Oh, running stream of sparkling joy,
To be a glorious human boy!"

Then, setting his hair erect with one comprehensive sweep, he caught up
his coat-skirts over his arm, and, assuming a parliamentary attitude,
burst into a comical medley, composed of extracts from Jefferson Brick's
and Lafayette Kettle's speeches, and Elijah Pogram's Defiance, from
"Martin Chuzzlewit." Gazing at Gus, who was convulsed with suppressed
merriment, he thundered forth:--

"In the name of our common country, sir, in the name of that righteous
cause in which we are jined, and in the name of the star-spangled
banner, I thank you for your eloquent and categorical remarks. You, sir,
are a model of a man fresh from Natur's mould. A true-born child of
this free hemisphere; verdant as the mountains of our land; bright and
flowin' as our mineral Licks; unspiled by fashion as air our boundless
perearers. Rough you may be; so air our Barrs. Wild you may be; so air
our Buffalers. But, sir, you air a Child of Freedom, and your proud
answer to the Tyrant is, that your bright home is in the Settin' Sun.
And, sir, if any man denies this fact, though it be the British Lion
himself, I defy him. Let me have him here!"--smiting the table, and
causing the inkstand to skip--"here, upon this sacred altar! Here, upon
the ancestral ashes cemented with the glorious blood poured out like
water on the plains of Chickabiddy Lick. Alone I dare that Lion, and
tell him that Freedom's hand once twisted in his mane, he rolls a corse
before me, and the Eagles of the Great Republic scream, Ha, ha!"

By this time the boys were rolling about in fits of laughter; even sober
Frank was red and breathless, and Jack lay back, feebly squealing, as he
could laugh no more. In a moment Ralph was as meek as a Quaker, and
sat looking about him with a mildly astonished air, as if inquiring the
cause of such unseemly mirth. A knock at the door produced a lull, and
in came a maid with apples.

"Time's up; fall to and make yourselves comfortable," was the summary
way in which the club was released from its sterner duties and permitted
to unbend its mighty mind for a social half-hour, chiefly devoted to
whist, with an Indian war-dance as a closing ceremony.

Chapter X. The Dramatic Club

While Jack was hopping gayly about on his crutches, poor Jill was
feeling the effects of her second fall, and instead of sitting up, as
she hoped to do after six weeks of rest, she was ordered to