Johnny left me at his front gate, and said he had made up his mind he wouldn't be a pirate, and that it would be a great deal more fun to be a plumber, and melt lead. I went home, and as the house was locked up, I had to ring the front-door bell. Father came to the door himself, and when he saw me, he said, "Jimmy, what in the world does this mean?" So I told him that Johnny and me had started for the Spanish Main to be pirates, but Johnny had changed his mind up in Deacon Sammis's woods, and that I thought I'd change mine too.
Father had me put to bed, and hot bottles and things put in the bed with me, and before I went to sleep, he came and said: "Good-night, Jimmy. We'll try and have more fun at home, so that there won't be any necessity of your being a pirate." And I said, "Dear father, I'd a good deal rather stay with you, and I'll never be a pirate without your permission."
This is why I say that Johnny McGinnis will never make a good pirate. He's too much afraid of getting wet.
"PETS OF THE FAMILY."—From a Painting by Edwin Douglas.
[THE KING'S PET LION.]
BY DAVID KER.
A long time ago there lived a young King in the east of Germany, who was so famous for strange adventures and out-of-the-way exploits that the people in those parts talk of him still; and if you turn away from the railway track, and march off with your knapsack through the passes of the "Giant Mountains," you will hear many a curious story about him, and many a strange old song, from the miners and charcoal-burners, whose queer little huts are dotted all over the higher slopes. And if, after three weeks or a month among those grand old forests, and green upland pastures, and shining water-falls, and huge black precipices—sleeping in your plaid under the lee of a big rock, and sharing some charcoal man's fried potatoes beside a pine-log fire—you do not come back with health and strength enough for a dozen, and good old stories enough for a library, it will certainly be your own fault.