money enough to go into
the circus with; but he said a cent was all he could spare these hard
times, an' I'd better take that an' buy something to eat with it, for
the show wasn't very good, anyway. I wish peanuts wasn't but a cent a
bushel."

"Then you would make yourself sick eating them."

"Yes, I s'pose I should; Uncle Dan'l says I'd eat till I was sick, if I
got the chance; but I'd like to try it once."

He was a very small boy, with a round head covered with short red hair,
a face as speckled as any turkey's egg, but thoroughly good natured
looking; and as he sat there on the rather sharp point of the rock,
swaying his body to and fro as he hugged his knees with his hands, and
kept his eyes fastened on the tempting display of good things before
him, it would have been a very hard hearted man who would not have given
him something.

But Mr. Job Lord, the proprietor of the booth, was a hard hearted man,
and he did not make the slightest advance toward offering the little
fellow anything.

Toby rocked himself silently for a moment, and then he said,
hesitatingly, "I don't suppose you'd like to sell me some things, an'
let me pay you when I get older, would you?"

Mr. Lord shook his head decidedly at this proposition.

"I didn't s'pose you would," said Toby, quickly; "but you didn't seem
to be selling anything, an' I thought I'd just see what you'd say
about it." And then he appeared suddenly to see something wonderfully
interesting behind him, which served as an excuse to turn his reddening
face away.

"I suppose your uncle Daniel makes you work for your living, don't he?"
asked Mr. Lord, after he had rearranged his stock of candy and had added
a couple of slices of lemon peel to what was popularly supposed to be
lemonade.

"That's what I think; but he says that all the work I do wouldn't pay
for the meal that one chicken would eat, an' I s'pose it's so, for I
don't like to work as well as a feller without any father and mother
ought to. I don't know why it is, but I guess it's because I take up so
much time eatin' that it kinder tires me out. I s'pose you go into the
circus whenever you want to, don't you?"

"Oh yes; I'm there at every performance, for I keep the stand under the
big canvas as well as this one out here."

There was a great big sigh from out Toby's little round stomach, as he
thought what bliss it must be to own all those good things and to see
the circus wherever it went.

"It must b