nd then the minister who used to go to college, and be a hazer, and
box, he got mad and squared off and hit Pa three times right by the eye,
and one of the deacons kicked Pa, and Pa got mad and said he could clean
out the whole shebang, and began to pull off his coat, when they
bundled him out doors, and Ma got mad to see Pa abused, and she left the
sociable, and I had to stay and eat ice cream and things for the whole
family. Pa says that settles it with him. He says they haven't got any
more christian charity in that church than they have in a tannery. His
eyes are just getting over being black from the sparring lessons, and
now he has got to go through oysters and beef-steak cure again. He says
it is all owing to me."

"Well, what has all this got to do with your putting up signs in front
of my store, 'Rotten Eggs,' and 'Frowy Butter a specialty,' said the
grocery man as he took the boy by the ear and pulled him around. You
have got an idea you are smart, and I want you to keep away from here.
The next time I catch you in here I shall call the police and have you
pulled. Now git!"

The boy pulled his ear back on the side of his head where it belonged,
took out a cigarette and lit it, and after puffing smoke in the face of
the grocery cat that was sleeping on the cover to the sugar barrel he
said:

"If I was a provision pirate that never sold anything but what was
spoiled so it couldn't be sold in a first class store, who cheated in
weights and measures, who bought only wormy figs and decayed cod-fish,
who got his butter from a fat rendering establishment, his cider from
a vinegar factory, and his sugar from a glucose factory, I would not
insult the son of one of the finest families. Why, sir, I could go out
on the corner, and when I saw customers coming here, I could tell a
story that would turn their stomachs, and send them to the grocery on
the next corner. Suppose I should tell them that the cat sleeps in the
dried apple barrel, that the mice made nests in the prune box, and rats
run riot through the raisins, and that you never wash your hands except
on Decoration day and Christmas, that you wipe your nose on your shirt
sleeves, and that you have the itch, do you think your business would be
improved? Suppose I should tell the customers that you buy sour kraut of
a wood-en-shoed Polacker, who makes it of pieces of cabbage that he gets
by gathering swill, and sell that stuff to respectable people, could
you pay