part I don't believe he really jumped more than thirty-three. He was too

sleepy to count straight anyhow. He had been lolling under his canvas tent down near the tennis-court all the afternoon, getting lazier and lazier every minute, and finally he had turned over square on his back, put his head on a small cushion his mamma had made for him, closed his eyes, and then came the "Boo!"

"I wonder--" he said, as he gazed about him, seeing no sign of any creature that could by any possibility say "Boo!" however.

"Of course you do. That's why I've come," interrupted a voice from the bushes. "More children of your age suffer from the wonders than from measles, mumps, or canthaves."

"What are canthaves?" asked Jimmieboy.

"Canthaves are things you can't have. Don't you ever suffer because you can't have things?" queried the voice.

"Oh, yes, indeed!" returned Jimmieboy. "Lots and lots of times."

"And didn't you ever have the wonders so badly that you got cross and wouldn't eat anything but sweet things for dinner?" the voice asked.

"I don't know exactly what you mean by the wonders," replied Jimmieboy.

"Why, wonders is a disease that attacks boys who want to know why things are and can't find out," said the voice.

"Oh, my, yes I've had that lots of times," laughed Jimmieboy. "Why, only this morning I asked my papa why there weren't any dandelionesses, and he wouldn't tell me because he said he had to catch a train, and I've been wondering why ever since."

"I thought you'd had it; all boys do get it sooner or later, and it's a thing you can have any number of times unless you have me around," said the voice.

"What are you anyhow?" asked Jimmieboy.

"I'm what they call the Encyclopædia Bird. I'm a regular owl for wisdom. I know everything--just like the Cyclopædia; and I have two wheels instead of legs, which is why they call me the Bicyclopædia Bird. I can't let you see me, because these are not my office hours. I can only be seen between ten and two on the thirty-second of March every seventeenth year. You can get a fair idea of what I look like from my photograph, though."

As the voice said this, sure enough a photograph did actually pop out of the bush, and land at Jimmieboy's feet. He sprang forward eagerly, stooped, and picking it up, gazed earnestly at it. And a singular creature the Bicyclopædia Bird must have been if the photograph did him justice. He had the head of an owl, but his body was oblong in shape, just like a book, and, as the voice had said, in place of legs were two wheels precisely like those of a bicycle. The effect was rather pleasing, but so funny that Jimmieboy really wanted to laugh. He did not laugh, however, for fear of hurting the Bird's feelings, which the Bird noticed and appreciated.

"Thank you," he said, simply.

"What for?" asked Jimmieboy, looking up from the photograph, and peering into the bush in the vain hope of catching a glimpse of the Bird itself.

"For not laughing," replied the Bird. "If you had laughed I should have biked away at once because I am of no value to any one who laughs at my personal appearance. It always makes me forget all I know, and that does me up for a whole year. If I forget all I know, you see, I have to study hard to learn it all over again, and that's a tremendous job, considering how much knowledge there is to be had in the world. So you see, by being polite and kind enough not to laugh at me, who can't help being funny to look at, and who am not to blame for looking that way, because I am not a self-made Bird, you are really the gainer, for I promise you I'll tell you anything you want to know."

"That's very nice of you," returned Jimmieboy; "and perhaps, to begin with, you'll tell me something that I ought to want to know, whether I do or not."

"That is a very wise idea," said the Bicyclopædia Bird, "and I'll try to do it. Let me see; now, do you know why the Pollywog is always amiable?"

"No," returned Jimmieboy. "I never even knew that he was, and so couldn't really wonder why."

"But you wonder why now, don't you?" asked the voice, anxiously. "For if you don't, I can't tell you."

"I'm just crazy to know," Jimmieboy responded.

"Then listen, and I will tell you," said the voice. And then the strange bird recited this poem about

THE POLLYWOG.

"The Pollywog's a perfect type Of amiability. He never uses angry speech Wherever he may be. He never calls his brother names, Or tweaks his sister's nose; He never pulls the sea-dog's tail, Or treads upon his toes.

"He never says an unkind word, And frown he never will. A smile is ever on his lips, E'en when he's feeling ill. And this is why: when Pollywog The first came on the scene, He had a temper like a cat's-- His eye with it was green.

"Now, just about the time when he Began to lose his tail, To change into a croaking frog, He came across a nail-- A nail so rusty that it looked Just like an angle-worm, Except that it was straight and stiff, And so could never squirm.

"And Polly, feeling hungry, to Assuage his appetite, Swam boldly up to that old nail, And gave it such a bite, He nearly broke his upper jaw; His lower jaw he bent. And then he got so very mad, His temper simply went.

"He lost it so completely as He lashed and gnashed around, That though this happened years ago, It has not since been found. And that is why, at all times, in The Pollywog you see, A model of that virtue rare-- True Amiability."

"Now, I dare say," continued the Bird--"I dare say you might have asked your father--who really knows a great deal, considering he isn't my twin brother--sixteen million four hundred and twenty-three times why the Pollywog is always so good-natured, and he couldn't have answered you more than once out of the whole lot, and he'd have been wrong even then."

"It must be lovely to know so much," said Jimmieboy.

"It is," said the Bird; "that is, it is lovely when you don't have to keep it all to yourself. It's very nice to tell things. That's really the best part of secrets, I think. It is such fun telling them. Now, why does the sun rise in the morning?"

"I don't know. Why?"

"For the same reason that you do," returned the sage Bird. "Because it is time to get up."

"Well, here's a thing I don't know about," said Jimmieboy. "What is 'to alarm?'"

"To frighten--to scare--to discombobulate," replied the Bird. "Why?"

"Well, I don't see why an alarm-clock is called an alarm-clock, because it doesn't ever alarm anybody," said Jimmieboy.

"Oh, it doesn't, eh?" cried the Bird. "Well, that's just where you are mistaken. It alarms the people or the animals you dream about when you are asleep, and they make such a noise getting away that they wake you up. Why, an alarm-clock saved my life once. I dreamed that I fell asleep on board a steamboat that went so fast hardly anybody could stay on board of her--she just regularly slipped out from under their feet, and unless a passenger could run fast enough to keep up with her, or was chained fast enough to keep aboard of her, he'd get dropped astern every single time. I dreamed I was aboard of her one day, and that to keep on deck I chained myself to the smoke-stack, and then dozed off. Just as I was dozing, a Misinformation Bird, who was jealous of me, sneaked up and cut the chain. As he expected, the minute I was cut loose the boat rushed from under me, and the first thing I knew I was struggling in the water. While I was struggling there, I was attacked by a Catfish. Cats are death to birds, you know, and I really had given myself up for lost, when '_ling-a-ling-a-ling-a-ling_' went the alarm-clock in the corner of my cage; the fish turned blue with fear, swished his tail about in his fright, and the splashing of the water waked me up, and there I was standing on one wheel on my perch, safe and sound. If that clock hadn't gone off and alarmed that Catfish, I am afraid I should have been forever lost to the world."

"I see now; but I never knew before why it was called an alarm-clock, and I've wondered about it a good deal," said Jimmieboy. "Now, here's another thing I've bothered over many a time: What's the use of weeds?"

"Oh, that's easy," said the Bird, with a laugh. "To make lawns look prettier next year than they do this."

"I don't see how that is," said Jimmieboy.

"Clear as window-glass. This year you have weeds on your lawn, don't you?"

"Yes," returned Jimmieboy.

"And you make them get out, don't you?" said the Bird.

"Yes," assented Jimmieboy.

"Well, there you are. By getting out they make your lawns prettier. That's one of the simplest things in the world. But here's a thing I should think you'd wonder at. Why do houses have shutters on their windows?" asked the Bird.

"I know why," said Jimmieboy. "It's to keep the sun out."

"That's nonsense, because the sun is so much larger than any house that was ever built it couldn't get in if it tried," returned the feathered sage.

"Then I don't know why. Why?" asked Jimmieboy.

"So as to wake people up by banging about on windy nights, and they are a mighty useful invention too," said the Bird. "I knew of a whole family that got blown away once just because they hadn't any shutters to bang about and warn them of their danger. It was out in the West, where they have cyclones, which are things that pick up houses and toss them about just as you would pebbles. A Mr. and Mrs. Podlington had built a house in the middle of a big field for themselves and their seventeen children. Mr. Podlington was very rich, but awful mean, and when the house was finished, all except the shutters, he said he wasn't going to have any shutters because they cost too much, and so they hadn't a shutter on the house. One night after they had lived where they were about six months they all went to bed about nine o'clock, and by ten they were sound asleep, every one of them. At eleven o'clock a breeze sprang up. This grew very shortly into a gale. Then it became a hurricane, and by two o'clock it was a cyclone. One cyclone wouldn't have hurt much, but at three o'clock two more came along, and the first thing the Podlington family knew their house was blown off its foundations, lifted high up in the air, and at breakfast-time was out of sight, and, what is worse, it has never come down anywhere, and all this happened ten years ago."

"But where did it go?" asked Jimmieboy.

"Nobody knows. Maybe it landed in the moon. Maybe it's being blown about on the wings of those cyclones yet. I don't believe we'll ever know," answered the Bird. "But you can see just why that all happened. It was Mr. Podlington's meanness about the shutters, and nothing else. If he had had shutters on that house, at least one of them would have flopped bangety-bang against the house all night, and the chances are that they would all have been waked up by it before the cyclone came, and in plenty of time to save themselves. In fact, I think very likely they could have fastened the house more securely to the ground, and saved it too, if they had waked up and seen what was going on."

"I'll never build a house without shutters," said Jimmieboy, as he tried to fancy the condition of the Podlingtons whisking about in the air for ten long years--nearly five years longer than he himself had lived. If they had landed in the moon it wouldn't have been so bad, but this other possible and even more likely fate of mounting on the wind ever higher and higher and not landing anywhere was simply dreadful to think about.

"I wouldn't, especially in the cyclone country," returned the voice in the bush. "But I'll tell you of one thing that would save you if you really did have to build a house without shutters; build it with wings. You've heard of houses with wings, of course?"

"Yes, indeed," said Jimmieboy. "Why, our house has three wings. One of 'em was put on it last summer, so that we could have a bigger kitchen."

"I remember," said the Bird. "I wondered a good deal about that wing until I found out it was for a kitchen, and not to fly with. The house had enough wings to fly with without the new one. In fact, the new one for flying purposes would be as useless as a third wheel to a bicycle."

"What do you mean by to fly with?" asked Jimmieboy, puzzled at this absurd remark of the Bird.

"Exactly what I say. Wings are meant to fly with, aren't they? I hope you knew that!" said the Bird. "So if the Podlingtons' house had had wings it might have got back all right. It could have worked its way slowly out of the cyclone, and then sort of rested on its wings a little until it was prepared to swoop down on to its old foundations, alighting just where it was before. A trip through the air under such circumstances would have been rather pleasant, I think--much pleasanter than going off into the air forever, without any means of getting back."

"But," asked Jimmieboy, "even if Mr. Podlington's house had had wings, how could he have made them work?"

"Why, how stupid of you!" cried the Bird. "Don't you know that he could have taken hold of the----"

"Ting-a-ling-a-ling a-ling-a-ling!" rang the alarm-clock up in the cook's room, which had been set for six o'clock in the afternoon instead of for six in the morning by some odd mistake of Mary Ann's.

"The alarm! The alarm!" shrieked the Bird, in terror.

And then the invisible creature, if Jimmieboy could judge by the noise in the bush, seemed to make off as fast as he could go, his cries of fear growing fainter and fainter as the wise Bird got farther and farther away, until finally they died away in the distance altogether.

Jimmieboy sprang to his feet, looked down the road along which his strange friend had fled, and then walked into the house, wishing that the alarm-clock had held off just a little longer, so that he might have learned how the wings of a house should be managed to make the house fly off into the air. He really felt as if he would like to try the experiment with his own house.

VIII.

GIANT THE JACK KILLER.

Jimmieboy was turning over the pages of his fairy book the other night, trying to refresh his memory concerning the marvelous doings of the fairy-land people by looking at the pictures. His papa was too tired to read to him, and as no one else in the house was willing to undertake the task, the boy was doing his best to entertain himself, and as it happened he got more out of his own efforts than he ever derived from the efforts of others. He had dallied long over the weird experiences of Cinderella, and had just turned over the pages which lead up to the story of Jack the Giant Killer, when something in the picture of the Giant's castle seemed to move.

Looking a little more closely at the picture in a startled sort of way, Jimmieboy saw that the moving thing was the knob of the castle door, and in a jiffy the door itself opened, and a huge homely creature whom Jimmieboy recognized at once as an ogre stuck his head out. For a moment the little fellow felt disposed to cry for help. Surely if the Giant could open the door in the picture there was no reason why he should not step out of the book entirely and make a speedy meal of Jimmieboy, who, realizing that he was entirely unarmed, was inclined to run and hide behind his papa's back. His fast oozing courage was quickly restored, however, by the Giant himself, who winked at him in a genial sort of fashion as much as to say: "Nonsense, boy, I wouldn't eat you, if I could." The wink he followed up at once with a smile, and then he said:

"That you, Jimmieboy?"

"Yes, sir," said Jimmieboy, very civilly indeed. "I'm me. Are you you?"

The Giant laughed.

"Yes," he replied, "and so, of course, we are ourselves. Are you very busy?"

"Not very," said Jimmieboy. "Why?"

"I want a little advice from you," the Giant answered. "I think it's about time the tables were turned on that miserable little ruffian Jack. The idea of a big thing like me being killed every day of his life by a mosquito like Jack is very tiresome, and I want to know if you don't think it would be fair if I should kill him just once for the sake of variety. It won't hurt him. He'll come to life again right away just as we Giants do----"

"Don't you stay dead when Jack kills you?" asked Jimmieboy.

"You know the answer to that as well as I do," said the Giant. "You've had this story read to you every day now for three years, haven't you?"

"About that," said Jimmieboy.

"Well, if we staid dead how do you suppose we'd be on hand to be killed again the next time you had the story read to you?"

"I never thought of that," said Jimmieboy.

"Never thought of it?" echoed the ogre. "Why, what kind of thoughts do you think, anyhow? It's the only thought for a thinker to think I think, don't you think so?"

"Say that again, will you?" said Jimmieboy.

"Couldn't possibly," said the ogre. "In fact, I've forgotten it. But what do you think of my scheme? Don't you think it would be wise if I killed Jack just once?"

"Perhaps it would," said the boy. "That is if it wouldn't hurt him."

"Hurt him? Didn't I tell you it wouldn't hurt him?" said the Giant. "I wouldn't hurt that boy for all the world. If I did I'd lose my position. Why, all I am I owe to him. The fairy people let me live in this magnificent castle for nothing. They let me rob them of all their property, and all I have to do in return for this is to be killed by Jack whenever any little boy or girl in your world desires to be amused by a tragedy of that sort. So you see I haven't any hard feelings against him, even if I did call him a miserable little ruffian."

"Well, I don't exactly like to have Jack killed," said Jimmieboy. "I've always rather liked him. What do you suppose he would say to it?"

"That's just the point. I wouldn't kill him unless he was willing. That would be a violation of my agreement with him, and when he came to he might sue me for what the lawyers call a breach of contract," said the ogre. "Now, it seemed to me that if you were to go to Jack and tell him that you were getting a little tired of having this story end the way it does all the time, and that you thought it only fair to me that I should have a chance to celebrate a victory, say once a week--every Saturday night for instance--he'd be willing to do it."

"Where can I find him?" asked Jimmieboy. "I just as lief ask him."

"He's in the picture, two pages farther along, sharpening his sword," said the ogre.

"Very well, I'll go see him at once," said Jimmieboy. Then he said good-by to the Giant, and turned over the pages until he came to the pictures showing how Jack sharpened his sword on the soles of the shoes of another giant, whom he had bound and strapped to the floor.

At first Jimmieboy did not know how to address him. He had often spoken to the figures in the pictures, but they had never replied to anything he had said. However, he made a beginning.

"Ahem!" he said.

The effect was pleasing, for as he said this Jack stopped sharpening his blade and turned to see who had spoken.

"Ah, Jimmieboy!" said the small warrior. "Howdy do. Haven't seen much of you this week. You've been paying more attention to Hop o' My Thumb than to me lately."

"Well, I love you just the same," said Jimmieboy. "I've just seen the Giant that lives up in the castle with the dragon on the front stoop."

"He's a good fellow," said Jack. "I'm very fond of him. He never gives me any trouble, and dies just as easy as if he were falling off a log, and out of business hours we're great chums. He's had something on his mind lately, though, that I don't understand. He says being killed every day is getting monotonous."

"That's what he said to me," said Jimmieboy.

"Well, I hope he doesn't resign his position," said Jack, thoughtfully. "I know it isn't in every way a pleasant one, but he might go farther and fare worse. The way I kill him is painless, but if he got into that Bean-stalk boy's hands he'd be all bruised up. You can't fall a mile without getting hurt, you know, and I like the old fellow too well to have him go over to that Bean-stalk cousin of mine."

"He likes you, too," said Jimmieboy, pleased to find that there was so much good feeling between the two creatures. "But he thinks he ought to get a chance to win once in a while. He said if he could arrange it with you to have him kill you once a week--Saturday nights, for instance--he'd be perfectly contented."

"That's reasonable enough," said Jack, nodding his head approvingly. "Did he say how he would like to do it?"

"No, only that he'd kill you tenderly, so that you wouldn't suffer," said Jimmieboy.

"Oh, I know that!" said Jack, softly. "He's too tender-hearted to hurt anybody. I'm very much inclined to agree to the proposition, but he must let me choose the manner of the killing. He hasn't had much practice killing people, and if he were to do it by hitting me on the head with a stick of wood I'd be likely to wake up with a headache next day; neither should I like to be smothered because while that doesn't bruise one or break any bones its awfully stuffy, and if there's one thing I like it is fresh air."

"Perhaps he might eat you," suggested Jimmieboy.

"He isn't big enough to do that comfortably," said Jack, shaking his head. "He'd have to cut me up and chew me, because his throat isn't large enough for him to swallow me at one gulp. But I'll tell you what you can do. You go back to him, and tell him that I'll agree to his proposition, if he'll have me cooked in a plum-pudding four hundred feet in circumference. I'm very fond of plum-pudding, and while he is eating it from the outside I could be eating it from the inside, and, of course, I shouldn't be burned in the cooking, because in the middle of a pudding of that size the heat never could reach me."

"But when he reached you," said Jimmieboy, "you'd have the same trouble you said you'd have if he ate you up. He'd have to cut you to pieces and chew you."

"Ah!" said Jack, "don't you see my point? By the time he reached me he would have eaten so much plum-pudding that he wouldn't have room for me, so I'd escape."

"But, then, you wouldn't be killed," said Jimmieboy.

"That wouldn't make any difference," said Jack. "We'd stop the story before I escaped and everybody would think I'd been eaten up, and that's all he wants. He just wants to seem to win once. He doesn't really care about killing me dead. Don't you see."

"Yes, I think I do," said Jimmieboy, "and I'll go back and tell him what you say."

"Thank you," said Jack. "And while you are there give him my love, and tell him I'll be around to kill him as usual after tea."

All of which Jimmieboy did and the Giant readily agreeing to the plum-pudding scheme, said good-night to his little visitor, and retired into the castle, closing the door after him.

Then Jimmieboy went to bed in a great hurry, because he knew how sleep made time seem shorter than it really was, and he was very anxious to have Saturday night come around so that he could see how the new ending to the story of Jack the Giant Killer worked.

As yet that Saturday night has not turned up, so that I really cannot tell you whether or not the arrangement was a success.

IX.

JIMMIEBOY AND THE FIREWORKS.

There was whispering going on somewhere, and Jimmieboy felt that it was his duty to find out where it was, who it was that was doing it, and what it was that was being whispered. It was about an hour after supper on the evening of July 3d when it all happened. A huge box full of fire-works had arrived only a few hours before, and Jimmieboy was somewhat afraid that the whisperings might have come from burglars who, knowing that there were thirty-five rockets, twenty Roman candles, colored lights by the dozen, and no end of torpedoes and fire-crackers and other things in the house, had come to steal them, and, if he could help himself, Jimmieboy was not going to allow that. So he began to search about, and in a few minutes he had located the whisperers in the very room at the foot of the back stairs in which the fire-works were. His little heart almost stopped beating for a moment when he realized this. It isn't pleasant to feel that perhaps you will be deprived, after all, of something you have looked forward to for a whole month, and upon the very eve of the fulfillment of your dearest hopes at that.

"I'll have to tell papa about this," he said; and then, realizing that his papa was not at home, and that his mamma was up stairs trying to convince his small brother that it would be impossible to get the moon into the nursery, although it looked much smaller even than the nursery window, Jimmieboy resolved that he would take the matter in hand himself.

"A boygler wouldn't hurt me, and maybe if I talk gruff and keep out of sight, he'll think I'm papa and run," he said.

Then he tried his gruff voice, and it really was tremendously gruff--about as gruff as the bark of a fox-terrier. After he had done this, he tip-toed softly down the stairs until he stood directly opposite the door of the room where the fire-works were.

"Move on, you boygler you!" he cried, just as he thought his father would have said it.

The answer was an explosion--not exactly of fire-works, but of mirth.

"He thinks somebody's trying to steal us," said a funny little voice, the like of which Jimmieboy had never heard before.

"How siss-siss-sissingular of him," said another voice that sounded like a fire-cracker missing fire.

"He thinks he can fool us by imitating the voice of his pop-pop-pop-popper," put in a third voice, with a laugh.

At which Jimmieboy opened the door and looked in, and then he saw whence the whispering had come, and to say that he was surprised at what he saw is a too mild way of putting it. He was so astonished that he lost all control over his joints, and the first thing he knew he was sitting on the floor. The spectacle had, in fact, knocked him over, as well it might, for there, walking up and down the floor, swarming over chairs and tables, playing pranks with each other, and acting in a generally strange fashion, were the fire-works themselves. It was interesting, and at the same time alarming, for one or two reckless sky-rockets were smoking, a lot of foolish little fire-crackers were playing with matches in one corner, and a number of the great big cannon torpedoes were balancing themselves on the arms of the gas-fixture, utterly heedless of the fact that if they were to fall to the floor they would explode and be done for forever.

"Hullo, Jimmieboy!" said one of the larger rockets, taking off his funny little cap at the astonished youngster. "I suppose you've come down to see us rehearse?"

"I thought somebody was stealing you, and I came down to frighten them away," Jimmieboy replied.

The Rocket laughed. "Nobody can steal us," it said. "If anybody came to steal us, we'd cry, and get so soaked with tears nobody could get us to go off, so what good would we be?"

"Not much, I guess," said Jimmieboy.

"That's the answer," returned the Rocket. "You seem to be good at riddles. Let me give you another. What's the difference between a man who steals a whole wig and a fire-cracker?"

"I am sure I don't know," said Jimmieboy, still too full of wonderment to think out an answer to a riddle like that.

"Why, one goes off with a whole head of hair," said the Rocket, "and the other goes off only with a bang."

"That's good," said Jimmieboy. "Make it up yourself?"

"No," said the Rocket. "I got that out of the magazine."

"What magazine?" asked Jimmieboy, innocently.

"The powder-magazine," roared the Rocket, and then the Pin Wheel and other fire-works danced about, and threw themselves on the floor with laughter--all except the Torpedoes, which jumped up and down on a soft plush chair, where they were safe.

When the laughter over the Rocket's wit had subsided, one of the Roman Candles called to the Giant Cracker, and asked him to sing a song for Jimmieboy.

"I can't sing to-night," said the Cracker. "I'm very busy making ready my report for to-morrow."

Here the Cracker winked at Jimmieboy, as much as to say, "How is that for a joke?" Whereat Jimmieboy winked back to show that he thought it wasn't bad; which so pleased the Cracker that he said he guessed, after all, he would sing his song if the little Crackers would stop playing until he got through. The little Crackers promised, and the Giant Cracker sang this song:

"THE GIANT CRACKER AND THE MANDARIN'S DAUGHTER.

"He was a Giant Cracker bold, His name was Wing-Hi-Ee. He wore a dress of red and gold-- Was handsome as could be. His master was a Mandarin, Who lived in old Shang-Hai, And had a daughter named Ah Din, With sweet blue almond eye.

"Now Wing he loved this Saffron Queen, And Ah Din she loved him; But Chinese law came in between Them with its measures grim. For you must know, in that far land, Where dwell the heathen wild, A Cracker may not win the hand Of any noble's child.

"This made their love a hopeless one-- Alas! that it should be That anywhere beneath the sun Exists such misery! So they resolved, since she could not Become his cherished bride, Together they'd seek out some spot And there they'd suicide.

"They hastened, weeping, from the town, Wing-Hi and fair Ah Din, And on the river-bank sat down Until the tide came in. Then Wing-Hi whispered, sitting there, With tear-drops in his eye, 'Good-by, Ah Din!' And, in despair, She answered him, 'Good-by.'

"And then she grasped a sulphur match; She lit it on her shoe, Whereat, with neatness and dispatch, Wing-Hi she touched it to. There came a flash, there came a shriek, A sound surpassing weird, And Wing-Hi brave and Ah Din meek In pieces disappeared."

"Isn't that lovely?" asked the Rocket, his voice husky with emotion.

"It's very fine," said Jimmieboy. "It's rather sad, though."

"Yes; but it might have been sadder, you know," said the Giant Cracker. "She might not have loved him at all; and if she hadn't loved him, he wouldn't have wasted a match committing suicide for her sake, and then there wouldn't have been any tragedy, and, of course, no song would have been written about it. Why, there is no end to the misery there might have been."

Here one of the Torpedoes fell off the gas-fixture to the floor, where he exploded with a loud noise. There was a rush from all sides to see whether the poor little fellow was done for forever.

"Send for the doctor," said the Pin Wheel. "I think he can be mended."

"No, don't," said the injured Torpedo. "I can fix myself up again. Send for a whisk broom and bring me a parlor match, and I'll be all right."

"What's the whisk broom for?" asked Jimmieboy, somewhat surprised at the remedies suggested.

"Why," said the Torpedo, "if you will sweep me together with the whisk broom and wrap me up carefully, I'll eat the head off the parlor match, and I'll be all right again. The match head will give me all the snap I need, and if you'll wrap me up in the proper way, I'll show you what noise is to-morrow. You'll think I'm some relation to that Miss Din in the Giant Cracker's song, unless I'm mistaken, when you hear me explode."

The Fire-crackers jeered a little at this, because there has always been more or less jealousy between the Torpedoes and the Fire-crackers, but the Rocket soon put a stop to their sneers.

"What's the use of jeering?" he said. "You don't know whether he'll make much noise or not. The chances are he'll make more noise than a great many of you Crackers, who are just as likely as not to turn out sissers in the long-run."

The Fire crackers were very much abashed by the Rocket's rebuke, and retired shamefacedly into their various packs, whereupon the Pin Wheel suggested that the Rocket recite his poem telling the singular story of Nate and the Rocket.

"Would you like to hear that story, Jimmieboy?" asked the Rocket.

"Very much," said Jimmieboy. "The name of it sounds interesting."

"Well, I'll try to tell it. It's pretty long, and your ears are short; but we can try it, as the boy observed to the man who said he didn't think the boy's mouth was large enough to hold four pieces of strawberry short-cake. So here goes. The real title of the poem is

"THE DREADFUL FATE OF NAUGHTY NATE.

"Way back in eighty-two or three-- I don't recall the date-- There lived somewhere--'twixt you and me, I really can't locate The place exact; say Sangaree-- A lad; we'll call him Nate.

"His father was a grocer, or A banker, or maybe He kept a thriving candy store, For all that's known to me. Perhaps he was the Governor Of Maine or Floridee.

"At any rate, he had a dad-- Or so the story's told; Most youngsters that I've known have had-- And Nate's had stacks of gold, And those who knew him used to add, He spent it free and bold.

"If Nate should ask his father for A dollar or a cent, His father'd always give him more Than for to get he went; And then, before the day was o'er, Nate always had it spent.

"Molasses taffy, circus, cake, Tarts, soda-water, pie, Hot butter-scotch, or rare beefsteak, Or silk hats, Nate could buy. His father'd never at him shake His head and ask him 'Why?'

"'For but one thing,' his father cried, 'You must not spend your store; Sky-rockets I cannot abide, So buy them never more. Let such, I pray, be never spied Inside of my front door.'

"But Nate, alas! did not obey His father's orders wise. He hied him forth without delay, Ignoring tarts and pies, And bought a rocket huge, size A, 'The Monarch of the Skies.'

"He clasped it tightly to his breast, And smiled a smile of glee; And as the sun sank in the west, He sat beneath a tree, And then the rocket he invest- I-g-a-t-e-d.

"Alas for Nate! The night was warm; June-bugs and great fire-flies Around about his head did swarm; The mercury did rise; And then a fine electric storm Played havoc in the skies.

"Now if, perchance, it was a fly, I'm not prepared to say; Or if 'twas lightning from the sky, That came along that way; Or if 'twas only brought on by The heat of that warm day,

"I am not certain, but 'tis clear There came a sudden boom, And high up in the atmosphere, Enlightening the gloom, The rocket flew, a fiery spear, And Nate, too, I presume.

"For never since that July day Has any man seen Nate. But far off in the Milky Way, Astronomers do state, A comet brilliant, so they say, Doth round about gyrate.

"It's head's so like small Natty's face, They think it's surely he, Aboard that rocket-stick in space, Still mounting constantly; And still must mount until no trace Of it at all we see."

"Isn't that the most fearfully awfully terribly horribly horribly terribly fearful bit of awfulness you ever heard?" queried the Rocket, when he had finished.

"It is indeed," said Jimmieboy. "It really makes me feel unhappy, and I wish you hadn't told it to me."

"I would not bother about it," said the Rocket; "because really the best thing about it is that it never happened."

"Suppose it did happen," said Jimmieboy, after thinking it over for a minute or two. "Would Nate ever get back home again?"

"Oh, he might," returned the Rocket. "But not before six or seven million years, and that would make him late for tea, you know. By-the-way," the Rocket added, "do you know the best kind of tea to have on Fourth of July?"

"No," said Jimmieboy. "What?"

"R-o-c-k-e-tea," said the Rocket.

The Pin Wheels laughed so heartily at this that one of them fell over on a box of Blue Lights and set them off, and the Rocket endeavoring to put them out was set going himself, and the first thing Jimmieboy knew, his friend gave a fearful siss, and disappeared up the chimney. The sparks from the Rocket falling on the Roman Candles started them along, and three or four balls from them landed on a flower piece which was soon putting forth the most beautiful fiery roses imaginable, one of which, as it gave its dying sputter, flew up and landed on the fuse of a great set piece that was supposed to have a motto on it. Jimmieboy was almost too frightened to move, so he just sat where he was, and stared at the set piece until he could read the motto, which was, strange to say, no motto at all, but simply these words in red, white, and blue fire, "Wake up, and go to bed right." Whereupon Jimmieboy rubbed his eyes, and opened them wider than ever to find his papa bending over him, and saying the very words he had seen on the set piece.

Probably the reason why his papa was saying this was that Jimmieboy had been found by him on his return home lying fast asleep, snuggled up in the corner of the library lounge.

As for the fire-works, in some way or other they all managed to get back into the box again in good condition, except the broken torpedo, which was found in the middle of the floor just where it had fallen. Which Jimmieboy thinks was very singular.

X.

JIMMIEBOY'S PHOTOGRAPH.

Jimmieboy had been taken to the photographer's and had posed several times for the man who made pictures of little boys. One picture showed how he looked leaning against a picket fence with a tiger skin rug under his feet. Another showed him in the act of putting his hands into his pockets, while a third was a miserable attempt to show how he looked when he couldn't stand still. The last pleased Jimmieboy very much. It made him laugh and Jimmieboy liked laughing better than anything, perhaps, excepting custard, which was his idea of real solid bliss. Why it made him laugh, I do not know, unless it was because in the picture he was very much blurred and looked something like a mixture of a cloud and a pin-wheel.

"I like that one," Jimmieboy said to his mother, when the proof came home. "Won't you let me have it?"

"Yes," said his mother. "You can have it. I don't think any one else wants it."

So the proof became Jimmieboy's property, and he put it away in his collection of treasures, which already contained many valuable things, such as the whistle of a rubber ball, a piece of elastic, and a worn-out tennis racket. These treasures the boy used to have out two or three times a day, and the last time he had them out something queer happened. The blurred little figure in the picture spoke to him and told him something he didn't forget in a hurry.

"You think I'm a funny-looking thing don't you?" said the blurred picture of himself.

"Yes, I do," said Jimmieboy, "that's why I laugh at you whenever I see you."

"Well, I laugh when I see you, too," retorted the picture. "You are just as funny to look at sometimes as I am."

"I'm not either," said Jimmieboy. "I don't look like a cloud or a pin-wheel, and you do."

"I'm a picture of you, just the same," returned the proof, "and if you had stood still when the man was taking you, I'd have been all right. It's awful mean the way little boys have of not standing still when they are having their pictures taken, and then laughing at the thing they're responsible for afterward."

"I didn't mean to be mean," said Jimmieboy.

"Perhaps not," retorted the picture, "but if it hadn't been for you I'd have been a lovely picture, and your mamma would have had a nice little silver frame put around me, and maybe I'd have been standing on your papa's desk with the inkstand and the mucilage instead of having to live all my life with a broken whistle and a tennis bat that nobody but you has any use for."

Here the picture sighed, and Jimmieboy felt very sorry for it.

"Boys don't know what a terrible lot of horrid things happen because they don't stand still sometimes," continued the picture. "I know of lots of cases where untold misery has come from movey boys."

"From what?" queried Jimmieboy.

"Movey boys," replied the picture. "By that I mean boys that don't stand still when they ought to. Why, I knew of a boy once who wouldn't stand still and he shook a whole town to pieces."

"Ho!" jeered Jimmieboy. "I don't believe it."

"Well, it's so, whether you believe it or not," said the picture. "The boy's name was Bob, and he lived somewhere, I don't remember where. His mother told him to stand still and he wouldn't; he just jumped up and down, and up and down all the time."

"That may be, but I don't see how he could shake a whole town to pieces," said Jimmieboy, "unless he was a very heavy boy."

"He didn't weigh a bit more than you do," answered the picture. "He was heavy enough when he jumped to shake his nursery though, and the nursery was heavy enough to shake the house, and the house was heavy enough to shake the lot, and the lot was heavy enough to shake the street, and the street shook the whole town, and when the town shook, everybody thought there was an earthquake, and they all moved away, and took the name of the town with them, which is why I don't know where it was."

Jimmieboy was silent. He never knew before that not standing still could result in such an awful happening.

"I know another boy, too, who lived in--well, I won't say where, but he lived there. He broke a fine big mirror in his father's parlor by not standing still when he was told to."

"Did he shake it down?" asked Jimmieboy.

"No, indeed, he didn't," returned the picture. "He just stood in front of it and got so movey that the mirror couldn't keep up with him, but it tried to do it so hard that it shook itself to pieces. But that wasn't anything like as bad as what happened to Jumping Sam. He was the worst I ever knew. He never would keep still, and it all happened and he never could unhappen it, so that it's still so to this very day."

"But you haven't told me what happened yet," said Jimmieboy, very much interested in Jumping Sam.

"Well, I will tell you," said the picture, gravely. "And this is it. The story is a poem, Jimmieboy, and it's called:

"THE HORRID FATE OF JUMPING SAM.

"Small Sammy was as fine a lad As ever you did see; But one bad habit Sammy had, A Jumper bold was he. And, oh! his fate was very sad, As it was told to me.

"He never, never, would stand still In school or on the street; He'd squirm if he were well or ill, If on his back or feet. He'd wriggle on the window-sill, He'd waggle in his seat.

"And so it happened one fine day, When all alone was he, He got to jumping in a way That was a sight to see. He leaped two feet at first, they say, And then he made it three.

"Then four, and five, the long day through, Until he could not stop. Each jump he jumped much longer grew, Until he gave a hop Up in the air a mile or two, A-twirling like a top.

"He turned about and tried to jump Back to his father's door, But landed by the village pump, Some twenty miles or more Beyond it, and an awful bump He'd got when it was o'er.

"And still his jumps increased in size, Until they got so great, He landed on the railway ties In some far distant state; And then he knew 'twould have been wise, His jumping to abate.

"But as the years passed slowly by, His jumping still went on, Until he leaped from Italy, As far as Washington. And he confessed, with heavy eye, It wasn't any fun.

"And when, in 1883, I met him up in Perth, He wept and said 'good-by' to me, And jumped around the earth. And I was saddened much to see That he knew naught of mirth.

"Last year in far Allahabad, Late in the month of June, I met again this jumping lad-- 'Twas in the afternoon-- As he with visage pale and sad Was jumping to the moon.

"So all his days, leap after leap, He takes from morn to night. He cannot eat, he cannot sleep, But flies just like a kite, And all because he would not keep From jumping when he might.

"And I believe the moral's true-- Though shown with little skill-- That whatsoever you may do, Be it of good or ill, Once in a while it may pay you To practice keeping still."

A long silence followed the completion of the blurred picture's poem. For some reason or other it had made Jimmieboy think, and while he was thinking, wonderful to say, he was keeping very quiet, so that it was quite evident that the fate of Jumping Sam had had some effect upon him. Finally, however, the spell was broken, and he began to wiggle just as he wiggled while his picture was being taken, and then he said:

"I don't know whether to believe that story or not. I can't see your face very plainly here. Come over into the light and tell me the poem all over again, and I can tell by looking in your eye whether it is true or not."

The picture made no reply, and Jimmieboy, grasping it firmly in his hand, went to the window and gazed steadily at it for a minute, but it was useless. The picture not only refused to speak, but, as the rays of the setting sun fell full upon it, faded slowly from sight.

Nevertheless, true story or not, Jimmieboy has practiced standing still very often since the affair happened, which is a good thing for little boys to do, so that perhaps the brief life and long poem of the rejected picture were not wasted after all.

XI.

JIMMIEBOY AND THE BLANK-BOOK.

Somebody had sighed deeply, and had said, "Oh dear!"

What bothered Jimmieboy was to find out who that somebody was. It couldn't have been mamma, because she had gone out that evening with papa to take dinner at Uncle Periwinkle's, and for the same reason, therefore, it could not have been papa that had sighed and said "Oh dear!" so plainly. Neither was it Moggie, as Jimmieboy called his nurse, companion, and friend, because Moggie, supposing him to be asleep, had gone up stairs to her own room to read. It might have been little Russ if it had only been a sigh that had come to Jimmieboy's ears, for little Russ was quite old enough to sigh; but as for adding "Oh dear!" that was quite out of the question, because all little Russ had ever been able to say was "Bzoo," and, as you may have observed for yourself, people who can only say "Bzoo" cannot say "Oh dear!"

It was so mysterious altogether that Jimmieboy sat up straight on his pillow, and began to wonder if it wouldn't be well for him to get frightened and cry. The question was decided in favor of a shriek of terror; but the shriek did not come, because just as Jimmieboy got his mouth open to utter it the strange somebody sighed again, and said:

"Aren't you sorry for me, Jimmieboy?"

"Who are you?" asked Jimmieboy, peering through the darkness, trying to see who it was that had addressed him.

"I'm a poor unhappy Blank-book," came the answer. "A Blank-book with no hope now of ever becoming great. Did you ever feel as if you wanted to become great, Jimmieboy?"

"Oh, yes, indeed," returned the boy. "I do yet. I'm going to be a fireman when I grow up, and drive an engine, and hold a hose, and put out great configurations, as papa calls 'em."

"Then you know," returned the Blank-book, "or rather you can imagine, my awful sorrow when I say that I have aspired to equally lofty honors, but find myself now condemned to do things I don't like, to devote my life not to great and noble deeds, but to miserable every-day affairs. You can easily see how I must feel if you will only try to imagine your own feelings if, after a life whose every thought and effort had been directed toward making you the proud driver of a fire-engine, you should find it necessary to settle down to the humdrum life of a lawyer, all your hopes destroyed, and the goal toward which you had ever striven placed far beyond your reach."

"You didn't want to be a fireman, did you?" asked Jimmieboy, softly.

"No," said the Blank-book, jumping off the table, and crossing over to Jimmieboy's crib, into which he climbed, much to the little fellow's delight. "No, I never wanted to be a fireman, or a policeman, or a car conductor, because I have always known that those were things I never could become. No matter how wise and great a Blank-book may be, there is a limit to his wisdom and his greatness. It sometimes makes us unhappy to realize this, but after all there is plenty in the world that a Blank-book can do, and do nobly, without envying others who have to do far nobler and greater things before they can be considered famous. Everything we have to do in this world is worth doing well, and everybody should be content to do the things that are given to his kind to accomplish. The poker should always try to poke as well as he can, and not envy the garden hose because the garden hose can sprinkle flowers, while he can't. The rake should be content to do the best possible rake's work, and not sigh because he cannot sing 'Annie Rooney' the way the hand-organ does."

"Then why do you sigh because of the work they have given you to do?"

"That's very simple," returned the Blank-book. "I can explain that in a minute. While I have no right to envy a glue-pot because it can hold glue and I can't, I have a right to feel hurt and envious when it falls to the lot of another Blank-book, no better than myself, to become the medium through which beautiful poems and lovely thoughts are given to the world, while I am compelled to do work of the meanest kind.

"It has always been my dream to become the companion of a poet, of a philosopher, or of a humorist--to be the Blank-book of his heart--to lie quiet in his pocket until he had thought a thought, and then to be pulled out of that pocket and to be made the receptacle of that thought.

"Oh, I have dreamed ambitious dreams, Jimmieboy--ambitious dreams that must now remain only dreams, and never be real. Once, as I lay with a thousand others just like me on the shelf of the little stationery shop where your mother bought me, I dreamed I was sold to a poet--a true poet. Everywhere he went, went I, and every beautiful line he thought of was promptly put down upon one of my leaves with a dainty gold pencil, contact with which was enough to thrill me through and through.

"Here is one of the things I dreamed he wrote upon my leaves:

"'What's the use of tears? What's the use of moping? What's the use of fears? Here's to hoping!

"'Life hath more of joy Than she hath of weeping. When grief comes, my boy, Pleasure's sleeping.

"'Only sleeping, child; Thou art not forsaken, Let thy smiles run wild-- She'll awaken!'

"Don't you think that's nice?" queried the Blank-book when he had finished reciting the poem.

"Very nice," said Jimmieboy. "And it's very true, too. Tears aren't any good. Why, they don't even wash your face."

"I know," returned the Blank-book. "Tears are just like rain clouds. A sunny smile can drive 'em away like autumn leaves before a whirl-wind."

"Or a clothes-line full of clothes before an east wind," suggested Jimmieboy.

"Yes; or like buckwheat cakes before a hungry school-boy," put in the Blank-book. "Then that same poet in my dream wrote a verse about his little boy I rather liked. It went this way:

"'Of rats and snails and puppy-dogs' tails Some man has said boys are made; But he who spoke to be truthful fails, If 'twas of my boy 'twas said.

"'For honey, and wine, and sweet sunshine, And fruits from over the swim, And everything else that's fair and fine, Are sure to be found in him.

"'His kisses are nice and sweet as spice, His smile is richer than cake-- Which, if it were known to rats and mice, The cheeses they would forsake.

"'His dear little voice is soft and choice, He giggles all day with glee, And it makes my heart and soul rejoice, To think he belongs to me.'"

"That's first rate," said Jimmieboy. "Only Mother Goose has something very much like it about little girls."

"That was just it," returned the Blank-book. "She had been a little girl herself, and she was too proud to live. If she had been a boy instead of a girl, it would have been the boy who was made of sugar and spice and all that's nice."

"Didn't your dream-poet ever write anything funny in you?" asked Jimmieboy. "I do love funny poems."

"Well, I don't know whether some of the things he wrote were funny or not," returned the Blank-book, scratching his cover with a pencil he carried in a little loop at his side. "But they were queer. There was one about a small boy, named Napples, who spent all his time eating apples, till by some odd mistake he contracted an ache, and now with J. Ginger he grapples."

"That's the kind," said Jimmieboy. "I think to some people who never ate a green apple, or tasted Jamaica ginger, or contracted an ache, it would be real funny. I don't laugh at it, because I know how solemn Tommy Napples must have felt. Did you ever have any more like that?"

"Oh my, yes," returned the Blank-book. "Barrels full. This was another one--only I don't believe what it says is true:

"A man living near Navesink, Eats nothing but thistles and zinc, With mustard and glue, And pollywog stew, Washed down with the best of blue ink.'"

"That's pretty funny," said Jimmieboy.

"Is it?" queried the Blank-book, with a sigh. "I'll have to take your word for it. I can't laugh, because I have nothing to say ha! ha! with, and even if I could say ha! ha! I don't suppose I'd know when to laugh, because I don't know a joke when I see one."

"Really?" asked Jimmieboy, who had never supposed any one could be born so blind that he could not at least see a joke.

"Really," sighed the Blank-book. "Why, a man came into the store where I was for sale once, and said he wanted a Blank-book, and the clerk asked him what for--meaning, of course, did he want an account-book, a diary, or a copy-book. The man answered, 'To wash windows with, of course,' and everybody laughed but me. I simply couldn't see the point. Can you?"

"Why, certainly," said Jimmieboy, a broad smile coming over his lips. "It was very funny. The point was that people don't wash windows with Blank-books."

"What's funny about that?" asked the Blank-book. "It would be a great deal funnier if people did wash windows with a Blank-book. He might have said 'to go coasting on,' or 'to sweeten my coffee with,' or 'to send out to the heathen,' and it would have been just as funny."

"I guess that's true," said Jimmieboy. "But it was funny just the same."

"No doubt," returned the Blank-book; "but it seems to me what's funny depends on the other fellow. You might get off a splendid joke, and if he hadn't his joke spectacles on he'd think it was nonsense."

"Oh no," said Jimmieboy. "If he hadn't his joke spectacles on he wouldn't think it was nonsense. Jokes are nonsense."

"But you said a moment ago the fun of the Blank-book joke was that you couldn't wash windows with one. That's a fact, so how could it be nonsense?"

"I never thought of it in that way," said Jimmieboy.

"Ah!" ejaculated the Blank-book. "Now that is really funny, because I don't see how you could think of it in any other way."

"I don't see anything funny about that," began Jimmieboy.

"Oh dear!" sighed the Blank-book. "We never shall agree, except that I am willing to believe that you know more about nonsense than I do. Perhaps you can explain this poem to me. I dreamt my poet wrote this on my twelfth page. It was called 'A Plane Tale:'

"'I used to be so surly, that All men avoided me; But now I am a diplomat, Of wondrous suavity.

"'I met a carpenter one night, Who wore a dotted vest; And when I asked if that was right, He told me to go West.

"'I seized his saw and brandished it, As fiercely as I could, And told him, with much show of wit, I thought he was no good.

"'At that he looked me in the face, And said my tone was gruff; My manner lacked a needed grace, In every way was rough.

"'He seized and laid me on a plank, He gave a little cough; And then, although my spirits sank, _He planed me wholly off_!

"'And ever since that painful night, When he so treated me, I've been as polished, smooth a wight, As any one can be.'"

"There isn't much sense in that," said Jimmieboy.

"Well, now, I think there is," said the Blank-book. "There's a moral to that. Two of 'em. One's mind your own business. If the carpenter wanted to wear a dotted vest it was nobody's affair. The other moral is, a little plane speaking goes a great way."

"Oh, what a joke!" cried Jimmieboy.

"I didn't make any joke," retorted the Blank-book, his Russia-leather cover getting red as a beet.

"Yes, you did, too," returned Jimmieboy. "Plane and plain--don't you see? P-l-a-n-e and p-l-a-i-n."

"Bah!" said the Blank-book. "Nonsense! That can't be a joke. That's a coincidence. Is that what you call a joke?"

"Certainly," replied Jimmieboy.

"Well, then, I'm not as badly off as I thought. I wanted to be a poet's book and couldn't, but it is better to be used for a wash-list as I am than to help funny men to remember stuff like that. I am very grateful to you, Jimmieboy, for the information. You have made me see that I might have fared worse than I have fared, and I thank you, and as I hear your mamma and papa coming up the stairs now, I'll run back to the desk. Good-night!"

And the Blank-book kissed Jimmieboy, and scampered over to the desk as fast as it could, and the next day Jimmieboy begged so hard for it that his mamma gave it to him for his very own.

"What shall you do with it now that you have it?" asked mamma.

"I'm going to save it till I grow up," returned Jimmieboy. "Maybe I'll be a poet, and I can use it to write poems in."

XII.

JIMMIEBOY AND THE COMET.

Jimmieboy was thinking very hard. He was also blinking quite as hard because he was undeniably sleepy. His father had been reading something to his mamma about a curious thing that lived up in the sky called a comet. Jimmieboy had never seen a comet, nor indeed before that had he even heard of one, so of course his ideas as to what it looked like were rather confused. His father's description of it was clear enough, perhaps, but nevertheless Jimmieboy found it difficult to conjure up in his mind any reasonable creature that could in any way resemble a comet. Finally, however, he made up his mind that it must look like a queer kind of a dog with nothing but a head and a tail--or perhaps it was a sort of fiery pollywog.

At any rate, while he thought and blinked, what should he see peeping in at him through the window but the comet itself. Jimmieboy knew it was the comet because the comet told him so afterward, and besides it wore a placard suspended about its neck which had printed on it in great gold letters: "I'm the Comet. Come out and take a ride through the sky with me."

"Me?" cried Jimmieboy, starting up as soon as he had read the invitation.

Immediately the word "Yes" appeared on the placard and Jimmieboy walked over to the window and stepping right through the glass as though it were just so much air, found himself seated upon the Comet's back, and mounting to the sky so fast that his hair stood out behind him like so many pieces of stiff wire.

"Are you comfortable?" asked the Comet, after a few minutes.

"Yes," said Jimmieboy, "only you kind of dazzle my eyes. You are so bright."

The Comet appeared to be very much pleased at this remark, for he smiled so broadly that Jimmieboy could see the two ends of his mouth appear on either side of the back of his neck.

"You're right about that," said the Comet. "I'm the brightest thing there ever was. I'm all the time getting off jokes and things."

"Are you really?" cried Jimmieboy, delighted. "I am so glad, for I love jokes and--and things. Get off a joke now, will you?"

"Certainly," replied the obliging Comet. "You don't know why the moon is called she, do you?"

"No," said Jimmieboy. "Why is it?"

"Because it isn't a sun, so it must be a daughter," said the Comet. "Isn't that funny?"

"I guess so," said Jimmieboy, trying to look as if he thought the joke a good one. "But don't you know anything funnier than that?"

"Yes," returned the Comet. "What do you think of this: What is the only thing you can crack without splitting it?"

"That sounds interesting," said Jimmieboy, "but I'm sure I never could guess."

"Why, it's a joke, of course," said the Comet. "You can crack a joke eight times a day and it's as whole as it ever was when night comes."

"That's so," said Jimmieboy. "That's funnier than the other, too. I see now why they call you a Comic."

"I'm not a Comic," said the Comet, with a laugh at Jimmieboy's mistake. "I'm a Comet. I end with a T like the days when you have dinner in the afternoon. They end with a tea, don't they?"

"That's the best, yet," roared Jimmieboy. "If you give me another like that I may laugh harder and fall off, so I guess you'd better hadn't."

"How would you like to hear some of my poetry?" asked the Comet. "I'm a great writer of poetry, I can tell you. I won a prize once for writing more poetry in an hour than any other Comet in school."

"I'm very fond of it," said Jimmieboy. "Specially when it don't make sense."

"That's the kind I like, too," agreed the Comet. "I never can understand the other kind. I've got a queer sort of a head. I can't understand sense, but nonsense is as clear to me as--well as turtle soup. Ever see any turtle soup?"

"No," said Jimmieboy, "but I've seen turtles."

"Well, turtle soup is a million times clearer than turtles, so maybe you can get some idea of what I mean."

"Yes," said Jimmieboy. "I think I do. Nonsense poetry is like a window to you. You can see through it in a minute."

"Exactly," said the Comet. "Only nonsense poetry hasn't any glass in it, so it isn't exactly like a window to me after all."

"Well, anyhow," put in Jimmieboy. "Let's have some of the poetry."

"Very good," said the Comet. "Here goes. It's about an animal named the Speeler, and it's called 'The Speeler's Lament.'

"Oh, many years ago, When Jack and Jill were young, There wandered to and fro, Along the glistening snow, A Speeler, much unstrung.

"I asked the Speeler why He looked so mortal sad? He gazed into my eye, And then he made reply, In language very bad,

"'I'm sad,' said he, 'because A Speeler true I be; And yet, despite my jaws, My wings, and beak, and claws, Despite my manners free,

"'Despite my feathers fine, My voice so soft and sweet, My truly fair outline, My very handsome spine, And massive pair of feet,

"'In all this world of space-- On foot, on fin, on wing-- From Nature's top to base, There never was a trace Of any such strange thing.

"'And it does seem to me-- Indeed it truly does-- 'Tis dreadful, sir, to be, As you can plainly see, A thing that never was!'"

"What's a Speeler?" said Jimmieboy.

"It isn't anything. There isn't any such thing as a Speeler and that's what made this particular Speeler feel so badly," said the Comet. "I know I'd feel that way myself. It must be dreadful to be something that isn't. I was sorry after I had written that poem and created the poor Speeler because it doesn't seem right to create a thing just for the sake of making it unhappy to please people who like poetry of that kind."

"I'm afraid it was a sensible poem," said Jimmieboy. "Because, really, Mr. Comet, I can't understand it."

"Well, let me try you on another then, and take away the taste of that one. How do you like this. It's called 'Wobble Doo, the Squaller.'

"The Wobble Doo was fond of pie, He also loved peach jam. But what most pleased his eagle eye, Was pickled cakes and ham.

"But when, perchance, he got no cake, Jam, ham, or pie at all, He'd sit upon a garden rake, And squall, and squall, and squall.

"And as these _never_ came his way, This hero of my rhyme, I really do regret to say, Was squalling all the time."

"Your poems are all sad, aren't they?" said Jimmieboy. "Couldn't you have let Wobble Doo have just a little bit of cake and jam?"

"No. It was impossible," replied the Comet, sadly, "I couldn't afford it. I did all I could for him in writing the poem. Seems to me that was enough. It brought him glory, and glory is harder to get than cakes and peach jam ever thought of being. Perhaps you'll like this better:

"Abadee sollaker hollaker moo, Carraway, sarraway mollaker doo-- Hobledy, gobbledy, sassafras Sam, Taramy, faramy, aramy jam."

"I don't understand it at all," said Jimmieboy. "What language is it in?"

"One I made up myself," said the Comet, gleefully. "And it's simply fine. I call it the Cometoo language. Nobody knows anything about it except myself, and I haven't mastered it yet--but my! It's the easiest language in the world to write poetry in. All you have to do is to go right ahead and make up words to suit yourself, and finding rhyme is no trouble at all when you do that."

"But what's the good of it?" asked Jimmieboy.

"Oh, it has plenty of advantages," said the Comet, shaking his head wisely. "In the first place if you have a language all your own, that nobody else knows, nobody else can write a poem in it. You have the whole field to yourself. Just think how great a man would be if he was the only one to understand English and write poetry in it. He'd get all the money that ever was paid for English poetry, which would be a fortune. It would come to at least $800, which is a good deal of money, considering."

"Considering what?" asked Jimmieboy.

"Considering what it would bring if wisely invested," said the Comet. "Did you ever think of what $800 was worth in peanuts, for instance."

Jimmieboy laughed at the idea of spending $800 in peanuts, and then he said: "No, I never thought anything about it. What is it worth in peanuts?"

"Well," said the Comet, scratching his head with his tail, "it's a very hard bit of arithmetic, but, I'll try to write it out for you. Peanuts, you know, cost ten cents a quart."

"Do they?" said Jimmieboy. "I never bought a whole quart at once. I've only paid five cents a pint."

"Well, five cents a pint is English for ten cents a quart," said the Comet, "and in $800 there are eight thousand ten centses, so that you could get eight thousand quarts of peanuts for $800. Now every quart of peanuts holds about fifty peanut shellfuls, so that eight thousand quarts of peanuts equal four hundred thousand peanuts shellfuls. Each peanut shell holds two small nuts so that in four hundred thousand of them there are eight hundred thousand nuts."

"Phe-e-ew!" whistled Jimmieboy. "What a feast."

"Yes," said the Comet, "but just you wait. Suppose you ate one of these nuts a minute, do you know how long it would take you, eating eight hours a day, to eat up the whole lot?"

"No," said Jimmieboy, beginning to feel a little awed at the wondrous possibilities of $800 in peanuts.

"Four years, six months, three weeks and six days, and you'd have to eat Sundays to get through it in that time," said the Comet. "In soda water it would be quite as awful and in peppermint sticks at two cents a foot it would bring you a stick forty thousand feet, or more than seven miles long."

"Isn't $800 wonderful," said Jimmieboy, overcome by the mere thought of so much peppermint candy.

"Yes--but really I am much more wonderful when you think of me. You haven't been on my back more than ten minutes and yet in that time I have taken you all around the world," said the Comet.

"All the way!" said Jimmieboy.

"Yes," said the Comet, stopping suddenly. "Here we are back at your window again."

"But I didn't see China, and I wanted to," said the boy.

"Can't help it," said the Comet. "You had your chance, but you preferred to talk about poetry and peanuts. It isn't my fault. Off with you, now."

And then the Comet bucked like a wild Western Broncho, and as Jimmieboy went over his head through the window and landed plump in his papa's lap, the queer creature with the fiery tail flew off into space.