The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. By Mark Twain.

Waikato Times, Volume XXV, Issue 2048, 22 August 1885, Page 2 (Supplement)

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. By Mark Twain.

(Continued.) It didn't take me long to make up my naiad that these liars warn't no king-i nor dukpg, at all, bnt jußt low-down humbugs and frauds. Bat I never said nothing, never let on ; kept it to myself; it's the beat way; then you don't have no quarrels, and don't gut into no trouble. If they wanted us to oall them kings and dukes, I hadn't no objections, 'long as it would keep peace in the family ; and it warn't bo use to tell Jim, bo I didn't tell him. If I never learnt nothing else out of pap I learnt that the beet way to get along with his kind of people is to let them have their own way. They asked us considerable uaany questions ; wsnted to know what we covered up the raft that way for, and hid by In the daytime instead of running— was Jim a runaway nigger ? Says I — " Goodness Bakes, would a runaway nigger run south 7 " No, they allowed he wouldn't. I had to account for things some way, so I says : " My folk s was living in Pike County, in Missouri, where I was born, and they all died of! but me and pa and my brother Ike. Pa, he 'lowed he'd break up and go down and live with Unole Ben, who's got a little onehorse placo on the river, forty-four mile below Orleans. Pa was pretty poor, and had some debts ; so when he'd squared up there warn't nothing left but sixteen dollars and our nigger, Jim. That warn't enough to take us fourteen hundred mile, deck passage nor no other way. Well, when the river rose, pa had a Btre&k of luck one day ; he ketched this piece of a raft ; so we reckoned we'd go down to Orleans on it. Pa's luck didn't hold out; a steamboat run over the forrard comer of the raft, one night, and we all went overboard and dove under tho wheel ; Jim and me come up, all right, but pa was drunk, and Ike was only four years old, so they never come up no more. Well, for the next day or two we had considerable trouble, because people waa always coming out in skiffs and trying to take Jim away from me, aying they believed he was a runaway nigger. We don't run day-times no more, now; nights they don't bother us." The duke says— " Leave mo alone to cipher out a way so we oan run in the day-time if we want to. I'll think the thing over — I'll invent a plan that'll fix it. Well, let it alone for to-day, because of coarse we don't want to go by that town yonder in daylight— it mightn't be healthy." Towards night it begun to darken up and look like ram : the heat lightning was squirting round, low down in the Bky, and the leaves was beginning to shiver — it was going to be pretty ugly, it was easy to see that, So the duke and the king went to overhauling our wigwam, to ccc what the beds were like. My bed was a straw tick— better than Jim's, which was a corn-shuck tick ; there's always cobs around about in a shuck tick, and they poke into you and hurt; and when you roll over, the dry shuoks sound like you was rolling over in a pile of dead leaves ; it makes such a rustling that you wake up. Well, the duke allowed he would take my bed ; but the king allowed he wouldn't. He says — " I should a reckoned the difference in rank would a sejosted to you that a cornshack bed warn't just fitten for me to sleep on. Your Grace'll take the shuck bed yourself." Jim and me was in & sweat again, for a minute, being afraid there was going to be some more trouble amongst them ; bo we ,waa pretty glad when the duke says — " 'Tis my fate to be always ground into tho mire under the iron heel of opprassion. Misfortune has broken my once haughty spirit ; I yield, I Bubmit ; 'tis my fate. I am alone in the world— let me suffer ; I can bear it." We got away as soon as it was good and dark. The king told us to stand well out towards the middle of the river, and not sbow a light till we got a long ways below the town. We come in sight of the little bunch of lights by-and-by — that waa the town, you know— and slid by, about a half a mile out, all right. When we was three-quarters of a mile below, we hoisted up our signal lantern ; and about ten o'clock it come on to rain and blow ond thunder and lighten everything; so the king told us to both stay on watch till the weather got better ; then him and the duke cruwled into the wigwam and turned in for the night. It was my watch below, till twelve, but I wouldn't a turned in, n,nyw^y, if I'd had a b°d; because a bedy don't fee fcuoh a Btoim as that wry day in the v/eck, not'by a long wpbi. My soulfe, how the wind did Ecieam alonp I And evtry second or two there'd come a t;lare that lit up tho white caps for half a msle around, r.nd you'd sec the islands looking duaty through the rain, and tho tr«:e3 thrinhinjr around in tho wind ; then cornea a h wack I— bsm I bum ! bumble-umblo-inti bnm-burj bum-bum— and tho thunder would ro rumbling and grumbling nway, azid guit — and then rip cornea another flash and another ifockdcliigi-r. Thowavei most washed me off tie laft, sometimes, but 1 hadn't any clotbna on, Riid didn't mind. Wu didn'chnve no trouble nboitt bunga ; tho lightning was glaring and ilittcring around bo constant that

,wf> could bos them plenty coo 1 ! cnoash to ttnrow her b^ad this way or tba% and mi;s tyhsm. Ilia-] the middle wf.V:), yru know, but I was pretty bKepy by thai ttoie.K) 3rn bas&id he won'd aland the f.t^t b^.lf i^{ i: lor nr; ho \vao fc.lv/ays mighty go that way, Jim >7 < \». I crawkd into the wigwam, br.t ti«a Meg aud the duko had their lera erprawleit aromd fo there warn't no show for rcu", 30 I laid outside — I didn't mind the rain, because it was warra, and tho wo.v >a vram't running fo bfp;h, now. About two they come up again, though, and Jim was going to callme.bHt heobanged hia mind because ho reckoned they warn't high enough yet to do any barm ; but he was mistaken a'ooat that, for pretty soon all of a sudden along comes a regular rioper, and washed cc overboard. It most killed Jim alaughing. lie was the easiest nigger to laugh that ever was, anyway. I took the watch, urA Jim ho la ; d down and snored away ; and Ly-and-bye the storm let up for good and all; and the fist cabinlight that ehowed. I roused him out and we slid the raft into hiding quarters for the day. The Ling got out an old ratty datk of cards after breakfast, and him and the £u!.e played eeven up » while, five cunts a game. Then they got tired of it, and allowed they would " lay out a campaign," a:j the called it. The duke T\ent down into hia carpet-bag and fetched up a lot of little printed bills, and read them out loud. One bill eaid " The celebrated Dr. Armand de Moatalban, of Paris," would " lecture on the Science of rh;cnology" at euch and such a place, on the blink day of Man 1 /, at ten cent'i adnvsuoi), and '• furnish charts of character at twenty five cents apiece." The duke eaid that wad him. In another bill he vs'.i? the " world r»>rjwntd SaakeapsreaM tragedian, Girrick ihe Younger, of Diury Lane, London." In other bilh he had a lot of othei names aud C\ r ;"i otuer wonderful thin? 1 ?, like nndiug water and «old with a " divinining rod, ' " dissipating witehspella," and so on. By-aad-bje he says — " But the histrionic mufeo is the darling. Have you ever trod the boards, Royally ?"* " No,"' says the king. "You shall, then, before you're thieo daya older, Fallen Grandeur," pays the duke. " The first good town we come to, we'll hire & ball and do the swoid-tißtat; in il oharcl 111. and the balcony eoene in Borneo ct-d Juliet. How does that strike you ?'' " I'm in, up to the hub, for jinytl ing that will pay, Bilgewsfer, but jou see I don't know nothing about play-ncln', r.nd hain't G\er reen much of it. Iwhh to fimall when pap used to have 'em at thj palaco. Do you reckon you can learn me?" "Easy!" "All light. I'm jist a-fivezn' for something frf-h, anyway. Lots commence, right away." So the duke he told him all about who Romeo was, und who Julif I was, and said he was used to being Borneo, so the kinp, could be Juliet. "But if JulictVsuch a younij ?al, duke, my peeled read and my white whickeis is Rom' to look oncommon odd on her, majbt." " No, don't you worry— these country pke3 won't ever think of that. Besides, you know, you'll be in costume, and that makes a1!a 1 ! tLo difference in the world ; Juliet's in i\ balcony, enjoying the rnoouliGht tcforc she gees to bed, and she's got on her nightgown and her ruflhd night-e&p. Here are the ooclumes for the parts." He got out two or three curtain-calico suits, which he said was meedjcvil armour for Bicbard 111. end t'other chap, and a long white cotton niaht-shirt and a iiifri-d nighveap to match. The king was satisfied; so the <?uke got out his book and read the parts over in the iGO3t Bpler.did spread eagle way, prancing around and acting at the aarrc time, to show how it had got to be don<: ; the he five the book to the king and told him to get his part by heart. Thera was a little one-horse town about three mile down the bend, and after dinner the duke said he had ciphered out his idea about how to run in daylight without it being dangsrsomo for Jim ; so he allowed he would go down to the town and fix that thing. The king allowed he would go too, and see if be couldn't Btnko something. We was out of coffee, bo Jim eaid I better go along with them in the canoe and get some. When we got there, there warn't nobody stirring ; streets empty, and perfectly dead and BtiU, like Sunday. We found a sick nigger sunning himaelf in a back yard, and he said everybody that warn't too youi.g or too sick or too old was gono to camp-meet-ing, about two mile back in the wooda. The king got the directions, and allowed he'd go and work that camp-me&ting for all it was worth, and I might go, too. The duko said what he waa after was a printing office. We found it ; a little bit of a concern, up over a carpenter shop—carpenters and printers all gone to the meetinp, and no doors locked. It was a dirty, littertd-up place, and had ink marks, and handbills with pictures of horpes and lunaway niggers on them, all over the walls. The duke shad his coat and eaid he was all light now. So me and the king lit out for the camp-meet-ing. We got there in about a half en hour, fairly dripping, for it was a mobt awful hot day. There was aa much as a thousand people there, from twenty mile round. The woodH was full of teams and wagons, bitched everywhere, feeding out of the wagon troughs and stamping to keep off tho flies. Tbeio was sheds made out of poles and roofed over with branches, where they hid lemonaoc and gingerbread to sell, and piles of water-mploas aud green corn and euch-iike truck. The preaching was going on under the same kinds of eheds, only they was bipgor and held crowds of people. The benches was mado out of outside slabs of logs, with holes bored in the round side to drive Bticks into for legs. They didn't have co backs. The preachers had high platforms to eUi.d on at one end of tho sheds. The women had on sun-bonnets ; and some had lineey-woelscy frocks, some gingham ones, and a few of the young ones had on calico. Some of the young men was bare-footul, and some of the children didn't have on any clothes but just a tow-linen shirt. Some of the old women was knitting, and some of the young folk 3 was couiting on the sly. Tho first Ehed we come to, the preacher was lining out a hymn. He lined out two linen, everybody Bung it, and it was kind of grand to hear it, there was bo many of them and they done it in tnch a rousing way ; then ha lined out two more for them to sing — and so on. The people woke up more and more, and sung louder and louder ; and towards the end some begun to groan, and some begun to ehout. Then tho preacher begun to preach ; and begun in earnest, too ; and went weaving first to one side of the plttform and then the other, and then a leaning down o\er tho front of it, with his arms and his body going all the time, and shoutirg his words out with all his might ; and eveiy now and then he would hold up his Bible and sp:ead it open, and kind of pas 3 it around this way and that, shouting, "It's the brazen serpent in tho wilderness! Look upon it and live 1 " And people would Bhout out, " Glory I — A-a men ! And so ho wont on, and the people groaning and crying and saying amen : " Oh, come to the mouvncio' bench i come, black with sin I (amen !) como sick and sore 1 (niitfit!) come, lame and halt, and blind 1 (tivivnl) come, poor and nccely, sunk in shame ! (a-a-nun I) come all that's worn, and coiled, and suffering !— come with a broken spirit 1 come with a contrite heart 1 como in your rags and sin and dirt 1 the waters that cleanse is free, the door of heaven stands opon--ob, enter in and be at rest ! " (a-a men I <)lonj, rjlon) hallelujah !) And so 00. You couldn't make out what the preacher Baid, any more, on account of tho shouting and crying. Folks got up, ovcrywherea m the crowd, aud worked their way, just by main sliength, to the mourners' bench, with tho tears running down their faces ; aud when all tho mourners had got up theco to tho fiont beuches in a crowd

t.Uey survg, and shouted, and flung themselves d-owu on the straw, jiul crazy and wild. Woll, the first 1 J--uowed, the King got Bgohig ; &nJ you could hesr him over everybndy; and ne.it ho went a-eharging up on,to iho pWAarm and the preacher bo begged bira to apeak to the people, and he done it. lie toM thx-m he was r pirate — bron a pirate for tl.ir'y ♦»n , < .<(. in vii. L. >. I" 1 " 1 Ocean, and his crew Wtia thinned out «. jns-iderable, last spriag, in a fight, and he was home now, to Si,ke out some fm-h mm, and thanks to •-_ \.< ' ' ed la«t night, and pat ashore oil of a wti,mbo*t without a cent, and ho was glad of it, it was the bkssedest thing ih at ever happened to him, because he was a changed man now, and happy for the first time in his life ; and poor as ho was, he W63 going to start right oil and work hia way bask to the Indian Ocean and put in the reat of hia life ti'yicg to turn the pirates into the trua p \th ; for he could do it better than anybody else, being acquainted with all the pirate crev.s m that oce»a ; and though it would take him a long time to get there without money, he wcuH get thero anyway, and every rime he convinced a pirate he would say to him, "Don't jou thank me, don't you give me no credit, ie all belongs to them dear peop'o in Pokeville camp-meeting, natural brccbeis and benefactors of the race— and fiat e!e>ir preacher theic, the :ruest friend a piiate over had 1" And then he busted into tears, and so did everybody. Then aoniebody 6ing3 out, " Take up a collection for him, take up a collection 1" Well, a half a dozen made a jump to do it, but Bomobody pings out, " Let Jam pass the hat louiid!" 'I hen everybody said it, the prer.cb.er too. So tLe king went all through the crowd with hi) hat, scabbing ms eje-s snd blessing the people and praising tLem and thanking them for beiug so good to the poor piratea ay/ay oft there; and every little while the piuucrt kinds of girls, rath the tears runliitg duwn their chreks, would up and ask hiua would they let him kies him, for to remember him by ; and be always done it ; and some of them he hugged and kipsed as many as five oi six times— and he waß invited to stay a week ; and everybody wanted him to live in then- houses, and said they'd think it was a honour ; but be said as this was the last day of the camp-meeting he couldn't do no good, and besides he was in a sweat to get to the iQdian Ocean right off and go to work on the pirates. When wo got back to the raft and he come to coun\. up, cc iound he had oollected eigbtyEeven dollar;; and seventy-five cents. And then he had fetched away a three-gallon jug of whisky, tco, that he found under a wagon when we w^s starting home through the woods. Too king Baid, take it all round, it laid over any day hs d ever put in the missionarying line. He baid it warn't no use talking, heathens don't amount to shucks, alongside of pirates, to work a camp-meeting with. The duke was thinking he'd been doing piUty well, till the king come to Bhow up, but after that he didn't think so much. He had set up and printed of! two little jobs for farmers, in that printing office — horse bills — i.ud took the money, four dollars. And he had got in ten dollais 1 worth of advertibemens for the paper, which he said he wou'd put in for four dollars if they would pay in advance—so they done it. The price of the paper was two dollars a year, but he took in three subscriptions for half a dollai apiece on condition of them paying him in advance ; they were going to pr.y in cord-wood pud onions, as ucual, but he md he bad just lought the concern and knocked down the prica as low ss he could ailord it, and wa3 going to run it for cash. He eet up a little piece of poetry, which he made, hnneelf, ous of his own head — three verse?— ls iud of sweet and saddish — the name of it wag, " Yes, crush, cold world, this breaking heart "—and he ltfi that all ect up and ready to print in the paper and d-dn't charge nothing tor it. Well, he took in nine dollars and a half, and said he done a pretty square day's work for it. Then he showed us another little job he'd printed and hand't charged for, because it was for us. It bed a picture of a runaway nigger, with a bundle on a stick, over hia shoulder, and " £200 reward under it. Tae reading was all abent Jim, and just described him to a dot. It said he run away fioin St. Jacques' plantation, forty miles below New Orleans, last ■winter, and likely went north, and whoever would catch him and send him baok, he could has c the reward and expenses. " Now," says the duke, " after to-night we can run in the daytime if we want to. Whenever we see anybody coming, wo can tie Jim hand und foot with a rope, and lay him in the wig- warn and show this handbill and say we captured him up the river, and were too poor to L-iivel on a bteam-boat, so we got this little iaf> on credit from our friends and are going down to get the reward. Handcuffs and chains would look still better on Jim, but it wouldn't go v.i:h the story of us being so poor. Too much like jewellery. Hopes are the correot thing— we must preserve the unities, as we say on the boards." We all said the duke was pretty smart, and there couldn't be no trouble about running daytimes. We judged we could make miles enough that night to get out of the reach of the pow-wow wo reckoned the duke's woik in the printing oflice was going to make in that little town — then we could boom right along, if wo wanted to. We laid low and kept still, and never shoved out till nearly ten o'clock ; then we slid by, pratty wide away from the town, and didn't hoist our lantern till we were clear out of sight of it. When Jim called me to take the watch at four in the morning, he says — " Huck, doea you leck'n we gwyne to run. across any mo' kings on dis trip ? " " No," I says, " I reckon not." " Well," says he, " dats all right, den. I doan' mine one er two kings, but dats enough. Dis ont>V powerful drunk, en de duke ain't much better." I found Jim had been trying to get him to talk French, so he could hear what it was like ; but he paid he had been in this country so long, and bad co much trouble, he'd forgot it. (To be continued).