meeting with any
remarkable adventure. The boys employed themselves the rest of the
afternoon in planning excursions and amusements, and before they got
through, they had laid out "fun" enough to occupy them for several days.

The evenings were now quite short, and as it was the custom to retire
to bed early at Mr. Preston's, it frequently happened that no lamps
were lit in the house for several days in succession. As twilight came
on that evening, Oscar, who began to feel pretty tired, laid down upon
the sofa in the sitting-room, and in a few minutes was fast asleep.
Jerry got a straw, and was about to tickle his ear, when his mother
stopped him. Oscar's nap, however, was a short one, and suddenly
waking up, he began to laugh.

"I guess you had a pleasant dream," said his aunt.

"I had a real funny one," replied Oscar. "I thought you sent me over
to the store to get some things, and when I got there, I had them all
jumbled together in my head, and I told the man I wanted a yard of
molasses, and a pound of calico, and a gallon of shingle-nails, and I
did n't know what else. And I thought the man laughed, and asked me if
I would take them loose, or have them done up in a rag. Then another
boy that was in the store set up a loud laugh, and that woke me up. I
wonder how long I slept--do you know, aunt?"

"Only two or three minutes," replied Mrs. Preston.

"I was real smart, then," replied Oscar; "for you gave me my errand,
and I harnessed the horse and drove away over to the Cross-Roads, and
went through the scene in the store, and woke up again, all in two or
three minutes. I thought I 'd been asleep half an hour."

"I should think you 'd dream about the store," said Jerry; "you 've
made fun enough about it, if that 's all."

"Well, I 'll leave it to aunt if it is n't odd to see such a queer lot
of stuff in one store; I 've heard about country stores, but I never
saw one that would come up to that before. It is almost equal to going
into a fair, to go in there. There was everything you could think of,
from a grindstone to a pop-gun."

"There is n't business enough to support more than one trader, and that
is the reason why Mr. Fletcher keeps such a variety," said Mrs. Preston.

"I know that," said Oscar, "and I suppose the folks are glad to have
him keep all sorts of knick-knacks; but it seems queer to me, to see
groceries and dry goods, and everything else, in the same shop."

"Did you see any babie