ith Sammy about how they
should manage it, two gentlemen gave them nine dollars, and so there was
but fifteen more to be raised. But that fifteen seemed harder to get than
the fifty they had already gotten. At last Willie thought of something.
They would try the sewing-machine man. Mr. Sharps would throw off fifteen
dollars.

But they did not know Mr. Sharps. Though he made more than fifteen
dollars on the machine, he hated to throw anything off. He was always
glad to put on. Sammy described him by saying that "Mr. Sharps was not
for-giving but he was for-getting."

They talked; they told the story; they begged. Mr. Sharps really could
not afford to throw off a cent. He was poor. Taxes were high. He gave a
great deal. (I do not know what he called a great deal. He had been to
church three times in a year, and twice he had put a penny in the plate.
I suppose Mr. Sharps thought that a great deal. And so it was, for him,
poor fellow.) And then the butcher had raised the price of meat; and he
had to pay twenty-three dollars for a bonnet for his daughter. Really, he
was too poor. So the boys went away down-hearted.

But Sammy went straight to an uncle of his, who was one of the editors
of the _Thornton Daily Bugle_. After a private talk with him he started
back to Mr. Sharps. Willie followed Sammy this time. What Sammy had in
his head Willie could not make out.

"I'll fix him!" That was the only word Sammy uttered on the way back.

"Now, Mr. Sharps," he began, "my uncle's name is Josiah Penn. Maybe you
know him. He's one of the editors of the _Thornton Daily Bugle_. I've
been talking with him. If you let me have a Feeler and Stilson
sewing-machine for fifty dollars, I will have a good notice put in the
_Daily Bugle_."

Mr. Sharps whistles a minute. He thought he could not do it. No, he was
too poor.

"Well, then, Willie," said Sammy, "we'll go across the street and try the
agent of the Hillrocks and Nibbs machine. I think Mr. Betweens will take
my offer."

"O!" said Mr. Sharps, "you don't want that machine. It's only a single
thread, and it will ravel, and--well--you don't want that."

"Indeed, my mother says there isn't a pin to choose between them," said
Sammy; "and I can give Mr. Betweens just as good a notice as I could give
you."

"Very well; take the machine for fifty dollars. I do it just out of pity
for the widow, you know. I never could stand by and see suffering and not
relieve it. You won't forget abo