248 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST, 
[August, 
riie Editor with his Young: Readers, 
MISCHIEVOUS TOM. 
Thomas G. was naturally a pleasant, sprightly lad, full 
of frolic, and seldom at rest. He must be busy, either at 
work, innocent play, or mischief. His mother, a good 
natured but rather careless woman, often found her pa¬ 
tience severely tried by “ Tom,” as she called him, for in 
his search after amusement, he was, as she declared, 
“ into every thing.” When he had trapped all the rats in 
the cellar, and the mice in the closet, he would fix snares 
for the chickens in the barn yard, or inveigle the cat into 
a bag, and amuse himself by watching her struggles. He 
knew the contents of all his mother’s closets, trunks, and 
bureaus, better than she did sometimes, for when she 
wanted cloth for patches, or strings for lying bundles, she 
often found Tom had used the patches to make sails for 
nis boat, or a tail for his kite, and the strings had been 
taken to harness his imaginary horses. If his mother could 
have taken more time to keep him innocently em¬ 
ployed, or had corrected him when he was guilty of mis¬ 
chief, he would have been less troublesome ; but she was 
a widow, obliged to work hard for a livelihood, and had 
little leisure to look after him. He was her only child, too, 
and she could not bear to punish him even w hen he de¬ 
served it, so he did about as he pleased. Fortunately his 
home was in the country, with no neighbors very near, 
and he did not have bad boys as companions ; had this 
been the case, he would soon have been ruined. 
But although he was thus neglected, he often found 
that mischief brings its own troubles. He was once se¬ 
verely burned while playing with the lamp, when left 
alone a few minutes. The burning fluid was spilled and 
took fire upon his clothes, and he narrowly escaped losing 
his life. Once, too, he fell into the well, while throwing 
in a hatful of frogs he had caught, but as it was not very 
deep, he was only badly bruised, soundly ducked, and 
greatly frightened. 
His last scrape is shown in the picture above, w hich we 
found in Merry’s Museum. He was invited by his uncle, 
who lived in a neighboring town, to spend a few weeks at 
his place, with which, as you may suppose, ho was great¬ 
ly delighted. His uncle was wealthy, and had no chil¬ 
dren ; and it was his intention, if he liked Tom, to take 
him for his own, and educate him. If Tom had known 
this, perhaps he would have taken pains to keep out of 
mischief ; but, as usual, he at once commenced to explore 
the place in search of adventures. First he roamed 
through the garden, and helped himself to such fruit and 
flowers as he fancied, but the gardener spied him, and 
soon drove him out. Just beyond the garden gate the bees 
were kept. Tom had never se- n a hive of them before, 
and was much interested at 
first in watching their mo¬ 
tions as they buzzed around 
the hive, or flew away to 
gather honey. He soon be¬ 
came tired of this, and, just 
for sport, thrust a stick into 
one of the hives. Poor fel¬ 
low, in an instant the en¬ 
raged bees poured out and 
attacked him, stinging him 
as he ran, until he roared 
with pain. He was so badly 
stung that he was confineu 
to his bed for more than a 
week. His uncle, who was 
a kind hearted man, took 
occasion, as he recovered, to 
talk with him about his mis¬ 
chievous propensities, and 
Tom was quite ready to be¬ 
lieve that such sport cost 
more than it was worth, and 
since then, when he has been 
tempted to do mischief, he 
has thought of the stings, and 
restrained himself, and he 
is now in a fair way to grow 
up a good and useful man. 
Perhaps there may be boys 
or girls among our young 
friends who are ready to 
seek enjoyment from what 
they know is not exactly 
right, when they think it can 
be done without the fear of 
punishment. Wrong always 
has a sting—if not like that 
of the bee to pierce and poi¬ 
son the body, it will yet ran¬ 
kle like a poison in the mind, 
and destroy happiness. It 
will be much easier and bet¬ 
ter for them to learn from the experience of Tom, and of 
others like him, that the right way is the best way, than 
to suffer the penalties themselves. 
A STARTLING REPORT. 
A clerical friend relates the following which happened 
to himself a few years since. He was just passing from 
boyhood to manhood, and had lately appeared in 
his first “ long tailed” coal. One Fourth of July, 
dressed in his best, he passed part of the day with 
a party of ycung ladies, and, for his own amuse¬ 
ment, he purchased a quantity of torpedoes. 
Some of you may not have seen these. They are 
small bits cf paper containing gravel, and a sub¬ 
stance called fulminate. When one is thrown 
forcibly upon the floor, or against a hard surface, 
it explodes with a noise nearly as loud as a fire 
cracker. Our friend had much sport in throwing 
these about and making the ladies start, for which 
he was afterwards punished nicely, as you shall 
hear. At the close of the day, he had a parcel re¬ 
maining, containing about one hundred torpedoes, 
which he left in the pocket of his long tailed coat. 
The next Sunday, he dressed for church, without 
thinking of the torpedoes, which of course he 
carried there with him. Taking his usual seat in 
the choir, he soon became interested in the sing¬ 
ing, which he says was unusually good that morn¬ 
ing. A piece had just been finished, the congre¬ 
gation were seated, and the minister was about 
engaging in prayer. Atl was hushed into perfect 
silence, when a tremendous report startled the 
congregation. Some thought a musket had been 
discharged, others, that the gallery was falling- 
only our young friend knew the truth—he had sat 
upon his torpedoes, and all exploded together. 
Fortunately no injury was done, except to his 
nether garments ; but fora longtime he always 
turned very red in the face, when any one asked 
him about torpedoes. You may be sure that after 
such a mishap, he always examined his pockets carefully 
before going to church, to see that they contained no ex¬ 
plosive materials. 
HAPTY JACK. 
A correspondent writes as follows : The story in the 
July number of the boy w ho was so afflicted by the loss 
of his whistle, reminds me that we have in this place, 
Brooklyn, N. Y., a cartman who has whistled himself 
into notoriety, and a comfortable living. He is a siout, 
burly fellow, with a skin black and shining, and a coun¬ 
tenance beaming with good nature. His happy face and 
pleasant manner have won for him the name « Happy 
Jack.” He is very kind-hearted and a great favorite 
among children. You can always tell when he is com¬ 
ing up the street on his cart, by the peculiar, clear, ring¬ 
ing, chirrupy notes with which he whistles his few favor- 
ite tunes. He can perform almost anything in the whist¬ 
ling line, but piefers to practice but few tunes in public, 
probably with an eye to attracting attention, for he is as 
shrewd as he is good natured. As he passes through the 
streets, the little children call after him, and he bows, 
shouts, laughs, and w histles to them, until out of sight. I 
have seen group after group of children salute him, 
for they all know him, and he has a pleasant reply for all. 
This is his way of advertising, and Barnum or Bonner 
could not succeed better than he has in attracting public 
attention. Consequently, as he is a careful cartman, he 
has abundant employment, besides enjoying life more 
than most of his class. 
HEEDED MEDICINE. 
Nothing is more ridiculous than for young people to 
“ put on airs.” They are fair game for jokers. The fol¬ 
lowing shows how one of this class was “ taken down.” 
Some twenty years ago a farmer’s barn in the vicinity 
of Worcester was struck by lightning and burned to the 
ground. Many of the citizens had gone to the fire, w hen 
a fop, well strapped and dickied, with his cap on one 
side of his head, met the celebrated Dr. G—n, and accost¬ 
ed him in this wise : 
“ Can you—ah, tell me, dc-’ah, how fah they have suc¬ 
ceeded in extinguishing the conflagration of the—ah, un¬ 
fortunate yeoman’s barn ?” 
The doctor eyed the individual attentively, dropped his 
head as usual for a moment, and then slipping his thumb 
and finger into his vest pocket, took out a couple of pills 
and handed them to him, saying— 
“ Take these, sir, and go to bed, and if you do not feel 
better in the morning call at my office.” 
BEWARE OF THE SERPENT. 
Can you read this picture? We have rarely seen a 
more expressive one. How well it represents that verse 
written by the wise King. “ Look not upon the wine 
when it is red, when it giveth its color in the cup, when 
it moveth itself aright. At the last, itbiteth like a serpent, 
and stingeth like an adder.” That poor inebriate has 
already been fearfully bitten by the serpent, Alcohol. His 
body is enfeebled, his mind stupefied, bis sense of shame 
gone, so that he can lie in a drunken sleep by the roadside, 
the sport of the thoughtless and the pity of the kind-heart¬ 
ed. The spirit of Temperance hovering over the foun¬ 
tain of pure water, looks mournfully upon him as though 
she would gladly restore him to happiness with the cup 
of life she holds. 
But, you may say, do such horrid looking snakes ever 
come out of the bottle, and attack the intemperate ? Yes 
—In that dreadful disease called delirium tremens, caused 
by intemperance, the sufferer sees or imagines he sees 
serpents, demons, and many other horrible shapes com¬ 
ing to attack him. The writer once took caro of a inan 
affected in tins way His groans and screams were fear 
