d rabbit, but that isn't
so much the point as that it slews around and spills you into a drift.
Sleds are lower and narrower than they used to be, and they also lack
the artistic adornment of a pink, or a blue, or a black horse, painted
with the same stencil but in different colors, and named "Dexter," or
"Rarus," or "Goldsmith Maid." These are good names, but nobody ever
called his sled by a name. Boggs's hill, back of the lady's house that
taught the infant-class in Sunday-school, was a good hill. It had a
creek at the bottom, and a fine, long ride, eight or ten feet, on the
ice. But Dangler's hill was the boss. It was the one we all made up our
minds we would ride down some day when the snow was just right. We'd
go over there' and look up to the brow of the hill and say: "Gee! But
wouldn't a fellow come down like sixty, though?"

"Betchy!"

We'd look up again, and somebody would say: "Aw, come on. Less go over
to Boggs's hill."

"Thought you was goin' down Dangler's."

"Yes, I know, but all the other fellows is over to Boggs's."

"A-ah, ye're afraid."

"Ain't either."

"Y' are teether."

"I dare you."

"Oh, well now--"

"I double dare you."

"All right. I will if you will. You go first."

"Nah, you go first. The fellow that's dared has got to go first. Ain't
that so, Chuck? Ain't that so, Monkey?"

"I'll go down if you will, on'y you gotta go first."

"Er--er--Who all 's over at Boggs's hill?"

"Oh, the whole crowd of 'em, Turkey-egg McLaughlin, and Ducky
Harshberger, and--Oh, I don' know who all."

"Tell you what less do. Less wait till it gets all covered with ice, and
all slick and smooth. Then less come over and go down."

"Say, won't she go like sixty then! Jeemses Rivers! Come on, I'll beat
you to the corner."

That was the closest we ever came to going down Dangler's hill. Railroad
hill wasn't so bad, over there by the soap-factory, because they didn't
run trains all the time, and you stood a good chance of missing being
run over by the engine, but Dangler's Well, now, I want to tell you
Dangler's was an awful steep hill, and a long one, and when you think
that it was so steep nobody ever pretended to drive up it even in the
summer-time, and you slide down the hill and think that, once you got to
going.

Fun's fun, I know, but nobody wants to go home with half his scalp
hanging over one eye, and dripping all over the back porch. Because,
you know, a fellow's mother gets crosser about