camp-meeting a few miles away, and did not expect to return till late at
night. Twelve-year-old Billy had been left at home to look after things,
and Dick had insisted upon staying to keep him company. The two were of
the same age, but Billy was considerably the larger. Billy had on his
every-day clothes, and was bare-footed, while Dick looked rather
uncomfortable in his Sunday suit and shoes and stockings.
"Guess I'll take these off," he said, seating himself on the doorstep
and beginning to untie his shoes. "There, that feels better," he added,
as he put the superfluous articles in at the door and looked down at his
bare feet. "What are we going to do?"
"I don't care. Anything you say."
"Then let's go swimming," suggested Dick. "Too hot to do anything else."
"Ma told me to stay pretty close about home. Somebody went into Mr.
Lawson's house last week, when there wasn't anybody there, and took a
whole lot of things. Guess she's afraid the same fellow will get into
ours, whoever it was."
"Can't you lock the house?"
"Not from the outside. The front door will fasten on the inside, and so
will the windows. But the kitchen door won't fasten at all. The lock is
off."
After going through the house to see what could be done, Billy said:
"I'll tell you what we'll do. We'll fasten everything but the kitchen
door, and then bring old Ring down and tie him close to that. He won't
let anybody get in."
Dick endorsed this plan, and they proceeded to carry it out. A stake was
driven into the ground, and the dog's chain was fastened to it. Ring was
part bull-dog, and rather too fond of using his teeth on strangers to be
permitted to run at large.
"You'll keep 'em away, won't you, Ring?" said Billy, patting the dog's
head. Then he brought a pan of water and placed it in Ring's reach, and
they were ready to start.
Passing out through the gate, which they closed, but carelessly
neglected to fasten, they crossed the prairie ridge that lay north of
the house, and walked on slowly toward the swimming-place. The creek was
more than a mile away. After reaching it, they amused themselves for an
hour or two, then put on their clothes and started back.
Before coming in sight of the house they heard Ring barking furiously.
Both started on a run to see what was the matter.
As soon as they came to where they could look over the ridge, Billy
burst out laughing.
"It's Kizner's pet sheep. He's got into the yard, and Ring's barking at
'im. Just watch the old ram, will you, making out like he's going to
butt Ring! He knows Ring's tied or he wouldn't be so bold. Just see Ring
rear and charge! Wouldn't he like to get to 'im once?"
"Is it old Aleck?" asked Dick. "If it is, he's not afraid of any dog.
Tommy Hendricks says he gets after their dog sometimes, and runs 'im
back into the yard. He butts like everything, that old sheep does.
Tommy's half scared to death of 'im."
"Huh!" exclaimed Billy, contemptuously. "Tommy may be, but I'm not. If
he fools with me I'll give 'im rocks, and turn old Ring loose on 'im to
boot. I'd just like to see 'im run _him_!"
"Better go slow," cautioned Dick. "You don't know that old ram. The
Kizner boys taught 'im to butt when he was a little bit of a thing, and
he's been getting worse and worse ever since. Why, my pa was going along
over on the branch last spring, and found Aleck sticking in a mud-hole.
So he up and helped 'im out, and was going ahead, when, zip! something
took 'im behind. It was Aleck butting 'im. That's the kind of a sheep
old Aleck is. And the old fellow was so poor then he could hardly walk.
He's big and fat now, I guess."
Billy laughed heartily. "What did your pa do?" he asked.
"Why, he caught 'im and pitched 'im back into the mud-hole; but I guess
he got out somehow."
"Well, I'm not afraid of 'im," declared Billy, and he began to fill his
pockets with stones of a size suitable for throwing.
Taking courage from Billy, Dick did the same. Then they hurried in at
the gate, and ran round to the back of the house, where the sheep and
the dog were tantalizing each other.
Aleck was a vicious-looking old ram, large and strong, with curled
horns, and a head made on purpose for butting. Perhaps he had received
his name because of his fighting powers. At any rate, it suited him very
well.
Both Ring and the sheep were out of temper. Ring was growling and
barking and tugging at his chain, doing his best to get loose. Aleck
charged toward him occasionally, and did not seem to be in the least
afraid.
"Get out of here!" shouted Billy, as he rushed round the house and threw
a stone at the ram, missing him.
Dick threw one also, with better aim, for it struck the ram on the side.
Aleck promptly turned his attention to the new-comers. He was in just
the right mood to deal with them.
What took place during the next few minutes the two boys had only a
confused recollection of afterwards. Each was conscious of being knocked
sprawling, and of trying to rise, and being knocked down again. Every
time one of them started to get on his feet he was sent rolling over the
hard ground. How the ram managed to move fast enough to keep both of
them down they were too much excited to observe; but he did it easily,
and would probably have kept a third boy down at the same time if there
had been three.
At last, after being knocked and rolled some distance, they were near
the stake-and-ridered fence which enclosed the large yard. Dick made a
rush on his hands and knees, and succeeded in climbing the fence far
enough to tumble through between the fence and the rider. Once on the
other side, he was safe enough.
Billy was not so fortunate. He saw a large opening between the rails
near the ground, and tried to crawl through it, but it proved to be too
small for a boy of his size, and he stuck fast. He called loudly for
help, and Dick promptly seized him by the arm and tried to pull him out
of the crack.
[Illustration: BILLY COMES THROUGH THE FENCE, ASSISTED BY DICK AND THE
RAM.]
Whether their efforts alone would have been successful is uncertain; but
the sheep was rendering material assistance on the other side. By the
united effect of Dick's pulling and Aleck's vigorous pushes, Billy was
at last rescued from his exciting position.
With the exception of a few bruises, neither of the boys was hurt, but
the appearance of both indicated the rough treatment they had received.
Dick's Sunday clothes looked even worse than Billy's every-day ones.
Their hats had been left on the other side of the fence.
They looked at each other ruefully for a few moments; then both began to
laugh.
"My! didn't he knock us while he was about it?" said Billy. "It just
made my head swim, the way he kept us tumbling and rolling."
"Mine too. And he did it so quick. He didn't give a fellow time to say
scat before he was right on 'im."
The boys walked round the yard fence, throwing stones at the ram and
trying to drive him out. Aleck, however, showed no inclination to go. He
stalked back and forth across the yard, perhaps longing for more boys to
conquer. But the two who had just escaped him had no intention of
getting in his reach again.
What to do they did not know. The sheep was between them and the only
unlocked entrance to the house.
"If old Ring was just loose once, he'd soon fix 'im," declared Billy,
who believed that Ring could whip anything but an elephant.
"Couldn't you slip around the house and get to Ring before Aleck saw
you?"
"Don't believe I want to try it," answered Billy, as he rubbed one
bruised knee. He had a great deal of respect for Aleck by this time.
"You can if you want to."
Dick didn't want to. "Well, what _are_ we going to do?" he asked,
feeling that Billy, being at home, should find some way out of the
difficulty.
"I don't know," replied Billy, scratching his head, "unless we just sit
down and wait till the old sheep gets ready to leave."
Dick's face fell. He was thinking of the pie and fried chicken which
Billy's mother had spoken of as the wagon drove off. "Must be nearly two
o'clock," he remarked, glancing up at the sun.
"Yes, I guess it is. I'm feeling mighty hungry. How are you?"
"I'm half starved," answered Dick, emphatically, very glad of an
opportunity to mention the matter, which, being company, he had not felt
at liberty to speak of before. "I do wish we could get in somehow or
other. If we only just hadn't left the gate open!"
They walked round to get in the shade of the smoke-house, for the sun
shone hot on their bare heads. Aleck kept watching them, as if he
expected they would come into the yard again.
For an hour or more they stood by the smoke-house, discussing various
plans of getting the dog loose. All their hopes centred in Ring. It was
easy to suggest ways of reaching him, but they all required
courage--more courage than either of the boys possessed so soon after
their disastrous encounter with Aleck.
Finally Billy suggested a plan that was wholly original. The
smoke-house, which was of logs, stood at the back end of the yard, the
rear of it forming a part of the yard fence. The ground sloped
considerably from the smoke-house to the kitchen door.
"We can climb in at the gable end of the smoke-house," Billy explained,
"and take one of the empty barrels there and put it out at the door; and
one of us can get in it and roll right down to the kitchen. Then there
won't be anything to do but just turn Ring loose and watch the wool
fly."
Dick was enthusiastic over this plan as soon as he heard it. He was sure
that it would succeed.
Climbing through an opening in the gable, they were soon in the
smoke-house. There were three or four empty flour-barrels against the
wall, each having an end out. One of these they moved to the door, and
were on the point of opening the door to put it outside.
"How are you going to get in, Billy--head first or feet first?"
"I expect, maybe, you'd better roll, Dick. You're smaller than I am, and
you can get in the barrel further."
Dick's enthusiasm died out very suddenly at this suggestion, and he
looked discouraged. He had taken it for granted that Billy would be the
one to get into the barrel.
"Oh, you can crawl in easy, Billy! There's just lots of room in there
for you."
"But I can start the barrel to rolling better than you can," insisted
Billy.
Perhaps Dick would have consented to go, but just then the sheep,
hearing voices in the smoke-house, came nearer to investigate, and
Dick's courage failed.
There was another long discussion between the two boys, each urging the
other to get into the barrel. Finally Billy took out his "Barlow"
pocket-knife. It had but one blade, and had cost ten cents.
"I'll give you that if you'll roll," he proposed.
Dick had no knife, and looked longingly at the offered reward. Then he
looked out through a crack at Aleck, and shook his head.
Billy put his hand in his other pocket and took out some marbles. "Then
I'll give you them," he said, spreading them out temptingly on his hand.
"Will you give me them and the knife too?"
"Not much, I won't," Billy answered, emphatically. "I wouldn't give you
both if you rolled all the way to Granbury." Granbury was the nearest
town.
Again they discussed the matter for several minutes. Aleck was nibbling
at some tufts of grass. The boys were growing hungrier, and now and then
glanced up longingly at some middlings of bacon hanging over their
heads.
"I don't care," said Billy at length, being rendered desperate by
hunger. "You can have the marbles and knife too. Let's open the door
enough to put the barrel out."
Dick did not seem to be at all elated over having his offer accepted. "I
don't know about it," he said, hesitatingly. "Don't believe I want to."
"But you said you would," urged Billy. "If you don't, that'll be backing
out."
"Aleck might butt the barrel with me in it," objected Dick.
"Who ever heard of a sheep butting a barrel? And what if he does? He
can't hurt you and you inside of it."
"I'll tell you what I'll do. If you'll give me the knife and marbles,
and that long lead-pencil of yours to boot, then I'll get in the barrel
and roll."
"No, sirree!" declared Billy, indignant at Dick's cupidity. "You don't
get any lead-pencil from me. I'll stay here a year first. Why, I
wouldn't give you that pencil and all the other things besides if you
rolled all the way to Missouri." Billy's parents had removed from
Missouri to Texas when he was small, and Missouri was farther than any
other place he knew of.
They remained silent a short while, hunger all the time gnawing at their
vitals. It seemed several days since they had eaten anything. At last
Billy could stand it no longer. "I don't care. Go ahead, and I'll throw
the pencil in. Now don't back out this time, or I won't have anything to
do with you any more."
Dick was so pressed by hunger that he had been on the point of accepting
the knife and marbles, so he was glad to take advantage of the more
liberal offer.
The door of the smoke-house was opened cautiously and the barrel put
out, the open end near the door. Then Dick hastily crawled into it, head
first. Billy leaned out of the door and turned the barrel so that it
would roll toward Ring. Aleck had learned that something was going on,
and was coming to find out if he could take any part in it.
"Here you go!" shouted Billy, giving the barrel a vigorous push, and
then shutting the door to keep Aleck out.
[Illustration: DICK'S TRAVELS ASSISTED BY ALECK.]
The sheep, however, was giving his attention to the barrel. He evidently
suspected a trick, and he also saw Dick's feet, which persisted in
sticking out at the open end, for the barrel was a small one. He rushed
toward it, striking it with his head so as to cause it to move faster,
but in a different direction. When at last it came to a standstill, it
was against the fence at one side of the yard, at about the point where
the boys had escaped from the sheep.
Dick was pretty badly scared, knowing that something had happened. But
when he felt the barrel stop, he started to crawl out backward.
"Stay in! stay in!" shouted Billy, frantically. "Aleck's right there!
You're not close to Ring at all!"
"Get 'im away, Billy!" entreated Dick, from the depths of the barrel.
"Get him away somehow!"
"I can't!" answered Billy, helplessly.
"Get out and let him run after you!"
Billy opened the smoke-house door and ventured a few feet from it. Aleck
did not see him, and he advanced a few feet farther. Then an idea
occurred to him, and he did what he might have done sooner if he had not
been afraid--made a dash toward Ring. The dog's collar was quickly
unbuckled.
"Sick 'im, Ring!" shouted Billy; but Ring needed no encouragement. His
only wish for the last two or three hours had been to get to the sheep.
A few moments later, Aleck, after a fierce but brief struggle, was lying
on the ground bleating for mercy, while the dog held him by the throat.
But for the boys, Ring would soon have finished him. They forced the dog
to release his hold, not because they felt any kindness for Aleck, but
because they were afraid their fathers would have to pay for him if he
should be killed. As soon as the ram was released he sprang up, rushed
round the house, out at the gate, and down the road as fast as his legs
could carry him, and was never seen there again.
"Don't you think you ought to give back the knife and marbles and
pencil?" asked Billy, after they had watched Aleck till he disappeared,
"You didn't turn Ring loose like you were to."
"No, I won't," declared Dick. "I did my part. I rolled. I couldn't help
where the barrel went to."
"Oh, all right," said Billy, in indifferent tones; but he looked
disappointed.
"I'll tell you what I'll do, Billy," said Dick, relenting a little as he
followed Billy into the kitchen. "I'll keep the knife, and give you back
the marbles and pencil. Isn't that fair!"
"Why, yes, that's fair enough, Dick," answered Billy, looking pleased.
"And let's give Ring some fried chicken and a little piece of pie for
his dinner. He helped us. If it hadn't been for him, no telling how long
that old sheep would have kept us out."
"All right!" was the enthusiastic response; and they began to make hasty
preparations for the long-delayed meal.
"STRAW-FIDDLERS."
On a certain cold morning in the October of 1824 a young man, scarcely
eighteen years old, but with a thin face full of premature intelligence
and a poetic sort of beauty, was hurrying through the street of Sklow,
in Poland, his cloak wrapped closely about his slender figure, his head
thrown back, the felt hat not concealing his eager anxious dark eyes,
which, roving here and there, were in reality absent in their expression
as young Gusikow reflected on a verdict just passed on him by a
prominent physician.
For some weeks he had been suffering from pains in his chest, increased
whenever he played his beloved flute, and that day J----, the doctor,
had declared that the musician must at once give up his work.
Gusikow, boy that he was, had a young wife awaiting his return in a
little house, which he entered with a sad enough expression, for what
would they have to depend upon if he was forced to abandon his
performances in the theatre, his lessons, his concert tours?
I fancy Michael and Marie Gusikow, poor children, were miserable enough
that morning. But genius, especially when it is musical, will not be
subdued, and in his wretchedness the lad searched the garret for an old
"strohfiedel" he had cast aside long ago as an instrument too
insignificant to be of any value. I cannot tell you precisely the origin
of the strohfiedel, which was made of strips of fir on a straw
frame-work, but it belongs to a most interesting "family" of
instruments, the present generation being the wooden and glass
xylophones, which we hear nowadays in every orchestra, while one of its
prominent traditions is the unexpected producing of musical sounds on
glasses partially filled with water, and which has suggested to
innumerable boys and girls, I am sure, experiments, from the trial on a
finger-bowl to a whole row of glasses on a smooth piece of board. In the
quaint old town of Nuremberg some instruments are preserved, known now
as harmonicas, which were played with the moistened finger; but I think
the instrument best known is that which the composer Gluck is said to
have invented, and which, by the name of the "musical glasses," was all
the rage in England in 1746. Gluck arranged twenty-six glasses
irregularly filled with clear spring water, and upon these he played a
variety of music with his fingers slightly moistened. In the _Vicar of
Wakefield_ the fashionable London ladies are described as able to "talk
of nothing but high life ... pictures, taste, Shakespeare, and the
_musical glasses_," while Horace Walpole, writing the same year, 1746,
to his friend Mann, refers to Gluck's performance, but says he thinks he
has heard of something of the same kind before. But it was to our own
Benjamin Franklin that the improved or perfected harmonica is due. He
was in London eleven years after Gluck's visit, and found a Mr.
Puckeridge performing on these musical glasses, very well, it is true,
but Franklin at once said that something better could be done.
Accordingly he put his scientific wits to work, and the result was an
instrument he called the armonica, to which an "h" was added, as being
more appropriate, and on this many celebrated musicians performed. It
consisted of basins of glass strung on an iron spindle, the lower edge
dipped into a trough of water. As an improvement on Gluck's method,
Franklin regulated the pitch of the tone by the size of the glasses, not
the amount of water in or under them. Mozart and many other well-known
composers did not disdain to write for the harmonica, and in 1788 a
"Method" for students was compiled. The very simplicity, however, of the
instrument made it easy of imitation and improvement. Wood and glass
with straw were combined under various names. In the beginning of this
century Ernst Chladni, who is called the father of modern acoustics,
devised an instrument of glass cylinders, wood, etc., which he called
the euphon, from which he evolved another, remarkable chiefly for its
power of increased and diminished sound, which he named a
clavi-cylinder. Dr. Chladni travelled about Europe with this instrument,
giving lectures on acoustics, which started much of the research we
benefit by to-day; but unfortunately for certain important work he had
on hand, Dr. Chladni died suddenly in 1827.
To return to Gusikow and his little wife, we can fancy the young people
on that chill October day accepting the dismal fact that the young
artist must lay aside his flute, yet realizing that only by means of
music could he earn a living. He took the strohfiedel to pieces, worked
over it, practised on it, and at last devised certain valuable
improvements; indeed, so far expanding and increasing its power and
musical importance that he was talked of by some almost as though he had
invented it, and presently he was known as a straw-fiddler of wonderful
ability, while his playing revived interest in all the old dulcimers and
psalteries, which the straw-fiddle closely resembles.
Gusikow continued to work over his strohfiedel, to improve it, and from
his suggestions we have a variety of the wooden, glass, and straw
instruments heard on all sides to-day. To what perfection he might have
brought his crude materials I can scarcely say, for he was busy with new
designs when, in 1837, he fell ill with his old foe, pulmonary trouble,
and died at Aix-la-Chapelle, in October of that year, in the
thirty-first year of his age.
If boys--and I know more than one of them--have contrived to make a
violin out of an old cigar-box and some rough materials, surely they
might do something with the ideas suggested by strohfiedels, and their
family connections in wood, glass, and chamois-leather hammers.
[Illustration: From Chum to Chum.]
BY GASTON V. DRAKE.
I.
FROM BOB TO JACK.
NEW YORK, _June_ 4, 1895.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
DEAR JACK,--I don't think they's going to be much chance for us to see
each other this summer, for where do you suppose we're going to go to?
You'd never guess. _Hoboken_! It's a queer place for a summer resort,
and Pop says there ain't much to do there, only, he says, getting
there's going to be fun. He says about the only thing people do in
Hoboken is to leave it in the morning and go back to it that night,
which I can't say strikes me as quite so much fun as being off there in
the White Mountains, with you getting scared at 'maginary bears, playing
wild Indian, fishing, rowing, playing tricks on bell-boys, and all that.
It may be just as Pop says, that living in Hoboken and going to business
in New York is a great thing for a man, because it makes going to
business a pleasure, but for a boy I don't see what good it is. Even if
it's true that Hoboken people don't need yachts, because they've always
got the ferry-boats handy for sailing, I can't get excited over the idea
of going there. There ain't any fishing, and as for hunting, Pop says
there's nothing wild there except Trolly Cars, and I never could see
what fun there was in hunting trolly cars. They arrest you for even
throwing stones at 'em in Brooklyn--I know that because I read it in a
newspaper. There was a boy who lived in a crowded part of Brooklyn where
there never was any birds and precious few dogs, and as he was the kind
of boy that had to throw stones at something, he flung a few at the
trolly cars, and a policeman caught him and took him to court, and the
judge made his father pay ten dollars to get him set free again, and, of
course, when he got him free again and took him home, you and I know
what the boy got, which I don't think isn't fun. I haven't got any use
for throwing stones at birds or dogs or trolly cars, but, as far as I
can find out, Hoboken's very much like Brooklyn in not having anything
else to hunt, even in fun. It hasn't got any woods for Indians to hide
in, and not a cave anywhere around.
[Illustration]