-rods and weather-vanes and
flagpoles--anything for notoriety. I told him he'd get killed sure some
day, but he laughed at me. Well, it wasn't a week after I warned him
when he was killed. He climbed an old lightning-rod without testing it
(it was on a little church up at Cold Spring, New York), and just as he
was reaching the steeple-top, with a whole town watching him, the end of
the rod pulled out, and he swung off with it, ripping out every dowel,
like the buttons off a coat, right down to the ground--smash. Poor
fellow, when I read the news I left my job at Trinity and took the first
train up to bury him."

This sad story lingered in my mind that night, and was there still the
next afternoon as I drew near the Church of the Pilgrims to witness the
first day's climbing. Already, at a distance, I knew that the men were
at work from the upbent heads of people on the street who stared and
pointed. And presently I made out two white figures on the steeple, one
swinging about fifteen feet below the ball, the other standing against
the shingled side without any support that I could see. Up the old tower
(inside) I made my way, and two ladders beyond the "bell-deck" came upon
Walter Tyghe, "Steeple Bob's" assistant, astride of a stone saddle on
one of the four peaks where the tower ends and the steeple begins. There
was a clear drop of a hundred feet all around him. He was "tending" the
two men aloft, as witnessed a couple of ropes dangling by him. It was
two jerks to come down and one to go up. Were he to lose his balance and
let go the hauling-rope, the men on the swing would instantly be killed,
as they had no "lock-blocks" on.

"Come out here," said Walter, "there's plenty of room," and, thus
encouraged, I straddled the peak, and we sat face to face, as two men
might sit on a child's rocking-horse, while the tower pigeons circled
beneath us, alarmed at this intrusion. Far down on the sidewalk were
little faces of distorted people; far up at the steeple-top were legs
kicking at ropes. And off over red housetops was the river, and the
great towers of New York spread with silver plumes by the steam jets.

"Now you can see the stirrups working," said Walter, and, looking up, I
saw a figure swing back from the steeple, an arm shoot out, and a length
of rope go wriggling around the shaft, cast like a lasso. Then the rope
was drawn into a noose, and the noose hauled tight. The legs kicked, the
figure hitched itself up about