"The idea of my getting tired of you and Joe, Lucy! I would be a lonely old man if it were not for you children. You help to keep me young. I can't think what I should do, either, if I had no one to listen to the stories that keep running through my head. Just now it is fairly bursting with the brave deeds of John Smith."
"Dear me! Don't let it burst, Uncle Sam. Do begin the story this very minute," cried Lucy, trying to look frightened.
A moment afterward the little sitting-room was so still that anyone could have heard the big clock ticking in the corner. Then Uncle Sam began to tell of the strange life of
CAPTAIN JOHN SMITH
Once upon a time there was a little boy who lived on a farm in England.
When he was born his father and mother said, "We will call our son John."
As soon as he was old enough he was set to work at a trade. His parents were poor and they thought, "It is a good thing to have a trade, for then a man can always get his own living."
The young John Smith could not agree with them. He did not like his work, so he did what other boys sometimes do. He ran away. Then his troubles began, for he had a hard life. He tried all sorts of things.
He became a soldier and later he went to sea and was out in such a terrible storm that his ship was wrecked. Again he was out in a ship when another storm came up.