Chapter M: A. L. Lane (2)

Then he began to read his newspaper quite hard and fast and to look severe, as one does who never gives anything to beggars, as a matter of principle.

But nobody else gave anything to Mary Elizabeth. She shuffled from one to another, hopelessly. Every gentleman shook his head. One called for a waiter to put her out. This frightened her and she stood still.

Over by a window, in a lonely corner of the great room, a young man was sitting apart from the others. He sat with his elbows on the table and his face buried in his arms. He was a well-dressed young man, with brown, curling hair.

Mary Elizabeth wondered why he looked so miserable and why he sat alone. She thought, perhaps, that if he weren't so happy as the other gentlemen, he would be more sorry for cold and hungry girls. She hesitated, then walked along and directly up to him.

One or two gentlemen laid down their papers and watched this; they smiled and nodded to each other. The child did not see them to wonder why. She went up and put her hand upon the young man's arm.

He started. The brown, curly head lifted itself from the shelter of his arms; a young face looked sharply at the beggar girl,--a beautiful young face it might have been.

It was haggard now and dreadful to look at,--bloated and badly marked with the unmistakable marks of a wicked week's debauch. He roughly said:

"What do you want?"

"I'm hungry," said Mary Elizabeth.

"I can't help that. Go away."

"I haven't had anything to eat for a whole day--a whole day!" repeated the child.

Her lip quivered. But she spoke distinctly. Her voice sounded through the room. One gentleman after another laid down his paper or his pipe. Several were watching this little scene.

"Go away!" repeated the young man, irritably. "Don't bother me. I haven't had anything to eat for three days!"

His face went down into his arms again. Mary Elizabeth stood staring at the brown, curling hair. She stood perfectly still for some moments. She evidently was greatly puzzled. She walked away a little distance, then stopped and thought it over.

And now paper after paper and pipe after cigar went down. Every gentleman in the room began to look on. The young man with the beautiful brown curls, and dissipated, disgraced, and hidden face was not stiller than the rest.

The little figure in the pink calico and the red shawl and big rubbers stood for a moment silent among them all. The waiter came to take her out but the gentlemen motioned him away.

Mary Elizabeth turned her five-cent piece over and over in her purple hand. Her hand shook. The tears came. The smell of the dinner from the dining-room grew savoury and strong. The child put the piece of money to her lips as if she could have eaten it, then turned and, without further hesitation, went back.

She touched the young man--on the bright hair this time--with her trembling little hand.

The room was so still now that what she said rang out to the corridor, where the waiters stood, with the clerk behind looking over the desk to see.

"I'm sorry you are so hungry. If you haven't had anything for three days, you must be hungrier than me. I've got five cents. A gentleman gave it me. I wish you would take it. I've only gone one day. You can get some supper with it, and--maybe--I--can get some somewheres! I wish you'd please to take it!"

Mary Elizabeth stood quite still, holding out her five-cent piece. She did not understand the stir that went all over the bright room. She did not see that some of the gentlemen coughed and wiped their spectacles.

She did not know why the brown curls before her came up with such a start, nor why the young man's wasted face flushed red and hot with a noble shame.

She did not in the least understand why he flung the five-cent piece upon the table, and, snatching her in his arms, held her fast and hid his face on her plaid shawl and sobbed. Nor did she seem to know what could be the reason that nobody seemed amused to see this gentleman cry.

The gentleman who had given her the money came up, and some more came up, and they gathered around, and she in the midst of them, and they all spoke kindly, and the young man with the bad face that might have been so beautiful stood up, still clinging to her, and said aloud:

"She's shamed me before you all, and she's shamed me to myself! I'll learn a lesson from this beggar, so help me God!"

So then he took the child upon his knee, and the gentlemen came up to listen, and the young man asked her what her name was.

"Mary Elizabeth, sir."

"Names used to mean things--in the Bible--when I was as little as you. I read the Bible then. Does Mary Elizabeth mean angel of rebuke?"

"Sir?"

"Where do you live, Mary Elizabeth?"

"Nowhere, sir."

"Where do you sleep?"

"In Mrs. O'Flynn's shed, sir. It's too cold for the cows. She's so kind, she lets us stay."

"Whom do you stay with?"

"Nobody, only Jo."

"Is Jo your brother?"

"No, sir. Jo is a girl. I haven't got only Jo."

"What does Jo do for a living?"

"She--gets it, sir."

"And what do you do?"

"I beg. It's better than to--get it, sir, I think."

"Where's your mother?"

"Dead."

"What did she die of?"

"Drink, sir," said Mary Elizabeth, in her distinct and gentle tone.

"Ah--well. And your father?"

"He is dead. He died in prison."

"What sent him to prison?"

"Drink, sir."

"Oh!"

"I had a brother once," continued Mary Elizabeth, who grew quite eloquent with so large an audience, "but he died, too."

"I do want my supper," she added, after a pause, speaking in a whisper, as if to Jo or to herself, "and Jo'll be wondering for me."

"Wait, then," said the young man. "I'll see if I can't beg enough to get you your supper."

"I thought there must be an extry one among so many folks!" cried Mary Elizabeth; for now, she thought, she should get back her five cents.

And, truly, the young man put the five cents into his hat, to begin with. Then he took out his purse, and put in something that made less noise than the five-cent piece and something more and more and more.

Then he passed around the great room, walking still unsteadily, and the gentleman who gave the five cents and all the gentlemen put something into the young man's hat.

So, when he came back to the table, he emptied the hat and counted the money, and, truly, it was forty dollars.

"Forty dollars!"

Mary Elizabeth looked frightened.

"It's yours," said the young man. "Now come to supper. But see! this gentleman who gave you the five-cent piece shall take care of the money for you. You can trust him. He's got a wife, too. But we'll come to supper now."

* * * * *

So the young man took her by the hand, and the gentleman whose wife knew all about what to do with orphans took her by the other hand, and one or two more gentlemen followed, and they all went into the dining-room, and put Mary Elizabeth in a chair at a clean white table, and asked her what she wanted for her supper.

Mary Elizabeth said that a little dry toast and a cup of milk would do nicely. So all the gentlemen laughed. And she wondered why.

And the young man with the brown curls laughed, too, and began to look quite happy. But he ordered chicken and cranberry sauce and mashed potatoes and celery and rolls and butter and tomatoes and an ice cream and a cup of tea and nuts and raisins and cake and custard and apples and grapes.

And Mary Elizabeth sat in her pink dress and red shawl and ate the whole; and why it didn't kill her nobody knows; but it didn't.

The young man with the face that might have been beautiful--that might be yet, one would have thought who had seen him then--stood watching the little girl.

"She's preached me the best sermon," he said below his breath, "I ever heard. May God bless her! I wish there were a thousand like her in this selfish world!"

And when I heard about it I wished so, too.

ELIZABETH STUART PHELPS WARD

Oh, there is nothing on earth half so holy
As the innocent heart of a child.

DICKENS

THE FROST

The Frost looked forth, one still clear night,
And whispered: "Now I shall be out of sight;
So through the valley and over the height,
In silence I'll take my way:
I will not go on like that blustering train,
The wind and the snow, the hail and the rain,
Who make so much bustle and noise in vain,
But I'll be as busy as they."

Then he flew to the mountain and powdered its crest;
He lit on the trees, and their boughs he dressed
In diamond beads--and over the breast
Of the quivering lake he spread
A coat of mail, that it need not fear
The downward point of many a spear
That he hung on its margin, far and near,
Where a rock could rear its head.

He went to the windows of those who slept,
And over each pane, like a fairy, crept;
Wherever he breathed, wherever he stept,
By the light of the moon were seen
Most beautiful things:--there were flowers and trees;
There were bevies of birds and swarms of bees:
There were cities with temples and towers; and these
All pictured in silver sheen.

But he did one thing that was hardly fair;
He peeped in the cupboard, and finding there
That all had forgotten for him to prepare--
"Now just to set them a-thinking,
I'll bite this basket of fruit," said he,
"This costly pitcher I'll burst in three,
And the glass of water they've left for me
Shall 'Tchick!' to tell them I'm drinking."

H. F. GOULD

CORN-FIELDS

When on the breath of Autumn's breeze,
From pastures dry and brown,
Goes floating, like an idle thought,
The fair, white thistle-down,--
Oh, then what joy to walk at will
Upon the golden harvest-hill!

What joy in dreaming ease to lie
Amid a field new shorn;
And see all round, on sunlit slopes,
The piled-up shocks of corn;
And send the fancy wandering o'er
All pleasant harvest-fields of yore!

I feel the day; I see the field;
The quivering of the leaves;
And good old Jacob, and his house,--
Binding the yellow sheaves!
And at this very hour I seem
To be with Joseph in his dream!

I see the fields of Bethlehem,
And reapers many a one
Bending unto their sickles' stroke,
And Boaz looking on;
And Ruth, the Moabitess fair,
Among the gleaners stooping there!

Again, I see a little child,
His mother's sole delight,--
God's living gift of love unto
The kind, good Shunammite;
To mortal pangs I see him yield,
And the lad bear him from the field.

The sun-bathed quiet of the hills,
The fields of Galilee,
That eighteen hundred years ago
Were full of corn, I see;
And the dear Saviour take his way
'Mid ripe ears on the Sabbath day.

Oh, golden fields of bending corn,
How beautiful they seem!
The reaper-folk, the piled-up sheaves,
To me are like a dream;
The sunshine, and the very air
Seem of old time, and take me there!

MARY HOWITT

SOUTH-WEST WIND, ESQ.

Treasure Valley belonged to three brothers--Schwartz, Hans, and Gluck. The two elder brothers were rich, cruel, quarrelsome men who never gave anything in charity. The youngest brother, Gluck, was twelve years old, and kind to everyone. He had to act as cook and servant to his brothers.

One cold, wet day the brothers went out, telling Gluck to roast a leg of mutton on the spit, let nobody into the house, and let nothing out. After a time some one knocked at the door. Gluck went to the window, opened it, and put his head out to see who it was.

It was the most extraordinary-looking little gentleman. He had a very large nose, slightly brass-coloured; very round and very red cheeks; merry eyes, long hair, and moustaches that curled twice round like a corkscrew on each side of his mouth. He was four feet six inches high, and wore a pointed cap as long as himself. It was decorated with a black feather about three feet long. Around his body was folded an enormous black, glossy-looking cloak much too long for him. As he knocked again he caught sight of Gluck.

"Hollo!" said the little gentleman, "that's not the way to answer the door; I'm wet, let me in."

To do the little gentleman justice, he _was_ wet. His feather hung down between his legs like a beaten puppy's tail, dripping like an umbrella; and from the ends of his moustaches the water was running into his waistcoat pockets, and out again like a mill stream.

"I beg pardon, sir," said Gluck, "I'm very sorry, but I really can't."

"Can't what?" said the old gentleman.

"I can't let you in, sir,--I can't, indeed; my brothers would beat me to death, sir, if I thought of such a thing. What do you want, sir?"

"Want?" said the old gentleman, petulantly, "I want fire and shelter; and there's your great fire there blazing, crackling, and dancing on the walls, with nobody to feel it. Let me in, I say; I only want to warm myself."

Gluck had had his head, by this time, so long out of the window that he began to feel it was really unpleasantly cold, and when he turned and saw the beautiful fire rustling and roaring, and throwing long, bright tongues up the chimney, as if it were licking its chops at the savoury smell of the leg of mutton, his heart melted within him that it should be burning away for nothing. "He does look _very_ wet," said little Gluck; "I'll just let him in for a quarter of an hour." Round he went to the door, and opened it; and as the little gentleman walked in, through the house came a gust of wind that made the old chimneys totter.

"That's a good boy," said the little gentleman. "Never mind your brothers. I'll talk to them."

"Pray, sir, don't do any such thing," said Gluck. "I can't let you stay till they come; they'd be the death of me."

"Dear me," said the old gentleman, "I'm very sorry to hear that. How long may I stay?"

"Only till the mutton's done, sir," replied Gluck, "and it's very brown."

Then the old gentleman walked into the kitchen, and sat himself down on the hob, with the top of his cap accommodated up the chimney, for it was a great deal too high for the roof. "You'll soon dry there, sir," said Gluck, and sat down again to turn the mutton. But the old gentleman did _not_ dry there, but went on drip, drip, dripping among the cinders, and the fire fizzed and sputtered, and began to look very black and uncomfortable; never was such a cloak; every fold in it ran like a gutter.

"I beg pardon, sir," said Gluck at length, after watching the water spreading in long quicksilver-like streams over the floor for a quarter of an hour; "mayn't I take your cloak?"

"No, thank you," said the old gentleman.

"Your cap, sir?"

"I am all right, thank you," said the old gentleman, rather gruffly.

"But--sir--I'm very sorry," said Gluck, hesitatingly; "but--really, sir--you're putting the fire out."

"It'll take longer to do the mutton, then," replied his visitor, dryly.

Gluck was very much puzzled by the behaviour of his guest; it was such a strange mixture of coolness and humility. He turned away at the string meditatively for another five minutes.

"That mutton looks very nice," said the old gentleman, at length. "Can't you give me a little bit?"

"Impossible, sir," said Gluck.

"I'm very hungry," continued the old gentleman; "I've had nothing to eat yesterday, nor to-day. They surely couldn't miss a bit from the knuckle!"

He spoke in so very melancholy a tone that it quite melted Gluck's heart. "They promised me one slice to-day, sir," said he; "I can give you that, but not a bit more."

"That's a good boy," said the old gentleman again.

Then Gluck warmed a plate and sharpened a knife. "I don't care if I do get beaten for it," thought he. Just as he had cut a large slice out of the mutton, there came a tremendous rap at the door. The old gentleman jumped off the hob, as if it had suddenly become inconveniently warm. Gluck fitted the slice into the mutton again, with desperate efforts at exactitude, and ran to open the door.

"What did you keep us waiting in the rain for?" said Schwartz, as he walked in, throwing his umbrella in Gluck's face.

"Ay! what for, indeed, you little vagabond?" said Hans, administering an educational box on the ear, as he followed his brother into the kitchen.

"Bless my soul!" said Schwartz, when he opened the door.

"Amen," said the little gentleman, who had taken his cap off, and was standing in the middle of the kitchen, bowing with the utmost possible velocity.

"Who's that?" said Schwartz, catching up a rolling-pin, and turning to Gluck with a fierce frown.

"I don't know, indeed, brother," said Gluck, in great terror.

"How did he get in?" roared Schwartz.

"My dear brother," said Gluck, deprecatingly, "he was so _very_ wet!"

The rolling-pin was descending on Gluck's head; but at the instant the old gentleman interposed his conical cap, on which it crashed with a shock that shook the water out of it all over the room. What was very odd, the rolling-pin no sooner touched the cap than it flew out of Schwartz's hand, spinning like a straw in a high wind, and fell into the corner at the farther end of the room.

"Who are you, sir?" demanded Schwartz, turning upon him.

"What's your business?" snarled Hans.

"I'm a poor, old man, sir," the little gentleman began very modestly, "and I saw your fire through the window, and begged shelter for a quarter of an hour."

"Have the goodness to walk out again, then," said Schwartz. "We've quite enough water in our kitchen, without making it a drying-house."

"It is a cold day to turn an old man out in, sir; look at my gray hairs." They hung down to his shoulders.

"Ay!" said Hans, "there are enough of them to keep you warm. Walk!"

"I'm very, very hungry, sir; couldn't you spare me a bit of bread before I go?"

"Bread, indeed!" said Schwartz; "do you suppose we've nothing to do with our bread but to give it to such red-nosed fellows as you?"

"Why don't you sell your feather?" said Hans, sneeringly. "Out with you!"

"A little bit," said the old gentleman.

"Be off!" said Schwartz.

"Pray, gentlemen--"

"Off, and be hanged!" cried Hans, seizing him by the collar. But he had no sooner touched the old gentleman's collar, than away he went after the rolling-pin, spinning round and round, till he fell into the corner on the top of it. Then Schwartz was very angry, and ran at the old gentleman to turn him out; but he also had hardly touched him, when away he went after Hans and the rolling-pin, and hit his head against the wall as he tumbled into the corner. And so there they lay, all three.

Then the old gentleman spun himself round with velocity in the opposite direction; continued to spin until his long cloak was all wound neatly about him; clapped his cap on his head, very much on one side (for it could not stand upright without going through the ceiling), gave an additional twist to his corkscrew moustaches, and replied with perfect coolness: "Gentlemen, I wish you a very good-morning. At twelve o'clock to-night I'll call again; after such a refusal of hospitality as I have just experienced, you will not be surprised if that visit is the last I ever pay you."

"If I ever catch you here again," muttered Schwartz, coming, half-frightened, out of the corner--but before he could finish his sentence, the old gentleman had shut the house door behind him with a great bang; and past the window, at the same instant, drove a wreath of ragged cloud, that whirled and rolled away down the valley in all manner of shapes; turning over and over in the air, and melting away at last in a gush of rain.

"A very pretty business, indeed, Mr. Gluck!" said Schwartz. "Dish the mutton, sir. If ever I catch you at such a trick again--bless me, why the mutton's been cut!"

"You promised me one slice, brother, you know," said Gluck.

"Oh! and you were cutting it hot, I suppose, and going to catch all the gravy. It'll be long before I promise you such a thing again. Leave the room, sir; and have the kindness to wait in the coal-cellar till I call you."

Gluck left the room melancholy enough. The brothers ate as much mutton as they could, locked the rest in the cupboard, and proceeded to get very drunk after dinner.

Such a night as it was! Howling wind and rushing rain, without intermission.

The brothers had just sense enough left to put up all the shutters, and double-bar the door, before they went to bed. They usually slept in the same room. As the clock struck twelve, they were both awakened by a tremendous crash. Their door burst open with a violence that shook the house from top to bottom.

"What's that?" cried Schwartz, starting up in his bed.

"Only I," said the little gentleman.

The two brothers sat up on their bolster, and stared into the darkness. The room was full of water, and by a misty moonbeam, which found its way through a hole in the shutter, they could see, in the midst of it, an enormous foam globe, spinning round, and bobbing up and down like a cork, on which, as on a most luxurious cushion, reclined the little old gentleman, cap and all. There was plenty of room for it now, for the roof was off.

"Sorry to incommode you," said their visitor, ironically. "I'm afraid your beds are dampish; perhaps you had better go to your brother's room; I've left the ceiling on there."

They required no second admonition, but rushed into Gluck's room, wet through, and in an agony of terror.

"You'll find my card on the kitchen table," the old gentleman called after them. "Remember, the _last_ visit."

"Pray Heaven it may be!" said Schwartz, shuddering. And the foam globe disappeared.

Dawn came at last, and the two brothers looked out of Gluck's little window in the morning. The Treasure Valley was one mass of ruin and desolation. The inundation had swept away trees, crops, and cattle, and left, in their stead, a waste of red sand and gray mud. The two brothers crept, shivering and horror-struck, into the kitchen. The water had gutted the whole first floor: corn, money, almost every movable thing had been swept away, and there was left only a small white card on the kitchen table. On it, in large, breezy, long-legged letters, were engraved the words:--

SOUTH-WEST WIND, ESQUIRE.

RUSKIN: "The King of the Golden River." (Adapted)

The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve;
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.

SHAKESPEARE

THE MEETING OF THE WATERS

There is not in the wide world a valley so sweet
As that vale in whose bosom the bright waters meet;
Oh! the last rays of feeling and life must depart,
Ere the bloom of that valley shall fade from my heart.

Yet it _was_ not that Nature had shed o'er the scene
Her purest of crystal and brightest of green;
'Twas _not_ her soft magic of streamlet or hill,
Oh! no,--it was something more exquisite still.

'Twas that friends, the beloved of my bosom, were near,
Who made every dear scene of enchantment more dear,
And who felt how the best charms of Nature improve,
When we see them reflected from looks that we love.

Sweet vale of Avoca! how calm could I rest
In thy bosom of shade, with the friends I love best,
Where the storms that we feel in this cold world should cease,
And our hearts, like thy waters, be mingled in peace.

MOORE

LOVE

Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you. Bless them that curse you, and pray for them which despitefully use you. And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise. For if ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them. And if ye do good to them which do good to you, what thank have ye? for sinners also do even the same. And if ye lend to them of whom ye hope to receive, what thank have ye? for sinners also lend to sinners, to receive as much again. But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil. Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful. Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven. Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again.

ST. LUKE, VI. 27-38

THE ROBIN'S SONG

"When the willows gleam along the brooks,
And the grass grows green in sunny nooks,
In the sunshine and the rain
I hear the robin in the lane
Singing, 'Cheerily,
Cheer up, cheer up;
Cheerily, cheerily,
Cheer up.'

"But the snow is still
Along the walls and on the hill.
The days are cold, the nights forlorn,
For one is here and one is gone.
'Tut, tut. Cheerily,
Cheer up, cheer up;
Cheerily, cheerily,
Cheer up.'

"When spring hopes seem to wane,
I hear the joyful strain--
A song at night, a song at morn,
A lesson deep to me is borne,
Hearing, 'Cheerily,
Cheer up, cheer up;
Cheerily, cheerily,
Cheer up.'"

UNKNOWN

WORK OR PLAY

Saturday morning was come, and all the summer world was bright and fresh and brimming with life. There was a song in every heart; and if the heart was young the music issued at the lips. There was cheer in every face, and a spring in every step. The locust trees were in bloom, and the fragrance of the blossoms filled the air.

Tom appeared on the sidewalk with a bucket of whitewash and a long-handled brush. He surveyed the fence, and the gladness went out of nature, and a deep melancholy settled down upon his spirit. Thirty yards of board fence nine feet high! It seemed to him that life was hollow, and existence but a burden. Sighing, he dipped his brush and passed it along the topmost plank; repeated the operation; did it again; compared the insignificant whitewashed streak with the far-reaching continent of unwhitewashed fence, and sat down on a tree-box discouraged.

He began to think of the fun he had planned for this day, and his sorrows multiplied. Soon the free boys would come tripping along on all sorts of delicious expeditions, and they would make a world of fun of him for having to work--the very thought of it burnt him like fire.

He got out his worldly wealth and examined it--bits of toys, marbles and trash; enough to buy an exchange of work maybe, but not enough to buy so much as half an hour of pure freedom. So he returned his straitened means to his pocket, and gave up the idea of trying to buy the boys.

At this dark and hopeless moment an inspiration burst upon him. Nothing less than a great, magnificent inspiration. He took up his brush and went tranquilly to work. Ben Rogers hove in sight presently; the very boy of all boys whose ridicule he had been dreading. Ben's gait was the hop, skip, and jump--proof enough that his heart was light and his anticipations high. He was eating an apple, and giving a long melodious whoop at intervals, followed by a deep-toned ding dong dong, ding dong dong, for he was personating a steamboat.

Tom went on whitewashing--paid no attention to the steamer. Ben stared a moment, and then said--

"Hi-yi! You're a stump, ain't you!"

No answer. Tom surveyed his last touch with the eye of an artist; then he gave his brush another gentle sweep, and surveyed the result as before. Ben ranged up alongside of him. Tom's mouth watered for the apple, but he stuck to his work. Ben said--

"Hello, old chap; you got to work, hey?"

"Why, it's you, Ben! I warn't noticing."

"Say, I'm going in a-swimming, I am. Don't you wish you could? But of course you'd druther work, wouldn't you? 'Course you would!"

Tom contemplated the boy a bit, and said--

"What do you call work?"

"Why ain't that work?"

Tom resumed his whitewashing, and answered carelessly--

"Well, maybe it is, and maybe it ain't. All I know is, it suits Tom Sawyer."

"Oh, come now, you don't mean to let on that you like it?"

The brush continued to move.

"Like it? Well, I don't see why I oughtn't to like it. Does a boy get a chance to whitewash a fence every day?"

That put the thing in a new light. Ben stopped nibbling his apple. Tom swept his brush daintily back and forth--stepped back to note the effect--added a touch here and there--criticised the effect again, Ben watching every move, and getting more and more interested, more and more absorbed. Presently he said--

"Say, Tom, let me whitewash a little."

Tom considered; was about to consent; but he altered his mind: "No, no; I reckon it wouldn't hardly do, Ben. You see, Aunt Polly's awful particular about this fence--right here on the street, you know--but if it was the back fence I wouldn't mind, and she wouldn't. Yes, she's awful particular about this fence; it's got to be done very careful; I reckon there ain't one boy in a thousand, maybe two thousand, that can do it the way it's got to be done."

"No--is that so? Oh, come now; lemme just try, only just a little. I'd let you, if you was me, Tom."

"Ben, I'd like to, honest injun; but Aunt Polly--well, Jim wanted to do it, but she wouldn't let him. Sid wanted to do it, but she wouldn't let Sid. Now, don't you see how I am fixed? If you was to tackle this fence, and anything was to happen to it--"

"Oh, shucks; I'll be just as careful. Now lemme try. Say--I'll give you the core of my apple."

"Well, here. No, Ben; now don't; I'm afeard--"

"I'll give you all of it!"

Tom gave up the brush with reluctance in his face, but alacrity in his heart. And while Ben worked and sweated in the sun, the retired artist sat on a barrel in the shade close by, dangled his legs, munched his apple, and planned the slaughter of more innocents. There was no lack of material; boys happened along every little while; they came to jeer, but remained to whitewash.

By the time Ben was fagged out, Tom had traded the next chance to Billy Fisher for a kite in good repair; and when he played out, Johnny Miller bought in for a dead rat and a string to swing it with; and so on, and so on, hour after hour. And when the middle of the afternoon came, from being a poor, poverty-stricken boy in the morning, Tom was literally rolling in wealth.

He had, besides the things I have mentioned, twelve marbles, part of a jew's harp, a piece of blue bottle-glass to look through, a spool-cannon, a key that wouldn't unlock anything, a fragment of chalk, a glass stopper of a decanter, a tin soldier, a couple of tadpoles, six fire-crackers, a kitten with only one eye, a brass door-knob, a dog-collar--but no dog--the handle of a knife, four pieces of orange-peel, and a dilapidated old window-sash. He had had a nice, good, idle time all the while--plenty of company--and the fence had three coats of whitewash on it! If he hadn't run out of whitewash, he would have bankrupted every boy in the village.

Tom said to himself that it was not such a hollow world after all. He had discovered a great law of human action, without knowing it, namely, that, in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to attain. If he had been a great and wise philosopher, he would have comprehended that Work consists of whatever a body is _obliged_ to do, and that Play consists of whatever a body is _not_ obliged to do.

MARK TWAIN: "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer."

BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE

Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
As his corpse to the rampart we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O'er the grave where our hero we buried.

We buried him darkly at dead of night,
The sods with our bayonets turning;
By the struggling moon-beam's misty light,
And the lantern dimly burning.

No useless coffin inclosed his breast,
Nor in sheet nor in shroud we wound him;
But he lay like a warrior taking his rest,
With his martial cloak around him.

Few and short were the prayers we said,
And we spoke not a word of sorrow;
But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead,
And we bitterly thought of the morrow.

We thought as we hollowed his narrow bed,
And smoothed down his lonely pillow,
That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head,
And we far away on the billow.

Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone,
And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him,--
But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep on,
In the grave where a Briton has laid him.

But half of our heavy task was done
When the clock struck the hour for retiring;
And we heard the distant and random gun
That the foe was sullenly firing.

Slowly and sadly we laid him down
From the field of his fame fresh and gory;
We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone,
But we left him alone with his glory.