UN SOU
They were somewhat disappointed at this, and scraped the other coins, but found them all copper.
“Pooh!” said Arthur; “what’s the odds? To an archaeologist isn’t a copper coin as precious as a gold one? Of course it is. Hallo, Phil! Haven’t you got that pot cleaned out yet? I’ve got an idea. I’ll put these sous in the pot, and then we can say that we’ve found a pot of money. We’ll be generous, too—we’ll give it all to the Museum.” Phil’s pot by this time was empty, and Arthur laughingly threw the sous into it. After this they began their search again, and enlarged the hole in hopes of finding more around the sides. And in this they were successful, for they found, near, a dozen more copper coins, which made a very respectable appearance in the pot, and in addition to these, about a dozen bits of iron—nails, spikes, and bolts.
“Hallo, boys! look here!” cried Bart, suddenly. He held in his hand an old, discolored bone. “Talking about relics,” said he, “here’s a relic of the original owner. The question is though, is it a human bone?”
“Pooh!” said Arthur; “it’s an ox bone, or a horse.”
“Not a bit of it,” said Bart. “I’m determined that it shall be Benedict Bellefontaine.”
“It’s a horse’s bone,” said Phil.
“No,” said Bart; “I’ll keep it carefully, and let the doctor have it. It will be the most precious article in the Museum.”
It was now growing too dark to work any longer. The sun had set, and they were satisfied with the result of their labors. So they gathered together their treasures, and set out for the Academy.
These treasures seemed to them to be by no means despicable.
They were,—
1 ploughshare,
1 colter,
4 bolts,
1 chain,
1 iron pot,
3 nails,
2 bits of iron,
2 spikes,
13 copper coins,
1 bone.
And any one who has ever been connected with a small museum, or has ever been acquainted with those who are connected with a valuable institution like that, will easily understand the value of articles like these, exhumed direct from the cellar of an old Acadian house.
The boys felt no doubt whatever as to the value of their treasure. In fact, they grew so excited over it that they began at last to think what they had found far better than what they hoped to find; and so it resulted that those who had gone out to find gold came back rejoicing in rusty iron.
On reaching the Academy they went at once to Dr. Porter’s house. They found the doctor at home, and were ushered up at once to his study.
The boys said nothing, but gravely, and in impressive silence, laid down their treasures on the doctor’s study table. It was covered with books and papers; but they were too oblivious of every thing, and too much absorbed in the contemplation of their own things, to think of that.
So Bruce entered first, and placed on the doctor’s table, right over some handsome volumes of Euripides, just received from London, the rusty, dirty old ploughshare.
“Hallo!” cried the doctor. “Why! what!—”
But before he could finish his sentence, Tom came up, and laid down a dozen old spikes and nails. Both of them turned and looked proudly at the doctor.
“Look here, boys,” cried the doctor, standing up; “what—”
He was interrupted by Phil, who came forward between him and the first boys, carrying an iron pot, which he triumphantly placed on a handsomely bound Hebrew Lexicon.
“What in the world—” began the doctor again, but was again interrupted by Arthur, who solemnly placed the colter on a new edition of Longinus, and then put the chain on some late English Quarterly Reviews. Just as the doctor was about to burst forth, Bart came immediately before him, and, with a face radiant with delight, laid down, right on the doctors blotting pad, that horrible, discolored, and disintegrated old bone.
For a moment it seemed that the doctor would burst forth in a fury. To him this behavior was the sublimity of unparalleled impudence; the act was so absolutely unequalled in its quiet audacity, that it actually made him dumb with amazement. The ploughshare, the colter, the iron pot, the rusty spikes and bolts, the old chain,—all these were so many stages up which his astonishment went to a climax which was fully attained when Bart put down the abominable old bone.
This was too much.
Then the doctor burst forth.
But not in fierce and furious indignation, and vehement and violent denunciation. It struck him in another way. It was his sense of the ridiculous that was affected. He forgot the ruin done to his precious editions of the classics, and his mind could only grasp the innocent, smiling faces of these five young rascals who had come into the awful seclusion of his own study to pile up his inviolable study table with old iron and old bones.
And so it was that the doctor burst forth into an uncontrollable fit of laughter,—not a common laugh, but one which was sent forth from the very depths of his nature,—all absorbing, overwhelming. Peal after peal, irrepressible. It was contagious, too. The boys caught it. They tried to restrain themselves at first. They tittered. They began to see themselves the absurdity of their act. The thought overcame them, and they all burst forth, too. The whole company thus went off into fearful explosions—cataclysms, in fact, of laughter.
It roused the house.
The family came running up to see the cause.
The doctor could not utter a word. Tears were running from his eyes; he could only point in silence to the old iron and old bone. The contagion seized upon the family also, and they all went off into the general laughter.
At length the boys took the things off the table, and put them on the floor. Gradually the doctor recovered his self-control, and asked the boys what it all meant. They told him all about it. He listened to them with a serious face, which, however, was occasionally disturbed by a tendency to another outburst, as again and again the thought of the past scene forced itself back. Finally, he managed to get the whole story, and by that time his laughter passed, and was succeeded by a new sensation.
It was one of intense delight at such discoveries. Now they appeared before him, not as old iron and old bone, but in their true character. He was an enthusiastic antiquarian, and all connected with the Acadian French excited his passionate interest. He looked affectionately at the ploughshare. He handled the colter tenderly. He examined one by one, with minute inspection, the spikes and the bolt. He scanned narrowly and admiringly the iron pot. He passed every link of the rusty chain through his fingers. He lingered long and lovingly over the coins, closely examining every one of them. He looked at the bone with an intense curiosity, mingled with deep sympathy for the unfortunate race of which it was the reminder.
He threw himself into his admiration over these with the same abandonment of feeling that had characterized his laughing fit. It was a proud and a delightful moment for the boys when they found that their discoveries were so highly prized. The doctor declared that there was nothing in the Museum to be compared with them, and finally sent for Messrs. Simmons and Long. These gentlemen soon appeared, and exhibited an interest in these Acadian relics which was fully equal to that of the doctor.
But the wonder was, to all of them, how in the world the boys had happened to think of digging in that particular place. They questioned them closely, though good humoredly, about this; and Bart, after vain efforts at eluding the questions, finally told the whole story.
Bart told that story in such a whimsical way, and with such an eye to effective representation, that in five minutes he had all his audience in another roar of laughter, worse than the first. He mimicked Captain Corbet with his mineral rod. He told about the lights and the magic ceremonies. He took off Solomon capitally, and finally spoke of the donkey’s bray, and its result, concealing nothing of their own terror. Bart went on, interrupted all the time by the laughter of his hearers, and at last succeeded in bringing his story down to the moment in which he was speaking.