"Well, well," said Stack, "I don't know how I ever came to—"

"Let me direct your attention to another incendiary matter," interrupted the major. "In the first love-scene between Adolph and—and—let me see—what's her name?—Mary—you say that 'her liquid blue eye rested softly upon him as he poured forth the story of his love, and its azure was dimmed by a flood of happy tears.' Well, sir, about twenty pages farther on, where the villain insults her, you observe that her black eyes flashed lightning at him and seemed to scorch him where he stood. Now, let me direct attention to the fact that if the girl's eyes were blue they couldn't be black; and if you mean to convey the impression that she had one blue eye and one black eye, and that she only looked softly at Adolph out of the off eye, while the near eye roamed around, not doing anything in particular, why, she is too phenomenal for a novel, and only suitable for a place in the menagerie by the side of the curiosities. And then you say that although her eye was liquid yet it scorched the villain. People won't put up with that kind of thing. It makes them delirious and murderous."

"Too bad!" said Stack. "I forgot what I'd said about her eyes when I wrote that scene with the villain."

"And here, in the twentieth chapter, you say that Magruder was stabbed with a bowie-knife in the hands of the Spaniard, and in the next chapter you give an account of the post-mortem examination, and make the doctors hunt for the bullet and find it embedded in his liver. Even patient readers can't remain calm under such circumstances. They lose control of themselves."

"It's unfortunate," said Stack.

"Now, the way you manage the Browns in the story is also exasperating. First you represent Mrs. Brown as taking her twins around to church to be christened. In the middle of the book you make Mrs. Brown lament that she never had any children, and you wind up the story by bringing in Mrs. Brown with her grandson in her arms just after having caused Mr. Brown to state to the clergyman that the only child he ever had died in his fourth year. Just think of the effect of such a thing on the public mind! Why, this story would fill all the insane asylums in the country."

"Those Browns don't seem to be very definite, somehow," said Stack, thoughtfully.

"Worst of all," said major, "in chapter thirty-one you make the lovers resolve upon suicide, and you put them in a boat and drift them over Niagara Falls. Twelve chapters farther on you suddenly introduce them walking in the twilight in a leafy lane, and although afterward she goes into a nunnery and takes the black veil because he has been killed by pirates in the Spanish West Indies, in the next chapter to the last you have a scene where she goes to a surprise-party at the Presbyterian minister's and finds him there making arrangements for the wedding as if nothing had ever happened; and then, after you disclose the fact that she was a boy in disguise, and not a woman at all, you marry them to each other, and represent the boy heroine as giving her blessing to her daughter. Oh, it's awful—awful! It won't do. It really won't. You'd better go into some other kind of business, Mr. Stack."

Then Stack took his manuscript and went home to fix it up so as to make the story run together better. The Patriot will not publish it even if Stack reconstructs it.

* * * * *

Major Slott, like most other editors, is continually persecuted by bores, but recently he was the victim of a peculiarly dastardly attack from a person of this class. While he was sitting in the office of the Patriot, writing an editorial about "Our Grinding Monopolies," he suddenly became conscious of the presence of a fearful smell. He stopped, snuffed the air two or three times, and at last lighted a cigar to fumigate the room. Then he heard footsteps upon the stairs, and as they drew nearer the smell grew stronger. When it had reached a degree of intensity that caused the major to fear that it might break some of the furniture, there was a knock at the door. Then a man entered with a bundle under his arm, and as he did so the major thought that he had never smelt such a fiendish smell in the whole course of his life. He held his nose; and when the man saw the gesture, he said,

"I thought so; the usual effect. You hold it tight while I explain."

"What hab you god id that buddle?" asked the major.

"That, sir," said the man, "is Barker's Carbolic Disinfecting Door-mat. I am Barker, and this is the mat. I invented it, and it's a big thing."

"Is id thad thad smells so thudderig bad?" asked the major, with his nostrils tightly shut.

"Yes, sir; smells very strong, but it's a healthy smell. It's invigorating. It braces the system. I'll tell you—"

"Gid oud with the blabed thig!" exclaimed the major.

"I must tell you all about it first. I called to explain it to you. You see I've been investigating the causes of epidemic diseases. Some scientists think they are spread by molecules in the air; others attribute them to gases generated in the sewers; others hold that they are conveyed by contagion; but I—"

"Aid you goig to tague thad idferdal thig away frob here?" asked the major.

"But I have discovered that these diseases are spread by the agency of door-mats. Do you understand? Door-mats! And I'll explain to you how it's done. Here's a man who's been in a house where there's disease. He gets it on his boots. The leather is porous, and it becomes saturated. He goes to another house and wipes his boots on the mat. Now, every man who uses that mat must get some of the stuff on his boots, and he spreads it over every other door-mat that he wipes them on. Now, don't he?"

"Why dode you tague thad sbell frob udder by dose?"

"Well, then, my idea is to construct a door-mat that will disinfect those boots. I do it by saturating the mat with carbolic acid and drying it gradually. I have one here prepared by my process. Shall I unroll it?"

"If you do, I'll blow your braids out!" shouted the major.

"Oh, very well, then. Now, the objection to this beautiful invention is that it possesses a very strong and positive odor."

"I'll bed it does," said the major.



"And as this is offensive to many persons, I give to each purchaser a 'nose-guard,' which is to be worn upon the nose while in a house where the carbolic mat is placed. This nose-guard is filled with a substance which completely neutralizes the smell, and it has only one disadvantage. Now, what is that?"

"Are you goig to quid and led me breathe, or are you goig to stay here all day log?"

"Have patience, now; I'm coming to the point. I say, what is that? It is that the neutralizing substance in the nose-guard evaporates too quickly. And how do I remedy that? I give to every man who buys a mat and a nose-guard two bottles of 'neutralizer.' What it is composed of is a secret. But the bottles are to be carried in the pocket, so as to be ready for every emergency. The disadvantage of this plan consists of the fact that the neutralizer is highly explosive, and if a man should happen to sit down on a bottle of it in his coat-tail pocket suddenly it might hist him through the roof. But see how beautiful my scheme is."

"Oh, thudder add lightnig! aid you ever goig to quid?"

"See how complete it is! By paying twenty dollars additional, every man who takes a mat has his life protected in the Hopelessly Mutual Accident Insurance Company, so that it really makes no great difference whether he is busted through the shingles or not. Now, does it?"

"Oh, dode ask me. I dode care a ced about id, adyway."

"Well, then, what I want you to do is to give me a first-rate notice in your paper, describing the invention, giving the public some general notion of its merits and recommending its adoption into general use. You give me a half-column puff, and I'll make the thing square by leaving you one of the mats, with a couple of bottles of the neutralizer and a nose-guard. I'll leave them now."

"Whad d'you say?"

"I say I'll just leave you a mat and the other fixings for you to look over at your leisure."

"You biserable scoundrel, if you lay wod ob those blasted thigs dowd here, I'll burder you od the spod! I wod stad such foolishness."

"Won't you notice it, either?"

"Certaidly nod. I woulded do id for ten thousad dollars a lide."

"Well, then, let it alone; and I hope one of those epidemic diseases will get you and lay you up for life."

As Mr. Barker withdrew, Major Slott threw up the windows, and after catching his breath, he called down stairs to a reporter,

"Perkins, follow that man and hear what he's got to say, and then blast him in a column of the awfulest vituperation you know how to write."

Perkins obeyed orders, and now Barker has a libel suit pending against The Patriot, while the carbolic mat has not yet been introduced to this market.

* * * * *

Mr. Barker was not a more agreeable visitor than the book-canvasser who, upon the same day, circulated about the village. He came into my office with a portfolio under his arm. Placing it upon the table, removing a ruined hat, and wiping his nose upon a ragged handkerchief that had been so long out of wash that it was positively gloomy, he said,

"Mister, I'm canvassing for the National Portrait Gallery; splendid work; comes in numbers, fifty cents apiece. Contains pictures of all the great American heroes from the earliest times to the present day. Everybody's subscribing for it, and I want to see if I can't take your name.

"Now, just cast your eyes over that," he said, opening his book and pointing to an engraving. "That's—lemme see—yes, that's Columbus. Perhaps you've heard sumfin about him? The publisher was telling me to-day, before I started out, that he discovered—No; was it Columbus that dis—Oh yes! Columbus, he discovered America. Was the first man here. He came over in a ship, the publisher said, and it took fire, and he stayed on deck because his father told him to, if I remember right; and when the old thing busted to pieces, he was killed. Handsome picture, ain't it? Taken from a photograph; all of 'em are; done specially for this work. His clothes are kinder odd, but they say that's the way they dressed in those days.

"Look here at this one. Now, isn't that splendid? William Penn; one of the early settlers. I was reading the other day about him; when he first arrived, he got a lot of Indians up a tree, and when they'd shook some apples down, he set one on top of his son's head and shot an arrow plumb through it, and never fazed him. They say it struck them Indians cold, he was such a terrific shooter. Fine countenance, hasn't he? Face shaved clean; he didn't wear a mustache, I believe, but he seems to've let himself out on hair. Now, my view is that every man ought to have a picture of that patriarch, so's to see how the first settlers looked and what kind of weskits they used to wear. See his legs, too! Trousers a little short, maybe, as if he was going to wade in a creek; but he's all there. Got some kind of a paper in his hand, I see. Subscription list, I reckon.

"Now, how does that strike you? There's something nice. That, I think, is—is—that is—a—a—yes, to be sure, Washington. You recollect him, of course. Some people call him 'Father of his Country,' George Washington. Had no middle name, I believe. He lived about two hundred years ago, and he was a fighter. I heard the publisher telling a man about him crossing the Delaware River up yer at Trenton, and seems to me, if I recollect right, I've read about it myself. He was courting some girl on the Jersey side, and he used to swim over at nights to see her, when the old man was asleep. The girl's family were down on him, I reckon. He looks like the man to do that, now, don't he? He's got it in his eye. If it'd been me, I'd a gone over on the bridge, but he probably wanted to show off before her; some men are so reckless. Now, if you'll go in on this thing, I'll get the publisher to write out some more stories about him, and bring 'em around to you, so's you can study up on him. I know he did ever so many other things, but I've forgot 'em; my memory's so thundering poor.

"Less see; who have we next? Ah, Franklin! Benjamin Franklin. He was one of the old original pioneers, I think. I disremember exactly what he is celebrated for, but I believe it was flying a—oh, yes! flying a kite, that's it. The publisher mentioned it. He was out one day flying a kite, you know, like boys do nowadays, and while she was flickering up in the sky, and he was giving her more string, an apple fell off a tree and hit him on the head, and then he discovered the attraction of gravitation, I think they call it. Smart, wasn't it? Now, if you or me'd a been hit, it'd just a made us mad, like as not, and set us a-cussing. But men are so different. One man's meat's another man's pison. See what a double chin he's got. No beard on him, either, though a goatee would have been becoming to such a round face. He hasn't got on a sword, and I reckon he was no soldier; fit some when he was a boy, maybe, or went out with the home-guard, but not a regular warrior. I ain't one myself, and I think all the better of him for it.

"Ah, here we are! Look at that! Smith and Pocahontas! John Smith. Isn't that just gorgeous? See how she kneels over him and sticks out her hands while he lays on the ground and that big fellow with a club tries to hammer him up. Talk about woman's love! There it is. Modocs, I believe. Anyway, some Indians out West there somewheres; and the publisher tells me that Shacknasty, or whatever his name is, there, was going to bang old Smith over the head with that log of wood, and this girl here, she was sweet on Smith, it appears, and she broke loose and jumped forward, and says to the man with the stick, 'Why don't you let John alone? Me and him are going to marry; and if you kill him, I'll never speak to you again as long as I live,' or words like them; and so the man, he give it up, and both of them hunted up a preacher and were married, and lived happily ever afterward. Beautiful story, ain't it? A good wife she made him, too, I bet, if she was a little copper-colored. And don't she look just lovely in that picture? But Smith appears kinder sick. Evidently thinks his goose is cooked; and I don't wonder, with that Modoc swooping down on him with such a discouraging club.

"And now we come to—to—ah—to Putnam—General Putnam. He fought in the war, too; and one day a lot of 'em caught him when he was off his guard, and they tied him flat on his back on a horse, and then licked the horse like the very mischief. And what does that horse do but go pitching down about four hundred stone steps in front of the house, with General Putnam laying there nearly skeered to death. Leastways, the publisher said somehow that way, and I oncet read about it myself. But he came out safe, and I reckon sold the horse and made a pretty good thing of it. What surprises me is he didn't break his neck; but maybe it was a mule, and they're pretty sure-footed, you know. Surprising what some of these men have gone through, ain't it?

"Turn over a couple of leaves. That's General Jackson. My father shook hands with him once. He was a fighter, I know. He fit down in New Orleans. Broke up the rebel legislature, and then, when the Ku-Kluxes got after him, he fought 'em behind cotton breastworks and licked 'em till they couldn't stand. They say he was terrific when he got real mad. Hit straight from the shoulder, and fetched his man every time. Andrew his first name was; and look how his hair stands up! And then here's John Adams and Daniel Boone and two or three pirates, and a whole lot more pictures, so you see it's cheap as dirt. Lemme have your name, won't you?"

"I believe not to-day."

"What! won't go in on William Penn and Washington and Smith, and the other heroes?"

"No."

"Well, well! Hang me if I'd a-wasted so much information on you if I'd a knowed you wouldn't subscribe. If every man was like you, it'd break up the business."

Then he wiped his nose and left. I hope he is doing better with the work than he did with me.



CHAPTER VII.

HOW MR. BUTTERWICK PURSUED HORTICULTURE.

Soon after he moved out from the city to live in the village Mr. Butterwick determined to secure the services of a good gardener who could be depended upon to produce from the acre surrounding the house the largest possible crop of fruit, vegetables and flowers. A man named Brown was recommended as an expert, and Mr. Butterwick engaged him. As Mr. Butterwick has no acquaintance with the horticultural art, he instructed Brown to use his own judgment in fixing up the place, and Brown said he would.

On the morning of the first day, while Mr. Butterwick was sitting on the front porch, he saw Brown going out of the gate with a gun upon his shoulder, and Mr. Butterwick conceived the idea that the horticultural expert intended to begin his career in his new place by taking a holiday.

In about an hour, however, Brown came sauntering up the street dragging a deceased dog by the tail. Mr. Butterwick asked him if he had accidentally shot his dog while aiming at a rabbit. But Brown simply smiled significantly and passed silently in through the gate.

Then he buried the dog beneath the grape-arbor; and when the funeral was over, Brown loaded up his gun, rubbed his muddy boots upon the grass, brought his weapon to "right shoulder shift" and sallied out again.

Mr. Butterwick asked him if he was going down to the woods after squirrels; but he put his thumb knowingly to his nose, winked at Mr. Butterwick and went mutely down the road. After a while he loomed up again upon the horizon, and this time Mr. Butterwick noticed that he was hauling after him a setter pup and a yellow dog, both dead, and yoked together with one of Brown's suspenders.

Mr. Butterwick failed to comprehend the situation exactly, but he ventured the remark that Brown must be a very poor shot to hit his own dogs every time instead of the game. Brown, however, was not open to criticism. He walked calmly down the yard, and after entombing the dogs by the grape-arbor, he put four fingers of buckshot in his gun, rearranged his suspenders, shouldered arms and struck out for the front gate with a countenance as impassive as that of a graven image.

Mr. Butterwick inquired if there was a target-shooting match over at the "King of Prussia;" but Brown didn't appear to hear him, and passed serenely down the street. At half-past eleven Brown came within hail again, and presently he marched up the yard with three departed cats and a blue poodle.



Mr. Butterwick thought it was extraordinary, and he asked Brown if he was engaged in gunning for domestic animals in order to settle a bet. But Brown only coughed a couple of times, closed one eye sagaciously and began to dig a fresh grave under the arbor. When the last sad rites were over, he charged his gun as usual, rubbed his nose thoughtfully with his sleeve, took a drink at the pump and wandered away.

He had been gone about fifteen minutes, when Mr. Butterwick heard two shots in quick succession. A minute later he saw Brown coming up the road with a considerable amount of velocity, pursued by Mr. Potts and a three-legged dog. Brown kept ahead; and when he had shot through the gate, he dashed into the house and bolted the door. Then Potts arrived with his dog, which stood by, looking as if it were very anxious to lunch upon somebody, while Potts explained to Butterwick that Brown had shot a leg off of his dog, and that he, Potts, intended to have satisfaction for the injury, if he had to go to law about it.

When Mr. Butterwick had pacified Potts and sent him away, Mr. Butterwick sought an interview with Brown:

"Brown, you have been behaving in a most preposterous manner ever since you came here. I employed you as a gardener, not as a gunner. You have nearly killed a valuable animal belonging to Mr. Potts; and I'll thank you to tell me what you mean, and right off, too."

Brown winked again, cleared his throat, pulled up his shirt-collar and said,

"I was goin' to quit soon as I ketched Potts's dog. He'd a bin splendid to bury out yer with the others. Lemme tell you how it is: The best thing to make grape-vines grow is dogs; bury 'em right down among the roots. Some people prefer grandmothers and their other relations. But gimme dogs and cats. Soon as I seen them vines of yourn I said to myself, Them vines wants a few dogs, and I concluded to put in the first day rakin' in all I could find. I'm goin' out again to-morrow, down the other road."

But he didn't. Mr. Butterwick discharged him that night. He was too enthusiastic for a gardener, and Mr. Butterwick thought that life might open out to him a brighter and more beautiful vista in some other capacity.

Subsequently, Mr. Butterwick concluded to attend to his garden himself, and early in the spring he received from the Congressman of our district a choice lot of assorted seeds brought from California by the Agricultural Department. There were more than he wanted, so he gave a quantity of sugar-beet and onion seeds to Mr. Potts, and some turnip and radish seeds to Colonel Coffin; then he planted the remainder, consisting of turnip, cabbage, celery and beet seeds, in his own garden.

When the plants began to come up, he thought they looked kind of queer, but he waited until they grew larger, and then, as he felt certain something was wrong, he sent for a professional gardener to make an examination.

"Mr. Hoops," he said, "cast your eye over those turnips and tell me what you think is the matter with them."

"Turnip!" exclaimed Hoops. "Turnip! Why, bless your soul, man! that's not turnip. That's nothin' but pokeberry. You've got enough pokeberry in that bed to last a million years."

"Well, Mr. Hoops, come over here to this bed. Now, how does that celery strike you? The munificent Federal government is spreading that celery all over this land of the free. Great, isn't it?"

"Well, well!" said Hoops; "and they shoved that off on you for celery, did they? Too bad! It's nothin' on earth but pokeberry. This is the California kind—the deadliest pokeberry that was ever invented."

"Are you sure you're not mistaken, Mr. Hoops? But you haven't seen my beets there in the adjoining bed. The seeds of those beets were sent from Honolulu by our consul there. He reports that the variety attains gigantic size."

"Really, now," said Hoops, "I don't want to hurt your feelings, but to be fair and square with you, as between man and man, those are not beets, you know. They are the Mexican pokeberry. I pledge you my word it's the awfulest variety of that plant that grows. It'll stay in this yer garden for ever. You'll never get rid of it."

"This seems a little hard, Mr. Hoops. But I'd like you to inspect my cabbages. They're all right, I know. The commissioner of agriculture got the seed from Borneo. They are the curly variety, I think. You boil them with pork, and they cut down beautifully for slaw. Look at these plants, will you? Ain't they splendid?"

"Mr. Butterwick," said Hoops, "I've got some bad news to break to you, but I hope you'll stand it like a man. These afflictions come to all of us in this life, sir. They are meant for our good. But really, sir, those are not Borneo cabbages. Cabbages! Why, thunder and lightnin'! They are merely a mixture of California and Mexican pokeberry with the ordinary kind, and a little Osage orange sprinkled through. It's awful, sir! Why, you've got about two acres of pokeberry and not a blessed bit of cabbage or turnips among them."

"Mr. Hoops, this is terrible news; and do you know I gave a lot of those seeds to Potts and Coffin?"

"I know you did; and I seen Colonel Coffin this mornin' with a shot-gun goin' round askin' people if they knew where he could find you."

"Find me! What do you mean?"

"Well, you see, sir, that there onion seed that you gave him was really the seed of the silver maple tree, and it's growed up so thick all over his garden that a cat can't crawl through it. There's about forty million shoots and suckers in that garden, and they'll have to be cut out with a handsaw. It'll take about a year to do it."

"You appall me, Hoops!"

"And that's not the worst of it. The roots are so matted and interlocked jes beneath the surface that you can't make any impression on 'em with a pickaxe. That garden of Coffin's is ruined—entirely ruined, sir. You might blast those roots with gunpowder and it would make no difference. And the suckers will grow faster than they're cut down. He'll have to sell the property, sir."

"And the commissioner of agriculture said that was onion seed. Why didn't Coffin hunt him with a shot-gun?"

"Yes, sir; and Mr. Potts's got pokeberry and silver maple growin' all over his place, too, and he's as mad as—Well, you just ought to hear him snortin' around town. He'll kill somebody, I'm afeard."

Mr. Butterwick settled the difficulty with Coffin and Potts somehow, but he made up his mind to vote for another man for Congress at the next election.

Mr. Butterwick was the first man to introduce that ingenious and useful implement the lawn-mower into our section of the country. As his mower was the only one in the village, it was at once in great demand. Everybody wanted to borrow it for a few days, and Butterwick lent it with such generosity that it was out most of the time, and a good many people had to wait for it. At last there was quite a rivalry who should have it next, and the folks used to put in their claims with the owner whenever they had an opportunity.

One day Mr. Smith's wife died, and Mr. Butterwick attended the funeral. Smith was nearly wild with grief. As the remains were put into their last resting-place he cried as if his heart would break, and his friends began to get uneasy about his nervous system. Presently he took his handkerchief from his eyes for a moment to rub his nose, and as he did so he saw Butterwick looking at him. A thought seemed to strike Smith. He dashed away a couple of tears; and stepping over a heap of loose earth as they began to shovel it in, he grasped Butterwick by the hand. Butterwick gave him a sympathetic squeeze, and said,

"Sorry for you, Smith; I am indeed! A noble woman and a good wife. But bear up under it, bear up! Our loss, you know, is her gain."

"Ah! she was indeed a woman in a thousand," responded Smith; "and now to think that she has gone—gone, left us for ever! But these afflictions must not make us forget the duty we owe to the living. She has passed away from toil and suffering, but we still have much to do; and, Butterwick, I want to borrow your lawn-mower. If you can fix it for Tuesday, I think maybe the worst of my anguish will be over."

"You may have it, of course."

"Thank you; oh, thank you! Our friends are a great comfort to us in the hour of bereavement;" and then Smith gave his arm to his mother-in-law, put his handkerchief to his eyes and joined the procession of mourners.

Upon the following Sunday, Rev. Dr. Dox preached a splendid sermon over in the Free church, and just as he reached "secondly" he paused, looked around upon the congregation for a minute, and then he beckoned Deacon Moody to come up to the pulpit. He whispered something in Moody's ear, and Moody seemed surprised. The congregation was wild with curiosity to know what was the matter. Then the deacon, blushing scarlet and seeming annoyed, walked down the aisle and whispered in Butterwick's ear. Butterwick nodded, and whispered to his wife, who was perishing to know what it was. She leaned over and communicated it to Mrs. Bunnel, in the pew in front; and when the Bunnels all had it, they sent it on to the people next to them, and so before the doctor reached "thirdly" the whole congregation knew that he wanted to borrow Butterwick's lawn-mower on Monday morning early.

A day or two later, while Butterwick was crossing the creek upon a train of cars, the train ran off the track and rolled his car into the water. Butterwick got out, however, into the stream, and as he emerged, spluttering and blowing, he struck against a stranger who was treading water. The stranger apologized, and said that Butterwick might not recognize him in his dilapidated condition as Martin Thompson, but while they were together, he would like to put in a word for that lawn-mower when the parson was done with it.



At last Butterwick grew tired of lending, and refused all applicants. Then the people began to steal it, and six respectable citizens only escaped going to jail because Butterwick had consideration for their families. Finally he chained it to the pump, and then they sawed off the pump and operated the mower with the log as a roller. Butterwick at last put it on top of his house, and that night fourteen ladders were seen against the wall. They did say that Ramsey, the lawyer, made one effort with a hot-air balloon, and failed only because he fell out and hurt his leg; but this was never traced to any reliable source.

The following week a man arrived and opened an agency for the sale of the mowers in the village, and gradually the excitement abated. Butterwick, however, has cut his grass with a sickle ever since.



CHAPTER VIII.

THE MEETING AND ITS MISSIONARY WORK.

The Methodist church in the village is doing now, as it has always done, a good and noble work for Christianity and the cause of public morals; but it has not escaped the trials which are permitted sometimes to afflict the Church militant. Years ago, when the congregation was first organized, it erected a small but very pretty frame meeting-house. In the course of time the people became dissatisfied with the location of the house of worship; and as they had a good offer for the site, they sold it and bought a better one in another quarter. Then they put rollers under the building, and as soon as it was off the ground the purchaser of the lot began to build a dwelling-house on the site. It was slow work pushing the church along the street, and before they got far somebody discovered that the title of the new site was not good, and so the bargain was annulled. The next day the brethren went plunging around town trying to buy another site, but nobody had one to sell; and on the following morning the supervisors got an order from the court requiring that meeting-house to be removed from the public street within twenty-four hours.

The brethren were nearly wild about it, and they begged old Brindley to let them run the concern in on his vacant lot temporarily until they could look around. But Brindley belonged to another denomination, and he said he felt that it would be wrong for him to do anything to help a church that believed false doctrines. Then they ran the meeting-house out on the turnpike beyond the town, whereupon the turnpike company notified them that its charges would be eight dollars a day for toll. So they hauled it back again; and while going down the hill it broke loose, plunged through the fence of Dr. Mackey's garden and brought up on top of his asparagus-bed. He is an Episcopalian, and he sued the meeting for damages; and the sheriff levied upon the meetinghouse. The brethren paid the bill and dragged the building out again.

They wanted to put it in the court-house yard, but Judge Twiddler, who is a Presbyterian, said that after examining the statutes carefully he could find no law allowing a Methodist meeting-house to be located in that place. In despair, the brethren ran the building down to the river-shore and fitted it on a huge raft of logs, concluding to tie it to the wharf until they could buy a lot. But as the owner of the wharf handed them on the third day a bill of twenty-five dollars for wharfage, they took the building out and anchored it in the stream. That night a tug-boat, coming up the river in the dark, ran halfway through the Sunday-school room, and a Dutch brig, coming into collision with it, was drawn out with the pulpit and three of the front pews dangling from the bowsprit. The owners of both vessels sued for damages, and the United States authorities talked of confiscating the meeting-house as an obstruction to navigation. But a few days afterward the ice-gorge sent a flood down the river and broke the building loose from its anchor. It was subsequently washed ashore on Keyser's farm; and he said he was willing to let it stay there at four dollars a day rent until he was ready to plough for corn. As the cost of removing it would have been very great, the trustees ultimately sold it to Keyser for a barn, and then, securing a good lot, they built a handsome edifice of stone.

On the first Sunday that the congregation worshiped in the new church Mr. Potts attended; and in accordance with his custom, he placed his silk high hat just outside of the pew in the aisle. In a few moments Mrs. Jones entered, and as she proceeded up the aisle her abounding skirts caught Mr. Potts' hat and rolled it nearly to the pulpit. Mr. Potts pursued his hat with feelings of indignation; and when Mrs. Jones took her seat, he walked back, brushing the hat with his sleeve. A few moments later Mrs. Hopkins came into church; and as Mr. Potts had again placed his hat in the aisle, Mrs. Hopkins' skirts struck it and swept it along about twenty feet, and left it lying on the carpet in a demoralized condition. Mr. Potts was singing a hymn at the time, and he didn't miss it. But a moment later, when he looked over the end of the pew to see if it was safe, he was furious to perceive that it was gone. He skirmished up the aisle after it again, red in the face, and uttering sentences which were very much out of place in the sanctuary. However, he put the hat down again and determined to keep his eye on it, but just as he turned his head away for a moment Mrs. Smiley came in, and Potts looked around only in time to watch the hat being gathered in under Mrs. Smiley's skirts and carried away by them. He started in pursuit, and just as he did so the hat must have rolled against Mrs. Smiley's ankles, for she gave a jump and screamed right out in church. When her husband asked her what was the matter, she said there must be a dog under her dress, and she gave her skirts a twist. Out rolled Mr. Potts' hat, and Mr. Smiley, being very near-sighted, thought it was a dog, and immediately kicked it so savagely that it flew up into the gallery and lodged on top of the organ. Mr. Potts, perfectly frantic with rage, forgot where he was; and holding his clinched fist under Smiley's nose, he shrieked, "I've half a mind to brain you, you scoundrel!" Then he flung down his hymn-book and rushed from the church. He went home bareheaded, and the sexton brought his humiliating hat around after dinner. After that Mr. Potts expressed a purpose to go habitually to Quaker meeting, where he could say his prayers with his hat on his head, and where the skirts of female worshippers are smaller.

* * * * *

Upon a subsequent occasion Mrs. Whistler had even a greater occasion for dissatisfaction with the sanctuary.

The facts in Mrs. Whistler's case were these: Mrs. Whistler has singular absence of mind, and on the last Sunday she attended church Dr. Dox began to read from the Scriptures the account of the Deluge. Mrs. Whistler was deeply attentive; and when the doctor came to the story of how it rained for so many days and nights, she was so much absorbed in the narrative and so strongly impressed with it that she involuntarily put up her umbrella and held it over her head as she sat in the pew. It appears that Mrs. Moody, who sits in the next pew in front, frequently brings her lap-dog to church with her; and when Mrs. Whistler raised her umbrella suddenly, the action affected the sensibilities of Mrs. Moody's dog in such a manner that he began to bark furiously.

Of course the sexton came in for the purpose of removing the animal, but it dodged into a vacant pew upon the other side of the aisle and defied him, barking vociferously all the time. Then the sexton became warm and indignant, and he flung a cane at the dog, whereupon the dog flew out and bit his leg. The excitement in the church by this time, of course, was simply dreadful. Not only was the story of the Deluge interrupted, but the unregenerate Sunday-school scholars in the gallery actually hissed the dog at the sexton, and seemed to enjoy the contest exceedingly.

Then Elder McGinn came after the dog with his cane, and as he pursued the animal it dashed toward the pulpit and ran up the steps in such a fierce manner that the doctor quickly mounted a chair and remarked, with anger flashing through his spectacles, that if this disgraceful scene did not soon come to an end he should dismiss the congregation. Then the elder crept softly up the stairs, and after a short struggle he succeeded in grasping the dog by one of its hind legs. Then he walked down the aisle with it, the dog meantime yelling with supernatural energy and the Sunday-school boys making facetious remarks.

Mrs. Whistler turned around, with other members of the congregation, to watch the retreating elder, and as she did so she permitted her unconscious umbrella to droop so that the end of one of the ribs caught Mrs. Moody's bonnet. A moment later, when she was straightening up the umbrella, the bonnet was wrenched off, and hung dangling from the umbrella. Mrs. Moody had become exceedingly warm, at any rate, over the onslaught made upon her dog, but when Mrs. Whistler removed her bonnet, she fairly boiled over; and turning around, white with rage, she screamed,

"What'd you grab that bonnet for, you wretch! Haven't you made enough fuss in this church to-day, skeering a poor innocent dog, without snatching off such bonnets as the like of you can't afford to wear, no matter how mean you live at home, you red-headed lunatic, you! You let my bonnet alone, or I'll hit you with this parasol, if it is in meeting, now mind me!"

Then Mrs. Whistler, for the first time, seemed to realize that her umbrella made her conspicuous; so she furled it and concluded to escape from an embarrassing position by going home. As she stepped into the aisle her enemy gave her a parting salute:

"Sneaking off before the collection, too! You'd better spend less for breastpins and give more to the poor heathen if you don't want to ketch it hereafter!"

Then she began to fan herself furiously, and as Mrs. Whistler emerged from the front door and things became calmer the doctor resumed the story of the Flood. But Mrs. Whistler has given up her pew and gone over to the Presbyterians, and there are rumors that Mrs. Moody is going to secede also because Elder McGinn insists that she shall leave her dog at home.

* * * * *

The Dorcas and missionary societies of the church are particularly active, but they were somewhat discouraged a year or two ago by certain unforeseen occurrences. The ladies of the Dorcas Society made up a large quantity of shirts, trousers and socks, and boxed them up and sent them to a missionary station on the west coast of Africa. A man named Ridley went out with the boxes and stayed in Africa for several months. When he returned, the Dorcas Society, of course, was anxious to hear how its donation was received, and Ridley one evening met the members and told them about it in a little speech. He said,

"Well, you know, we got the clothes out there all right, and after a while we distributed them among some of the natives in the neighborhood. We thought maybe it would attract them to the mission, but it didn't; and after some time had elapsed and not a native came to church with the clothes on, I went out on an exploring expedition to find out about it. It seems that on the first day after the goods were distributed one of the chiefs attempted to dress himself in a shirt. He didn't exactly understand it, and he pushed his legs through the arms and gathered the tail up around his waist. He couldn't make it stay up, however, and they say he went around inquiring in his native tongue what kind of an idiot it was that constructed a garment that wouldn't hang on, and swearing some of the most awful heathen oaths. At last he let it drag, and that night he got his legs tangled in it somehow and fell over a precipice and was killed.

"Another chief who got one on properly went paddling around in the dark, and the people, imagining that he was a ghost, sacrificed four babies to keep off the evil spirit.



"And then, you know, those trousers you sent out? Well, they fitted one pair on an idol, and then they stuffed most of the rest with leaves and set them up as kind of new-fangled idols and began to worship them. They say that the services were very impressive. Some of the women split a few pairs in half, and after sewing up the legs used them to carry yams in; and I saw one chief with a corduroy leg on his head as a kind of helmet.

"I think, though, the socks were most popular. All the fighting-men went for them the first thing. They filled them with sand and used them as boomerangs and war-clubs. I learned that they were so much pleased with the efficiency of those socks that they made a raid on a neighboring tribe on purpose to try them; and they say they knocked about eighty women and children on the head before they came home. They asked me if I wouldn't speak to you and get you to send out a few barrels more, and to make them a little stronger, so's they'd last longer; and I said I would.

"This society's doing a power of good to those heathen, and I've no doubt if you keep right along with the work you will inaugurate a general war all over the continent of Africa and give everybody an idol of his own. All they want is enough socks and trousers. I'll take them when I go out again."

Then the Dorcas passed a resolution declaring that it would, perhaps, be better to let the heathen go naked and give the clothes to the poor at home. Maybe that is the better way.



CHAPTER IX.

JUDGE TWIDDLER'S COW.

For several months previous to last summer Judge Twiddler's family obtained milk from Mr. Biles, the most prominent milk-dealer in the village. The prevailing impression among the Twiddlers was that Mr. Biles supplied an exceedingly thin and watery fluid; and one day when the judge stepped over to pay his quarterly bill he determined to make complaint. He found Mr. Biles in the yard mending the valve of his pump; and when the judge made a jocular remark to the effect that the dairy must be in a bad way when the pump was out of order, Mr. Biles, rising with his hammer in his hand, said,

"Oh, I ain't going to deny that we water the milk. I don't mind the joking about it. But all I say is that when people say we do it from mercenary motives they slander the profession. No, sir; when I put water in the milk, I do it out of kindness for the people who drink it. I do it because I'm philanthropic—because I'm sensitive and can't bear to see folks suffer. Now, s'pos'n a cow is bilious or something, and it makes her milk unwholesome. I give it a dash or two of water, and up it comes to the usual level. Water's the only thing that'll do it. Or s'pos'n that cow eats a pison vine in the woods; am I going to let my innocent customers be killed by it for the sake of saving a little labor at the pump? No, sir; I slush in a few quarts of water, neutralize the pison, and there she is as right as a trivet.

"But you take the best milk that ever was, and it ain't fit for the human stomach as it comes from the cow. It has too much caseine in it. Prof. Huxley says that millions of poor ignorant men and women are murdered every year by loading down weak stomachs with caseine. It sucks up the gastric juice, he says, and gets daubed all around over the membranes until the pores are choked, and then the first thing you know the man suddenly curls all up and dies. He says that out yer in Asia, where the milkmen are not as conscientious as we are, there are whole cemeteries chock full of people that have died of caseine, and that before long all that country will be one vast burying-ground if they don't ameliorate the milk. When I think of the responsibility resting on me, is it singular that I look at this old pump and wonder that people don't come and silver plate it and put my statue on it? I tell you, sir, that that humble pump with the cast-iron handle is the only thing that stands betwixt you and sudden death.

"And besides that, you know how kinder flat raw milk tastes—kinder insipid and mean. Now, Prof. Huxley, he says that there is only one thing that will vivify milk and make it luxurious to the palate, and that is water. Give it a few jerks under the pump, and out it comes sparkling and delicious, like nectar. I dunno how it is, but Prof. Huxley says that it undergoes some kinder chemical change that nothing else'll bring about but a flavoring of fine old pump-water. You know the doctors all water the milk for babies. They know mighty well if they didn't those young ones'd shrink all up and sorter fade away. Nature is the best judge. What makes cows drink so much water? Instinct, sir—instinct. Something whispers to 'em that if they don't sluice in a little water that caseine'd make 'em giddy and eat 'em up. Now, what's the odds whether I put in the water or the cow does? She's only a poor brute beast, and might often drink too little; but when I go at it, I bring the mighty human intellect to bear on the subject; I am guided by reason, and I can water that milk so's it'll have the greatest possible effect.

"Now, there's chalk. I know some people have an idea that it's wrong to fix up your milk with chalk. But that's only mere blind bigotry. What is chalk? A substance provided by beneficent nature for healing the ills of the human body. A cow don't eat chalk because it's not needed by her. Poor uneducated animal! she can't grasp these higher problems, and she goes on nibbling sour-grass and other things, and filling her milk with acid, which destroys human membranes and induces colic. Then science comes to the rescue. Professor Huxley tells us that chalk cures acidity. Consequently, I get some chalk, stir it in my cans and save the membranes of my customers without charging them a cent for it—actually give it away; and yet they talk about us milkmen 'sif we were buccaneers and enemies of the race.

"But I don't care. My conscience is clear. I know mighty well that I have a high and holy mission to perform, and I'm going to perform it if they burn me at the stake. What do I care how much this pump costs me if it spreads blessings through the community? What difference does it make to a man of honor like me if chalk is six cents a pound so long as I know that without it there wouldn't be a membrane in this community? Now, look at the thing in the right light, and you'll believe me that before another century rolls around a grateful universe will worship the memory of the first milkman who ever had a pump and who doctored his milk with chalk. It will, unless justice is never to have her own."

Then Mr. Biles rigged the sucker in the pump, toned up a few cans of milk, corrected the acidity, and went into the house to receipt the judge's bill.

Mr. Biles' theory interested the judge, but the argument did not convince him. And so the judge resolved to buy a cow and obtain pure milk, without regard for the alleged views of Professor Huxley. Accordingly, he purchased a cow of a man named Smith, who lives over at the Rising Sun. She was warranted to be fresh and a first-rate milker. When Judge Twiddler got her home, he asked his hired man, Mooney, if he knew how to milk a cow, and Mooney said of course he did. The animal, therefore, was consigned to Mooney's care. On the next day, however, Mooney came into the house to see the judge, and he said,

"Judge, that man cheated you in that cow. Why, she's the awfullest old beast that ever stood on four legs Dry as punk; hasn't got a drop of milk in her. That's a positive fact. I've been trying to milk her for three or four hours, and can't get a drop. Might as well attempt to milk a clothes-horse. Regular fraud!"

"This is very extraordinary," exclaimed the judge.

"Yes, sir; and she's wicked. I never saw such a disposition in a cow. Why, while I was working with her she kicked like a flint-lock musket; butted and rared around. I'd rather fool with a tiger than with a cow like that."

So the judge drove over to the Rising Sun to see Smith about it; and when he complained that Smith had sold him a worthless and vicious beast, and a dry cow at that, Smith said there must be some mistake about it. He agreed to go back with the judge and investigate the matter. When they reached the judge's stable, Mooney was not about, but Smith descended from the wagon, approached the cow, and, to the astonishment of the judge, milked her without the slightest difficulty, the cow meantime remaining perfectly quiet, and even breaking out now and then into what the judge thought looked like smiles of satisfaction. And then the judge went out to hunt up his hired man. He said to him,

"Mooney, what did you mean by telling me that our cow was dry and ugly? You said you couldn't milk her, but Mr. Smith does so without any difficulty, and the cow remains perfectly passive."

"I'd like to see him do it," said Mooney, incredulously.

Then Smith sat down and proceeded to perform the operation again. When he began, Mooney exclaimed,

"Why, my gracious! that isn't the way you milk a cow, is it?"

"Of course it is," replied Smith. "How else would you do it?"

"Well, well! and that's the way you milk, is it? I see now I didn't go about it exactly right. Why, you know, I never had much experience at the business; I was brought up in town, and, be George, when I tackled her, I threw her over on her back and tried to milk her with a clothes-pin. I see now I was wrong. We live and learn, don't we?"



So Smith went home, and the cow remained, and the judge's man waxes stronger in experience with the mysteries of existence daily.

But the cow was not a perfect animal, after all. Among other things, Smith assured the judge that she had a splendid appetite. He said that she was the easiest cow with her feed that he ever saw; she would eat almost anything, and she was generally hungry.

At the end of the first week after she came, Mrs. Twiddler concluded to churn. The hired man spent the whole day at the crank, and about sunset the butter came. They got it out, and found that there was almost half a pound. Then Mrs. Twiddler began to see how economical it was to make her own butter. A half pound at the store cost thirty cents. The wages of that man for one day were one dollar, and so the butter was costing about three dollars a pound, without counting the keep of the cow. When they tried the butter, it was so poor that they couldn't eat it, and they gave it to the man to grease the wheelbarrow with. It seemed somewhat luxurious and princely to maintain a cow for the purpose of supplying grease at three dollars a pound for the wheelbarrow, but it was hard to see precisely where the profits came in. After about a fortnight the cow seemed so unhappy in the stable that the judge turned her out in the yard.

The first night she was loose she upset the grape-arbor with her horns and ate four young peach trees and a dwarf pear tree down to the roots. The next day they gave her as much hay as she would eat, and it seemed likely that her appetite was appeased. But an hour or two afterward she swallowed six croquet-balls that were lying upon the grass, and ate half a table-cloth and a pair of drawers from the clothes-line. That evening her milk seemed thin, and the judge attributed it to the indigestibility of the table-cloth.

During the night she must have got to walking in her sleep, for she climbed over the fence; and when she was discovered, she was swallowing one of Mrs. Twiddler's hoopskirts. That evening she ran dry and didn't give any milk at all. The judge thought the exercise she had taken must have been too severe, and probably the hoopskirt was not sufficiently nutritious. It was comforting, however, to reflect that she was less expensive, from the latter point of view, when she was dry than when she was fresh. Next morning she ate the spout off the watering-pot, and then put her head in the kitchen window and devoured two dinner-plates and the cream-jug. Then she went out and lay down on the strawberry-bed to think. While there something about Judge Twiddler's boy seemed to exasperate her; and when he came over into the yard after his ball, she inserted her horns into his trowsers and flung him across the fence. Then she went to the stable and ate a litter of pups and three feet of the trace-chain.

The judge felt certain that her former owner didn't deceive him when he said her appetite was good. She had hunger enough for a drove of cattle and a couple of flocks of sheep. That day the judge went after the butcher to get him to buy her. When he returned with him, she had just eaten the monkey-wrench and the screw-driver, and she was trying to put away a fence-paling. The butcher said she was a fair-enough sort of cow, but she was too thin. He said he would buy her if the judge would feed her up and fatten her; and the judge said he would try. He gave her that night food enough for four cows, and she consumed it as if she had been upon half rations for a month. When she finished, she got up, reached for the hired man's straw hat, ate it, and then, bolting out into the garden, she put away the honeysuckle vine and a coil of India-rubber hose. The man said that if it was his cow he would kill her; and the judge told him that he had perhaps better just knock her on the head in the morning.

During the night she had another attack of somnambulism, and while wandering about she ate the door-mat from the front porch, bit off all the fancy-work on top of the cast-iron gate, swallowed six loose bricks that were piled up against the house, and then had a fit among the rose bushes. When the judge came down in the morning, she seemed to be breathing her last, but she had strength enough left to seize a newspaper that the judge held in his hand; and when that was down, she gave three or four kicks and rolled over and expired. It cost the judge three dollars to have the carcase removed. Since then he has bought his butter and milk and given up all kinds of live-stock.



CHAPTER X.

OUR CIVIL SERVICE.

Some of the public officers of Millburg are interesting in their way. The civil service system of the village is based upon the principle that if there is any particular function that a given man is wholly unfitted to perform he should be chosen to perform it. The result is that the business of our very small government goes plunging along in the most surprising manner, with a promise that it will end some day in chaos and revolution—of course upon a diminutive scale.

A representative man is Mr. Bones, the solitary night-watchman of the town. One of the duties of Mr. Bones is to light the street-lamps. It is an operation which does not require any very extraordinary effort of the intellect; but during a part of the summer the mind of Mr. Bones did not seem to be equal to the strain placed upon it by this duty. It was observed that whenever there were bright moonlight nights Mr. Bones would have all the lamps burning from early in the evening until dawn, while upon the nights when there was no moon he would not light them at all, and the streets would be as dark as tar. At last people began to complain about it, and one day one of the supervisors called to see Mr. Bones about it. He remarked to him,

"Mr. Bones, people are finding fault because you light up on moonlight nights and don't light the lamps when it is dark. I'd like you to manage the thing a little better."

"It struck me as being singular, too, but I can't help it. I've got instructions to follow the almanac, and I'm going to follow it."

"Did the almanac say there'd be no moon last night?"

"Yes, it did."

"Well, the moon was shining, though, and at its full."

"I know," said Mr. Bones, "and that's what gits me. How in the thunder the moon kin shine when the almanac says it won't beats me out. Perhaps there's something the matter with the moon; got shoved off her course may be."

"I guess not."

"Well, it's changed off somehow, and I've got to have something regular to go by. I'm going by what the almanac says; and if the moon's going to shuffle around kinder loose and not foller the almanac, that's its lookout. If the almanac says no moon, then I'm bound to light the lamps if there's millions of moons shining in the sky. Them's my orders, and I'll mind 'em."

"How d'you know the almanac is not wrong?"

"Because I know it ain't. It was always right before."

"Let's look at it."

"There it is. Look there, now. Don't it say full moon on the 20th? and this yer's only the 9th, and yet it's full moon now."

"That's so; and—Er—er—Less—see Er-er—Mr. Bones, do you know what year this almanac is for?"

"Why, 1876, of course."

"No, it isn't; it's for 1866. It's ten years old."

"Oh no! 1866! Well, now, it is. I declare! 1866! Why, merciful Moses! I got the wrong one off the shelf, and I've been depending on it for three months! No wonder the lamps was wrong. Well, that beats everything."

Then Mr. Bones tore up the almanac and got one for 1876, and ever since that time the lamp-lighting department has given tolerable satisfaction.

But it is as a night-watchman that Mr. Bones shines with surpassing splendor. When he first entered the service, he was very anxious to make a good impression on Colonel Coffin, the burgess and head of the village government; and the first night upon which he went on duty Colonel Coffin was awakened about half-past twelve by a furious ring at his door-bell. He looked out of the window and perceived the watchman, who said,

"She's all right. Nobody's broke in. I've got my eye on things. You kin depend on me."

The colonel thought he was one of the most faithful watchmen he ever saw, and he returned serenely to bed. On the following night, just after twelve, there was another energetic ring at the bell; and when the burgess raised the window, the watchman said,

"Your girls ain't left the window-shutters open and the house is not afire. All right as a trivet while I'm around, you bet!"

"Louisa," said the colonel to his wife as he returned to his couch, "that is a splendid watchman, but I think he's just the least bit too enthusiastic."

A couple of nights later, when the door-bell rang at half-past one, the colonel felt somewhat angry, and he determined to stay in bed; but the person on the step below at last began to kick against the front door, when the colonel threw up the window and exclaimed,

"What do you want?"

It was the watchman, and he said,

"You know old Mrs. Biles up the street yer? Well, I've just rung Biles up, and he says her rheumatism ain't no better. Thought you might want to know, so I called. I felt kinder lonesome out here, too."

As Colonel Coffin slammed the sash down he felt mad and murderous. The next night, however, that faithful guardian applied the toe of his boot to the front door with such energy that the colonel leaped from bed, and protruding his head from the window said,

"I wish to gracious you'd stop kicking up this kind of fuss around here every night! What do you mean, anyhow?"

"Why, I only stopped to tell you that Butterwick has two setter pups, and that I'd get you one if you wanted it. Nothing mean about that, is there?"

The colonel uttered an ejaculatory criticism upon Butterwick and the pups as he closed the window, and a moment later he heard the watchman call up Smith, who lives next door, and remark to him,

"They tell me it's a splendid season for bananas, Mr. Smith."

When Coffin heard Smith hurling objurgations about bananas and watchmen out upon the midnight air, he knew it was immoral, but he felt his heart warm toward Smith. The next time the watchman tried to get the colonel out by ringing and kicking the colonel refused to respond, and finally the watchman banged five barrels of his revolver. Then Coffin came to the window in a rage.

"You eternal idiot," he said, "if you don't stop this racket at night, I'll have you put under bonds to keep the peace."

"Oh, all right," replied the watchman. "I had something important to tell you; but if you don't want to hear it, very well; I kin keep it to myself."

"Well, what is it? Out with it!"

"Why, I heard to-day that the kangaroo down at the Park in the city can't use one of its hind legs. Rough on the Centennial, ain't it?"

Then, as the colonel withdrew in a condition of awful rage, the watchman sauntered up the street to break the news to the rest of the folks. On the next night a gang of burglars broke into Coffin's house and ransacked it from top to bottom. Toward morning Coffin heard them; and hastily dressing himself and seizing his revolver, he proceeded down stairs. The burglars heard him coming and fled. Then the colonel sprang his rattle and summoned the neighbors. When they arrived, the colonel, in the course of conversation, made some remarks about the perfect uselessness of night-watchmen. Thereupon Mr. Potts said,

"I saw that fellow Bones only an hour ago two squares above here, at McGinnis's, routing McGinnis out to tell him that old cheese makes the best bait for catfish."

Mr. Bones was reprimanded, but he remained upon what is facetiously known as "the force." The borough cannot afford to dispense with the services of such an original genius as he.

Our sheriff is a man of rather higher intelligence, but he also has a singular capacity for perpetrating dreadful blunders. Over in the town of Nockamixon one of the churches last year called a clergyman named Rev. Joseph Striker. In the same place, by a most unfortunate coincidence, resides also a prize-fighter named Joseph Striker, and rumors were afloat a few weeks ago that the latter Joseph was about to engage in a contest with a Jersey pugilist for the championship. Our sheriff considered it his duty to warn Joseph against the proposed infraction of the laws, and so he determined to call upon the professor of the art of self-defence. Unhappily, in inquiring the way to the pugilist's house, somebody misunderstood the sheriff, and sent him to the residence of the Rev. Joseph Striker, of whom he had never heard. When Mr. Striker entered the room in answer to the summons, the sheriff said to him familiarly,

"Hello, Joe! How are you?"

Mr. Striker was amazed at this address, but he politely said,

"Good-morning."

"Joe," said the sheriff, throwing his leg lazily over the arm of the chair, "I came round here to see you about that mill with Harry Dingus that they're all talking about. I want you to understand that it can't come off anywheres around here. You know well enough it's against the law, and I ain't a-going to have it."

"Mill! Mill, sir? What on earth do you mean?" asked Mr. Striker, in astonishment. "I do not own any mill, sir. Against the law! I do not understand you, sir."

"Now, see here, Joe," said the sheriff, biting off a piece of tobacco and looking very wise, "that won't go down with me. It's pretty thin, you know. I know well enough that you've put up a thousand dollars on that little affair, and that you've got the whole thing fixed, with Bill Martin for referee. I know you're going down to Pea Patch Island to have it out, and I'm not going to allow it. I'll arrest you as sure as a gun if you try it on, now mind me!"

"Really, sir," said Mr. Striker, "there must be some mistake about—"

"Oh no, there isn't; your name's Joe Striker, isn't it?" asked the sheriff.

"My name is Joseph Striker, certainly."

"I knew it," said the sheriff, spitting on the carpet; "and you see I've got this thing dead to rights. It sha'n't come off; and I'm doing you a favor in blocking the game, because Harry'd curl you all up any way if I let you meet him. I know he's the best man, and you'd just lose your money and get all bunged up besides; so you take my advice now, and quit. You'll be sorry if you don't."

"I do not know what you are referring to," said Mr. Striker. "Your remarks are incomprehensible to me, but your tone is very offensive; and if you have any business with me, I'd thank you to state it at once."

"Joe," said the sheriff, looking at him with a benign smile, "you play it pretty well. Anybody'd think you were innocent as a lamb. But it won't work, Joseph—it won't work, I tell you. I've got a duty to perform, and I'm going to do it; and I pledge you my word, if you and Dingus don't knock off now, I'll arrest you and send you up for ten years as sure as death. I'm in earnest about it."

"What do you mean, sir?" asked Mr. Striker, fiercely.

"Oh, don't you go to putting on any airs about it. Don't you try any strutting before me," said the sheriff; "or I'll put you under bail this very afternoon. Let's see: how long were you in jail the last time? Two years, wasn't it? Well, you go fighting with Dingus and you'll get ten years sure."

"You are certainly crazy!" exclaimed Mr. Striker.

"I don't see what you want to stay at that business for, anyhow," said the sheriff. "Here you are, in a snug home, where you might live in peace and keep respectable. But no, you must associate with low characters, and go to stripping yourself naked and jumping into a ring to get your nose blooded and your head swelled and your body hammered to a jelly; and all for what? Why, for a championship! It's ridiculous. What good'll it do you if you're champion? Why don't you try to be honest and decent, and let prize-fighting alone?"

"This is the most extraordinary conversation I ever listened to," said Mr. Striker. "You evidently take me for a—"

"I take you for Joe Striker; and if you keep on, I'll take you to jail," said the sheriff; with emphasis. "Now, you tell me who's got those stakes and who's your trainer, and I'll put an end to the whole thing."

"You seem to imagine that I am a pugilist," said Mr. Striker. "Let me inform you, sir, that I am a clergyman."

"Joe," said the sheriff, shaking his head, "it's too bad for you to lie that way—too bad, indeed."

"But I am a clergyman, sir—pastor of the church of St. Sepulchre. Look! here is a letter in my pocket addressed to me."

"You don't really mean to say that you're a preacher named Joseph Striker?" exclaimed the sheriff, looking scared.

"Certainly I am. Come up stairs and I'll show you a barrelful of my sermons."

"Well, if this don't beat Nebuchadnezzar!" said the sheriff. "This is awful! Why, I mistook you for Joe Striker, the prize-fighter! I don't know how I ever—A preacher! What an ass I've made of myself! I don't know how to apologize; but if you want to kick me down the front steps, just kick away; I'll bear it like an angel."

Then the sheriff withdrew unkicked, and Mr. Striker went up stairs to finish his Sunday sermon. The sheriff talked of resigning, but he continues to hold on.

* * * * *

Mr. Slingsby, our assessor and tax-collector, holds on too. He is another model member of our civil service. The principal characteristic of Mr. Slingsby is enthusiasm. He has an idea that whenever a man gets anything new it ought to be taxed, and he is always on hand to perform the service. I had about fifteen feet added to one of my chimneys last spring; and when it was done, Slingsby called and assessed it, under the head of "improved real estate," at eighty dollars, and collected two per cent. on it. A few days later, while I was standing by the fence, Slingsby came up and said,

"Beautiful dog you have there."

"Yes; it's a setter."

"Indeed! A setter, hey? The tax on setters is two dollars. I'll collect it now, while I have it on my mind."

I settled the obligation, and the next day Slingsby came around again. He opened the conversation with the remark,

"Billy Jones told me down at the grocery-store that your terrier had had pups."

"Yes."

"A large litter?"

"Four."

"Indeed! Less see: tax is two dollars; four times two is eight—yes, eight dollars tax, please. And hurry up, too, if you can, for they have a new batch of kittens over at Baldwin's, and I want to ketch old Baldwin before he goes out. By the way, when did you put that weathercock on your stable?"

"Yesterday."

"You don't say! Well, hold on, then. Four times two is eight, and four—on the weathercock, you know—is twelve. Twelve dollars is the exact amount."

"What do you mean by four dollars tax on a weathercock? I never heard of such a thing."

"Didn't, hey? Why, she comes in under the head of 'scientific apparatus.' She's put up there to tell which way the wind blows, ain't she? Well, that's scientific intelligence, and the apparatus is liable to tax."

"Mr. Slingsby, that is the most absurd thing I ever heard of. You might just as well talk of taxing Butterwick's twins."

"Butter—You don't mean to say Butterwick has twins? Why, certainly they're taxable. They come in under the head of 'poll-tax.' Three dollars apiece. I'll go right down there. Glad you mentioned it." Then I paid him, and he left with Butterwick's twins on his memorandum-book.

A day or two afterward Mr. Slingsby called to see me, and he said,

"I've got a case that bothers me like thunder. You know Hough the tobacconist? Well, he's just bought a new wooden Indian to stand in front of his store. Now, I have a strong feeling that I ought to tax that figure, but I don't know where to place it. Would it come in as 'statuary'? Somehow that don't seem exactly the thing. I was going to assess it under the head of 'idols,' but the idiots who got up this law haven't got a word in in reference to idols. Think of that, will you? Why, we might have paganism raging all over this country, and we couldn't get a cent out of them. I'd a put that Indian under 'graven images,' only they ain't mentioned, either. I s'pose I could tax the bundle of wooden cigars in his fist as 'tobacco,' but that leaves out the rest of the figure; and he's not liable to poll-tax because he can't even vote. Now, how would it strike you if I levied on him as an 'immigrant'? He was made somewheres else than here, and he came here from there, consequently he's an immigrant. That's my view. What do you think of it?"

I advised him to try it upon that plan, and the next morning Mr. Slingsby and Mr. Hough had a fight on the pavement in front of the Indian because Mr. Slingsby tried to seize the immigrant for unpaid taxes. Slingsby was taken home and put to bed, and the business of collecting taxes was temporarily suspended. But Slingsby will be around again soon with some new and ingenious ideas that he has thought of during his illness.



CHAPTER XI.

FUNEREAL AND CONJUGAL.

Mrs. Banger has buried four husbands, and her experience of domestic life in their company was so satisfactory that she recently married a fifth, Mr. Banger. The name of her fourth was McFadden. The name of her first and third was Smyth, while that of her second, oddly enough, was Smith. Soon after her return from her last wedding-tour she was visited by Mr. Toombs, the undertaker, who called ostensibly to correct an error in his last bill. When Mrs. Banger entered the parlor, Mr. Toombs greeted her cordially and said,

"Ah! Mrs. Smy—Banger, I mean; I hope I see you well? Did you have a pleasant trip? Nice weather while you were away; a little backward, maybe, but still comfortable, and likely to make things grow. Cemetery looks beautiful now. I was out there to-day to a burying. Grass is coming up charming on your lot, and I noticed a blackberry bush growing out of Mr. Smyth's grave. He was fond of 'em, I reckon. There they were lying, Smith and Smyth, and McFadden and the other Smyth, all four of them. No woman could have done fairer with those men than you did, ma'am; those mahogany coffins with silver-plated handles were good enough for the patriarchs and prophets, and the President of the United States himself daren't ask anything better than a hearse with real ostrich feathers and horses that are black as ink all over.

"I know when we laid Mr. McFadden out I said to Tim Lafferty, my foreman, that the affection you showed in having that man buried in style almost made me cry; but I never fully realized what woman's love really is till you made me line Mr. Smith's coffin with white satin and let in a French plate-glass skylight over the countenance. That worked on my feelings so that I pretty near forgot to distribute the gloves to the mourners. And Mr. Smith was worthy of it; he deserved it all. He was a man all over, no difference how you looked at him; stoutish, maybe, and took a casket that was thick through, but he was all there, and I know when you lost him it worried you like anything.

"Now, it's none of my business, Mrs. Banger; but casting my eye over those graves to-day, it struck me that I might fix 'em up a little, so's they'd be more comfortable like. I think McFadden wants a few sods over the feet, and Smith's headstone has worked a little out of plumb. He's settled some, I s'pose. I think I'd straighten it up and put a gas-pipe railing around Mr. Smyth. And while you're about it, Mrs. Banger, hadn't you better buy about ten feet beyond Mr. Smith, so's there won't be any scrouging when you bury the next one? I like elbow-room in a cemetery lot, and I pledge you my word it'll be a tight squeeze to get another one in there and leave room for you besides. It can't be done so's to look anyways right, and I know you don't want to take all four of 'em out and make 'em move up, so's to let the rest of you in. Of course it'd cut you up, and it'd cost like everything, too.

"When a person's dead and buried, it's the fair thing to let him alone, and not to go hustling him around. That's my view, any way; and I say that if I was you, sooner than put Mr. Smith on top of McFadden and Smyth on top of Smith, I'd buy in the whole reservation and lay 'em forty feet apart.

"And how is Mr. Banger? Seem in pretty good health? Do you think we are to have him with us long? I hope so; but there's consumption in his family, I believe. Life is mighty uncertain. We don't know what minute we may be called. I'm a forehanded kind of man, and while his wedding-suit was being made I just stepped into the tailor's and ran it over with a tape-measure, so's to get some idea of his size. You'd hardly believe it, but I've got a black walnut casket at the shop that'll fit him as exact as if it had been built for him. It was the luckiest thing. An odd size, too, and wider than we generally make them. I laid it away up stairs for him, to be prepared in case of accident. You've been so clever with me that I feel 'sif I ought to try my best to accommodate you; and I know how women hate to bother about such things when their grief is tearing up their feelings and they are fretting about getting their mourning-clothes in time for the funeral.

"And that's partly what I called to see you about, Mrs. McFa—Banger, I mean. I've got a note to pay in the morning, and the man's pushing me very hard; but I'm cleaned right out. Haven't got a cent. Now, it occurred to me that maybe you'd advance me the money on Mr. Banger's funeral if I'd offer you liberal terms. How does fifteen per cent. strike you? and if he lives for six or seven years, I'll make it twenty. Mind you, I offer the casket and the best trimmings, eight carriages, the finest hearse in the county, and ice enough for three days in the swelteringest weather in August. And I don't mind—well—yes, I'll even agree to throw in a plain tombstone. If you can do that to accommodate a friend, why, I'll—No? Don't want to speculate on it? Oh, very well; I'm sorry, because I know you'd been satisfied with the way I'd have arranged things. But no matter; I s'pose I can go round and borrow elsewhere. Good-morning; drop in some time, and I'll show you that casket."

As Toombs was going out he met Mr. Banger at the door. When he was gone, Banger said,

"My dear, who is that very odd-looking man?"

And Mrs. Banger hesitated a moment, turned very red, and answered,

"That is—that man is—a—a—he is, I believe—a—a—a—a some kind of a—an undertaker."

Then Banger looked gloomy and went up stairs to ponder. But Mrs. Banger felt that she had a duty to perform in taking care that the lot in the cemetery should not fall into such disorder as Mr. Toombs had indicated, and she resolved to call upon Mr. Mix, at his monumental marble-works, to get him to attend to the matter for her. Mr. Mix did not know her, and his ignorance of her past history turned out to be unfortunate. The following conversation occurred between them:

Mrs. Banger. "Mr. Mix, I am anxious to have my cemetery lot fixed up—to put in new tombstones and reset the railing; and I called to see if I could make some satisfactory arrangement with you."

Mix. "Certainly, madam. Tell me precisely what it is you want done."

Mrs. B. "Well, I'd like to have a new tombstone put over the grave of John—my husband, you know—and to have a nice inscription cut in it, 'Here lies John Smyth,' etc., etc. You know what I mean; the usual way, of course, and maybe some kind of a design on the stone like a broken rosebud or something."

Mix. "I understand."

Mrs. B. "Well, then, what'll you charge me for getting up a headstone just like that, out of pretty good white marble, and with a little picture of a torch upside down or a weeping angel on it, and the name of Thomas Smith cut on it?"

Mix. "John Smyth, you mean."

Mrs. B. "No, I mean Thomas."

Mix. "But you said John before."

Mrs. B. "I know, but that was my first husband, and Thomas was my second, and I want a new headstone for each of them. Now, it seems to me, Mr. Mix, that where a person is buying more than one, that way, you ought to make some reduction in the price—throw something off. Though, of course, I want a pretty good article at all the graves. Not anything gorgeous, but neat and tasteful and calculated to please the eye. Mr. Smyth was not a man who was fond of show. Give him a thing comfortable, and he was satisfied. Now, which do you think is the prettiest, to have the name in raised letters in a straight line over the top of the stone, or just to cut the words 'Alexander P. Smyth' in a kind of a semicircle in sunken letters?"

Mix. "Did I understand you to say Alexander P.? Were you referring to John or Thomas?"

Mrs. B. "Of course not. Aleck was my third. I'm not going to neglect his grave while I'm fixing up the rest. I wish to make a complete job of it, Mr. Mix, while I am about it, and I'm willing for you to undertake it if you are reasonable in your charges. Now, what'll you ask me for the lot, the kind I've described, plain but substantial, and sunk about two feet I should think, at the head of each grave? What'll you charge me for them—for the whole four?"

Mix. "Well, I'll put you in those three headstones—"



Mrs. B. "Four headstones, Mr. Mix, not three."

Mix. "Four, was it? No; there was John and Thomas and Alexander P. That's all you said, I think. Only three."

Mrs. B. "Why, I want one for Adolph too, as a matter of course, the same as the others. I thought you knew I wanted one for Adolph, one made just like John's, only with the name different. Adolph was my fourth husband. He died about three years after I buried Philip, and I'm wearing mourning for him now. Now, please give me your prices for the whole of them."

Mix. "Well, madam, I want to be as reasonable as I can, and I tell you what I'll do. You give me all your work in the future, and I'll put you in those five headstones at hardly anything above cost; say—"

Mrs. B. "Four headstones, not five."

Mix. "I think you mentioned five."

Mrs. B. "No; only four."

Mix. "Less see: there was John, and Thomas and Aleck, and Adolph and Philip."

Mrs. B. "Yes, but Aleck and Philip were the same one. His middle name was Philip, and I always called him by it."

Mix. "Mrs. Banger, I'll be much obliged to you if you'll tell me precisely how many husbands you have planted up in that cemetery lot. This thing's getting a little mixed."

Mrs. B. "What do you mean, sir, by saying planted? I never 'planted' anybody. It's disgraceful to use such language."

Mix. "It's a technical term, madam. We always use it, and I don't see as it's going to hurt any old row of fellows named Smyth. Planted is good enough for other men, and it's good enough for them."

Mrs. B. "Old row of—What d'you mean, you impudent vagabond? I wouldn't let you put a headstone on one of my graves if you'd do it for nothing."

Then Mrs. Banger flounced out of the shop, and Mix called after her as she went through the door,

"Lemme know when you go for another man, and I'll throw him in a tombstone for a wedding-present He'll want it soon."

Mrs. Banger subsequently procured the services of a person in the city, and she regards Mr. Mix with something like detestation.

But Mrs. Banger herself is not universally beloved. Colonel Coffin knows of one woman who despises her methods and desires her complete repression. A short time after the election of the colonel to the Legislature a lady called to see him at his law-office. When she had closed the door, she sat down and said,

"Colonel, my name is Mooney. I am unmarried—a single woman. I called to see you in reference to pushing a bill through the Legislature for the benefit of maiden ladies such as myself. Let me direct your attention to some extraordinary facts. Statistics tell us that in the entire population of the world there are one-fourth more women than men. In this country the proportion of women to men is slightly larger. In this State there are two and one-eighth women to every man. Now, this outrageous condition of affairs—"

"Excuse me for a moment, madam," said the colonel. "Really, the Legislature can do nothing to improve the matter. It cannot regulate the proportion of the sexes by law."

"I know it," replied Miss Mooney. "That is not what I am coming at. I say that this condition of affairs is grossly unjust. If I had had the management of it, and had been compelled to arrange that there should be more women than men, I certainly should not have had any fractions. There are not only two women for every man, but an eighth of a woman besides, so that ever so many of us women would each belong to eight different men if a fair distribution were made. How do I know, for instance, that an eighth of me does not belong to you? Why, I don't know it; and I say it's awful."

"If such is the case, madam," said the colonel, "I surrender all my rights without waiting for a legislative enactment."

"Excuse me," replied Miss Mooney, "but you do not catch the drift of my remarks. Of course, while the laws against bigamy are in existence, some of those women can never be married, although for my part, when a man has two wives and an eighth of another wife, I call it polygamy. Well, now, the point I want to make is this: When more than half of us can't marry, it's only right that the other half should have a fair chance. There are not men enough to go round, any how, and for gracious' sake let's make them go as far as they honestly will. Well, then, how'll we do it? How'll we make an equitable distribution of those men?"

"Hanged if I know, madam. The Legislature daren't meddle with them."

"I'll tell you how to do it. Listen to me. Shut down on the widows. You hear me! Suppress the widows. Make it death for any widow to marry again. That's my remedy; and there'll never be any justice till it's the law. Just look at it! When a woman has been married once, she's had more than her share of the male population; she's had her own share and the share of another woman and an eighth. Is it right, is it honorable, for that woman to go and marry another man, and take the share of two more women and an eighth? I say, is it just the thing?"

"Well, on the surface it does look a little crooked."

"Crooked is not the word. Colonel Coffin, I know these widows. I have had my eye on them. They've got a way of bursting into a man's feelings and walking off with his affections that fills a modest woman like me with gall and bitterness. You know Mrs. Banger? No? Well, now, look at her, f'r instance. First she married Mr. Smyth, although what on earth he ever saw to admire about her I cannot imagine. That was her allowance. Having obtained Smyth, oughtn't she to have stood back and given some other woman a chance—now, oughtn't she?"

"Really, madam, I am hardly able to express an opinion."

"But no. After a while Smyth succumbed. He died. She entombed him, crying, mind you, all the time, as if, having lost Smyth, she wanted to die and join Smyth in the grave and in Paradise. But no sooner was he well settled than she began to flirt with Mr. Smith, and what does he do but yield to her blandishments and marry her? Took her, and seemed to glory in it.

"Now, you'd've thought that she'd've been satisfied with that, when she'd got the share of four women and a quarter. But pretty soon, as luck would have it, Smith, died and she hustled him into the grave. And in less than a year afterward I was amazed to hear that she was going to marry another Smyth. I was never more astonished in my life. Positively going to annex a third man, when the supply was too short anyway. Did you ever hear of such impudence? Did you, now?"

"I'll think it over and see if I can remember."

"Well, then, I thought for certain now that woman would knock off and give the rest of us some kind of a chance; and when Smyth was killed by cholera and interred, it never entered my head that that widow'd go after another man. But, bless your soul! she'd hardly got into second mourning before she began to pursue Mr. McFadden, and got him. Now, look at it. One woman, no better'n I am, has had the property of eight women and a half, and here I am single and getting on in life, with the chances growing absurdly small. No civilized country ought to tolerate such a thing. It's worse than piracy. You may scuttle a ship or blow her up or run her against the rocks, and no great harm is done, because timber's plenty and you can build another one. But when one woman scuttles three men and then ties to a fourth, what are you going to do about it? You can't go out into the woods and chop down trees and saw them up and tack them together and build a man. Now, can you?"

"That seems to be the common impression, anyway."

"Just so. And I want you to pass a bill through that Legislature to make it a felony for a widow to marry again. I've drawn up a draft of a bill and I'll leave it with you. I've made it retroactive, so that it'll bring that woman Banger up with a short turn and send her after Smith and the others. I don't care to marry, myself, but I want justice. Are you married?"

"Madam, leave the bill with me and I will examine it."

"I say are you married?"

"I—I—married did you say? Oh yes. I've been married for ten years."

"Very well, then; good-morning;" and Miss Mooney withdrew.

"Thunder!" exclaimed the colonel as he shut the door. "If I'd've been single, I believe she'd've proposed on the spot."

It is not considered likely that the Mooney anti-widow bill will be pushed very hard in the Legislature next session.



CHAPTER XII.

A NEW MRS. TOODLES.—POTTS' ADVENTURES.

One evening I met Mr. Potts out upon the turnpike, taking a walk; and I joined him. As we proceeded he became rather confidential. The subject of the mania for collecting bric-a-brac came up; and after an expression of opinion from me respecting the matter, Mr. Potts told the story of his wife's fondness for that kind of thing. He said,

"My wife is the most infatuated bric-a-brac hunter I ever heard of. She's an uncommonly fine woman about most things; loves her children; makes splendid pies; don't fool with any of those fan-dangling ways women have of fixing their hair; and she's an angel for temper. But she beats Mrs. Toodles for going to auctions. She's filled my house with the wildest mess of bric-a-brac and such stuff you ever came across outside of a museum of natural curiosities. She's spent more money for wrecks that wouldn't be allowed in the cellar of a poor-house than'd keep a family in comfort for years.

"You know Scudmore, who sold out the other day? She was there, bidding away like a millionaire. Came home with a wagon-load of things—four albata tea-pots without lids or handles; two posts of a bedstead and three slats; a couple of churns and fourteen second-hand sun-bonnets, and more mournful refuse like that. Said she didn't intend to buy, but she bid on them to run them up to help Mrs. Scudmore, and the auctioneer knocked them down quicker'n a wink. Said it was 'Lot 47,' and she had to take it all. And she said maybe she could make up the sun-bonnets into bibs for the baby and use the tea-pots for preserves. She thought she might make a pretty fair bedstead out of the posts by propping the other ends on a chair; and she said it was a lucky thing she was so forehanded about those churns, because she might have a cow knocked down to her, and then she would be all ready for butter-making. More'n likely she'll buy some old steer and bring him home while she's rummaging around for bric-a-brac.

"When the Paxtons had their sale in January she was around there, of course, and came home after dinner with the usual dismembered furniture; and when I said to her, 'Emma, why under Heaven did you buy in the mud-dredge and the sausage-stuffer?' she said she thought the sausage-stuffer would do for a cannon for the boys on the Fourth of July, and there was no telling if Charley wouldn't want to be a civil engineer when he grew up, and perhaps he'd get a contract for deepening the channel of the river; and then he'd rise up and bless the foresight of the mother who'd bought a mud-dredge for two dollars and saved it up for him.

"I sold that scoop on Wednesday for old iron for fifteen cents; and I'll bang the head off of Charley if he ever goes to dredging mud or playing cannon with the sausage-stuffer. I won't have my boys carrying on in that way.

"Over there at Robinson's sale I believe she'd've bid on the whole concern if I hadn't come in while she was going it. As it was, she bought an aneroid barometer, three dozen iron skewers, a sacking-bottom and four volumes of Eliza Cook's poems. Said she thought those volumes were some kind of cookery-books, or she wouldn't have bid on them, and the barometer would be valuable to tell us which was north. North, mind you! She thought it indicated the points of the compass. And yet they want to let women vote! I threw in those skewers along with the mud-dredge, and she's used the sacking-bottom twice to patch Charley's pants; and that's all the good we ever got out of that auction.

"But she don't care for utility; it's simply a mania for buying things. We haven't a stove in the house, and yet what does she do at Murphy's sale but bid on sixty-two feet and three elbows of rusty stovepipe and cart it home with four debilitated gingham umbrellas. Said the umbrellas were a bargain because, by putting in new covers and handles and a rib here and there, they would do for birthday presents for her aunts. And the stovepipe could be sent out to the farm to be put around the peach trees to keep the cows off. How in thunder she was ever going to get a stovepipe around a peach tree never crossed her mind. She is just as impractical as a baby.

"When Bailey had the auction at his insurance office, there she was, and, sure enough, that afternoon she landed in our side yard with Bailey's poll-parrot and a circular saw. It amused me. She wanted to use that saw as a dinner-gong, but it was cracked, and so she has turned it into a griddle for muffins. Bailey had taught the parrot to swear so that I was afraid it'd demoralize Charley, and I don't mind telling you in confidence that I killed it by putting bug-poison in a water-cracker.

"Now, I see there's an auction advertised for Friday at Peters'; and Peters has a pyramid of old tomato cans and bric-a-brac of that sort piled up in his back yard. Now, you see if that woman don't bid on those cans until she runs them up to a dollar apiece, and then come lugging them around to our house with some extraordinary idea about loading them up with gunpowder and selling them to the government during the next war for bombshells. If she does, that winds the thing up. I'm a good-natured man, but no woman shall bring home three hundred tomato cans to my house and retain a claim upon my affections. I'll resign first."