ad taken
the earth out of the first hole and put it back again into the second!

"You star-spangled fool!" said Ajax.

"You tole me," replied Johnnie, "that the work mus' be did all over
agen--an' I done it."

"Directions," I remarked, "may be made too explicit."

After this incident, we always spoke of Johnnie as Bumblepuppy.

Some six months later Alethea-Belle told us that Johnnie Kapus was
doing "chores" for the widow Janssen; milking her cow, taking care of
the garden, and drawing water. Upon inquiry, however, we learned that
the cow was drying up, the well had caved in, and the garden produced
no weeds, it is true, and no vegetables!

"Why doesn't the widow sack him?" Ajax asked.

"Mis' Janssen is kinder sorry for Johnnie," replied the
schoolmistress; then she added irrelevantly, "There's no denyin' that
Johnnie Kapus has the loveliest curly hair."

About a fortnight after this, when the July sun was at its zenith and
the starch out of everything animate and inanimate, old man Kapus came
up to the ranch-house. Johnnie, he said, disappeared during the
previous night.

"And he's bin kidnapped, too," the uncle added.

"Kidnapped?"

"Yes, boys--hauled out o' winder! A man weighin' close onter two
hundred pounds 'd naterally prefer to walk out o' the door, but the
widder hauled Johnnie out o' winder."

"The widow?"

"Mis' Janssen. There was buggy tracks at the foot o' the melon patch,
and the widder's missin'. She's put it up to marry my Johnnie. I
suspicioned something, but I counted on Johnnie. I sez to myself:
'Others might be tempted by a plump, well-lookin' widder, but not
Johnnie.' Ye see, boys, Johnnie ain't quite the same as you an' me."

"Not quite," said Ajax.

"Mebbee ye've wondered why I sot sech store by Johnnie. Wal--I'll tell
ye. Johnnie's paw an' me was brothers an' pardners afore the war. An'
after Bull Run John sez to me: 'Abram,' he sez, 'we mustn't let Ole
Glory trail in the dust.' That's what he sez. 'John,' I answers, 'what
kin we do to prevent it?' '_Enlist_,' sez he. An' we done it. But
afore we go within smellin' distance o' the rebs, yes, boys, afore we
saw 'em, a bullet comes slam-bang into John's head."

The old man paused, overcome. We turned our eyes from his wrinkled,
troubled face, as Ajax entreated him to say no more.

"He died in defence of his flag," I muttered.

"Ah!" exclaimed Johnnie's uncle, "I thought you'd say that. No, boys,
John didn't die. A Kapus take