tulip beds, finds the little fellow crouched at the foot of the
dike and inquires what ails him. The lad, raising his weary
head--but wait, I shall quote the exact language of the book:

"I am hindering the sea from running in," was the simple reply
of the child.

Simple? I'll say it is! Positively nothing could be simpler unless
it be the stark simplicity of the mind of an author who figures
that when the Atlantic Ocean starts boring its way through a crack
in a sea wall you can stop it by plugging the hole on the inner
side of the sea wall with a small boy's arm. Ned Buntline may
never have enjoyed the vogue among parents and teachers that Mr.
McGuffey enjoyed, but I'll say this for him--he knew more about
the laws of hydraulics than McGuffey ever dreamed.

And there was Peter Hurdle, the ragged lad who engaged in a long
but tiresome conversation with the philanthropic and inquisitive
Mr. Lenox, during the course of which it developed that Peter
didn't want anything. When it came on to storm he got under a
tree. When he was hungry he ate a raw turnip. Raw turnips, it
would appear, grew all the year round in the fields of the favored
land where Peter resided. If the chill winds of autumn blew in
through one of the holes in Peter's trousers they blew right out
again through another hole. And he didn't care to accept the dime
which Mr. Lenox in an excess of generosity offered him, because,
it seemed, he already had a dime. When it came to being plumb
contented there probably never was a soul on this earth that was
the equal of Master Hurdle. He even was satisfied with his name
which I would regard as the ultimate test.