ng salute.

"I am Ben Starr," I replied promptly, "an' if you wait till I get
bigger, I'll bus' you open."

"Hi! hi! wat you wanter bus' me open fur, boy? Is you got a pa?"

"He's Thomas Starr, an' he cuts lambs and doves on tombstones. I've seen
'em, an' I'm goin' to learn to cut 'em, too, when I grow up. I like
lambs."

The door behind me opened suddenly without warning, and as I scrambled
from the doorstep, my enemy, the merry driver, backed his creaking
vehicle to the sidewalk across which the slow procession of mourners
filed. A minute later I was caught up by my mother's hand, and borne
into a carriage, where I sat tightly wedged between two sombre females.

"So you've brought yo' little boy along, Mrs. Starr," remarked a third
from the opposite seat, in an aggressive voice.

"Yes, he had a cold an' I thought the air might do him good," replied my
mother with her society manner.

"Wall, I've nine an' not one of 'em has ever been to a funeral,"
returned the questioner. "I've al'ays been set dead against 'em for
children, ain't you, Mrs. Boxley?"

Mrs. Boxley, a placid elderly woman, who had already begun to doze in
her corner, opened her eyes and smiled on me in a pleasant and friendly
way.

"To tell the truth I ain't never been able really to enjoy a child's
funeral," she replied.

"I'm sure we're all mighty glad to have him along, Mrs. Starr," observed
the fourth woman, who was soft and peaceable and very fat. "He's a fine,
strong boy now, ain't he, ma'am?"

"Middlin' strong. I hope he ain't crowdin' you. Edge closer to me,
Benjy."

I edged closer until her harsh bombazine sleeve seemed to scratch the
skin from my cheek. Mrs. Boxley had dozed again, and sinking lower on
the seat, I had just prepared myself to follow her example, when a
change in the conversation brought my wandering wits instantly together,
and I sat bolt upright while my eyes remained fixed on the small,
straggling houses we were passing.

"Yes, she would go, rain or no rain," my mother was saying, and I knew
that in that second's snatch of sleep she had related the story of our
last evening's adventure. "To be sure she may have been all she ought to
be, but I must say I can't help mistrustin' that little, palaverin' kind
of a woman with eyes like a scared rabbit."

"If it was Sarah Mickleborough, an' I think it was, she had reason
enough to look scared, po' thing," observed Mrs. Kidd, the soft fat
woman, who sat on my left si