The boy shrugged his shoulders in an impatient manner. Spunky Jack you air and shall be till-Where be you goin', pard?" "Fur a little cuss as you air, you hev a heap o' grit. "Put it there, my gay rooster," he cried. "It might be anything, but you can call me Jack if you're anxious," answered the boy, in the same sharp, suspicious way he had used all along.īilly Barlow grinned quite amicably and extended his huge horny hand. "Me? Why, sonny, I'm jest the nicest feller, when yer know me, as ever yer did know. "I don't intend you shall," retorted the undaunted boy, sharply. "What do you take me for?"Īs he spoke, out came a little pistol from his pocket, which he cocked with a sharp click that meant business and so the big tramp seemed to think, for he halted and began to laugh in an uneasy sort of way, saying: "Keep off!" angrily cried the youngster, as the other advanced. "If I have, I know enough to keep them," was the dry answer, and the boy was turning away when the big tramp rose quickly to his feet and gave a couple of strides, saying: Likely's not, yer've got some stamps left-hey, sonny?" "How do you know that?" asked the other, a little sulkily. "Well, sonny, how d'yer like the road?" he asked, in a condescending tone. From his fragment of a battered straw hat, his uncombed hair and beard, through all his rags, down to his bare, dirty feet, he was a perfect specimen of the true summer tramp. There was no question as to the calling of this lazy stranger. "You jest bet your sweet life there is, sonny," unexpectedly answered a voice near him, and the boy turned with a start to see a man of huge frame and rough appearance lying on his back under a tree, staring at him. "After all," he said, aloud, baring his head to the light breeze that stirred under the trees, so different to the sultry calm outside "after all, there is some pleasure, even in a tramp's life." The house which he had noticed lay on the other side of the wood which he was entering, and he soon lost sight of it but the refreshing coolness of the green beeches and oaks turned the current of his thoughts to pleasanter themes than his own poverty. "There is the place," he muttered, half aloud "but for all the good it will do me, I might as well be in Siberia." The boy in question seemed to feel this, for he uttered a heavy sigh, just ere he entered the wood, as he caught sight of the gleaming glass roof of a conservatory several miles away, at the side of a large and handsome stone house. The country around was of that rich and smiling description which is apt to raise envy in the bosom of the poor man, as he casts his eyes on pleasant mansions in the midst of their fields and orchards, and contrasts it with his own dusty path. The sun was near the zenith, and the dust rose in little clouds at every step taken by the young wayfarer, but he still pressed on for he saw before him a forest, which promised him shade, coolness and rest. In the midst of this sultry season a slight, handsome and delicate-looking boy, who seemed as if he might have been about sixteen, and whose dress indicated poverty if not want, plodded wearily along one of the roads that led from the coal regions of Pennsylvania toward Pittsburg. The white dust covered everything as with a vail, and the leaves curled up under their powdery covering, afraid to look out till the falling of the night-dews. How hot it was! For weeks not a drop of rain fell over half the Union. WHO does not remember the riot summer of 1877?
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