ands on it. Jim was most ruined for a servant, because he got stuck
up on account of having seen the devil and been rode by witches.

Well, when Tom and me got to the edge of the hilltop we looked away down
into the village and could see three or four lights twinkling, where
there was sick folks, maybe; and the stars over us was sparkling ever so
fine; and down by the village was the river, a whole mile broad, and
awful still and grand. We went down the hill and found Jo Harper and Ben
Rogers, and two or three more of the boys, hid in the old tanyard. So we
unhitched a skiff and pulled down the river two mile and a half, to the
big scar on the hillside, and went ashore.

We went to a clump of bushes, and Tom made everybody swear to keep the
secret, and then showed them a hole in the hill, right in the thickest
part of the bushes. Then we lit the candles, and crawled in on our hands
and knees. We went about two hundred yards, and then the cave opened up.
Tom poked about amongst the passages, and pretty soon ducked under a wall
where you wouldn't a noticed that there was a hole. We went along a
narrow place and got into a kind of room, all damp and sweaty and cold,
and there we stopped. Tom says:

"Now, we'll start this band of robbers and call it Tom Sawyer's Gang.
Everybody that wants to join has got to take an oath, and write his name
in blood."

Everybody was willing. So Tom got out a sheet of paper that he had wrote
the oath on, and read it. It swore every boy to stick to the band, and
never tell any of the secrets; and if anybody done anything to any boy in
the band, whichever boy was ordered to kill that person and his family
must do it, and he mustn't eat and he mustn't sleep till he had killed
them and hacked a cross in their breasts, which was the sign of the band.
And nobody that didn't belong to the band could use that mark, and if he
did he must be sued; and if he done it again he must be killed. And if
anybody that belonged to the band told the secrets, he must have his
throat cut, and then have his carcass burnt up and the ashes scattered
all around, and his name blotted off of the list with blood and never
mentioned again by the gang, but have a curse put on it and be forgot
forever.

Everybody said it was a real beautiful oath, and asked Tom if he got it
out of his own head. He said, some of it, but the rest was out of
pirate-books and robber-books, and every gang that was high-toned had it