"That we may bundle em out!" sed I.

"Bless me!" sed she, "I reely coodent do that. Why expel em?"

"Becoz," sed I, "no nigger shel contaminate the white children uv this deestrick. No sech disgrace shel be put on to em."

"Well," said this aggravatin skoolmarm, wich wuz from Noo Hamshire, "yoo put em out."

"But show me wich they are."

"Can't you detect em, sir? Don't their color betray em? Ef they are so neer white that you can't select em at a glance, it strikes me that it can't hurt very much to let em stay."

I wuz sorely puzzled. There wuzn't a girl in the room who looked at all niggery. But my reputashun wuz at stake. Noticin three girls settin together who wuz somewhat dark complectid, and whose black hair waved, I went for em and shoved out, the cussid skoolmarm almost bustin with lafter.

Here the tragedy okkerred. At the door I met a man who rode four miles in his zeal to assist us. He hed alluz hed an itchin to pitch into a nigger, and ez he cood do it now safely, he proposed not to lose the chance. I wuz a puttin on em out, and hed jist dragged em to the door, when I met him enterin it.

"Wat is this?" sed he, with a surprised look.

"We're puttin out these cussid wenches, who is contaminatin yoor children and mine," sed I. "Ketch hold of that pekoolyerly disgustin one yonder," sed I. "Wenches! You miserable skoundrel, them girls are my girls."

And without waitin for an explanashen, the infooriated monster sailed into me, the skoolmarm layin over on one ov the benches explodin in peels uv lafter. The three girls, indignant at bein mistook for nigger wenches, assisted their parent, and between em, in about four minutes I wuz insensible. One uv the trustees, pityin my woes, took me to the neerest railroad stashen, and somehow, how I know not, I got home, where I am at present recooperatin.

I hev only to say that when I go on sich a trip again,

I shel requir as condishen precedent, that the Afrikins to be put out shel hev enuff Afrikin into em to prevent sich mistakes. But, good Lord, wat hevent I suffered in this cause?

TOM SAWYER WHITE-WASHING THE FENCE.

MARK TWAIN.

Tom Sawyer having offended his sole guardian, Aunt Polly, is by that sternly affectionate dame punished by being set to whitewash the fence in front of the garden. The world seemed a hollow mockery to Tom, who had planned fun for that day, and he knew that he would be the laughing stock of all the boys as they came past, and saw him set to work like a "nigger." But a great inspiration burst upon him, and he went tranquilly to work. What that inspiration was will appear from what follows.

One of the boys, Ben Rogers, comes by and pauses, eating a particularly fine apple. Tom does not see him. Ben stares a moment, and then says:

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

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

"Hello, old chap, you got to work, hey?"
"Why, it's you, Ben; I wasn't noticing."
"Say, I'm going in a-swimming, I am.

Don't you

wish you could? But of course you'd ruther work, wouldn't you? Course you would!”

Tom contemplated the boy a bit, and said:

"What do you call work?"

"Why, ain't that work?"

Tom resumed his whitewashing, and answered, carelessly:

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

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

The brush continued to move.

"Like it? Well, I don't see why I oughtn't to like

it. Does a boy get a chance to whitewash a fence every day?"

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

"Say Tom, let me whitewash a little."

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

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

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

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

"Well, here. No Ben; now don't; I'm afeard--
"I'll give you all of it!"

Tom gave up the brush with reluctance in his face, but alacrity in his heart. And while Ben worked and sweated in the sun, the retired artist sat on a barrel in the shade close by, dangling his legs, munched his apple, and planned the slaughter of more innocents. There was no lack of material; boys happened along every little while; they came to jeer but remained to whitewash. By the time Ben was fagged out, Tom had traded the next chance to Billy Fisher for a kite in good repair; and when he played out, Johnny Miller bought it for a dead rat and a string to swing it with, and so on, and so on, hour after hour. And when the

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

Tom said to himself that it was not such a hollow world after all. He had discovered a great law of human action without knowing it, namely, that in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only neces sary to make it difficult to attain.

A TRAGICAL TALE OF THE TROPICS.

W. S. GILBERT.

Jean Jacque Knyfe was a jolly tar,
Aboard of the steamship "Golden Star,"
That belongs to the line of old what-d'ye-call,
And sails from New York to Aspinwall.

Kitty Bo Peep was a dusky maid,
Whose father was in the banana trade;
Oranges, too, were in his way;

And the Bo Peeps lived at Panama Bay.

One day Jean Jacque Knyfe left his ship,
And across the Isthmus he took a trip;
And in his wanderings who should he see
But Kitty, asleep, 'neath a mango-tree.

Under a mango-tree, fast asleep,

With her head on her arm, lay sweet Bo Peep.
She looked like an angel-minus wings-
In her snow-white muslin and other things.

And Jean he took and shivered his eyes,
And swore an oath of tremendous size,
That any party might take his hat,
If he'd ever seen a sight like that.

Kitty Bo Peep started up in alarm,
And Jacque Knyfe offered to her his arm;
You'd thought he'd known her a year or two
If you'd only seen the kisses he threw.

'Twas love at first sight, I am sure, with he;
And ditto it was, I know with she;

She promised to meet him and tell her love
That night, at nine, in the pine-apple grove.

And there, at that witching hour in June,

They whispered their love 'neath the round full moon: He held her fast in his manly arms,

And feasted his eyes on her dusky charms.

The ring-tailed monkeys sported around,

And the speckled snakes squirmed over the ground;
The crocodile paused in his wild career,
When he heard their low-toned voices near.

Ominous hour! sad to relate!

A cocoanut dropped on Jean Jacque Knyfe's pate;
It doubled hi.n up-she gave a yell,-
And down a cold corpus Jean Jacque fell!

Bo Peep she shrieked for a glass of rum;
And an ounce of a kind of native gum,
Which the generous neighbors, quick as flash,
Kindly supplied her with-for cash.