nt, which would cause
the one he had left behind to look back. He would then lift his cane as
though it were the rod of a magician.

"Old Mr. Calamity is coming," said a Philadelphia schoolboy to another,
one new school day in autumn. "See, he is watching Franklin, and is
trying to avoid meeting him."

Their teacher came along the street.

"Why, boys, are you watching the old gentleman?"

"He is trying to avoid meeting Mr. Franklin, sir."

"Calamity comes to avoid Industry," said the teacher, as he saw the two
men. Franklin was the picture of thrift, and his very gait was full of
purpose and energy. "I speak in parable," said the teacher, "but that
old gentleman is always in a state of alarm, and he seems to find
satisfaction in predicting evil, and especially of Mr. Franklin. The
time was when the young printer avoided him--he was startled, I fancy,
whenever he heard the cane on the pavement; he must have felt the force
of the suggestion that Calamity was after him. Now he has become
prosperous, and the condition is changed. Calamity flees from him. See,
my boys, the two men."

They stopped on the street.

Mr. Calamity passed them on the opposite side, and Mr. Franklin came
after him, walking briskly. The latter stopped at the door of his
office, but the old gentleman hurried on. When he reached the corner of
the street he planted his cane down on the pavement and looked around.
He saw the popular printer standing before his office door on the
street. The two looked at each other. The old man evidently felt
uncomfortable. He turned the corner, out of sight, when an extraordinary
movement appeared.

Mr. Calamity reached back his long, ruffled arm, and his cane, in view
of the philosopher, the teacher, and the boys, and shook the cane
mysteriously as though he were writing in the air. He may have had in
mind some figure of the ancient prophets. Up and down went the cane,
around and around, with curves of awful import. It looked to those on
the street he had left as though the sharp angle of the house on the
corner had suddenly struck out a living arm in silent warning.

The arm and cane disappeared. A head in a wide-rimmed hat looked around
the angle as if to see the effect of the writing in the air. Then the
arm and cane appeared again as before. It was like the last remnant of a
cloud when the body has passed.

The teacher saw the meaning of the movement.

"Boys," said he, "if you should ever be pursued b