You see their fust baby had been born; they named him Peasley,--Peasley
Hobart,--after Hattie's folks. So, seein' as how it wuz payin' f'r a book
that told about babies, Leander didn't begredge that five dollars so very
much after all.

"Leander," sez Hattie one forenoon, "that B cyclopeedy ain't no account.
There ain't nothin' in it about babies except 'See Maternity'!"

"Waal, I'll be gosh durned!" sez Leander. That wuz all he said, and he
couldn't do nothin' at all, f'r that book-agent, Lemuel Higgins, had the
dead wood on him,--the mean, sneakin' critter!

So the years passed on, one of them cyclopeedies showin' up now 'nd
then,--sometimes every two years 'nd sometimes every four, but allus at a
time when Leander found it pesky hard to give up a fiver. It warn't no use
cussin' Higgins; Higgins just laffed when Leander allowed that the
cyclopeedy was no good 'nd that he wuz bein' robbed. Meantime Leander's
family wuz increasin' and growin'. Little Sarey had the hoopin' cough
dreadful one winter, but the cyclopeedy didn't help out at all, 'cause all
it said wuz: "Hoopin' Cough--See Whoopin' Cough"--and uv course there
warn't no Whoopin' Cough to see, bein' as how the W hadn't come yet!

Oncet when Hiram wanted to dreen the home pasture, he went to the
cyclopeedy to find out about it, but all he diskivered wuz:

"Drain--See Tile." This wuz in 1859, and the cyclopeedy had only got down
to G.

The cow wuz sick with lung fever one spell, and Leander laid her dyin' to
that cussid cyclopeedy, 'cause when he went to readin' 'bout cows it told