tes. I am staying here on business
connected with the United States Bank. This is my brother,' says she,
pointin' to the big man.

"'How d'ye do?' says he, a-puttin' his hands together, turnin' his toes
out an' makin' a funny little bow. 'I am General Tom Thumb,' he says
in a deep, gruff voice, 'an' I've been before all the crown-ed heads of
Europe, Asia, Africa, America an' Australia,--all a's but one,--an' I'm
waitin' here for a team of four little milk-white oxen, no bigger than
tall cats, which is to be hitched to a little hay-wagon, which I am to
ride in, with a little pitch-fork an' real farmer's clothes, only
small. This will come to-morrow, when I will pay for it an' ride away to
exhibit. It may be here now, an' I will go an' see. Good-bye.'

"'Good-bye, likewise,' says the lady. 'I hope you'll have all you're
thinkin' you're havin', an' more too, but less if you'd like it.
Farewell.' An' away they goes.

"Well, you may be sure, I stood there amazed enough, an' mad too when I
heard her talk about my bein' all I was a-thinkin' I was. I was sure my
husband--scarce two weeks old, a husband--had told all. It was too bad.
I wished I had jus' said I was the Earl-ess of Random an' brassed it
out.

"I rushed back an' foun' him smokin' a pipe on a back porch. I charged
him with his perfidy, but he vowed so earnest that he had not told these
people of our fancies, or ever had spoke to 'em, that I had to believe
him.

"'I expec',' says he, 'that they're jus' makin'-believe--as we are.
There aint no patent on make-believes.'

"This didn't satisfy me, an' as he seemed to be so careless about it I
walked away, an' left him to his pipe. I determined to go take a walk
along some of the country roads an' think this thing over for myself.
I went aroun' to the front gate, where the woman of the house was
a-standin' talkin' to somebody, an' I jus' bowed to her, for I didn't
feel like sayin' anything, an' walked past her.

"'Hello!' said she, jumpin' in front of me an' shuttin' the gate.
'You can't go out here. If you want to walk you can walk about in the
grounds. There's lots of shady paths.'

"'Can't go out!' says I. 'Can't go out! What do you mean by that?'

"'I mean jus' what I say,' said she, an' she locked the gate.

"I was so mad that I could have pushed her over an' broke the gate, but
I thought that if there was anything of that kind to do I had a husband
whose business it was to attend to it, an' so I runs aro