"Shine 'em up, red hot," explains the boy. "I'm one of them fellers." Here he breaks away and hops out again into the road, singing:
"Áina, maina, mona, Mike,
Bassalona, bona, strike!
Hay, way, crown, rack,
Hallico, ballico, we—wo—wack!"
—which he evidently intends as a kind of Hitalian; for, simultaneously, he aims a stone at JOHN MCLAUGHLIN, grazes Mr. BUMSTEAD'S whiskers instead, and in another instant a sound of breaking glass is heard in the distance.
"Peace, young scorpion!" says Mr. BUMSTEAD, with a commanding gesture. "JOHN MCLAUGHLIN, let me see you home. The road is too unsteady to-night for an old man like you. Let me see you home, far as my house, at least."
"Thank you, sir, I'd make better time alone. When you came up, sir, Old Mortarity was meditating on this bone-farm," says Mr. MCLAUGHLIN, pointing with a trowel, which he had drawn from his pocket, into the pauper burial-ground. "He was thinking of the many laid here when the Alms-House over yonder used to be open as a Alms-House. I've patched up all these graves, as well as them in the Ritual churchyard, and know 'em all, sir. Over there, Editor of Country Journal; next, Stockholder in Erie; next, Gentleman who Undertook to be Guided in His Agriculture by Mr. GREELEY'S 'What I Know about Farming;' next, Original Projector of American Punch; next, Proprietor of Rural Newspaper; next, another Projector of American Punch—indeed, all the rest of that row is American Punches; next, Conductor of Rustic Daily; next, Manager of Italian Opera; next, Stockholder in Morris and Essex; next, American Novelist; next, Husband of Literary Woman; next, Pastor of Southern Church; next, Conductor of Provincial Press.—I know 'em ALL sir," says Old Mortarity, with exquisite pathos, "and if a flower could spring up for every tear a friendless old man has dropped upon their neglected graves, you couldn't see the wooden head-boards for the roses."
"Tharsverytrue," says Mr. BUMSTEAD, much affected—"Not see 'em for your noses—beaut'ful idea! You're a gooroleman, sir. Here comes SMALLEY again."
"I ain't doing nothink, and you're all the time wanting me to move on, and he's werry good to me, he is," whimpers SMALLEY, throwing a stone at Mr. BUMSTEAD and hitting Old Mortarity.
"Didn't I tell you to always aim at me?" cries the latter, angrily rubbing the place. "Don't I give you a penny a night to aim right at me?"
"I only chucked once at him," says the youth, penitently.
"You see, Mr. BUMSTEAD," explains JOHN MCLAUGHLIN, "I give him an Object in life. I am that Object, and it pays me. If you've ever noticed these boys, sir, they never hit what they aim at. If they throw at a pigeon or a tree, the stone goes through a garret window. If they throw at a dog, it hits some passer-by on the leg. If they throw at each other, it takes you in the back as you're turnin' a corner. I used to be getting hit all over every night from SMALLEY'S aiming at dogs, and pigeons, and boys like himself; but now I hire him to aim at me, exclusively, and I'm all safe.—There he goes, now, misses me, and breaks another winder."