16 A GOOD BARGAIN DECLINED. 



Something over an hour had now passed, and the bronze-red pep- 

 peridge across the street had become scarlet and royal purple in the fierce 

 light of the almost level sun. The Doctor walked round and round the 

 tree encouraging me. 



" She'll come in a minute — in a minute ! Hit her again — she hasn't 

 any friends ! She's a-coming !" 



But, bless you ! my repeated whacks, littering the whole neighbor- 

 hood with chips (which already had attracted a swarm of carpenter bees), 

 seemed to have no more effect than would the cracking of hickory-nuts 

 at the base of Pompey's Pillar. The harder I worked, the more I sweat ; 

 and the oftener a blow went wild the more that wicked neighbor of mine 

 hugged himself with glee, and exasperated me by personal remarks and 

 unfounded encouragement. 



"All great men," he said, with evenly shared flattery, "have been 

 choppers. There's Horace, and Gladstone, and Grevy, and Greeley, and — " 



" E. B. Hayes," I interrupted. " Go on — pretty soon you'll disprove 

 your own statement." 



"Oh no," he answered, unruffled, "you and I are enough to keep up 

 the average. Now, Brother I.," he continued, changing the subject, 

 "I've another idea. You see those trees over there? I have just bought 

 them." 



He pointed to another part of the grove where four great trunks 

 diverged from the same root. They were oaks of huge size and fine sym- 

 metry, and had been highly prized by every one near, until some angel- 

 forsaken miscreant kindled a fire in their midst and burned the heart out 

 of the whole group. That man will be hanged yet if Nature has her dues ! 

 Now that they had become feeble it was necessary to take them down, in 

 order to save their crushing other ornaments of the bosky knoll by an 

 unguarded fall. 



As I carefully straightened out my nerveless fingers, and slowly un- 

 bent my stiffened arm, I replied, " What of it ?" 



" This," said the Doctor. " I'll give you those four big trees for eight 

 dollars if you will remove them." 



" I won't do it," I said ; " but I'll tell you what I will do. I'll give 

 you six dollars for the trees, and then I'll give you half the wood, if you 

 will place the other half, piled up, in my back yard." 



He smiled blandly, but declined. That man don't know a good bar- 

 gain when he sees it. 



It was now nearly two hours since the work had been begun, and I 

 was getting tired. What sufferings Kobinsou Crusoe must have had in 



