiet an leave me alone, I guess 
 my mother knows more n you do about 
 
 it. 
 
 Ed sulkily muttered: " Twa n t a 
 kangaroo," but Susy went on with her 
 catalogue of beasts. 
 
 "There was a bore-constrictor there 
 that can crush eight men at once, 
 one of the circus men told my mother 
 so, an she said, C I should think you d 
 be afraid he might get out, he could 
 squeeze through the bars, couldn t he? 
 And the man said he was scared for his 
 life all the time. The bore-constrictor 
 did get out up in Lynn." 
 
174 The Believing Years 
 
 "Did he crush eight men ?" two or 
 three of us asked at once. 
 
 "No; they lassoed him. But he may 
 get out again any time. An there was 
 a hipperpottermus that you couldn t 
 see, except one eye, cos he kept down 
 in a tank of water, an he was horrid, 
 an, oh ! I forgot ! Alice Remick had on 
 a new dress an she went to give an eller- 
 phant a cookie, an the ellerphant switched 
 up his trunk and spattered her with mud so 
 it spoiled her dress, an she got both eyes 
 stuck up with mud so she couldn t see, 
 an she cried so her father had to go right 
 home without seein any more of the 
 circus, an " 
 
 "Did one of the elephants come in and 
 ride round on a big velocipede?" de 
 manded Ed Mason. 
 
 "No," said Susy; "but" 
 
 "Did the seals play on drums, an 
 cymbals, an sing?" he persisted. 
 
Susy 175 
 
 "No; but they" 
 
 "Oh, well," replied Ed, "they did at 
 the circus last year. An this circus only 
 had ten elephants. Last year they had 
 fourteen. An last year they had a Black 
 Tent of Myst ries, too. I don t b lieve 
 this was much of a circus !" 
 
 With this remark we both thought we 
 might effectively take leave. We de 
 parted together, and as we left the garden 
 we could still hear the shrill tones of 
 Susy : 
 
 " an there was an ejjicated pig 
 that sat up in a chair with a ruffle round 
 his neck, an they said he could read, 
 but he didn t, an one man fell out of that 
 swing, an we thought he was goin to get 
 killed, but he fell in a net an jumped up 
 an kissed his hand, but my mother says 
 they do get killed, often, an there was 
 a cinnamon bear " 
 
 As we walked by my house Ed Mason 
 repeated his remark : 
 
176 The Believing Years 
 
 "I don t b lieve twas much of a circus." 
 
 My father looked suddenly over a hedge 
 and said: "Then you couldn t arrange 
 to go with me this evening?" 
 
 We both jumped. We were startled 
 at his voice, and there was also something 
 in what he said that seemed to make the 
 sun burst out of the clouds. 
 
 Perhaps it was not well to judge the 
 circus without seeing it. 
 
 "Because I am going," he continued, 
 "and I should be glad of your company, 
 unless, of course, you are leaving for 
 Omaha?" 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 ARMA PUERUMQUE CANO 
 
 IN the warfare that raged through the 
 neighborhood it invariably fell on Ed 
 Mason and me to support lost causes. 
 
 As the two smallest, we were told off 
 to represent the English at Bunker Hill. 
 It was a revised and thoroughly patriotic 
 Bunker Hill, for the English never 
 reached the top, but had to retreat under 
 a galling fire of green apples. 
 
 As Confederates, we dashed boldly 
 but ineffectually across the valley at 
 Gettysburg. 
 
 When the honor of the Old Guard at 
 Waterloo was in our keeping, we did not 
 die, but we did surrender ignominiously, 
 
 N 177 
 
178 The Believing Years 
 
 and were locked up in a box-stall in Peter 
 Bailey s father s stable. 
 
 After that, the allied forces, consisting 
 of Peter, Rob Currier, Joe and Charley 
 Carter, and Horace Winslow, basely with 
 drew to inspect Auntie Merrill s pears 
 (which were nearly ripe) and left us 
 Napoleonic veterans to wither in captivity. 
 
 It was not only in struggles among 
 ourselves that we had to drink of the 
 bitter cup of defeat. When we banded 
 together against the common enemy, 
 things were not much better. Take, 
 for instance, the time when Peter Bailey 
 decided to turn the stable into a police 
 station. The stalls suggested cells (there 
 were no horses kept in them), and the 
 success with which the Old Guard had 
 been imprisoned after their crushing de 
 feat at Waterloo, showed the desirability 
 of more captives. 
 
 At first things took their usual course. 
 
Arma Puerumque Cano 179 
 
 Ed Mason and I were informed that we 
 were a gang of cutthroats, burglars, high 
 way robbers, pickpockets, counterfeiters, 
 and other kinds of ruffians, and bade to 
 sneak about the streets. We were warned 
 not to run too fast when the police 
 approached to arrest us, and told that it 
 was "no fair" to make any determined 
 resistance. 
 
 When Peter Bailey, Rob Currier, and 
 the others dashed out of the stable, clad 
 (in their own estimation) in blue coats 
 and brass buttons, we were to submit to 
 arrest ad libitum. 
 
 But after we had been dragged in and 
 confined in cells a dozen or twenty times, 
 it began to pall, even on the policemen. 
 
 It had long ago become sickeningly 
 familiar to us. 
 
 To give the thing variety, new victims 
 must be found. We were weary of the 
 business and had ceased to feel any ter- 
 
i So The Believing Years 
 
 TOT at the prospect of confinement. We 
 never served terms longer than thirty 
 seconds, for we had to be released im 
 mediately in order to be arrested once 
 more. With only two criminals in the 
 world, the policeman s lot became a 
 tedious one. Both prisoners and police 
 felt that unless something happened the 
 stable could no longer a prison make, 
 nor wooden stalls a cage. 
 
 Peter proposed to reform the whole 
 thing. He boldly suggested that we go 
 outside our own circles and arrest the 
 Irish boys, those who went in the 
 winter to the parochial school. It would 
 have to be done with all the majesty of the 
 law, and that required a billy for each 
 policeman. 
 
 These were duly made out of broom 
 sticks. With great pains a hole was 
 burned through the top of each with a 
 red-hot poker. Then a cord was passed 
 
Arma Puerumque Cano 181 
 
 through the hole, so the billy might be 
 dangled and swung. 
 
 We were now ready for the prisoners, 
 and our first campaign was all that the 
 heart could wish. We waylaid a group 
 of boys, and, without much struggle, 
 soon had a prisoner in each cell. After 
 a little we let them go. 
 
 They hurried off, remarking that they 
 would get even with us. 
 
 These wholesale arrests were continued 
 for two or three days, and all went happily. 
 It was not until a week afterward that 
 the reckoning came. Then a crowd of 
 the outraged prisoners found Ed Mason 
 and me alone, fell upon us, and beat us 
 full sore. Without the whole force of 
 police our authority had waned, and 
 once again it became apparent that hu 
 miliation was ever our fortune in feats 
 of arms. 
 
 It was this last straw that led to our 
 
1 82 The Believing Years 
 
 singular revolt on the day of the famous 
 cowboy and Indian raid. We outraged 
 all the proprieties, turned against the 
 white man, and showed a criminal dis 
 regard for the cause of civilization. But 
 for once victory rested with us. We 
 plucked success out of failure, and found 
 that it was good. When we had it, we 
 declined to let it go. Force of arms had 
 decided the issue, and we accepted its 
 arbitrament. Argument could not move 
 us. The worm turned, and the turning 
 of him was terrible. 
 
 A hot and languorous day in August 
 saw the great battle of redskins and pale 
 faces. Nothing in the weather stirred us 
 to mighty deeds. The long afternoon 
 had dragged on to half-past four. For 
 two hours we had roamed the street, the 
 gardens, and back yards. A dulness 
 settled over things. The phoebe-bird who 
 sat on Mr. Hawkins s woodshed reit- 
 
Arma Puerumque Cano 183 
 
 crated his dismal note, as though the 
 weariness of the dog-days had entered 
 his very soul. 
 
 " Phe-e-e be-e-e-e," he remarked, 
 with that falling inflection on the last 
 syllable that would dampen the spirits 
 of a circus clown. 
 
 " Phe-e-e be-e-e." 
 
 Mr. Hawkins himself leaned over his 
 gate and smoked his pipe. An ice-cart 
 came lumbering down the street. That, 
 at least, was interesting. We hurried to 
 meet it, and each possessed himself of a 
 lump of ice. Then we perched, some on 
 my fence and some on the blue box that 
 held the garden hose. We removed the 
 straw and sawdust from the ice, and 
 began to suck it. 
 
 Mr. Hawkins, having taken his clay 
 pipe from his mouth, engaged in a con 
 versation with the driver of the ice-cart 
 on the prospects of rain. We watched 
 
184 The Believing Years 
 
 them languidly. They debated the ques 
 tion at length, until the dripping water 
 from the ice-cart had formed three dark 
 spots in the dusty street. 
 
 Peter Bailey said : "Let s go up to 
 Davenport s and see if the raft is there." 
 
 Davenport s was a general term used 
 to describe a field, and a pond in that 
 field. The pond was a small affair, with 
 no large amount of water, but a great 
 deal of black mud. It was not without 
 certain tremendous fascinations, how 
 ever, for we believed that in one place it 
 had no bottom. 
 
 Moreover, leeches abounded. 
 
 Few, if any of us, had ever seen a leech ; 
 but we were aware that if one of them 
 attached himself to the human body, no 
 power under Heaven could drag him off, 
 and he would not stop his infernal work 
 until he had drained away every drop of 
 blood. 
 
Arma Puerumque Cano 185 
 
 Ed Mason and I had other reasons 
 than the leeches for not wanting to ex 
 periment with the raft at Davenport s. 
 Only a week before we had been cap 
 sized from that raft. We had not found 
 the bottomless spot, nor been attacked 
 by leeches ; but we had crawled ashore 
 in such a condition of muddiness that our 
 reception at our respective homes had 
 been depressing. Davenport s could get 
 along without us for a while. 
 
 Peter s suggestion fell flat. Just then 
 Charley Carter caught sight of a spare 
 piece of clothes-line in my side yard. He 
 ran and seized it, shouting "Lassos!" 
 
 It was a happy idea. The boundless 
 West, the prairies, herds of buffaloes, 
 roving Indians, cowboys these were 
 the visions that excited us in an instant, 
 especially the cowboys. 
 
 What a life is theirs to gallop for 
 ever with cracking revolvers and whirling 
 
1 86 The Believing Years 
 
 lassos ; to capture the mighty buffalo, 
 and bring down the hated Indian ! 
 
 Why should we not do that ? 
 
 Mr. Hawkins, next door, might con 
 tinue to smoke his pipe to the monoto 
 nous song of the phoebe. For us, the 
 career of danger far beyond the Missis 
 sippi ; the life that knows no fear on the 
 wind-swept prairie ! 
 
 A lack of any more rope in my yard, 
 and my firm refusal to have the clothes 
 lines cut down entire, made us depart to 
 Bailey s stable, where desperate enter 
 prises were set on foot. 
 
 We made the lassos and drew upon 
 our armory for wooden revolvers. These 
 are thoroughly satisfactory weapons if 
 you wave them in the air and shout 
 "Bang!" at frequent intervals. 
 
 But immediately Peter Bailey s genius 
 for military organization asserted itself. 
 He and Rob Currier, the two Carters, 
 
Arma Puerumque Cano 187 
 
 and Horace Winslow would be the cow 
 boys. The hostile Indians must be im 
 personated, of course, by Ed Mason and 
 myself. What was the sense of having 
 cowboys without Indians for them to 
 destroy ? 
 
 So we should have no lassos, nor yet 
 revolvers, but only tomahawks. 
 
 Right here I drew the line. 
 
 Ed backed me up, and we announced 
 our ultimatum. Indians we would be, 
 and lassoless we would go, but to ask us 
 to refrain from carrying revolvers was 
 demanding too much. We stuck out for 
 revolvers, and intimated that a refusal 
 would cause us to withdraw from all 
 operations that afternoon. 
 
 So the concession was made. 
 
 Even then we knew that the adventure 
 could end in only one fashion. We 
 should be chased, hunted down, shot, 
 lassoed, scalped, and finally burned at the 
 
1 88 The Believing Years 
 
 stake, during an imposing war-dance ; 
 for these cowboys were fully enamored 
 of Indian methods of warfare when turned 
 against the Indians themselves. 
 
 We were to belong to a dangerous tribe, 
 recently discovered by Peter Bailey, and 
 called Sigh-ux. We agreed to start on 
 our barbaric career from the stable. 
 From there to the street corner we should 
 have full license to pillage and destroy. 
 In order to give the avenging cowboys 
 due provocation, we were to commit cer 
 tain outrages on the way. These might 
 include burning down the Universalist 
 Church on the corner and ringing the 
 door-bell at Miss Whipple s private 
 school. 
 
 Once we had turned into Oak Street, 
 where I lived, we would have to look to 
 our safety. The cowboys would be on 
 our track. 
 
 So off we went. 
 
Arma Puerumque Cano 189 
 
 In a few moments, ignited by shots 
 from our revolvers, the Universalist 
 Church was wrapped in flames. We 
 rang Miss Whipple s door-bell, and, as an 
 additional atrocity, threatened her cat 
 with tomahawks. Then we turned up 
 Oak Street, and knew in a moment, by 
 the yells that arose, that the cowboys 
 had burst out of their encampment and 
 were after us. 
 
 I suppose Ed shared my feelings of 
 despair as we ran up the street. The 
 youngest cowboy was two years older 
 than either of us ; they were all swifter 
 runners, and they outnumbered us by 
 three. In a few moments it would all 
 be over. Our brief season of bloodshed 
 and destruction was past, and it now 
 only remained for us to be slaughtered 
 at the cowboys will. 
 
 It was so tiresome ! 
 
 Our defeats at Bunker Hill, at Gettys- 
 
190 The Believing Years 
 
 burg, at Waterloo, and on countless other 
 stricken fields recurred to us as we panted 
 along. If we could only turn the tables 
 in some way ! 
 
 Instinctively we hurried toward the 
 side yard of my house, climbed the fence, 
 and tumbled over. We landed on the 
 blue box that held the garden hose. The 
 cowboys were approaching rapidly, with 
 loud cries and much banging of revolvers. 
 Already Horace Winslow was shouting 
 that he had shot me five times, and that 
 I must fall dead instantly. In a moment, 
 we knew, they would be over the fence 
 after us. 
 
 Moved by the same thought, we opened 
 the blue box. The hose was connected 
 with the tap at the side of the house. 
 Ed turned the tap, while I, standing on 
 the edge of the box and looking over the 
 fence into the street, swept the road with 
 a stream of cold water. 
 
Arma Puerumque Cano 191 
 
 Horace stopped abruptly in his rush 
 toward the fence, and Joe Carter, who 
 had halted about thirty feet away to 
 pour a volley of bullets after us, executed 
 a swift movement to the rear. 
 
 The others paused where they were. 
 Tomahawks, scalping-knives, spears, and 
 revolvers none of these would have 
 checked the bold cowboys for a moment ; 
 but this stream of water was another 
 matter. 
 
 It does not do for any cowboy, how 
 ever desperate, to go home to his parents 
 with his clothes soaking wet. Such 
 events often mean an enforced retirement 
 for a day from the field of glory. 
 
 "Whatcher doing?" screamed Peter 
 Bailey. "That ain t fair !" 
 
 We felt that he was right. This gar 
 den hose suddenly springing out of the 
 Western prairie was a false note. Ar 
 tistically it jarred. It was like bringing 
 a school-teacher into fairyland. 
 
192 The Believing Years 
 
 But we did not stop the stream. For 
 once we saw the militant Peter, his fear 
 less lieutenant, Rob Currier, and all the 
 rest of the ever victorious army held in 
 check. No feeling that we were violating 
 the fitness of things could detract from 
 the sweetness of the moment. If eternal 
 defeat had not embittered us in the past, 
 we might have been more artistic and 
 less human on this occasion. But in an 
 instant, and as by direct intervention of 
 the gods, our retreat had been turned into 
 triumph, and that we did not intend to 
 relinquish. 
 
 Woe, woe, to the vanquished ! 
 
 "Aw, that s a great thing to do!" 
 sneered Rob Currier. 
 
 "You can t do it !" shouted Joe Carter 
 in a state of great excitement ; "Indians 
 don t have hose !" 
 
 "That s all right," I replied, "these 
 Indians have got some. They got it 
 
Arma Puerumque Cano 193 
 
 from a settler s cabin, or or or some 
 how. Anyhow, they ve got it." 
 
 "But tain t fair," reiterated Peter 
 Bailey. 
 
 " Tain t fair for five of you to be al 
 ways masserkerin us," remarked my 
 fellow Indian. 
 
 Peter was disposed to bitterness. He 
 did not enjoy having his military plans 
 frustrated in such a manner. 
 
 "You re only a couple of babies, 
 you re afraid to be masserkered," he said. 
 
 Naturally, the babies invited him to 
 come right on and do his massacring. 
 
 "I will, if you ll turn off that hose, I 
 don t want to get all wet." 
 
 "Course we won t turn it off, an if 
 you re afraid to come, why, you re beaten, 
 an you must surrender, an be toma 
 hawked, an burned at the stake, an have 
 blazin pine splinters stuck in your flesh. 
 Will you do it?" 
 
194 The Believing Years 
 
 They firmly declined to become parties 
 to any such attractive proceedings. 
 
 "Come on," said Joe Carter; "let em 
 stay there and play with the hose. They 
 don t know how to be Indians, anyway. 
 We ll go back to the barn, and lasso buf 
 faloes." 
 
 "Come on," said Peter, and the whole 
 band of cowboys departed. 
 
 Then the victorious Indians, the two 
 triumphant Sigh-ux, danced a short war- 
 dance, and whooped two or three war- 
 whoops, so loud that Mr. Hawkins 
 opened his gate, and came out to the 
 sidewalk to see what was the matter. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 WHEN MY SHIP COMES IN 
 
 ABOUT the middle of the month my 
 family went to spend a week or two in a 
 cottage at a neighboring beach. I en 
 joyed being at the sea-side, but I was hard 
 up for playmates. For a few days there 
 was a boy in the cottage next ours, and 
 he spent most of his time riding around 
 the veranda on a velocipede. 
 
 This made me feel that I needed a 
 velocipede, too, and I suggested to my 
 father that he supply my lack. 
 
 "You shall have one," he said, 
 "when my ship comes in." 
 
 I had never heard of the ship before 
 had never known that my father owned 
 so much as a rowboat. But he had said 
 195 
 
196 The Believing Years 
 
 it himself I was to have a velocipede 
 "when his ship came in." I tried to find 
 out how soon he expected her, and where 
 she was coming from. But he was hurry 
 ing away to take the train which carried 
 him each day to the city, and I could 
 get no particulars about his ship. He 
 laughed, waved his hand, and was gone. 
 
 This left me rather dissatisfied, but I 
 reflected, as I strolled around the veranda, 
 that it was a good thing I had heard about 
 this ship while we were living at the sea 
 shore. At home there was less opportu 
 nity to watch for ships. Here I saw 
 dozens of them every day. Sometimes 
 there would not be one in sight when I 
 went to bed, but in the morning seven 
 or eight would ride at anchor a mile 
 or more from the beach. 
 
 Great steamers passed along, leaving 
 a trail of smoke behind, and once or twice 
 I had seen dainty yachts, glittering with 
 
When My Ship Comes In 197 
 
 white paint and polished brass. Then 
 heavy barges would go slowly by, pulled 
 by puffing tugs. I had been told that 
 they were loaded with coal, and I hoped 
 that my father s ship was not one of 
 them. If there was a velocipede for me 
 on a barge, it would get black and sooty. 
 I much preferred to have it come by one 
 of the yachts or, wait a moment 
 once there had swept by a fine three- 
 masted schooner, her hull painted white 
 and all her sails set. She was a beauty, 
 and she looked big enough to sail around, 
 the world by herself. The yachts could 
 hardly do that. 
 
 I decided that I would rather have my 
 father s ship turn out to be a schooner 
 like that white one. 
 
 By the time I had reached this decision 
 I had come to the water s edge. It was 
 a warm morning, and the sun, three or 
 four hours high, sparkled on the ocean. 
 
198 The Believing Years 
 
 The waves broke, ran hissing up the 
 beach, and retreated, leaving hundreds 
 of little bubbling holes in the sand. I 
 knew these holes they were the 
 dwellings of sand-fleas, who now were 
 in a fair way of getting drowned out. 
 
 Farther up the beach, out of danger 
 from the waves, I came upon a large sand- 
 flea hopping along energetically. I sat 
 down to head him off, and find what he 
 was about. With his hard-shelled and 
 rounded back he looked like a small 
 model of some prehistoric and armored 
 monster only he had two very mild 
 blue eyes. As soon as I tried to intercept 
 him with a piece of dried marsh-grass he 
 put his head down and dug so vigorously 
 that he was soon covered with sand. 
 
 His disappearance left me alone. It 
 was a lonely place, that beach, for the 
 peanut-man and the merry-go-round 
 had not discovered it, and its only in- 
 
When My Ship Comes In 199 
 
 habitants were a few cottagers, like our 
 family, and the fishermen. 
 
 But I did not miss the crowd. A few 
 minutes walk farther down the beach 
 brought me to a point of sand that ran 
 out into the ocean for fifty or sixty yards 
 at low tide. At the end it curved around 
 and enclosed a small salt-water pond. 
 
 This was an enchanted spot. 
 
 In the first place, it was the very kind 
 of a pond for " going in wading." That 
 mysterious and dangerous thing called 
 the undertow, which lived among the 
 breakers, had no influence in these quiet 
 waters. Then, along the edges could be 
 found, more than anywhere else, all kinds 
 of interesting shells and sea creatures. 
 There were large white shells, well 
 adapted for scooping holes in the sand, 
 and smaller, roundish cockle-shells whose 
 inmates were usually at home. When you 
 picked up one of them the cockle retired 
 
soo The Believing Years 
 
 inside and drew a trap-door over the en 
 trance. 
 
 There were starfish with waving ten 
 tacles, sand-dollars, and the empty shells 
 of sea-urchins and razor-clams. The 
 black and ominous-looking objects which 
 I implicitly believed to be sharks eggs 
 were often found near the borders of that 
 ocean pond, and horseshoe crabs crawled 
 darkly beneath its surface or lay dry 
 and deceased on the sand. 
 
 Some rocks, covered with seaweed, 
 sheltered a colony of ordinary crabs 
 little ones, who scuttled away as you ap 
 proached, and big, dignified, ferocious 
 veterans, who looked up at you defiantly 
 and blew a multitude of bubbles, though 
 whether they did this through wrath and 
 indignation, or merely with the conscious 
 joy of the artist, I could never discover. 
 
 These rocks were also the haunt of 
 sea-gulls, who took flight before you 
 
When My Ship Comes In 201 
 
 could come close to them. The sand 
 pipers were more neighborly, skipping 
 along the beach in front of you, though 
 even they were shy and wary. 
 
 The waves brought up many charming 
 varieties of seaweed, red, green, and 
 brown. Beautiful enough it looked in 
 the water; the disappointment came 
 when you took it out. 
 
 Besides all these living or growing 
 things, each high tide cast up on the 
 sands an assortment of fascinating objects 
 pebbles of odd shapes and colors, 
 smooth bits of wood rounded by the 
 waves, spindles and spools that had come 
 down the river from the mills of far-away 
 towns, and bottles which always looked 
 as if they were going to contain a mes 
 sage from some ship-wrecked mariner 
 but never did. 
 
 And now the greatest delight of all 
 had been added, for I could watch for my 
 
202 The Believing Years 
 
 father s ship to come in. It would nat 
 urally land there, I argued ; while he was 
 living at the seashore he would have it 
 come as near as possible to his house. 
 It might run right up to the beach ; they 
 would put out a gangplank and one of 
 the sailors would wheel my velocipede 
 ashore. 
 
 Then I could spend the day riding it 
 around the veranda of our cottage. 
 
 Or perhaps the ship would not be able 
 to come so close to the shore. It would 
 anchor a mile or two out, and send a 
 boat. The velocipede might get wet 
 coming in an open boat that way, and, if 
 it were made of iron, the water would rust 
 it. I hoped they would know enough to 
 cover it up before they started to row in 
 to the beach. 
 
 There were certainly no ships in sight 
 that I could believe were my father s. 
 Two fishing schooners were riding at 
 
When My Ship Comes In 203 
 
 anchor, and the smoke of a steamer 
 showed on the horizon that was all. I 
 left the pond behind and walked out to 
 the end of the little cape. At any mo 
 ment my father s ship might come in sight, 
 and it was surely well for me to be ready 
 for her. The sailors would be glad to 
 see me, for then they could hand over 
 the velocipede, sail away again to wher 
 ever they came from, and get anything 
 else my father might want. 
 
 Where were they coming from ? 
 
 That was an interesting question. I 
 could see no land out there, but I had 
 been told that if a ship sailed straight 
 ahead in that direction the first land 
 reached would be Portugal. 
 
 "I wonder what kind of velocipedes 
 they have in Portugal ?" 
 
 I uttered this aloud, and I jumped 
 when I heard a voice say : 
 
 "What s that you are wondering ?" 
 
204 The Believing Years 
 
 A man had walked up behind me. He 
 was a stranger a tall man, carrying 
 his hat in his hand. He repeated his 
 question, and I told him that I was won 
 dering about the velocipedes in Portugal. 
 
 "Portugal Portugal," he ruminated. 
 "I ve never been in Portugal. I ve been 
 near it, though. I ve been in Spain. In 
 fact, I own some property in Spain." 
 
 "Do you ?" I queried in astonishment. 
 "But you look like an American. And 
 Portugal s right straight out there. Why 
 didn t you go there first ?" 
 
 "Well, I went another way, you see. 
 And then the Spaniards are easier to get 
 along with they re better landlords." 
 
 "Can you talk Spanish ?" I demanded. 
 
 "A little," he replied modestly; 
 "enough to answer. Tell me about this 
 velocipede of yours. How did it get to 
 Portugal?" 
 
 "It didn t get there," I told him ; "it s 
 
When My Skip Comes In 205 
 
 coming from there. Or, anyhow, it s 
 
 coming from somewhere. On my father s 
 
 ship." 
 
 "Oh, your father has a ship, has he ?" 
 "Yes. He told me this morning that 
 
 I could have a velocipede when his ship 
 
 came in." 
 
 He looked down at me seriously enough. 
 
 "I see. And so now you re waiting 
 for his ship to come in." 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 There was a pause. Then he seemed 
 struck by the appearance of my bare legs. 
 
 "What is the matter with your shins ?" 
 he asked. 
 
 "Mosquito bites," I replied briefly. 
 
 After another pause he said, gravely : 
 
 "Camphor is good for mosquito bites." 
 
 "Yes, I know. My mother puts it on 
 every night." 
 
 I thought a moment, and then asked, 
 
 "Do they have mosquitoes in Spain ?" 
 
206 The Believing Years 
 
 "Not on my estates," he assured me; 
 "nothing unpleasant on them at all. 
 But it s funny you should be here waiting 
 for a ship to come in. For that s just 
 what I am doing." 
 
 "Have you a ship ?" 
 
 "One exactly like your father s." 
 
 "Do you know my father ?" 
 
 "No, but I know his ship." 
 
 "Is it a three-masted schooner, painted 
 white?" 
 
 "Why, it s white. I am not sure about 
 the three masts. But it s white sure 
 enough, all bright and shiny. So is mine. 
 Most of em are." 
 
 "Do many people have ships ?" 
 
 "Oh, yes, lots and lots. Some of 
 them have velocipedes on board, and 
 some have oh, all kinds of things." 
 
 "What have you on yours ?" 
 
 He eyed me again. * 
 
 "You would laugh if I told you." 
 
When My Ship Comes In 207 
 
 "No, I wouldn t either." 
 
 "Yes, you would." 
 
 "No, I wouldn t either" I insisted. 
 "Tell me what you ve got on your ship." 
 
 "Promise you won t tell ?" he asked. 
 
 "Yes, of course." 
 
 "Cross your throat ?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 And I did so. 
 
 He bent down. "Well, then, it s a " 
 
 He broke off and looked along the 
 beach. I looked too, but saw nothing 
 remarkable ; only Miss Norton, who 
 lived in the cottage next but one to ours. 
 She had Boojum, the Nortons bull ter 
 rier, on a leash. Boojum was pulling at 
 the leash and dragging her along as 
 usual, and she seemed to be quite out of 
 breath when she reached the little sandy 
 point. 
 
 My friend, the man, told me to come 
 on, and hurried off to meet Miss Norton. 
 
2o8 The Believing Years 
 
 They shook hands and began to talk. I 
 stood where I was and watched them. 
 At last the man turned toward me and 
 shouted : 
 
 "Come on! Don t you want to go 
 for a walk ? We ll watch for your ship 
 as we go." 
 
 But I shook my head. I did not in 
 tend to be drawn from my vigil as easy 
 as that. Miss Norton did not interest 
 me particularly I could see her any day. 
 
 The man was apparently glad to see 
 her ; they slipped Boojum s leash, let him 
 rush off by himself, and then started 
 together along the sand. 
 
 He could not have had anything valu 
 able on his ship, for he never glanced at 
 the ocean at all. 
 
 I turned again to inspect the horizon, 
 reflecting that it was quite different when 
 you expected your ship to bring you a 
 velocipede. 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 THE LUCKY-BUG 
 
 AFTER all my waiting and watching I 
 never saw the ship that fetched my veloci 
 pede. It came during the night, I 
 fancy shortly after we got home from 
 the beach. 
 
 But I had the velocipede, that was 
 the main thing. It was built mostly of 
 wood, and painted red. On it, I spent 
 four happy days, riding up and down the 
 sidewalks of Oak Street. 
 
 Then, somehow, it got broken, and had 
 to be sent away to be mended. This 
 was distressing enough of itself. But it 
 turned out to be the first of a veritable 
 series of misfortunes. 
 
 On the same day that I broke the veloci- 
 p 209 
 
210 The Believing Years 
 
 pede, the cat made an attempt on the 
 life of my sole surviving goldfish. She 
 had been unsuccessful, I am glad to say, 
 and she now had to disappear over the 
 fence with more than her usual speed 
 whenever I came out of the house. But 
 in her efforts she had dislodged a pail of 
 minnows that stood beside the goldfish s 
 residence, and a quart or more of pond- 
 water, with fifteen unfortunate minnows, 
 had been deposited on my bed. I was 
 not there to distress my eyes with their 
 dying struggles, but the household au 
 thorities had made much of the incident, 
 dwelling quite irrelevantly on the state 
 of the bedclothes, rather than the fate of 
 the minnows. 
 
 Consequently I was led to believe that 
 any more minnows would be received 
 into the house with a coolness bordering 
 upon absolute inhospitality. 
 
 The shocking unreasonableness of this 
 
The Lucky-bug 211 
 
 attitude was perfectly plain to me, as I 
 think it will be to any fair-minded person. 
 I pointed out that neither I, nor the gold 
 fish, nor the deceased minnows were in 
 any degree to blame. Not the most 
 biassed tribunal in the world, save one 
 composed of feminine housekeepers, 
 would ever think of finding guilty any 
 party to the accident except the cat. 
 
 But did they so much as reprove her? 
 
 Not they. 
 
 She was a moth of peace, rusting in 
 idleness under the kitchen stove or on the 
 back fence, fat, lazy, and full of sin. Like 
 all of her kind, she tempered a career of 
 sloth with occasional deeds of cruelty 
 and blood by day and with diabolical 
 yells at night. Yet she was maintained, 
 a favored pensioner, in the household, 
 under the superstitious delusion that she 
 caught mice, and she would have gone 
 over to the neighbors any day if it had 
 
212 The Believing Years 
 
 struck her that they were more generous 
 with rations than we were. 
 
 My estimate of her was formed the 
 night I heard the screams of a nest of 
 young robins in the apple tree, up which 
 she had dragged her fat body, like an 
 overfed snake, bent on slaughter. And 
 nothing in the vast amount of misleading 
 literature lauding her race has ever suc 
 ceeded in whitewashing the character of 
 the old reprobate. 
 
 The velocipede went away to be re 
 paired, and the minnows departed this 
 life on Monday. On Tuesday I broke the 
 large blade of my jack-knife, and on 
 Wednesday fell in with three boys from 
 the parochial school, who still recalled 
 with animosity their captivity in Peter 
 Bailey s stable. 
 
 It was three against one, and I emerged 
 from the encounter with very little glory, 
 a good deal of dust on my clothes, and 
 
The Lucky-bug 213 
 
 two or three rather lame spots on my 
 person. 
 
 Beyond argument, I had somehow got 
 into disgrace with fortune and men s 
 eyes. At this rate, unless the gods were 
 propitiated, it seemed unlikely that I 
 should survive until the end of the 
 week. 
 
 What could I do to win fortune back ? 
 Some great stroke was evidently neces 
 sary. Ever since Monday, the day of 
 the first catastrophes, I had carefully 
 dropped stones down the culvert under 
 the railway track every time I passed. 
 
 Nothing at all had come of it. 
 
 Yet it is, as every one knows, a very 
 potent charm indeed. To all who doubt 
 I have only to say that Charley Carter, 
 after dropping stones in the culvert three 
 or four times a week for two years, had, 
 one day, only an hour and a half after 
 dropping a stone, found eleven cents (two 
 
214 The Believing Years 
 
 nickels and a copper) down in Market 
 Square. But it did not work with me. 
 
 Billy Mason, an unquestioned authority 
 in all such matters, advised the capture 
 of a Lucky-bug. That was his recipe, 
 delivered when the shades of Wednesday 
 evening were drawing in. And now be 
 hold me, in the bright sunlight of Thurs 
 day morning, anxiously following the 
 movements of a large Lucky-bug, who 
 was sliding merrily over the surface of 
 the frog pond. 
 
 He darted swiftly about on the water, 
 making two little ripples that broadened 
 to the right and left behind him. His 
 neat, dark, gentleman-like coat was 
 slightly glossy, catching the sunshine in 
 one tiny bright spot on his back. Ten 
 or a dozen inches he would slide in one 
 direction, looking always like the tip of an 
 arrow-head whose sides were formed by 
 the ripples he made. 
 
The Lucky-bug 215 
 
 Then he would shoot off abruptly at 
 right angles, halt again, and change his 
 course once more. There was no method 
 in his actions ; no vulgar pursuit of food. 
 
 The swallows, who in ceaseless parab 
 olas soared, swept, and fluttered over 
 that end of the pond, had a very practical 
 purpose, however charming their flight 
 might appear. They were gathering a 
 comfortable meal of gnats and mosquitoes. 
 
 But the Lucky-bug, so far as I could see, 
 was in it merely for the fun of the thing. 
 Why toil and fuss about breakfast on a 
 fine morning of summer ? Much pleas- 
 anter to skim over the water, mindful 
 only of the waving branches of the great 
 elms overhead and the grassy bankings 
 dotted with the yellow blossoms of the 
 arnica. 
 
 That was his philosophy, I thought, 
 and I sympathized with it. But I realized 
 that it was not for me. The grinding 
 
216 The Believing Years 
 
 cares of life oppressed me, and left no 
 time for idle amusement. My needs had 
 driven me forth with a glass fruit-jar 
 filled with water, and I must capture 
 that Lucky-bug. He might continue his 
 antics, but it must be in the narrow, 
 circumscribed limits of the fruit-jar; not 
 on the surface of the frog pond. 
 
 That good luck would attend me if I 
 could catch him, I had no manner of 
 doubt. Billy Mason had cited specific 
 instances of the extreme felicity of those 
 who caught and held these small black 
 water-beetles, and Jimmy Toppan reen- 
 forced Billy s thesis by relating that it 
 was only four months after he had caught 
 a Lucky-bug that his father had bought 
 him a Shetland pony. 
 
 The possession of a pony was beyond 
 my utmost hopes, but I did pray, at least, 
 that when I had attained a Lucky-bug 
 the misfortunes which had assailed me 
 
The Lucky-bug 217 
 
 during the last three days might come 
 to an end. Indeed, at that moment 
 of desperation, fresh from my unhappy 
 meeting with the parochial school boys, 
 I would have gladly foregone any future 
 pony for the mere privilege of being 
 let alone by whatever malign deity it was 
 that seemed bent on pestering me. 
 
 The Lucky-bug sailed warily about, 
 never coming within easy reach. Evi 
 dently he had noticed me and my fruit- 
 jar. If I had brought a net, his capture 
 would have been easy, but the authorities 
 held that he ought to be seized with the 
 hand. Otherwise, the charm might fail. 
 
 I observed him in silence, and at last 
 was glad to see that his motions were 
 bringing him nearer the shore. He 
 darted in and out, but, on the whole, 
 came gradually within reach. 
 
 I leaned forward over the water, my 
 hand outstretched. 
 
218 The Believing Years 
 
 Another swift movement brought him 
 nearer me. Evidently he had decided 
 that I was not a hostile object. His 
 trustfulness was going to get him into 
 trouble. Still another slide toward me, 
 and I made a quick grab at him. 
 
 But he was quicker. He seized a tiny 
 bubble where he got it, I could not see 
 and dived like a flash, carrying the 
 bubble with him. It was evidently his 
 air supply, or else for illuminating pur 
 poses, I could not be sure which, but 
 he looked like a diver carrying an electric 
 searchlight. 
 
 Once he reached the bottom it was 
 only about six inches distant there at the 
 edge of the pond he became invisible 
 among the pebbles and bits of wood. 
 I groped about, but could not dislodge 
 him. 
 
 So I drew back and waited. In a few 
 moments he came to the surface again, a 
 
The Lucky -bug 219 
 
 yard or two to the left. I made ready to 
 snatch at him once more, but he was 
 plainly cautious now, for he went below 
 with his bubble before I had any chance 
 of getting him. 
 
 I decided to look for another Lucky-bug 
 with less suspicion in his character, and 
 I set out to stroll around the pond. 
 
 A little farther along I found two or 
 three toads, meditating, apparently, 
 near the edge of the water. I reflected on 
 the unfairness of calling that pond after 
 the gay and handsome frog when it was 
 almost exclusively occupied by that more 
 sedate and useful citizen, the toad. That 
 was the way of the world as it seemed to 
 me on that morning. The frog had a 
 smart coat, his carriage was jaunty, and 
 his movements nimble. Also was he an 
 expert swimmer. When you had said that 
 about him you had said all. 
 
 Nobody liked the toad s appearance; 
 
22O The Believing Years 
 
 his progress on land was lumbering, to 
 say the least, and no one thought of going 
 to him for swimming lessons. With him 
 swimming was a duty during certain 
 weeks of the year. With the frog it was 
 an art and a joy forever. But did the 
 frog ever contribute to the happiness of 
 the world as the toad had been doing but 
 a few weeks earlier ? 
 
 I think not. 
 
 The toad had not only the nightingale s 
 eyes ; he had, during those early spring 
 months, the other gift of the nightingale 
 as well. Had not all heard him on the 
 mild evenings when, with his throat 
 swelled out, he trilled love songs that made 
 the whole pond musical ? And did any 
 one give him credit ? 
 
 No; they said, "Hear the frogs sing- 
 ing!" 
 
 Musing thus on the black injustice of 
 things, I circled the pond and came again 
 
The Lucky-bug 221 
 
 to the haunt of the original Lucky-bug. 
 There he was, or his twin, skimming 
 about as before. I approached, stooped 
 over, reached out my hand, and grabbed. 
 
 / had him I 
 
 He was instantly in the fruit-jar, where 
 he seemed perfectly contented, sailing and 
 diving as if he were on the pond. 
 
 I walked home triumphant. Did my 
 luck change ? Can you ask the question ? 
 I do not want to make the case too 
 strong, for my attitude is that of the sci 
 entific investigator. So I will mention 
 only two of the events that followed the 
 capture of that Lucky-bug. 
 
 And mind, please, that both of them 
 occurred on that same Thursday. 
 
 On my way home, I found the works 
 of an old alarm clock which somebody 
 had abandoned. The cover, face, and 
 bell were gone; but you could still wind 
 it up and make a delightful whirring 
 
222 The Believing Years 
 
 sound, calculated to distract all grown 
 ups. 
 
 That was not all. 
 
 When I got home, I found that there 
 was to be blueberry pudding for dinner 
 and my brother was gone for the day ! 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 WEST INJY LANE 
 
 EVERY one called it "West Injy Lane," 
 but some of the property holders had put 
 up a sign-post with the words, "Wash 
 ington Avenue." 
 
 There was never a Washington Ave 
 nue which looked so little like one. A 
 pleasant old road, it had not greatly 
 changed its appearance since the day 
 when the man for whom it had been re 
 named passed by. It meandered along, 
 innocent of sidewalks, and bordered, right 
 and left, with grass. A pond at one end 
 was musical all the spring and summer, 
 first with the high notes of the "peep 
 ers," then with the soprano trilling of 
 223 
 
224 The Believing Years 
 
 toads, and finally with the gruff per 
 formances of basso-profundo bullfrogs. 
 
 Cows and sheep nibbled the grass at 
 the sides of the road, or grazed in the 
 meadows beyond the stone walls. There 
 were only five or six farm-houses through 
 out the mile and a half of the lane, and 
 their barns stood open all summer, while 
 the swallows flashed in and out. Solemn 
 files of white ducks waddled down to the 
 pond, where they spread devastation 
 among the minnows and polliwogs, and 
 then waddled contentedly back again, 
 clapping their yellow bills as if smacking 
 their lips. Their bills and feet gleamed 
 in the sunlight. 
 
 It does not seem that any kind of 
 weather but bright sunshine ever pre 
 vailed in West Injy Lane. Certainly, 
 Ed Mason and I did not see how it could 
 be improved. At one end, near the 
 pond, was the country grocery where you 
 
West Injy Lane 225 
 
 could get weighed on the scales, and buy 
 jumbles (shaped like an elephant) at two 
 for a cent. Near the other end was 
 HaskelFs Field, a hallowed spot, for 
 it always contained one or two grass- 
 covered rings, the relics of circuses past 
 and the promise of circuses to come. 
 
 Midway between the two, and in front 
 of one of the houses, was a gigantic and 
 half-ruined elm, already celebrated in 
 legend and verse. Its romantic story 
 never impressed us, except to make me 
 wonder how it happened that when the 
 young man had stuck a willow branch 
 into the ground in front of his sweet 
 heart s dwelling, an elm tree should have 
 sprouted therefrom. 
 
 " Twasn t a willow," said Ed Mason, 
 as we walked through the lane one morn 
 ing, " twas a piece of elm." 
 
 " Twas a willow," I retorted. 
 
 "How do you know ?" 
 Q 
 
226 The Believing Years 
 
 " Cos Charley Carter told me." 
 "He don t know anything bout it." 
 "Yes, he does, too ! Fred Noyes told 
 him, and Peter Bailey told him, and 
 Cap n Bannister told him" 
 Ed was silent. 
 
 The name of Captain Bannister was 
 potent. He lived in a house on this very 
 lane, a small, red-faced man with black 
 hair. He had been a sailor, it was said, 
 but he was a farmer now, so far as he 
 had any occupation at all. He had no 
 family and no servants, and he dwelt 
 alone with a fluctuating number of cats. 
 His house was painted white, spot 
 less and shining. It was without blinds, 
 and so dazzling as to make you sneeze 
 when you looked at it. The path up 
 to his front door was lined, not with the 
 usual white-washed rocks, but with large 
 white sea-shells from some foreign coun 
 try. Back of these were double rows of 
 
West Injy Lane 227 
 
 cinnamon pinks, the Captain s joy and 
 pride. 
 
 Once I had been taken by my elders 
 to call on Captain Bannister. He showed 
 us around his house, a museum of 
 curiosities. But of all the stuffed birds, 
 all the spiny and prickly fishes, all the 
 curious bits of coral and wooden ships 
 somehow stuffed into glass bottles, 
 none had seemed so interesting as a small 
 box filled with what the Captain assured 
 me was "tooth-powder from China." 
 That the Chinese should know and use 
 a pink substance so much like that with 
 which I had to struggle every morning 
 seemed to me nothing less than mar 
 vellous. 
 
 The fact had another aspect as well, 
 it robbed foreign travel of one of its 
 charms. If one could wander so far and 
 still be pursued by enervating domestic 
 customs, one might as well stay at home. 
 
228 The Believing Years 
 
 Why subject yourself to the dangers of 
 the deep if liberty fled always before your 
 coming ? 
 
 One room in the Captain s house gave 
 me a fright. It was a small, dark apart 
 ment, a closet for size. In it the owner 
 had chosen to place four or five lay 
 figures in old-fashioned garments. They 
 had dried pumpkins for heads and they 
 sat in ghostly silence amid the gloom. 
 There was a man with a pipe in his mouth 
 sitting in front of an empty fireplace, an 
 old woman, and two or three children. 
 There was even a baby in a cradle, 
 its yellow, pumpkin face looking out from 
 a ruffled cap. 
 
 I did not linger there. 
 
 Ever since that visit the silent family 
 had haunted my dreams, and I more than 
 half suspected that Captain Bannister 
 would like to lock me up in the room 
 with them. I did not know what ad- 
 
West Injy Lane 229 
 
 vantage he would get by such an action, 
 but its possibility seemed very near. 
 
 Even on the bright morning that Ed 
 Mason and I, walking through West Injy 
 Lane engaged in a discussion about the 
 old tree even then, to me the Captain s 
 house was an eerie place. 
 
 There was no reason aside from the 
 pumpkin family why it should be so. 
 It glistened with all its usual brightness, 
 and there was the owner himself puttering 
 about in the little garden. Ed Mason 
 walked up to the picket fence, bold as 
 a lion, and addressed the captain in an 
 easy, conversational tone. 
 
 "Good mornin , Cap n Bannister!" 
 
 The sailor faced about. 
 
 "Hullo, boys ! Won t yer come in ? 
 . . . Yer needn t be afraid, I won t 
 hurt yer." 
 
 This last was for my benefit ; I had 
 not shown as much readiness to enter 
 the gate as had my companion. 
 
250 The Believing Years 
 
 "Come right in." 
 
 So I went in. The next remark of the 
 old man did much to put everything on 
 an agreeable footing. 
 
 "Do you boys like peaches ?" 
 
 We did like peaches, and we said so. 
 
 "Well, just wait till I pull up two or 
 three of these plantains, an we ll go round 
 to the side of the house an see if there s 
 any on the tree. . . . There . . . now 
 
 come on." 
 
 We followed him around the corner 
 of the house. A black cat with a white 
 breast came running to meet his master. 
 
 "Hullo, here s Nickerdemus ; I told 
 him to watch the peaches. Did yer 
 keep the bees away, Nickerdemus ?" 
 
 Nicodemus yawned and gave every 
 sign of having been asleep, after the man 
 ner of his kind when there is no personal 
 advantage in keeping awake. 
 
 The captain put a ladder against the 
 
West Injy Lane 231 
 
 tree, climbed up, and began to drop 
 peaches to us. Until then I had a faint 
 suspicion that he might be merely lur 
 ing us on and on toward the room 
 where sat the pumpkin family. But all 
 such suspicions vanished now. You 
 cannot think ill of a man who gives you 
 peaches like those. 
 
 Ed Mason intended to find out about 
 the old elm tree, and he broached the 
 subject fearlessly. 
 
 "Cap n, Sam says that you said they 
 planted a piece of willow where the old 
 elm came up." 
 
 "What s that? No; they didn t 
 plant no willow, but all this about the 
 young feller that came callin on his 
 girl, an cut a stick to keep off the dogs, 
 an stuck the stick in the ground in front 
 of her door, an then went away an for 
 got it, an the tree grew outer that stick, 
 all that s bosh. Don t yer believe it." 
 
232 The Believing Years 
 
 We promised not to believe it. The 
 captain came down the ladder with two 
 more peaches, which he passed over to us. 
 He stood, watching us eat them, and en 
 larged on the subject of the tree. 
 
 "I know all bout it, cos my second 
 cousin, Silas Winkley, lived there, an 
 his great-gran father planted that there 
 tree jus like any other tree. Silas s 
 great-gran father, ol Deacon Plummer, 
 wa n t callin on any girls there, cos he 
 was up ards of seventy when he planted 
 the tree, an had children an gran - 
 children of his own. These here poems 
 is all cat s-foot-in-yer-pocket ! " 
 
 We did not know exactly what that 
 meant, but it seemed to cast some doubt 
 on the truth of the legend, at any rate. 
 
 "Silas Winkley," ruminated the Cap 
 tain, "thought he was a sailor. He went 
 two or three v yge-s with ol Dick Cutter 
 an fin lly he got Melvin Bailey, gran - 
 
West Injy Lane 233 
 
 father of this Melvin that s alive now, to 
 give him command of a ship. I ve heard 
 my father tell bout it lots of times, 
 he was second mate. She was the 
 Nanny Karr, spelt it with a K, 
 they did then. Well, Silas took her 
 down as fur as Nantucket all right, 
 hee, hee, heel" 
 
 Here Captain Bannister paused and 
 chuckled for a few moments. 
 
 "Yes, siree, he got her down there 
 without no difficulties, hee, hee, hee ! 
 an then he run her plumb on to the south 
 side of the island. In a dead ca m, 
 mind yer, an on a night as clear as a 
 whistle. The crew all went ashore, 
 they could a dropped off n her bows on to 
 land without wettin their feet a most, 
 an the next mornin Silas went aboard 
 ag in to git his wife s knittin -needles, 
 his wife was along with him." 
 
 The captain paused again to choke 
 and wheeze. 
 
234 The Believing Years 
 
 "Well, in a day or two there come a 
 high tide, an they got whale-boats, an 
 hawsers, an some fellers on the island, 
 an they got her off all right, she 
 wa n t no ways hurt in the sand, an 
 they went on their way rej icin , cept 
 Melvin Bailey, who had had a hunderd 
 an forty dollars of his forked out to the 
 fellers with the whale-boats. However, 
 he didn t know nothin bout this till 
 months arterwards. Silas set out ag in, 
 he was bound for Fayal, d yer know 
 where Fayal is ?" 
 
 We were silent, till at last I suggested : 
 "It s in Spain, I mean Portugal, isn t 
 it?" 
 
 1 "Now look at that ! I betcher when 
 I was your age there wa n t any boy in 
 this town that didn t know Fayal. It s 
 one o the Azores, an some ways this 
 side of Spain or Portugal either. Well, 
 Silas was bound for Fayal, but he had 
 
West Injy Lane 235 
 
 the most terrible luck you ever see. 
 Fust, he run into a gale and got drove 
 way south of the Capes. When he wrote 
 back to Melvin Bailey bout this gale he 
 said that the seas run tremenjus high, 
 an that the ship was put into great 
 jeopardy. Well, Melvin wa n t what yer 
 call a very edjicated man, an he got 
 down his atlas an hee, hee, hee ! an 
 tried to find Great Jeopardy ! Hee, hee, 
 hee!" 
 
 I thought I was not appreciating the 
 joke to its utmost, so I inquired politely : 
 "Where is Great Jeopardy, Cap n ?" 
 "It ain t nowhere, son. That s just 
 the pint of the hull thing, there ain t 
 no such place ! Jeopardy means dan 
 ger, an all Silas meant was that, owin to 
 the gale, the ship was put into dan 
 ger, hee, hee, hee ! I s pose Melvin 
 thought twas one of them islands like 
 the Lesser Antilles, or some of them" 
 
236 The Believing Years 
 
 This time Ed Mason and I could join 
 in Captain Bannister s mirth. The cap 
 tain, still chuckling, led the way across 
 the yard and sat down on the stone door 
 step, warm in the noon sunshine. Ed 
 and I perched on a grass banking beside 
 him to hear the further adventures of 
 Silas Winkley. 
 
 "Well, Silas he kep havin bad luck. 
 His fust mate, Andy Spauldin , was took 
 down sick pretty soon with yaller janders, 
 an that left Silas an my father to navi 
 gate the ship. It was my father s fust 
 v yge as an officer, an I guess he wa n t 
 no great shakes navigatin , though he 
 was most as good as Silas was, at 
 that." 
 
 "In bout two weeks they made what 
 Silas thought was Fayal. Silas sailed into 
 harbor as proud as Nebberkernezzar, 
 when one of the men come up an says, 
 says he, That ain t Fayal, Cap n, but 
 
West Injy Lane 237 
 
 Silas told him to shut his mouth, he 
 guessed he knew where he was without 
 no Joppa clam-digger tellin him his 
 business. Yer see Silas he was born 
 over to Ipswich, an terrible proud of it, 
 I dunno why. But after he d come 
 to anchor, an he d got on his shore clothes, 
 he got into the boat an went ashore. 
 It didn t take him long to find out that 
 the feller was right ; it wa n t Fayal, it 
 wa n t even one of the Azores, he hadn t 
 made no east ard at all, hee, hee, 
 hee ! Hee, hee, hee ! It was hee, hee, 
 hee!" 
 
 The captain s laughing was so pro 
 longed this time, he was so doubled up 
 with excruciating merriment as to cause 
 us some anxiety. He coughed and 
 strangled, and his usually red face be 
 came deep purple. Finally he man 
 aged to control himself enough to gasp 
 faintly : 
 
238 The Believing Years 
 
 " It was one of the West Injies ! Yes- 
 sir, Silas had sailed pretty nigh due south 
 after the gale was over, an here he was 
 on one of the West Injy Islands. I 
 dunno what one : my father said Silas 
 wouldn t never tell em, though he reck 
 oned it might a been Cubia. Joe 
 Noyes was in the crew, an he said it was 
 further to the east ard than Cubia, but 
 it was one of the West Injies all right. 
 The story got out, of course, when the 
 Nanny got back here, an, when Silas 
 come down to live on this lane with 
 his mother s folks, for Melvin Bailey 
 didn t ask him to command no more ships, 
 why then they began to call this West 
 Injy Lane. That wa n t its name, 
 twas Plummer s Lane, but folks has 
 called it West Injy Lane ever since, 
 cept these cotty-dummers that want 
 it called Washington Avenue. Yessir, 
 that s the way it happened." 
 
West Injy Lane 239 
 
 And then the captain added, some 
 what irrelevantly : 
 
 "So yer see I know all bout that tree, 
 an yer don t want to believe any of them 
 poets !" 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 THEIR UNACCOUNTABLE BEHAVIOR 
 
 MY orders were explicit. 
 
 I was to take a note up to the Bigelow s 
 house on Elm Street, and I was to give 
 the note to Miss Carew. There was no 
 answer. After delivering the note I 
 might do as I pleased, but I must not be 
 late for dinner. 
 
 The member of my family who issued 
 these directions was one with whom it 
 paid to keep on good terms. I might 
 have felt grieved about this errand on 
 such a morning, but I had already found 
 that Jimmy Toppan and Ed Mason had 
 departed from their homes on some 
 private mission which did not seem to 
 include me. Bereft of playmates I had 
 240 
 
Their Unaccountable Behavior 241 
 
 spent a lonely half-hour in the side yard, 
 blowing on blades of grass, and raising 
 fiendish shrieks therewith. So my em 
 ployment on business which would send 
 me far from home was mutually agree 
 able. I had only one request to make. 
 
 "Can I go on my velocipede ?" 
 
 "Yes; but don t go too fast and get 
 overheated, and don t lose the note." 
 
 The prohibition about going too fast 
 was superfluous. The velocipede had 
 tires which were but bands of iron. 
 Progress upon it, over the uneven brick 
 sidewalks, was slow and not altogether 
 painless. The pedals (they looked like 
 large spools) were attached at such an 
 angle that a thrilling speed was hard to 
 attain. 
 
 But to me, as I rode it along the pleas 
 ant, shaded sidewalks of Elm Street on 
 that morning, it was a chariot of joy. 
 
 Naturally, I paused for a moment at 
 
242 The Believing Years 
 
 Mr. Hawkins s gate to exchange saluta 
 tions with that gentleman. Mr. Hawkins 
 did not believe that it would rain : 
 though it might. Fortified with this 
 information, I continued past Jimmy Top- 
 pan s house, past the frog pond and the 
 school. I proceeded at a moderate rate, 
 not over three-quarters of a mile an 
 hour. At the street crossings, paved as 
 they were with cobblestones, it was, on 
 the whole, easier to dismount and wheel 
 my velocipede. 
 
 When I reached Higginson s toy-shop 
 I stopped again, flattened my nose 
 against the window, and observed the 
 condition of the market. There had been 
 a sharp break in marbles, evidently, 
 they were now offered at fifteen for a 
 cent. Return-balls remained firm, how 
 ever; and tops had advanced. After 
 I had noted these facts, and concluded, 
 further, that some one had, since yester- 
 
Their Unaccountable Behavior 243 
 
 day, purchased two of the five sticks of 
 striped candy from the glass jar in the 
 window, I continued on my journey. 
 
 Fifteen minutes later I reached the 
 Bigelow house, a square, three-storied 
 residence set a little back from the street. 
 The front door was open, and you could 
 look right through the broad, cool hall, 
 through a back door, and down the gar 
 den path. Everything about the house 
 was big, and quiet, and cool, and there 
 was no one to be seen, and no sign of 
 any one, except for a tall bicycle which 
 stood at the curb-stone. 
 
 I knew that bicycle : it belonged to 
 a neighbor of mine, Mr. Dennett. 
 He was a grave, elderly man of nearly 
 twenty-one years. Before him I stood 
 in speechless awe. Most of the time, 
 except in summer, he was away at a place 
 called Harvard, which drew many of his 
 kind. 
 
244 The Believing Years 
 
 In summer he, with others like him, 
 rode about on bicycles, and did various 
 interesting things. Often they played 
 tennis at a place farther up Elm Street. 
 Sometimes, on these occasions, Ed Mason 
 and I had been allowed to stand outside 
 the high wire nets, and fetch back balls 
 when they were knocked into the street, 
 a privilege which we especially es 
 teemed. 
 
 The balls were of the most fascinating 
 kind imaginable : they would bounce 
 to a tremendous height, and it was ru 
 mored that they cost thirty cents apiece. 
 
 I wondered why Mr. Dennett was at 
 the Bigelows . 
 
 However, there was my note to de 
 liver. I left my red velocipede standing 
 beside the enormous bicycle, and rang the 
 front door-bell. After a long wait, a very 
 red-faced, cross-looking woman not Mrs. 
 Bigelow at all came to the door. 
 
Their Unaccountable Behavior 245 
 
 "A letther fer Miss Keroo ? Well, 
 ye d betther be afther takin it to her 
 yersilf. She s out in the garrden, there. 
 An no more time have I to waste in 
 runnin fer this bell ivry foive minutes !" 
 
 And she went away, muttering. I was 
 not surprised to see her so cross. They 
 always were cross ; it was their normal 
 condition. I walked through the hall 
 and took the garden path. 
 
 It was lined on both sides with box, 
 and beyond were flower-beds. Also there 
 were apple trees, and cherry trees, and 
 peach trees, the last full of red and 
 yellow fruit. A number of bees were 
 inquiring into the hollyhocks, and on a 
 stalk of Canterbury bells sat a brown 
 and black butterfly, slowly opening and 
 closing his wings. 
 
 But I could not see Miss Carew. Near 
 the foot of the garden the path was 
 arched by a summer-house. Its latticed 
 
246 The Believing Years 
 
 sides were covered thick with clematis 
 and trumpet-vine. I kept on down the 
 path and walked into the summer-house. 
 
 There was a quick exclamation, and 
 Miss Carew arose hastily from a seat in 
 the corner. Mr. Dennett was sitting 
 there, and he had a curious expression on 
 his face, which made him rather more 
 terrible to me than usual. Miss Carew, 
 like the cross woman who had let me into 
 the house, had very red cheeks. But in 
 the case of Miss Carew the color was 
 not permanent. It was more noticeable 
 at this moment than I had ever seen it 
 before ; but it did not last. 
 
 "Why, it s Sammy ! " said Miss Carew, 
 with a laugh. 
 
 I disliked being called "Sammy" be 
 fore Mr. Dennett, and I felt my face grow 
 red also. I remembered that Miss Carew 
 was a stranger, who had been visiting 
 the Bigelows scarcely two months, but I 
 corrected her just the same. 
 
Their Unaccountable Behavior 247 
 
 "Sam," I remarked, with dignity. 
 
 "Sam," she repeated apologetically. 
 
 Then I took the note out of my jacket 
 pocket, and handed it to her. She 
 thanked me, opened the envelope, and 
 read the message. Then she said that 
 it was a all right," and added that I was 
 a good boy to bring the note. 
 
 Encouraged by this flattery, I backed 
 to a bench on the other side of the sum 
 mer-house, and sat down facing them. 
 Miss Carew had seated herself again, 
 though at a somewhat greater distance 
 from Mr. Dennett than before. 
 
 There was a slight pause. 
 
 Miss Carew asked me how I came, 
 had I walked all the way ? 
 
 "No," I replied, "I rode my veloci 
 pede." 
 
 "Did you, really?" she said; "that s 
 a long ride for you, isn t it ?" 
 
 It interested me to hear Miss Carew 
 
248 The Believing Years 
 
 talk, she came from some part of the 
 country where they have a greater respect 
 for the letter R than was usual with us. 
 But I denied that I was fatigued. 
 
 "No m; it ain t far at all ! Once," I 
 continued, growing reminiscent, " I rode 
 nearly up to Chain Bridge!" 
 
 "Is that so?" 
 
 "Yes m; but when I got up to the 
 Three Roads, Mr. Titcomb came along, 
 an said I d better go back, it was so 
 hot." 
 
 "Did you go back?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 There was another silence, which Miss 
 Carew again broke. 
 
 "What kind of a velocipede is yours ?" 
 she asked. 
 
 "A wooden one," I assured her. 
 
 Then it struck me that the conversa 
 tion was becoming a trifle inane, and I 
 tried to make things more interesting. 
 
Their Unaccountable Behavior 249 
 
 "My velocipede is out in front of the 
 house now, you can come out and see 
 it, if you want to." 
 
 But Miss Carew thought she would 
 defer that pleasure till another time. 
 
 Mr. Dennett took the witness. 
 
 "Do you go to school, Sam ?" 
 
 Really, it seemed that he might have 
 done better than that. I had that ques 
 tion asked me about five hundred times 
 a year by grown-ups. Evidently this 
 Harvard was not the place I had thought. 
 But I answered him. 
 
 "Not now : it s vacation." 
 
 "Yes, I know. But you go when it 
 isn t vacation ?" 
 
 "Oh, yes." 
 
 "What school, the Jackman ?" 
 
 "No;theKelley." 
 
 "Oh ! Whose room ?" 
 
 "Last year I was in Miss Temple s, 
 an next I ll be in Miss Philipps s." 
 
250 The Believing Years 
 
 I had apparently satisfied Mr. Den 
 nett s curiosity, for he relapsed into 
 silence. There was a long pause, while I 
 swung my legs, and looked at them ex 
 pectantly. I was quite ready to answer 
 more questions if they had them to put. 
 
 They did not seem to think of any 
 point on which they required information 
 for two or three minutes. Then Mr. 
 Dennett did make an inquiry, or, 
 rather, a suggestion. 
 
 "Perhaps your mother may want you 
 for something, Sam ?" 
 
 But I was able to set his mind at rest 
 instantly. 
 
 "Oh, no; she don t want me till one 
 o clock, an it s only half-past ten, now." 
 
 "Later than that, isn t it ?" 
 
 "No, sir. I saw the Piscopal clock 
 when I came by." 
 
 He seemed to be relieved at this, but 
 presently he had another question to ask : 
 
Their Unaccountable Behavior 251 
 
 "Do you care for blackberries, Sam ?" 
 
 "Yes ! Have you got any ?" 
 
 "There are some down the hill, there, 
 against the fence. Why don t you 
 go and get them ?" 
 
 "Thank you, shall I bring some of 
 them back to you ?" 
 
 "No, just eat em yourself, and have 
 a good time." 
 
 This was by far the most sensible 
 thing he had said, and I hurried down 
 to the blackberry bushes. But when I 
 got to them, and inspected the long, 
 thorny branches, I found that my ex 
 pectations were to be disappointed. If 
 there had been any good berries they 
 had been picked. All that remained 
 were unripe. 
 
 I hurried back to the summer-house, 
 and burst in upon its occupants. They 
 seemed to be having some kind of a mis 
 understanding : Miss Carew had a book 
 
252 The Believing Years 
 
 in her hands, which Mr. Dennett was try 
 ing to take from her. 
 
 "Hullo! Back already? What was 
 the matter with the blackberries, are 
 they green ?" 
 
 "No," I replied, "they are red, but 
 they re red when they re green, you 
 know." 
 
 And I climbed back to my former place 
 on the bench opposite them. Immedi 
 ately, Mr. Dennett became concerned 
 about my velocipede. 
 
 "Did you leave your velocipede in the 
 street, Sam ? Aren t you afraid some 
 one will steal it ?" 
 
 I laughed. 
 
 "Oh, I guess not. I left it right be 
 side your bicycle, an there wouldn t 
 any one dare to touch it, would they, 
 Miss Carew?" 
 
 The lady agreed that it would require 
 great boldness, but still, she thought, it 
 
Their Unaccountable Behavior 253 
 
 might be well for me to go and see if it 
 were safe. 
 
 To allay her uneasiness I went back as 
 far as the house, and looked through the 
 hall. Both the machines were there, in 
 perfect safety. I returned to the sum 
 mer-house, and reported the fact, pleased 
 at being able to tell my friends that they 
 need not worry. 
 
 As I was climbing to my seat again, 
 Mr. Dennett had another suggestion. 
 
 "Look here, Sam, we saw a squirrel in 
 Mr. Moulton s trees when we came out 
 here. Don t you want to go and see if 
 you can find him ?" 
 
 A squirrel is always worth seeing. I 
 asked one or two questions concerning 
 his whereabouts, and then departed, 
 promising to return as soon as I found him. 
 Mr. Moulton s trees were many, and after 
 I had gone through the hole in the hedge, 
 I instituted a careful inspection of each 
 tree. 
 
254 The Believing Years 
 
 Mr. Moulton came down the drive, 
 and when I told him what I was looking 
 for, he joined in the hunt. I can truth 
 fully say that we examined each branch 
 with care. 
 
 But no squirrel appeared at all, though 
 we saw three blackbirds, and plenty of 
 robins. When I got back to the summer- 
 house Miss Carew and Mr. Dennett were 
 both gone, although they had left the 
 book behind. I searched and called, but 
 could not find them any more than I had 
 found the squirrel. 
 
 As I departed down Elm -Street again 
 on my velocipede, I thought the matter 
 over at some length. Mr. Dennett had 
 not left the premises, unless he had done 
 so without his bicycle, for that remained 
 where I had first seen it. 
 
 There was something singular about 
 their behavior. Had they, perchance, 
 picked all the ripe blackerries before I 
 
Their Unaccountable Behavior 255 
 
 arrived, and had they been trying, with 
 so much artifice, to conceal that fact from 
 me ? 
 
 That was the most reasonable explana 
 tion I could devise, and, certainly, the 
 circumstances demanded some kind of 
 explanation. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 THE SIEGE OF AUNTIE MERRILL 
 
 IT was Peter Bailey who organized the 
 siege. We had long ago made up the 
 quarrel that arose on the day of the In 
 dian raid. He still maintained that Ed s 
 and my conduct had been contrary to 
 all rules of warfare, but we noticed that 
 we were not expected, since that day, 
 to impersonate the under dog in every 
 combat. 
 
 Peter s reputation for generalship was 
 a little tarnished, and for that reason he 
 got up this grand military movement 
 against the property and person of 
 Auntie Merrill. 
 
 That lady had, so Peter said, certain 
 256 
 
The Siege of Auntie Merrill 257 
 
 "distressed damsels" closely immured in 
 dungeons beneath her house. 
 
 "Distressed what?" asked Ed Mason. 
 
 "Damsels," replied Peter. 
 
 "What d ye mean, girls?" 
 
 "Well, yes." 
 
 "I don t want em," rejoined the prac 
 tical Ed; "let em stay there." 
 
 Peter was exasperated. 
 
 "Why, we ve got to get them out," he 
 asserted, "or they ll starve to death." 
 
 "How d they get in there?" Ed 
 Mason wished to know. 
 
 "What difference does that make ? 
 She captured em, I s pose." 
 
 I thought I could throw a little light 
 on this dark subject. It was Monday 
 morning, and I had been looking over 
 the fence into the Merrill garden only 
 half an hour before. 
 
 "There ain t any distressed damsels 
 there, Peter," I said earnestly; "I saw 
 
258 The Believing Years 
 
 em. One of em s Katie Clancy, an 
 she lives there all the time, an the other 
 is Mrs. Muldoon, an she s hangin out 
 the wash." 
 
 But I was unmercifully snubbed for 
 my pains. 
 
 "You make me perfectly tired," he 
 retorted. "I don t mean Katie, nor Mrs. 
 Muldoon. I know them. The er 
 damsels are in dungeons below the 
 ground." 
 
 I turned to Rob Currier, Jimmy Top- 
 pan, and Horace Winslow, who had come 
 into the Masons back yard with Peter. 
 But they had been under the influence 
 of Peter s warlike mind and persuasive 
 tongue for an hour or more. They 
 seemed to believe in the damsels, and 
 their confidence tended to shake my 
 doubts. 
 
 Ed Mason was not so easily moved from 
 scepticism. 
 
The Siege of Auntie Merrill 259 
 
 "What are they doin there?" he in 
 quired. 
 
 "Doin ? They ain t doin anything, 
 you chump ! They re chained hand an 
 foot to the rock. How could they do 
 anything ? They re waitin for us to 
 
 rescue em. : 
 
 "Why don t they call a p liceman ?" 
 
 " Cos they can t ! How could they 
 call so he d hear through the rock ?" 
 
 "Did Auntie Merrill put em in there ?" 
 
 "Yes ; she did, or some of her mur 
 mur mur dons." 
 
 "Her what?" 
 
 Horace Winslow broke into the conver 
 sation. 
 
 "Don t you know what murmidons 
 are ? They re big woolly elephants with 
 long tusks." 
 
 "Oh, get out! Auntie Merrill hasn t 
 got any. You think you re stuffin me, 
 but you ain t !" 
 
260 The Believing Years 
 
 Peter seemed to be willing to change 
 the subject, and get on to the main issue. 
 
 "We ll divide into two regiments, 
 I ll take command of one, and Rob of 
 the other. I ll take Horace and Sam, 
 and Rob can take Ed Mason and Jimmy. 
 We ll stay here, an you can go down 
 into Sam s yard an climb over the fence, 
 an go up by the path next the Mortons 
 house. Then we ll attack the house from 
 two sides at once. Now, go on, Rob." 
 
 But this was going altogether too fast 
 for me. 
 
 "How ll we get by Mrs. Muldoon ? 
 She s out there on the clothes-jack now." 
 
 "That ll be all right," Peter assured me ; 
 "if she says anything, just knock her 
 down!" 
 
 But I could not imagine myself knock 
 ing Mrs. Muldoon down under any cir 
 cumstances. In the first place, she 
 weighed over two hundred pounds. 
 
The Siege of Auntie Merrill 261 
 
 "An say," continued Ed Mason, 
 "how are we goin to attack the house 
 when we get there ? What ll we do ?" 
 
 Even Jimmy Toppan was wavering. 
 
 "Where are the murmidons ? What ll 
 we do if we meet them ?" he asked. 
 
 Such questions were quite appropri 
 ate. We had long been accustomed to 
 scout on Auntie Merrill, as well as other 
 more formidable persons. W T e had 
 tracked her up and down her garden 
 many times, peered at her from behind 
 bushes, and observed her from the tops 
 of trees. But Peter, filled with a long 
 ing for military glory and daring deeds, 
 was proposing an exploit altogether more 
 hazardous than anything we had ever 
 attempted. Thirsting for conquest, he 
 overlooked all obstacles. He had, how 
 ever, failed to infect us with his en 
 thusiasm. 
 
 For one thing, this inhuman treatment 
 
262 TJie Believing Years 
 
 of the damsels seemed rather foreign to 
 Auntie Merrill s character, as I knew it. 
 It was true she had spoken to me with 
 severity on one occasion, something 
 about running across her new grass plot, 
 and she had warned me against throwing 
 stones at the statue of George Washing 
 ton near her house. The latter warning 
 had been totally unnecessary, I had 
 never dreamed of doing such a thing. 
 I never had, that is, until she put the idea 
 into my head, after that it appealed to 
 me with the fearful fascination of a deadly 
 crime. 
 
 I was somewhat afraid of her, but 
 it was nevertheless hard to think of 
 her keeping these unfortunate creatures 
 chained up and starving. Moreover, to 
 make an open attack upon her house by 
 force of arms (Peter had served out 
 wooden revolvers to us, and had a sword 
 for himself) was a serious business. It 
 
The Siege of Auntie Merrill 263 
 
 struck me that we might get involved 
 with the police. In the first place, the 
 attack carried with it the possible neces 
 sity of an assault and battery upon Mrs. 
 Muldoon, a perfectly respectable and 
 very muscular washerwoman. 
 
 Then, supposing that we had over 
 come that difficulty, there was the house 
 to enter. 
 
 Who could say that the doors might 
 not be locked ? 
 
 Finally, there were these mysterious 
 and terrible "murmidons." No one, not 
 even Peter, seemed to be able to say 
 exactly what they were, or tell at what 
 moment we might be confronted by them. 
 
 Altogether, I have seldom engaged in 
 any military enterprise where the ob 
 stacles seemed so overwhelming, and the 
 chances of success so slight. 
 
 But Peter would hear of no objections. 
 
 If we did not wish to embroil ourselves 
 
264 The Believing Years 
 
 with Mrs. Muldoon, it would be a simple 
 matter to keep behind the hedge until 
 we were between her and the house. 
 Then it would be too late for her to make 
 any effective resistance. 
 
 As for the locked doors, beat em 
 down ! 
 
 He would take care of the "murmi- 
 dons " himself, leave them to him. 
 
 We were quite willing to do so. 
 
 But even at this last moment, when 
 our general thought he had arranged 
 everything, and as he was about to issue 
 his orders once more to Colonel Currier, 
 there came a hitch. 
 
 "Well, say, look here. What are we 
 goin to do with these damsels when we 
 get em?" 
 
 It was still Mason, the unconvinced, 
 who spoke. 
 
 "Don t be such a jay ! We ll send 
 em home, of course !" 
 
The Siege of Auntie Merrill 265 
 
 "Where do they live?" 
 
 Peter fairly danced with rage. 
 
 "How do I know where they live ? 
 We can ask em, can t we ?" 
 
 "I s pose we can. But how are you 
 goin to get their chains off ? You said 
 they were chained to the rock." 
 
 The general had to assume more re 
 sponsibility for himself. 
 
 "I ll get em off all right. Now, I do 
 wish you d go ahead an start, an shut 
 up your talkin . Rob, you w r histle as 
 soon as you get back of the quince bush, 
 an we ll come right over the fence here, 
 an both regiments must charge up to 
 the house at the same time. But don t 
 start till I give the order to charge." 
 
 Rob Currier, Ed, and Jimmy disap 
 peared behind Mr. Hawkins s woodshed. 
 They had scarcely done so when Peter 
 called them back. 
 
 "You must be sure to take Auntie Mer- 
 
266 The Believing Years 
 
 rill a prisoner," he commanded; "take 
 her alive " 
 
 They promised not to let her escape. 
 Then they set out once more. We 
 climbed upon the fence, and watched for 
 them to appear at the foot of the Merrill 
 garden. Soon we saw them crossing 
 my yard in Indian file. Rob mounted 
 the fence, and looked over. 
 
 No enemy in sight. 
 
 Then all three climbed the fence, 
 crouched behind the hedge, and crept 
 up the path to the quince bush. Rob 
 whistled. 
 
 As soon as he heard this signal, Peter 
 ordered us into the hostile territory. 
 We dropped silently over the fence, and 
 lay flat on our stomachs in the grass. 
 Peter raised himself slightly on his arms 
 and gazed at the stronghold. 
 
 Mrs. Muldoon had gone into the house 
 for more clothes-pins. 
 
The Siege of Auntie Merrill 267 
 
 Now was our chance ! 
 
 Peter rose, waved his sword, and was 
 just opening his mouth to order the 
 charge, when an unexpected thing hap 
 pened. 
 
 Auntie Merrill opened a side door of her 
 house, walked out on the veranda, de 
 scended two steps, and proceeded slowly 
 up the side path to the street. She was 
 dressed in black as usual, with a lavender 
 bonnet, and she carried a little parasol. 
 She opened the garden gate, crossed the 
 sidewalk, stepped into a carriage that 
 was standing by the curb, and drove 
 quietly away. 
 
 The enemy had escaped. 
 
 We had been baffled without having 
 a chance to strike a blow. But there 
 were still the house and the damsels. 
 Ought we not continue on our expedition ? 
 
 While we were considering this ques 
 tion, Katie Clancy appeared at a base 
 ment door, with a broom in her hand. 
 
268 The Believing Years 
 
 "Now, thin, clear outer here, ye little 
 divils, or I ll be takin the broom to ye !" 
 
 And she started on a frontal attack. 
 
 Peter was over the fence again in two 
 seconds. Horace and I, like well-dis 
 ciplined troops, did not let him precede 
 us by more than an inch. 
 
 In a few moments the detachment 
 under Rob Currier returned to head 
 quarters. 
 
 Jimmy Toppan said : 
 
 "Let s go down to Plumbush an go in 
 
 swimmin ." 
 
 "What s the matter with Four Rocks ?" 
 suggested Peter. 
 
 "Oh, come on to Plumbush," Jimmy 
 insisted, "my uncle s goin to drive 
 down to the farm in the buckboard, an 
 we can get a ride with him, part way." 
 
 The question was put and carried with 
 out dissent, and the meeting stood ad 
 journed. 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 
 ENTERTAINING ALICE 
 
 IT was sprung on me without any pre 
 tence of a fair warning. Rob Currier, Ed 
 Mason, and I had just rounded up a herd 
 of buffaloes in the back of my garden, 
 and we were busily engaged in lassoing 
 separate members of the herd before they 
 should slip through the fence into Mr. 
 Tilton s vegetable patch. Once let them 
 get there and it would be well-nigh im 
 possible, among the lettuce and tomatoes, 
 ever to reduce them to submission. Your 
 buffalo is tractable and decent on even 
 turf, but when he gets all mixed up with 
 vegetables he becomes a perfect nuisance. 
 
 At the most exciting moment came a 
 voice which had to be obeyed : 
 269 
 
270 The Believing Years 
 
 "Sam!" 
 
 I ran, with my lasso in my hand, to 
 ward the house. 
 
 "Sam, go right upstairs and wash your 
 hands and face, and brush your hair. 
 Leave that old rope outside, don t 
 bring it in here." 
 
 That old rope ! 
 
 Before I could make any inquiries, any 
 explanations, I was hustled in, rushed 
 upstairs, forcibly cleaned, lacerated with 
 Dr. Kaltblut s steel-pronged tomahawk 
 (falsely called a hair-brush) and shoved 
 downstairs again. 
 
 Here, I was dragged a whited sep 
 ulchre into a front room, where sat a 
 lady, a perfect stranger to me, and 
 a little girl. 
 
 Toward the smaller and younger of 
 these beings I was propelled. 
 
 "Here, Alice, this is Sam. Sam, this 
 is little Alice Remick, who is going to be 
 
Entertaining Alice 271 
 
 your neighbor. I want you to be nice to 
 her, and play with her this afternoon, 
 and entertain her." 
 
 The concentrated perfidy of it ! The 
 unmitigated baseness ! What more could 
 Lucrezia Borgia have contrived ? 
 
 Entertain her ! Entertain this spindle- 
 legged, pig-tailed creature who was suck 
 ing her thumb in lively embarrassment ! 
 Was I a dancing bear, or a mountebank, 
 that I should be called upon to furnish 
 amusement to this? Reflect that I had 
 been called from high and mighty pur 
 suits, that I was roping a gigantic and 
 ferocious bull buffalo at the very moment 
 when I was interrupted. That even as 
 I stood there in the house the black 
 berry bushes were in danger from the 
 rest of the herd, since the band of hunt 
 ers had been deprived of one unerring 
 hand and bold spirit. And all for the 
 purpose of "entertaining" this hope 
 less product of civilization ! 
 
272 The Believing Years 
 
 There was just one thing to do, and 
 that was to bolt out of the room without 
 an instant s delay. 
 
 I did so, but only succeeded in getting 
 to the front door. This was locked, 
 and in a second I had been recaptured. 
 Then I was taken back to the room, where 
 I had to stand the humiliation of hear 
 ing myself apologized for, in the presence 
 of the little girl. 
 
 "Why, I do not know what made him 
 behave so ! I never knew him to do 
 anything like it before. Aren t you 
 ashamed of yourself, Sam ? Now, you 
 must be polite to Alice, for she is a stran 
 ger. You ll do it to please me, Sam." 
 
 This was certainly playing it pretty 
 low down. I had been trapped by a com 
 bination of force and guile, and now an 
 appeal was uttered in terms that made 
 a refusal difficult, as well as useless. 
 
 But what could I do with her ? I had 
 
Entertaining Alice 273 
 
 no experience with them, except very 
 seldom, and then in groups. To have 
 a lone specimen like this thrust upon me 
 was simply preposterous. Many of the 
 boys had sisters, both Rob and Ed 
 were provided for in that respect. Very 
 little profit, that I could see, did they 
 ever get out of them. When the sisters 
 were older, they were simply additions 
 to the household tyrants who thronged 
 in every family. They assumed an air 
 of authority; gave orders, administered 
 punishments, and reported to higher 
 quarters what they were pleased to con 
 sider serious misdemeanors. 
 
 As for the younger ones, they were 
 so many millstones about the neck. Sadie 
 Currier and Louise Mason were always 
 tagging on behind, spying here and in 
 terfering there. The two Kittredges, 
 Susy and Minnie, were worse than all 
 the rest. Minnie s spotless behavior, 
 
274 The Believing Years 
 
 clean hands, correct pronunciation, and 
 generally immaculate existence was a 
 continual reproach to all of us who were 
 merely human. Susy s tongue was never 
 quiet, and she divided her time between 
 chanting her own merits, and predicting 
 woe for the rest of the world. 
 
 So it was with a not altogether unprej 
 udiced eye that I gazed on this small 
 interloper, and wondered what I had done 
 that I should be treated like this. Doubt 
 less she reciprocated the feeling heartily, 
 but I had no means of knowing that. 
 I could not go forth again to the buffalo 
 hunt, carrying this bit of impedimenta 
 with me. When I even suggested tak 
 ing her outdoors, a veto was pronounced 
 promptly. 
 
 Alice was dressed too nicely to go and 
 play outdoors. 
 
 Dressed indeed she was, starched 
 and cleaned and combed distressingly. 
 
Entertaining Alice 275 
 
 "Perhaps Alice would like to see some 
 of the things in your playroom, Sam, 
 why don t you take her out there ?" 
 
 I had expected it. There only re 
 mained this final blow, and I knew it 
 would fall. Admit this girl to my inner 
 sanctum, oh, well, the world was 
 turned upside down this afternoon. 
 What had to be, had to be, and there 
 was an end to it. 
 
 "Come on !" I said, in a tone that 
 mingled resignation and gruffness. 
 
 Alice did not evince any great amount 
 of eagerness to follow me. Instead, she 
 hung back, exactly like a girl ! Here 
 was I, putting myself out to be pleasant 
 and courteous, giving up my afternoon, 
 in fact, for her amusement, and at my 
 very first invitation she pretended re 
 luctance. 
 
 Her mother urged her to accompany 
 me, however, and pretty soon we reached 
 my especial room. 
 
276 The Believing Years 
 
 "Do you like polliwogs ?" I demanded, 
 walking toward a glass jar in which 
 several hundred of them swam about like 
 animated quotation marks. 
 
 "Ugh ! I hate em ! Nathty squiggly 
 things !" and she turned away ab 
 ruptly. 
 
 Here was a nice beginning for you ! 
 My prized polliwogs, gathered at no 
 small trouble, and already beginning to 
 show the most interesting signs of frog- 
 gishness, were dismissed as "nathty 
 squiggly things !" 
 
 But I let the matter pass. I was de 
 termined to be polite, polite and 
 patient. I picked up a little box, covered 
 with wire. 
 
 "Here is my snake box, I ve only 
 got two now, one green one and " 
 
 I had no time to finish about the red 
 one, nor to exhibit the snakes themselves. 
 They were really the most harmless 
 

 Entertaining Alice 277 
 
 little fellows in the world, neither of 
 them over five inches long. One I had 
 found under a fallen headstone in the 
 old burying-ground, and the other I had 
 obtained by swapping with Ed Mason, 
 giving a sinker, two fish-hooks, a 
 turtle, and a piece of rock candy in 
 exchange. 
 
 But as soon as I mentioned the snakes, 
 this perverse female backed across the 
 room, her eyes closed, and both ears 
 stopped with the tips of her forefingers, 
 as if she thought my pets might utter 
 some fearful screech. 
 
 "Oh, snakth! Take em away! I 
 don t want to thee em ! I hate em. 
 What do you have such nathty petth for ? 
 Why don t you have nice ones ?" 
 
 This was insulting. I was far fonder 
 of my pets than of this fussy little per 
 son. Moreover, I was doing my best to 
 amuse her. 
 
278 The Believing Years 
 
 "I do have nice ones," I rejoined in 
 dignantly, "an I ve got a dog, an a 
 white rabbit, an two guinea pigs out in 
 the barn. Do you like any of those ?" 
 
 "Not very much." 
 
 She was hopeless, simply hopeless. 
 Under the circumstances it seemed 
 hardly worth while to show her my June 
 bugs, although I had seven or eight 
 which I had caught the night before. 
 They were of the superior golden-yel 
 low variety, too, not the common 
 brown ones. 
 
 "Haven t you any pets ?" I asked. 
 
 "Yeth; I ve got a kitten." 
 
 A kitten ! I might have known as 
 much. Ordinarily I would have refrained 
 from any comment on kittens, but now, 
 "Kittens are no good," I announced. 
 
 "They are too; they re lovely." 
 
 "No, they ain t, either, they grow 
 up into cats." 
 
Entertaining Alice 279 
 
 "Catth are nice." 
 
 "They catch birds, and torture em," 
 I remarked. 
 
 The little girl began to whimper. 
 
 I couldn t stand blubbering, at any 
 rate. I must do something to stop that. 
 What would appeal to her ? There was 
 the engine which would puff out steam 
 when you lighted the lamp under its 
 boiler. Instinctively I knew she would 
 not care for that. 
 
 There was my bag of marbles, in 
 cluding two "alleys," one of which had 
 some beautiful substance that looked 
 like checkerberry candy inside it. 
 
 I brought the marbles forward ; she 
 remained passive. 
 
 My railroad punch (which had once 
 belonged to a real conductor on a train) 
 she might look at that. Nay, more, 
 she might punch fascinating little holes 
 in a piece of paper with it. In my 
 
280 The Believing Years 
 
 determination to be hospitable I would 
 leave no stone unturned. 
 
 But she laid the punch down, and 
 wandered listlessly toward the door, her 
 thumb once more in her mouth. 
 
 There was nothing for it but to play 
 my highest trump ; she should see my 
 white mice ! They were prosperous and 
 interesting, and there were five new ones 
 since last week. 
 
 "Come here," I said, and I took her 
 to their box. We looked down into 
 their home, and as we did so, an elder 
 mouse poked his head above the straw, 
 and sniffed the air curiously, his little 
 eyes twinkling, and his whiskers quiver 
 ing with excitement. 
 
 Miss Alice uttered a loud squeal, and 
 dashed out of the room. I could hear 
 her all along the passage: 
 
 "Oh, mamma, mamma, a mouth! 
 a mouth!" 
 
Entertaining Alice 281 
 
 Well, I gave it up. I had made every 
 effort, there was no pleasing the 
 creature. My conscience was clear at 
 all events, and that was the principal 
 thing. 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 WHILE THE EVIL DAYS COME NOT 
 
 SEPTEMBER was horribly near. And 
 worse, there was coming that 5th day 
 of September when a certain bell should 
 ring again, and we trudge up Elm Street, 
 fidgeting uneasily about in our new 
 "fall" clothes. 
 
 The spectre of that man, that arith 
 metic-man, whose name during the days 
 of vacation it were almost profanation 
 to speak, arose before us with a hateful 
 leer. 
 
 The nights and mornings had grown 
 cooler, and where daisies and butter 
 cups had blossomed at the roadside, 
 the golden-rod and frost-flowers had it 
 all their own way. 
 
 282 
 
While the Evil Days Come Not 283 
 
 But one last adventure we must have, 
 one last protest in the name of liberty. 
 And so we organized, on the third day 
 of September, an extensive expedition 
 for the morrow, and I went to spend the 
 night with Ed Mason, to be ready to 
 make an early start. 
 
 I fell asleep, wondering if we might 
 not discover some unknown countries 
 during the next day. When I woke, a 
 small, dim figure stood beside me, repeat 
 ing the words, "It s half-past four." 
 
 It took me a number of seconds to com 
 prehend their meaning, and to recognize 
 their speaker. Then I knew, of course, 
 this was the hour of rising for the great 
 expedition into the backwoods, and here 
 was Ed Mason telling me of that fact. 
 
 By day, Mason stalked the earth, com 
 pelling and terrible, in all the majesty 
 of nine years. The ground trembled 
 beneath his feet, and none looked upon 
 
284 The Believing Years 
 
 him without reverence. With his own 
 strong right arm he had slain the musk- 
 rat in its lair, and he had explored the 
 fastnesses of "Second Woods," -which, 
 as everybody knew, were at least three- 
 quarters of a mile beyond "First Woods." 
 
 But now, in the chilly twilight before 
 dawn, and clad in a single white gar 
 ment, which hung from his shoulders 
 angelwise, there lacked something of the 
 awe which usually invested the Terror 
 of the Neighborhood. 
 
 Moreover, the nearly complete dark 
 ness which surrounded us, and eight 
 solid hours of sleep from which I had 
 just emerged, tended to make me slow 
 of understanding. Only the afternoon 
 before, and the world which had stretched 
 beyond the borders of the town lay at 
 our feet, awaiting our conquering foot 
 steps. Now, the world seemed not only 
 cold and dark, but immeasurably vast, 
 
While the Evil Days Come Not 285 
 
 and we no longer a pair of relentless 
 Columbuses. Rather small, in fact, we 
 seemed, and not wholly equipped to tame 
 the jungle, and bring the desert to ac 
 knowledge its masters. 
 
 However, I said nothing of this to Ed 
 Mason, but arose and dressed. He was 
 making ready in another room, and in 
 a few minutes we tiptoed down the stairs. 
 At five o clock we were to meet other 
 bold travellers at a rendezvous near the 
 frog pond, and there was no time to be 
 lost. 
 
 Luncheons, a day s supply of food, 
 had been prepared and put in boxes the 
 evening before. 
 
 With these under our arms, we hurried 
 out into the faint light and through the 
 side yard, our spirits and our clothes a 
 trifle dampened on the way, by means 
 of a glass of water thoughtfully poured 
 upon us from a window by Ed s sister 
 
286 The Believing Years 
 
 Florence. This attention was by way 
 of reciprocating our act of the previous 
 week, when we had locked her for a while 
 in the hen-house, a bit of humor 
 which we had long ago forgotten, but 
 which, it appeared, she still held in lively 
 recollection. 
 
 As we approached the pond, three other 
 personages came into sight. These were 
 Rob Currier, Jimmy Toppan, and Joe 
 Carter. Charley Carter had been one 
 of the organizers of the expedition, but 
 a too intimate association with Mr. 
 Hawkins s Bartlett pear tree and the 
 fruit thereof, late on the previous after 
 noon, had rendered his absence un 
 avoidable. 
 
 From his elder brother we gathered 
 that Charles had passed the darkling 
 hours in a manner not altogether agree 
 able, and that his parents, and even Dr. 
 Macey, had been in consultation over 
 
While the Evil Days Come Not 287 
 
 the matter. Indeed, it was a narrow 
 escape for Joe that he was not made to 
 suffer vicarious punishment, and be kept 
 at home on this day of days, but luckily 
 he had been able to prove an alibi. 
 
 Peter Bailey would not accompany us. 
 
 This was not on account of illness, 
 but, as we had all been made aware, 
 because he disapproved of our methods. 
 It was absurd, he had pointed out, to 
 go on such an excursion without a com 
 pass. The military instinct which al 
 ready made Peter regard himself as a 
 future ornament to the United States 
 Army, and which is doubtless of supreme 
 value to him to-day in a stock-broker s 
 office, this instinct demanded a com 
 pass in order to find our path through 
 the wilds. 
 
 None of us had a compass, and Peter s 
 was broken, and could not be replaced 
 until his birthday, six months hence. 
 
288 The Believing Years 
 
 We must either postpone our trip for 
 six months or go without Peter. He 
 would not trust himself so far from civil 
 ization unless at any moment he might 
 satisfy his passion for knowing where 
 lay the north. 
 
 Some little delicacy made us refrain 
 from suggesting that at the farthest point 
 which we should probably reach, the 
 spires of most of the churches in town 
 would undoubtedly be visible, and that 
 we might take our bearings from these. 
 
 Jimmy Toppan, then, as now, a navi 
 gator of deep seas, was one on whom the 
 compass argument had made a profound 
 impression. He described an ingenious 
 but complicated recipe (which had once 
 proved the salvation of certain mariners) 
 whereby the hands of a watch, if 
 directed toward the sun, or away from 
 the sun, I forget which, at noon, might 
 serve in place of the magnetic needle. 
 
While the Evil Days Come Not 289 
 
 But, as Rob Currier observed, we might 
 be hopelessly lost long before noon, and Ed 
 Mason supplemented this gloomy proph 
 ecy by recalling the fact that Peter 
 Bailey s Waterbury watch (the only 
 time-piece amongst us) was never going, 
 through Peter s constant neglect to spend 
 the fifteen minutes necessary to wind 
 it up. 
 
 The plan for the day had nearly fallen 
 through, but we finally decided to take our 
 lives in our hands, and go without a com 
 pass. Peter, after treating us to a few sar 
 casms on our unscientific venture, refused 
 absolutely to have anything to do with the 
 trip. So there were but five of us who 
 set out at last. 
 
 On one thing we were determined. 
 This was an all-day expedition. The 
 necessary amount of exploration, of hunt 
 ing and fishing, could not be accom 
 plished in a few hours. We carried food 
 
2 go The Believing Years 
 
 for three full meals, and our families had 
 been warned that they must get along 
 without us until night began to gather in. 
 
 Ed Mason had a light air-rifle, and Joe 
 Carter, by virtue of his seniority and ex 
 perience (he was thirteen that week) 
 carried a small but pernicious revolver. 
 The rest of us had fishing-poles and lines, 
 and I was further equipped with a burn 
 ing-glass, without which no one should 
 venture into the wilderness, where 
 matches may fail, and camp-fires have 
 to be kindled. 
 
 We had not gone far when the suit 
 ability of breakfast occurred to us. We 
 paused by the road, not far from the 
 brickyard (where Ed Mason had once 
 beaten off an attack by tramps) and ate 
 one third of our provision. 
 
 Rob Currier s box proved to contain, 
 among other things, a couple of hard- 
 boiled eggs, and to find a third part of 
 
While the Evil Days Come Not 291 
 
 two eggs was not only puzzling, but un 
 pleasantly reminiscent of Mr. Colburn s 
 Arithmetic, a book which we did not 
 care to have accompany us, even in spirit. 
 
 Rob solved the problem by eating both 
 eggs then and there. 
 
 A short walk brought us to a spot on 
 Little River where the fishing was good, 
 and here Jimmy Toppan and I promptly 
 unlimbered our rods. Ed Mason wan 
 dered across the meadow to look for 
 a legendary owl, which he claimed once 
 to have seen in a tree near the centre of 
 the meadow. 
 
 An owl-haunted tree it certainly looked, 
 but at that hour of the day there was 
 little surprise that Ed saw nothing of 
 him. The hunter soon returned to the 
 river bank, where Jimmy and I were 
 pulling in hornpouts at a great rate. 
 
 The others, scornful of hornpouts, had 
 departed to a small pool, farther up the 
 
292 The Believing Years 
 
 river, where nobler game was reported. 
 Before the end of an hour they returned, 
 bringing two very small and skinny 
 pickerel. Now your pickerel, be he ever 
 so meagre, is of course a nobler fish than 
 your hornpout, and there is more glory 
 in his capture. So Joe Carter and Rob 
 were fain to look with loathing upon the 
 dozen fat hornpouts which lay on the 
 grass, and to consider that Jimmy and 
 I had spent our time in but a trifling 
 fashion. 
 
 Not content with vaunting the su 
 periority of their two dusty pickerel, 
 they reduced us to deeper humiliation 
 by recounting their adventures. Joe 
 Carter had lost bait, hook, and float from 
 his fishing tackle, through the agency 
 of the enormous turtle who had lived for 
 many a year under the bridge at the head 
 of the pool, and Rob Currier had fallen 
 into the water and come out wet to the 
 
While the Evil Days Come Not 293 
 
 knees. So it was evident that there was 
 nothing for Jimmy and me but to hide our 
 diminished heads. 
 
 We said little, but suggested that as 
 the morning was apparently far ad 
 vanced, it would-be well to have a swim 
 and our midday meal. By the railroad 
 track, a short cut, we reached the 
 swimming place, Four Rocks. It was 
 probably the poorest swimming pool ever 
 prescribed by an iron tradition. Passing 
 trains made it necessary modestly to 
 seek deeper water, and grazing cows 
 threatened to devour our clothes ; but 
 here, and at no other place, did every 
 boy learn to swim. 
 
 Tradition is a tyrant ; during the be 
 lieving years it is the worst of despots. 
 
 In a few minutes we were all in the 
 water, all except Rob Currier, who, 
 under threat of dire punishment, had been 
 eternally charged by his mother to keep 
 
294 The Believing Years 
 
 out of the water until he was a com 
 plete master of the art of swimming. 
 
 As he had not yet learned on land, 
 he sat on the bank, threw pebbles at the 
 cows, and from time to time remarked 
 monotonously: "Oh, come on!" 
 
 The process of dressing was slow, 
 the use of towels, or any serious attempt 
 to dry oneself, being tabooed as a sign 
 of the most degrading effeminacy. When 
 we were ready to depart, the position 
 of the sun, and a hollow sensation in 
 our interiors, showed beyond question 
 that we must once more draw upon our 
 commissariat. 
 
 Guided by three gaunt poplars, we 
 advanced to the Devil s Den, an an 
 cient limestone quarry, which had some 
 of the appearance, and many of the 
 advantages, of a natural cave. Curious 
 mineral substances were found there, 
 asbestos might be dug from the rock 
 
While Me Evil Days Come Not 295 
 
 with a jack-knife, and green veins of 
 serpentine decorated the side of the 
 cliff. 
 
 It was a recognized spot for picnics, 
 and we should have scarcely thought of 
 eating our principal meal anywhere else. 
 In the deepest part of the cleft was an 
 unwholesome-looking puddle into which 
 dripped the moisture from the roof of 
 the cave. It was rather gloomy, and 
 made visitors lower their voices a little, 
 until they were in the sunlight once 
 more. 
 
 We built a fire, for what purpose it 
 would be difficult to say, as sandwiches, 
 cake, and fruit do not need a great deal 
 of cooking, and the fish which we had 
 captured had been left with old Mr. 
 Harris, the railroad-crossing tender, to 
 be claimed on our return trip. 
 
 It was pleasant, although a trifle hot 
 and smoky on a warm day, to sit around 
 
296 The Believing Years 
 
 a fire and refresh our wearied frames 
 with food. Joe Carter had a clay pipe, 
 and after he had eaten, tried the experi 
 ment of smoking dried leaves in it. He 
 coughed a good deal, and did not seem 
 to derive that joy from the process which 
 we had all heard arose from the use of 
 a pipe. 
 
 After a little time we set out once more, 
 climbed to the top of Devil s Pulpit, 
 and then took the road toward the 
 Devil s Basin. In that region, the Devil 
 seems to have had a large interest in the 
 scenery. The road is of the pleasantest, 
 however. Here, before the snow has 
 hardly left the woods, the spring "peepers" 
 sing insistently from a little bog, while, 
 a few weeks later, the gentle blossoms 
 of the hepatica emerge shyly from the 
 dead leaves, and the anemone springs 
 up on the hillside. 
 
 Now, although the tide of summer 
 
While the Evil Days Come Not 297 
 
 ebbed, the woods were crammed with 
 things of interest. We investigated the 
 Basin, another deserted quarry. We 
 explored the edges of the bog, and stalked 
 a flock of crows who had gathered in the 
 top of an oak. The afternoon passed 
 at first pleasantly, but finally with some 
 tedium, the day seemed interminably 
 long. Yet we grudged every moment, 
 for we realized that the hours of vaca 
 tion were numbered. 
 
 We rambled about till we became 
 aware that we were very tired, that the 
 day was waning, and that three or four 
 long miles lay between us and home. 
 
 So we hurried through our suppers, 
 and started on the return trip. Joe 
 Carter walked a little in advance, calling 
 out from time to time : 
 
 "You fellers better hurry up, unless 
 you want to camp all night in the woods." 
 
 Then he would casually take out his 
 
298 The Believing Years 
 
 revolver and look mysteriously toward 
 the deep undergrowth on each side of the 
 road, as if to signify that he could not 
 hold himself responsible for what man 
 ner of thing might beset us after the 
 powers of darkness should be exalted. 
 
 We did not want to camp all night in 
 the woods (Ed Mason and I had not for 
 gotten a certain experience !) and we 
 hastened our steps. 
 
 When we reached Mr. Harris s little 
 shanty, it was closed and locked, and the 
 old gentleman had gone, whither we 
 knew not. Our fish he had kindly pre 
 served for us in a pail of water. We 
 gathered them up, and hurried on. 
 
 We debated what was the exact hour, 
 and both Ed Mason and Rob Currier 
 thought that sunset was close upon us. 
 Ed remarked that he had seen one or 
 two bats fluttering about, as we came 
 through the woods. Evidently the 
 
While the Evil Days Come Not 299 
 
 creatures of the night were beginning to 
 make their appearance. 
 
 Tired we were, we knew that, 
 and a little moody at the thought of 
 approaching school. I had a small, 
 sharp pebble in my shoe, which made 
 walking very painful. So I had to 
 delay the party until I could rid myself 
 of it. 
 
 Finally we left the railroad track, and 
 started on the home stretch over the old 
 turnpike. We felt more at ease now, 
 since houses were in plain sight, and the 
 town distant only a matter of thirty 
 minutes walking. 
 
 Here we met a man driving a sorrel 
 horse in a wagon. 
 
 Joe Carter hailed him. 
 
 "Say, mister, do you know what time 
 it is ?" asked Joe. 
 
 The man pulled up the horse, and took 
 a watch out of his pocket. He looked 
 
300 The Believing Years 
 
 at the dial, and then held the watch to 
 his ear. 
 
 "Well," he remarked leisurely, "guess 
 my watch has stopped again. But I 
 can tell yer pretty close. It was quarter 
 to nine when I came by Moulton s, an 
 that wa n t more n fifteen minutes ago. 
 It s bout nine o clock now, I guess 
 you young fellers better be gettin home 
 pretty quick, or you won t get no break 
 fast!" 
 
 We all shouted at once. 
 
 The man looked at us bewildered. 
 
 "What are you talkin about?" Joe 
 Carter asked him; "quarter of nine in 
 the evening ?" 
 
 "Evening ?" said the man ; "you crazy ? 
 No, quarter to nine in the mornin , 
 of course. What do you oh ! I see ! 
 Been spendin the night in the woods, an 
 got lost, ain t yer ?" 
 
While the Evil Days Come Not 301 
 
 "No," Joe replied ; "we been out 
 all day, we started fore daylight 
 this morning, an we thought it was 
 night." 
 
 The man still stared, but gradually 
 he began to grasp the situation. His 
 mouth slowly opened, a grin began to 
 creep round to his ears, and he cackled. 
 Cackled offensively and long. 
 
 We could not stand that, and we 
 hurried along the road. The man stood 
 up in his wagon, looking after us, and 
 still uttering that idiotic cackle. 
 
 "Well, we re a lot of numb-heads," 
 remarked Rob Currier. 
 
 Apparently we all agreed, but no one 
 said so. We stubbed along in the dust, 
 silent and ashamed. The fiasco had 
 taken the life out of us. We did not 
 want to go back to the woods and we did 
 not want to return home. The jeers 
 that might greet us there would be worse 
 
302 The Believing Years 
 
 than the laughter of the man in the 
 wagon. 
 
 Out for an all-day expedition on the 
 last day before school opened, out for 
 a grand exploration of the wild country, 
 and we had eaten all three of our meals 
 and come home at nine o clock in the 
 morning ! What were these bats and 
 night-birds that we had seen ? Where 
 was the sunset and all the rest of 
 it ? This last day of vacation to be 
 spoiled 
 
 Suddenly Joe Carter stopped in the 
 middle of the road. 
 
 His mouth opened, and then a grin 
 spread over his face. 
 
 "By Jings!" he shouted. 
 
 We stopped and gazed at him. 
 
 Then he began to jump about excitedly 
 on one leg. 
 
 "Don t you see ?" he cried. 
 
 "What? See what?" 
 
While the Evil Days Come Not 303 
 
 "Why, don t you see ? What do we 
 care for that old hayseed in the wagon ? 
 Or for any one ? We ve still got a whole 
 day of vacation left !" 
 
/r T v HE following pages contain advertisements 
 of a few of the Macmillan novels. 
 
BY E. B. DEWING 
 
 OTHER PEOPLE S HOUSES 
 
 Cloth, ismo, $1.30 
 SOME OPINIONS OP THE WORK 
 
 " An acute study acute at times to the point of painfulness of a phase 
 of life especially aggressive in our own time, but peculiar to no single 
 period . . . there is an underlying power in the book that definitely con 
 veys a promise of better things." New York Evening Post. 
 
 " It is a remarkable story, with plenty of ingenuity in it, and some start 
 ling developments. Any story so plainly out of the beaten path deserves 
 the attention of the reading public." Cleveland Plain Dealer. 
 
 " Other People s Houses is a striking and absorbing study of character, 
 and is an effective introduction to a writer whose ability will doubtless 
 place her among the very few American novelists of importance." 
 New York Times. 
 
 BY MARY S. WATTS 
 
 THE LEGACY 
 
 Cloth, I2mo, $1.50 
 
 " It is a good story and at the same time good literature. Its plot is 
 handled with a sure hand, its occasional touches of emotion are genuine, 
 its spirit is wholesome and buoyant. It belongs in the select company of 
 the best American novels." Record-Herald. 
 
 " In Nathan Burke and in The Legacy, Mrs. Watts has reached a 
 high-water mark in American fiction, has told two stories of genuine 
 Americanism. Every page shows her truly remarkable gift of observa 
 tion observation shrewd but not unkind and her power to probe the 
 hearts of weak and erring mortals. Those who would keep in touch with 
 the best product of story-telling in America must not miss The Legacy. " 
 New York Globe. 
 
 " It is a story exceptionally well told, reaching and maintaining a rare 
 pitch of interest." New York World. 
 
 " It is a masterful novel throughout, and places the writer in the very 
 highest rank of modern authors." Salt Lake Tribune. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY 
 
 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 
 64-66 Fifth Avenue, New York 
 
MR. WINSTON CHURCHILL S NOVELS 
 
 Each, cloth, gilt tops and titles, $1.50 
 
 A Modern Chronicle Illustrated 
 
 This, Mr. Churchill s first great presentation of the Eternal Feminine, is 
 throughout a profound study of a fascinating young American woman. 
 It is frankly a modern love story. 
 
 " The most thorough and artistic work the author has yet turned out. A 
 very interesting story and a faithful picture of character . . . one that 
 will give rise to much discussion." New York Sun. 
 
 Mr. Crewe s Career Illustrated 
 
 " It is an honest and fair story. ... It is very interesting; and the 
 heroine is a type of woman as fresh, original, and captivating as any that 
 has appeared in American novels for a long time past." The Outlook, 
 
 The Celebrity An Episode 
 
 " No such piece of inimitable comedy in a literary way has appeared for 
 years. ... It is the purest, keenest fun." Chicago Inter-Ocean, 
 
 Richard Carvel Illustrated 
 
 " In breadth, massing of dramatic effect, depth of feeling, and rare whole- 
 someness of spirit, it has seldom, if ever, been surpassed by an American 
 romance." Chicago Tribune. 
 
 The Crossing Illustrated 
 
 " A thoroughly interesting book, packed with exciting adventure and 
 sentimental incident, yet faithful to historical fact both in detail and in 
 spirit." The Dial. 
 
 The Crisis Illustrated 
 
 " A charming love story that never loses its interest. . . . The intense 
 political bitterness, the intense patriotism of both parties, are shown 
 understandingly." Evening Telegraph, Philadelphia. 
 
 Coniston Illustrated 
 
 " A lighter, gayer spirit and a deeper, tenderer touch than Mr. Churchill 
 has ever achieved before. . . . One of the truest and finest transcripts 
 of modern American life thus far achieved in our fiction." Chicago 
 Record-Herald, 
 
 PUBLISHED BY 
 
 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 
 64-66 Fifth Avenue, New York 
 
IMPORTANT FICTION 
 
 GERTRUDE ATHERTON S 
 
 Tower of Ivory cioth,i 2 mo,$i. 5 o 
 
 " The Tower of Ivory provides the closest study of certain phases of 
 English high life at home and abroad that has been given us by any 
 novelist in a great many years. Mrs. Atherton has her readers 
 grappled to her soul by some of the most solid merits of the novelist and 
 these she repays generously." Chicago Evening Post. 
 
 CLARA E. LAUGHLIN S 
 
 Just Folks Cloth, I2mo, $1.50 
 
 " This work does for readers of fiction the very real service of human 
 izing the slums." Philadelphia Press. 
 
 " A most readable story, and one that warms the heart toward others." 
 Christian Advocate, New York. 
 
 MABEL O. WRIGHT S 
 
 Princess Flower Hat cloth, i 2 mo,$i. 5 o 
 
 " The tale is charming, the reading throughout is delightful, and no 
 lover of a garden will pass the book unnoticed." San Francisco 
 Call. 
 
 E. V. LUCAS 
 
 Mr. Ingleside cioth, izmo, $1.35 net 
 
 " Mr. Ingleside is a literary man s novel. The story itself is the least 
 of Mr. Ingleside ; it is the way it is told, the keen observation of men 
 and things and life in general, the excellent characterization, the drollery 
 and whimsey that bring delight from page to page. ... It is rich with 
 allusions and memories, ready with knowledge of life, and quickened 
 with a love for quirks and oddities in character wherever they are to be 
 found." Argus, Albany, N.Y. 
 
 RICHARD WASHBURN CHILD S 
 
 Jim Hands Cloth, i2mo, $1.20 net 
 
 " This is an excellent story. It treats of simple people, of a noble- 
 hearted girl who saw her duty, and of the man she loved. There are 
 scenes of real dramatic power. The interest is sustained. The kind of 
 book that works the heart chords every now and then." News and 
 Courier, Charleston, S.C. 
 
 " Mr. Child gives us a novel of uncommon interest, but what marks it at 
 once for attention is its purely human quality, its knowledge of the 
 fundamental traits of men and women, its atmosphere of truth to daily 
 life." New York Tribune. 
 
IMPORTANT FICTION Continued 
 
 JAMES LANE ALLEN S 
 
 The Doctor s Christmas Eve 
 
 Cloth, i2mo, $1.50 
 
 " Kentucky in its rural aspects and with its noble men and women forms 
 the scenery for this romance of quaintness and homeliness which lovingly 
 interprets the career of a country doctor who has lost faith in life but not 
 in ideals. Incidentally the author has interpreted the new spirit of 
 American childhood in its relation to the miracles and legends and lore 
 of other lands and older times, which have through the centuries gath 
 ered about the great Christmas festival of the Nativity." New York 
 Times. 
 
 " What so many have so long hoped Mr. Allen would do he has accom 
 plished in this work, namely, a description of Kentucky and the blue- 
 grass farms as seen by a youngster." New York A merican. 
 
 MARY S. WATTS* 
 Nathan Burke 
 
 Cloth, ismo, $1.50 
 
 " It is sometimes said that one of the best tests of a good novel, as it is of 
 a well-planned meal, is how you feel at the end. Are you satisfied or do 
 you wish that at some time the performance may be repeated ? When 
 one is through with Nathan Burke, one thinks, I d like to read it right 
 over again." Columbia Dispatch. 
 
 WILLIAM ALLEN WHITE S 
 A Certain Rich Man 
 
 Cloth, ismo, $1.50 
 
 " This novel has a message for to-day, and for its brilliant character 
 drawing, and that gossipy desultory style of writing that stamps Mr. 
 White s literary work, will earn a high place in fiction. It is good and 
 clean and provides a vacation from the cares of the hour. It resembles 
 a Chinese play, because it begins with the hero s boyhood, describes his 
 long, busy life, and ends with his death. Its tone is often religious, 
 never flippant, and one of its best assets is its glowing descriptions of 
 the calm, serene beauties of nature. Its moral is that a magnate never 
 did any real good with money." Oregonian, Portland, Ore. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY 
 
 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 
 64-66 Fifth Avenue, New York 
 
Mr. OWEN WISTER S NOVELS 
 
 Members of the Family 
 
 Decorated doth, i2mo, $1.25 net 
 " Thrilling and unusual tales of life on the Western prairies. Mr. Wister 
 has shown himself a master in this class of fiction." Critic. 
 
 The Virginian 
 
 Decorated, cloth, i2mo, $1.50 net 
 
 " The vanished West is made to live again by Owen Wister in a manner 
 which makes his book easily the best that deals with the cowboy and the 
 cattle country. ... It is picturesque, racy, and above all it is original." 
 The Philadelphia Press. 
 
 Lady Baltimore 
 
 Cloth, i2mo, $1.50 
 
 " After cowboy stories innumerable, the Virginian came as the last and 
 definite word on that romantic subject in our fiction. Lady Baltimore 
 will serve in much the same way as the most subtly drawn picture of the 
 old-world diimity of the vanished South." The New York Evening 
 Mail. 
 
 Mr. EDEN PHILPOTTS NOVELS 
 
 Eachy in decorated cloth, $1.50 
 
 The American Prisoner illustrated 
 
 " Intensely readable . . . perfectly admirable in its elemental humor and 
 racy turns of speech." The Spectator, London. 
 
 The Secret Woman 
 
 " There cannot be two opinions as to the interest and the power of The 
 Secret Woman. It is not only its author s masterpiece, but it is far in 
 advance of anything he has yet written and that is to give it higher 
 praise than almost any other comparison with contemporary fiction could 
 afford." Times Saturday Review. 
 
 Knock at a Venture 
 
 Sketches of the rus 
 touches. 
 
 The Portreeve 
 
 Sketches of the rustic life of Devon, rich in racy, quaint, and humorous 
 touches. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY 
 
 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 
 64-66 Fifth Avenue, New York 
 
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