Beadle's Half Dime Library, No. 1140 — page 1: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

' dav, a num a “ “al —-_ *F rari, ee prs > a — ¥. ten, ——_ > ae CopY¥RIGHT, 18738, By BEADLE & ADAMS. No. 1440. : Oregon Sol; NICK WHIFFLES’S BOY SPY. BY CAPT. J. F. C. ADAMS, CHAPTER L A **CONDEMNED DIFFIKILTY.” “WHEN a’ man has got to say yes or no, and can't for his life make up his mind which he orter say, then I allow he’s in a condemned diffi- kilty; but, when you’rein such a kentry as this, where the varmints are all around you, it’s the pest plan to be ’spicious of ’em all.” Thus spcke Nick Whiffles, with the old smile lighting up his honest, homely countenance, in reply to a remark of his friend Oregon Sol, a brother trapper, as they half-reclined on the face of a large flat rock, far up in the wilds of the North- west, one pleasant summer es of years ago. “ There’s my gran’father,” eontinued Nick, *‘ who used so be the most onsuspicious old gentleman that I ever knowed. I remember one day, when a man come along and offered to sell him a piece of land that he said was just the piace to raise elephants onto to sell to the circus companies. The old man borrered the money on % mortgage, and paid him nis price fur the land, and then went out there to begin raisin them little. pets When he got there and come to locate his land, he found it was right in the middle of the Wisconsin river, where the water was twenty-four feet That set the old gentieman in high duageon, and he come ‘“earin’ back az’in. and went for that swindler: but, when he found him, the chap axed his par- account of the httle Published Every Month. ; cee Dp, : don OT] mistake that had been made, and that he sold him laid a Bh - it wa +} ' ne Tract ' 17 BW iAile!l . . > 4 mat i ee oe tL y ere = Ss =| = Cs ll fe el eet tls st a et! ee es el es Mm. J. REVERS & CO... Publishers. LN, = treet, JAMES SULLI' 2270 RIKT* Pearl New York. thow, i he does look as innocent in the face asa spring chicken.” 'That’s jest it,” assented Oregon Sol, as he ejected a mouthful of tobacco-juice, with such skill as‘to knock a fly off the ear of the dog Calamity that was stretched out dozing at their feet; “th .’s whar the condemned diffikilty, as you call .c, comes in. Sometimes I look into the face of Marunyo, the Indian boy, and I think if ever there was a young lamb goin’ round onto two legs, that ’ere chap is him. You remember down on Dent’s Bay, a month ago, when we war fishin’, he swum out at nicht. fur over a mile, and to tellus that a party of them cussed Modocs, led by Captain Jack, was waitin’ fur darkmess so as to come down and raise our ha’r. No mistake, Marunyo kept us out of a‘mighty bad scrape that time, and I felt like axin’ his pardon fur ever thinkin’ anything wrong bout him. Then ag’in, thar didn’t noth- in’ come to make me feel shaky, till a week or “sN > van VV ‘ er ¢) Sak ; , . {Bi jeu! ASS \ VOL. ALVILL. . two ggo, when I war ne’r among the lava-beds PRICE 5CENTS 50c. a year. and see’d Marunyo hobnobin’ with these same Modoes that are the meanest went unscalped.” ‘Wal, we’ve cot to watch him michty close that’s all,” replied Nick. “ Most’of the Whiffles family was of a’spicious nature.\ They always had a ’spicion that thar was something extron- nery in the way of smartness bout ‘me. but when I growed up, my mother said it was one of them ‘spicions that never was con The sehoolmaster, howsumever. said T w blasted fool, the first time he sot eves onto and that ’spicion was confirmed. Therewas aunt, too, that had her fust beau when she seventy-three years old. She was so ’spicion that she was too young to keep company. the she made it a practice to set the dog on that" Revolutionary pensioner when he come to tsee her.” ‘* Did he keep it up?’ ‘Wal, yes—that is till he hadn’t any more seats left to his breeches, and then, when he was layin’ in bed to get ‘em mended so as to begin over again, she run off with his father that had been a widower for more nor forty years,” : ‘But ain’t you a leetile in- clined to be ‘spicious your- self?’ asked Oregon Sol, who, on this lazy summer after- moon, was disposed to humor the loquacity of his friend. “That depends upon sar- cumstances,” was the reply. **Qne time, when two other chaps and me war arter the same gal, [’d a’spicion that Oumeot.”em played a con- iS mean trick on both He was a sort of a—” ello what’s up, Ca- lamity ?”’ | Nick’s yarn was cut off abruptly, for the dog, that hitherto had seemed to be in sound sleep, suddenly raised his head and gave out a faint whine, the meaning of which was evident enough to t It meant cusses that ever the two trappers. that some one was approach- ing and that it behoved them to be on the watch. it was to notice action of the two trap- curtous he dog ut- Sitting , as they last hour, to the them. themseives it COomicbooks.com