gh. There were going to be two parties: one to attack the
fort, and the other to defend it, and they were just going to throw
sods; but one boy had a real shot-gun, that he was to load up with
powder and fire off when the battle got to the worst, so as to have it
more like a battle. He thought it would be more like yet if he put in a
few shot, and he did it on his own hook. It was a splendid gun, but it
would not stand cocked long, and he was resting it on the wall of the
fort, ready to fire when the storming-party came on, throwing sods and
yelling and holloing; and all at once his gun went off, and a cow that
was grazing broadside to the fort gave a frightened bellow, and put up
her tail, and started for home. When they found out that the gun, if
not the boy, had shot a cow, the Mexicans and Americans both took to
their heels; and it was a good thing they did so, for as soon as that
cow got home, and the owner found out by the blood on her that she had
been shot, though it was only a very slight wound, he was so mad that he
did not know what to do, and very likely he would have half killed those
boys if he had caught them. He got a plough, and he went out to their
fort, and he ploughed it all down flat, so that not one sod remained
upon another.

My boy's brother had a good many friends who were too old for my boy to
play with. One of them had a father that had a flour-mill out at the
First Lock, and for a while my boy's brother intended to be a miller. I
do not know why he gave up being one; he did stay up all night with his
friend in the mill once, and he found out that the water has more power
by night than by day, or at least he came to believe so. He knew another
boy who had a father who had a stone-quarry and a canal-boat to bring
the stone to town. It was a scow, and it was drawn by one horse;
sometimes he got to drive the horse, and once he was allowed to steer
the boat. This was a great thing, and it would have been hard to believe
of anybody else. The name of the boy that had the father that owned this
boat was Piccolo; or, rather, that was his nickname, given him because
he could whistle like a piccolo-flute. Once the fellows were disputing
whether you could jump halfway across a narrow stream, and then jump
back, without touching your feet to the other shore. Piccolo tried it,
and sat down in the middle of the stream.

My boy's brother had a scheme for preserving ripe fruit, by sealing it
up in a stone ju