Jungle Delight

Jungle Delight reputable and safe “Arsk a blessin’, Ebenezer.”,THE silence was broken a little later by merry voices on the stairway. For several nights the girls had been gathering in May Nell’s room. Billy knew “things were doing” there by the sounds; the tap, tap of the tack hammer, added to much chatter and rustling. Now May Nell caught him by the hand and pulled him across the hall. A strange pungent fragrance like burning spice, yet not familiar, met them at the door. And inside, the dark hangings full of lurking shadows gave the room a foreign air.,“I might as well tell you all about it, Mrs. Wopp,” confessed Howard. “When I got to town and found the train was almost due, I felt frightfully shy. So I got Ken Judson to put on his boiled shirt and Sunday suit and go to the station. He looked the part, I assure you, much better than I would. He brought Miss Gordon to ‘The Golden West’ where I had recovered sufficiently to speak to her.”,Her wardrobe was a heavy drain on Edith’s purse, yet the young teacher delighted almost as a mother in the dainty garments that won her to extravagance.,In front of the stone steps that led up to the barred door he hesitated; but the dog raced round to the rear. Instantly Billy followed.，Mr. Wopp looked up in approval and brandished a formidable looking piece of fat meat, precariously poised on one prong of his fork and in his efforts to lose none of its dripping flavor, described an uncertain spiral in the air.，“Please,” answered the discomfited youth, “I aint never seen a ship of no kind.”，It took some time to focus her intellect on the proper placing of mirthful youngsters, but at last, after singing “Like a little candle burning in the night,” all were in readiness to imbibe biblical learning.CHAPTER XVIII.—A PAIR OF CHECKED TROUSERS.

“Was it as bad as that?” She smiled, and smoothed back the thick, tumbled hair.,Armed with the big baskets, several young men of the party travelled from bench to bench, followed by others with coffee pots. The strenuous exercises of the evening, preceded in most cases by a long ride or drive, had developed vigorous appetites and the viands were disposed of with wonderful rapidity.,“Run, Billy! You left the door open—she’ll get the dinner!” Mrs. Bennett cautioned, hurrying out herself to reckon the loss.,“The child may eclipse you in refining Billy’s language,” Mrs. Bennett said, with a smile, aside to Edith; and went into the kitchen to “dish up” the dinner.,Jean changed the situation by proposing a toast to Billy’s new sister.,“I like Sunday School best ’cause I do things there.”,All went well with the preparation; and on a glorious spring night in the full moon, the town and countryside jammed the Opera House “to its eyebrows,” Billy said, looking through the peephole in the curtain to the high window seats crowded with boys.,After supper, Betty was sought diligently, but without success. At last Moses discovered her underneath the huge red tablecloth that covered the dining-room table. She was sound asleep on the floor with Jethro in her arms and his head on her bosom. Her face was smeared with tear-stains.,Billy at work or at play was so absorbed that it was hard for him to measure time; and he had a queer notion that it was some other intelligence beside his own will that reminded him, often too late, of duties waiting. This he named Betsey; and among the children Betsey came to stand for Billy’s conscience.,“Here was Joner scourin’ down to Jopper to take the ship to Tarshidge arter the Lord hed distinctly told him to go to Niniver, an’ fer punishment the Lord hed him swallered by a whale.”,“And Bouncer’s here,” May Nell added, hugging the dog affectionately.,“The fleetin’ of youth is most sartin,” answered his wife, coining this epigram on the shortness of life’s spring-time, and sighing as she spoke. The good lady herself was looking through a stereoscope at some views and finding one of Niagara Falls she endeavored to cheer her despondent husband..