ed
millions of 'em in learning to write. One reason why it's so slow to
learn is that the things you have to write are perfect nonsense. 'Enough
is as good as a feast!' All I can say is, the man who made that proverb
never had a feast, or he'd have known better! This green paint doesn't
dry very quick, father. We'll have to wait till to-morrow before we put
in the red spots for the berries. I wish I had some little red beads.
They'd stick on the wet paint now, like one o'clock."

There were no red beads, so he rose to go to bed. When he had said
good-night and had reached the door, he stopped and looked back again.

"Say, father, haven't you anything you can sell to get some more money
for the Motor?"

John Henry shook his weary head and smiled sadly.

"Nothing that would bring nearly enough to pay for the casting," he
answered. "Don't worry about it, boy. Leave that to me--I'm used to it.
Go to bed and sleep, and you'll feel like an Air-Motor yourself in the
morning!"

"That's the worst of it," returned the boy. "Just to sit there under a
glass case and have you take care of me and do nothing, like a girl.
That's the way I feel sometimes."

He shook his young head quite as gravely as the inventor had shaken his
own, and went quietly to bed without saying anything more.

"I don't know what to do, I'm sure," he said to himself as he got into
bed, "but I'm sure there's something. Maybe I'll dream it, and then I'll
do just the contrary and it'll come all right."

But boys of practical minds and sound bodies do not dream at all, unless
it be after a feast, and most of them can stand even that without having
nightmare, unless two feasts come near together, like Christmas and a
birthday within the week.

A great-uncle of mine was once taken for a clergyman at a public dinner
nearly a hundred years ago, and he was asked to say grace; he was a
good man, and also practical, and had a splendid appetite, but he was
not eloquent, and this is what he said:--

"The Lord give us appetites to enjoy, and strength to digest ALL the
good things set before us. Amen!"

And everybody said "Amen" very cheerfully and fell to.

IV

HOW THERE WAS A FAMINE IN THE CITY

It rained in New York and it "snowed slush" in Connecticut, after its
manner, and the world was a very dreary place, especially all around the
dilapidated cottage where everything was going to pieces, including John
Henry Overholt's last hopes.

If he ha