future to lick him for, so I lammed his both eyes black, bunged up his nose, and sent him hollering home. He met our schoolteacher on the way. Mr. Judson and I come together fairly regular, yet we liked each other. He was a square man, Samuel Judson, and he knew kids from thirty years' experience. He never made but one mistake with me, and he come out and begged my pardon before the whole school for that. Father sneered at his doing it—saying a teacher ought to uphold discipline, and to beg a boy's pardon was just inviting all kinds of skulduggery. Howsomever, Sammy Judson won me by that play. When he put the gad on me it was with the best of feelings on both sides. I can see the old lad now, smiling a thin little smile, sort of sourcastic, yet real kind underneath, whilst he twiddled the switch in his hands.

"Just let me trim a certain amount of foolishness out of you, and you'll make a fine man—a fine man, William," he'd say. And perhaps you think that small thin gentleman didn't know how to make a hickory bite! He could get every tender spot, by instinct.

Well, he met young Mr. Anker, as I was saying, and asked him what ailed him. Algy explained the foul way I treated him, careful not to let the tale lose anything.

"Ah!" says Sammy, "and what was this for?"

"For nothing at all—not a thing!"

Sammy looks at him from under his shaggy eyebrows. "I've often longed to thrash you for that same reason," says he, and marches on.

But lovely Peter! Father handed me back my mistreating Algy with interest on the investment. Pheeew! And talk! I was the most cowardly brute in the country—to assault and batter a poor, nice, gentlemanly little boy—a great big hulking scoundrel like myself—why, it passed all crimes in history. Old Uncle Nero scratching the fiddle, while the fire-insurance companies tore their hair, was a public benefactor compared to me.

That passed. I was only hindered, not stopped, in my reckless career of Village Pride. I'm a kind of determined cuss. But Fate sprung a stuffed deck on me. I did a piece of reforming really worth doing, but it cost me my home. Moreover, I was perfectly innocent of the intention. Don't it beat the devil? To tell it longhand, the play come up like this:

We had a party in our town who deserved a statue in the Hall—Mary Ann McCracken by name. She was a Holy Terror. Never before nor since have I seen anything like Mary Ann. I reckon she 

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