Chapter 3 - Page 2

this drownded man was just his size, and was ragged,
and had uncommon long hair, which was all like pap;
but they couldn't make nothing out of the face, be-
cause it had been in the water so long it warn't much
like a face at all. They said he was floating on his
back in the water. They took him and buried him on
the bank. But I warn't comfortable long, because I
happened to think of something. I knowed mighty
well that a drownded man don't float on his back, but
on his face. So I knowed, then, that this warn't pap,
but a woman dressed up in a man's clothes. So I was
uncomfortable again. I judged the old man would
turn up again by and by, though I wished he wouldn't.

We played robber now and then about a month, and
then I resigned. All the boys did. We hadn't robbed
nobody, hadn't killed any people, but only just pre-
tended. We used to hop out of the woods and go
charging down on hog-drivers and women in carts
taking garden stuff to market, but we never hived any
of them. Tom Sawyer called the hogs "ingots," and
he called the turnips and stuff "julery," and we would
go to the cave and powwow over what we had done,
and how many people we had killed and marked. But
I couldn't see no profit in it. One time Tom sent a
boy to run about town with a blazing stick, which he
called a slogan (which was the sign for the Gang to
get together), and then he said he had got secret news
by his spies that next day a whole parcel of Spanish
merchants and rich A-rabs was going to camp in Cave
Hollow with two hundred elephants, and six hundred
camels, and over a thousand "sumter" mules, all
loaded down with di'monds, and they didn't have only
a guard of four hundred soldiers, and so we would lay
in ambuscade, as he called it, and kill the lot and
scoop the things. He said we must slick up our swords
and guns, and get ready. He never could go after
even a turnip-cart but he must have the swords and
guns all scoured up for it, though they was only lath
and broomsticks, and you might scour at them till you
rotted, and then they warn't worth a mouthful of ashes
more than what they was before. I didn't believe we
could lick such a crowd of Spaniards and A-rabs, but
I wanted to see the camels and elephants, so I was on
hand next day, Saturday, in the ambuscade; and when
we got the word we rushed out of the woods and down
the hill. But there warn't no Spaniards and A-rabs,
and there warn't no camels nor no elephants. It
warn't anything but a Sunday-school picnic, and only
a primer-class at that. We busted it up, and chased
the children up the hollow; but we never got anything
but some doughnuts and jam, though Ben Rogers got
a rag doll, and Jo Harper got a hymn-book