XVII.

HOLD! ENOUGH!!

The other evening it chanced that a combination of disastrous
circumstances wrought havoc with my temper. I lost my train; my head
hummed like a bumblebee with weary pain, and the elastic that held my
hat to its moorings broke, so that that capering compromise between
inanimate matter and demoniac possession blew half a block up street on
its own account, and was brought back to me by a youthful son of
Belial, who took my very last quarter as reward for the lively chase.

"There's no use!" said I to myself as I jogged along through the
gloaming; "blessed be the woman who knows enough to cry 'hold!' against
such odds!"

And just then I spied a wizened little mite of a woman trotting by,
carrying a gripsack bigger than herself. She grasped it, and held it
against her wan little stomach, as a Roman warrior might carry his
shield into battle--plucky to the last.

"Now," said I, "look here, Amber, have you a fifty pound sachel to tug
through the darkness? No! Then you might be worse off."

And I went on a little farther and I met the brave firemen going home
drenched and worn from the big fire. "You coward!" said I to myself,
"what if you were a fireman! Something to growl about then, I guess."

And I went a bit farther and I saw a little white coffin in a window.
"How about that?" said I. "If the darlings were gone to their long