"The Adventures of Tom Sawyer," Ch's 13-21

Joe was for being a hermit, and living on crusts in a remote cave, and dying, some time, of cold and want and grief; but after listening to Tom, he conceded that there were some conspicuous advantages about a life of crime, and so he consented to be a pirate.

Tom listened a moment, but no sound disturbed the quiet.

The Black Avenger stood still with folded arms, "looking his last" upon the scene of his former joys and his later sufferings, and wishing "she" could see him now, abroad on the wild sea, facing peril and death with dauntless heart, going to his doom with a grim smile on his lips.

But they discovered the danger in time, and made shift to avert it.

You see a pirate don't have to do anything, Joe, when he's ashore, but a hermit he has to be praying considerable, and then he don't have any fun, anyway, all by himself that way."

Then at once they reached and hovered upon the imminent verge of sleep -- but an intruder came, now, that would not "down."

Not a leaf stirred; not a sound obtruded upon great Nature's meditation.

They tramped gayly along, over decaying logs, through tangled underbrush, among solemn monarchs of the forest, hung from their crowns to the ground with a drooping regalia of grape-vines.

They were jubilant with vanity over their new grandeur and the illustrious trouble they were making.

And he also put into the hat certain schoolboy treasures of almost inestimable value -- among them a lump of chalk, an India-rubber ball, three fishhooks, and one of that kind of marbles known as a "sure 'nough crystal."

Then with a mutual impulse the two bereaved women flung themselves into each other's arms and had a good, consoling cry, and then parted.

A sumptuous breakfast of bacon and fish was shortly provided, and as the boys set to work upon it, Tom recounted (and adorned) his adventures.

He was so homesick that he could hardly endure the misery of it.

Both boys were looking very pale and miserable, now.

Then a faint moan came sighing through the branches of the forest and the boys felt a fleeting breath upon their cheeks, and shuddered with the fancy that the Spirit of the Night had gone by.

The tempest rose higher and higher, and presently the sail tore loose from its fastenings and went winging away on the blast.

The storm culminated in one matchless effort that seemed likely to tear the island to pieces, burn it up, drown it to the tree-tops, blow it away, and deafen every creature in it, all at one and the same moment.

However, there was no other way; so with such show of cheerfulness as they could muster they called for the pipe and took their whiff as it passed, in due form.

As the service proceeded, the clergyman drew such pictures of the graces, the winning ways, and the rare promise of the lost lads that every soul there, thinking he recognized these pictures, felt a pang in remembering that he had persistently blinded




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himself to them always before, and had as persistently seen only faults and flaws in the poor boys.

And the loving attentions Aunt Polly lavished upon him were the one thing capable of making him more uncomfortable than he was before.

Tom got more cuffs and kisses that day -- according to Aunt Polly's varying moods -- than he had earned before in a year; and he hardly knew which expressed the most gratefulness to God and affection for himself.

He did not go skipping and prancing, but moved with a dignified swagger as became a pirate who felt that the public eye was on him.

Amy's happy prattle became intolerable.

And he went through the motions of thrashing an imaginary boy -- pummelling the air, and kicking and gouging.

Becky roused up from her lethargy of distress and showed good interest in the proceedings.

There was silence while one might count ten -- the master was gathering his wrath.

The school-master, always severe, grew severer and more exacting than ever, for he wanted the school to make a good showing on "Examination" day.

No matter what the subject might be, a brain-racking effort was made to squirm it into some aspect or other that the moral and religious mind could contemplate with edification.

Dark and tempestuous was night.

Even the boisterous winds unanimously came forth from their mystic homes, and blustered about as if to enhance by their aid the wildness of the scene.