This story about the building of the deacon's barn brings to my mind another, pretty closely related to it. Will you hear that, too?
One morning, as Uncle Mike was walking out, he saw a boy sitting down on the door steps of one of his neighbors. Upon a closer inspection of the lad it appeared that he was a poor boy, without any parents, who was wandering about, doing odd jobs, here and there, and getting what people had a mind to pay him for his services.
[Illustration: MIKE MARBLE AND THE BEGGAR.]
He was not a common vagrant, exactly, and yet he came very near being one. It was not supposed that he was a vicious boy; still it could not be denied that the life he led was tolerably well calculated to make him vicious, and most of the neighbors were afraid to have him about their houses, without keeping a sharp look out on his movements.
Mr. Marble had heard of the lad, though it so happened that he had never met him until this time.
"Hallo, there, my boy!" said Uncle Mike, "what are you so busy about?"
"Eating a cold johnny-cake, sir," was the laconic answer.
"Pretty well, though I guess a little butter wouldn't hurt it."
"Look here, my lad," said Uncle Mike, "what do you do generally for a living?"
"Yes, sir, if I can get any thing for it."
"I am a hard-working man. Will you work like a dog, if I'll let you try?"
"Please, sir, I'd rather work like a boy."
And he took the boy home with him. The first thing he set him about was weeding the onion bed. It was hard work, as I know from experience. Oh, how it makes a poor fellow's back ache, to stoop down and weed onions for half a day. You must know that you can't use the hoe more than about a quarter of the time. If you could, the work would be comparatively easy and pleasant. But you can't do that. You must bend right down to the task, as if you really loved the onions, and were nursing them, as a fond mother nurses a pet child.
"Well, Fred," said the old gentleman, when the dinner horn blew its blast of invitation for the workmen to come in and pay their respects to Mrs. Marble's boiled pork and cabbage, "well, Fred, how do you like weeding onion beds?"
"And would you like to keep at it all the afternoon?"
"I would like to please you, sir. That's what I came here for."