st
at that moment, he had not seen that brown hand reaching through the
hole to clutch him again by the coat.

The action seemed so natural, so like a hungry boy who gropes in the
dark pantry for something to eat, that it would have taken more
arguments than Ben had at his disposal to persuade Toby that his Mr.
Stubbs could not understand all that was said to him. Toby put another
doughnut in the outstretched hand, and then sat silently, as if in a
brown-study over some difficult problem.

For some time the ride was continued in silence. Ben was going through
all the motions of whistling without uttering a sound--a favorite
amusement of his--and Toby's thoughts were far away in the humble home
he had scorned, with Uncle Daniel, whose virtues had increased in his
esteem with every mile of distance which had been put between them, and
whose faults had decreased in a corresponding ratio.

Toby's thoughtfulness had made him sleepy, and his eyes were almost
closed in slumber, when he was startled by a crashing sound, was
conscious of a feeling of being hurled from his seat by some great
force, and then he lay senseless by the side of the road, while the
wagon became a perfect wreck, from out of which a small army of monkeys
was escaping. Ben's experienced ear had told him at the first crash that
his wagon was breaking down, and, without having time to warn Toby of
his peril, he had leaped clear of the wreck, keeping his horses under
perfect control, and thus averting more trouble. It was the breaking of
one of the axles which Toby had heard just before he was thrown from his
seat, and when the body of the wagon came down upon the hard road.

[Illustration: THE BREAK-DOWN, AND ESCAPE OF THE MONKEYS.]

The monkeys, thus suddenly released from confinement, had scampered off
in every direction, and by a singular chance Toby's aged friend started
for the woods in such a direction as to bring him directly before the
boy's insensible form. The monkey, on coming up to Toby, stopped, urged
by the well-known curiosity of its race, and began to examine the boy's
person carefully, prying into pockets and trying to open the boy's
half-closed eyelids. Fortunately for Toby, he had fallen upon a
mud-bank, and was only stunned for the moment, having received no
serious bruises. The attentions bestowed upon him by the monkey served
the purpose of bringing him to his senses; and, after he had looked
around him in the gray light of the com