llage street, half way down to the tavern.

"Out of the pen into the barn-yard, and out of that into the street when
the gate was open. Won't I have a time getting him home!"

There was little doubt of that, for the pig felt that it was his duty to
root as he went, and he refused to walk quietly past any good
opportunity to thrust his snub-nose into something.

Ben worked, and so did the pig.

"Hullo! What's that?"

The pig had turned up a clod of earth with something sticking on it, and
Ben sprang forward to pick it up.

"It's a cent!"

It was round; it was made of copper; it was a coin of some kind; but it
was black and grimy, and Ben rubbed hard to clean it.

"I never saw a cent like that before. I can't even read what it says on
it."

"What have you found, Ben, my boy?"

"Guess it's a kind of a cent. The pig found it."

All the boys in the village knew old Squire Burchard, only they were
half afraid of him. It was said he could read almost any kind of book,
and that was a wonderful sort of man for any man to be.

"The pig found it? I declare! I guess I'll have to buy it of you."

"Don't you s'pose it'll pass?"

"Well, yes, it might; but it'll only buy a cent's worth. I'll give you
more than that for it."

"Going to melt it over and make a new cent of it?"

"No, Ben, not so bad as that. I'll keep it to look at. It's a very old
German coin, and I'm what they call a numismatist."

Ben listened hard over that word for a moment, and tried to repeat it.

"Rumismatics--I know; it's a good deal like what father says he has
sometimes. Gets into his back and legs."

"Not quite, Ben; but it makes me gather up old coins, and put them in a
glass case, and look at them."

"Father's is worse 'n that; it takes him bad in rainy weather."

"Well, Ben, I'll give the pig or you, just as you say, a quarter of a
dollar for that cent."

Ben's eyes fairly danced, but all he could manage to say was, "Yes, sir.
Thank you, sir. Guess I will."

"There it is, Ben. It's a new one. I don't care much for new ones.
What'll you do with it?"

Ben hesitated only a moment, for he was turning the quarter over and
over, and thinking of just the answer to the squire's question.

"It's a puppy, sir. Mrs. Malone said I might have it for a quarter, and
father said I couldn't buy it unless I found the money."

"It'll be the pig's puppy, then? All right; but you can't make pork of
him."

The pig was driven home in a good deal