Cape Cod Stories by Joseph Crosby Lincoln
page 68 of 208 (32%)
page 68 of 208 (32%)
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Montague dives headfirst for the crowd. He fell over a baby carriage,
and I gained a tack 'fore he got up. He wa'n't more'n ten yards ahead when I come busting through, upsetting children and old women, and landed in what I guess was the main street of the place and right abreast of a parade that was marching down the middle of it. First there was the band, four fellers tooting and banging like fo'mast hands on a fishing smack in a fog. Then there was a big darky toting a banner with "Jenkins' Unparalleled Double Uncle Tom's Cabin Company, No. 2," on it in big letters. Behind him was a boy leading two great, savage looking dogs--bloodhounds, I found out afterwards--by chains. Then come a pony cart with Little Eva and Eliza's child in it; Eva was all gold hair and beautifulness. And astern of her was Marks the Lawyer, on his donkey. There was lots more behind him, but these was all I had time to see just then. Now, there was but one way for Booth Hank to get acrost that street, and that was to bust through the procession. And, as luck would have it, the place he picked out to cross was just ahead of the bloodhounds. And the first thing I knew, them dogs stretched out their noses and took a long sniff, and then bust out howling like all possessed. The boy, he tried to hold 'em, but 'twas no go. They yanked the chains out of his hands and took after that poet as if he owed 'em something. And every one of the four million other dogs that was in the crowd on the sidewalks fell into line, and such howling and yapping and scampering and screaming you never heard. Well, 'twas a mixed-up mess. That was the end of the parade. Next minute I was racing across country with the whole town and the Uncle Tommers astern of me, and a string of dogs stretched out ahead fur's you could |
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