"Hold!" cried Wiggins. "Are you not a gentleman? If not, in behalf of my princ.i.p.al I now withdraw the challenge."

"Who is your princ.i.p.al?" exclaimed the landlord. "A man who comes into my house to turn it upside down! Gets into a muss with a monkey as soon as he arrives! Pretends he wants to fight Captain Bragg and then hides himself like a white-livered poltroon in the bottom of a well! Amuses himself by running and racing among the ladies like a naked Caliban and frightening my female boarders out of their wits! I'll give him satisfaction,--the ugly brute!"

The landlord began to ascend the stairway, breathing vengeance against Botts. Wiggins caught him by the tail of his coat and called out, "Hold!

hold! I command the peace!"

"Are you a magistrate?" said the landlord.

"No; but I am a good citizen, and in the name of the law I command the peace!"

"Let me go!" said the landlord, flourishing his cudgel. "Let me go! If you tear my coat-tail off, I will----"

Here a number of ladies appeared on the upper landing and opposed a barrier of beauty between the landlord and Botts, whose ugly visage was seen in their rear. Several gentlemen were in the corridor at the foot of the stairway, and among them a fat and funny little fellow, who stood gazing at the scene with a most comical expression of countenance. The landlord struggled to get free, but Wiggins held on to the tail of his coat with the tenacity of a terrier.

"Let me go, I say!" shouted Boniface, shaking his cudgel at Botts.

The ladies screamed and Botts looked amazed. Suddenly a voice was heard issuing from the mouth of the challenger, exclaiming, "Save me, ladies!

oh, save me! save me!"

"What! begging, you ugly beast!" exclaimed the landlord. "Yes, you had better beg!"

"Oh, ladies!" exclaimed Botts, in piteous tones. "Don't let him murder me! I put myself under your protection!"

"Who ever heard the like?" said a gentleman standing at the foot of the stairway. "The pitiful poltroon! Come away, landlord! You wouldn't beat a man who has put himself under the protection of the women!"

The ladies gathered round Botts, and vowed that they would protect him.

Botts was amazed at their tender solicitude in his behalf. The landlord was puzzled. He dropped his cudgel and walked back to his office, followed by Wiggins, who was intensely disgusted at the poltroonery of his princ.i.p.al.

"Look here, Wiggins," said Boniface, "I can't thrash a man who begs for mercy and puts himself under the protection of petticoats, but tell him to get out of my house. There has been nothing but confusion in it since he came. Let him be off, and tell him to take that drunken fellow Perch with him."

Wiggins undertook to convey the message of the landlord to Botts and the Long Green Boy. Just then Toney and Tom entered, and the former espying the fat little fellow standing in the corridor, exclaimed, "Why, Charley! how are you? where did you come from?"

"Toney, my boy, glad to see you! I've just arrived."

"Let me introduce you to my friend Tom Seddon," said Toney. "Tom, this is Charley Tickle, an old college friend."

Seddon and Tickle shook hands, and looked as if they intended to be most excellent friends.

"Charley," said Toney, "we have not met since we parted at college.

Where have you been?"

"All over the world, Toney. I have traveled extensively, I can tell you.

I have been a lecturer, a biologist, an artist, and am now a professor.

Mind that you always give me my t.i.tle when we go into company together."

"Where is your local habitation at present?"

"I am studying phrenology under the learned Professor Boneskull."

"Who is he?"

"A celebrated phrenologist. A few days ago he arrived in your town of Mapleton, and has there rented a house. You will find him flourishing when you go back. The room in which he receives visitors will cause you to open your eyes with wonder and awe."

"Why so?" said Toney.

"When you enter, you will see opposite the door a bust of Socrates, and on its head is perched a prodigious owl. If I am with you, the owl will speak to us and say. 'How do you do, gentlemen?--I am glad to see you.'"

"It must be a parrot," said Seddon.

"No, Mr. Seddon, it is an owl. He never speaks except when I am present, and then he sometimes becomes quite eloquent. There is evidently something supernatural about the bird, and I have suggested to Boneskull that it may be a fairy. He has consulted it on several occasions, and has received most excellent advice."

"No doubt of it," said Toney. "The owl is the bird of wisdom."

"Boneskull has a number of animals, birds, and reptiles stuffed, and arranged around his room in gla.s.s cases. To show you how implicitly the learned man relies upon what is uttered by the bird of wisdom, I will relate one or two incidents. One morning I met a young fellow who had a rat which he had skinned and stuffed, and having ingeniously fastened bristles to its tail, was persuading people that it was a squirrel. I told him to take it to Boneskull. When I entered his study, the learned man was examining this curious specimen, and shaking his head rather dubiously. But on my entrance, the owl spoke and a.s.sured him it was a genuine squirrel, and of a very rare species; whereupon he purchased it, and it now forms a part of his collection."

"But how happens it," said Seddon, "that the bird never speaks except when you are present?"

"Oh, that is easily accounted for," said Tickle. "The bird of wisdom has a vast deal of discretion. He will not commit himself by any utterance except in the presence of a reliable witness. In me he has confidence, and in no other living man. I one day told a man to take a skull, which he had found, to the phrenologist, and that he would get a good price for it. When I entered, Boneskull had it in his hand and was carefully examining it. The owl now spoke, and said that it was the skull of a distinguished negro lawyer of Timbuctoo, which a missionary had brought home with him on his return from Africa. Boneskull was delighted with this information. He purchased the skull, and always has it before him on his table. It affords him great pleasure to point out its intellectual developments as indicated by the b.u.mps. He says that an intellect once resided in that cranium equal to that of Clay, Webster, or Calhoun, and that its b.u.mps clearly demonstrate that the negro is the equal of the white man in mental capacity. The vender of this valuable specimen of craniology afterwards told me that it was the skull of an idiot who had died in the almshouse; but I did not believe him, for how could I doubt the veracity and intelligence of the bird of wisdom?"

Here the conversation was interrupted by the appearance of Botts and Perch, accompanied by Pate and Wiggins, and followed by Scipio, Hannibal, and Caesar carrying the baggage of the two former gentlemen.

Toney and his friends walked with them to the cars. On the way Wiggins and Botts got into a warm altercation, and the latter became much excited as Wiggins upbraided him with having shown the white feather when menaced by the landlord's cudgel.

"I tell you," exclaimed Botts, "I never uttered a word."

"You did," said Scipio, who was walking behind with a trunk on his shoulder.

"What's that you say?" shouted Botts, turning round and looking at Scipio with a most malignant aspect.

"Indeed, Ma.s.sa Botts," exclaimed Scipio, "I didn't say nothing."

"Botts begged!" said Hannibal. "Yaw! haw! haw!"

"Asked the women to save him from a beating!" said Caesar. "Yaw! haw!

haw!"

Botts stood glaring at the negroes like a ferocious wild beast. His ugly visage became absolutely frightful. Lifting up his cane, he suddenly charged on Caesar, who dropped the trunk he was carrying and fled with precipitation, followed by Scipio and Hannibal. Botts followed the fugitives, bellowing out oaths and brandishing his cane until they reached the hotel, when they darted into the bas.e.m.e.nt-story, and hid themselves in some place of refuge.

The landlord was standing on the veranda of the hotel, and behold Scipio and his comrades flying before the infuriated Botts. He turned white with rage and roared out, in a tone of thunder, "Making another muss, are you? Can't you be off without raising a row with my negroes? I'll settle with you, now there are no petticoats to protect you." And the landlord rushed into the house for his cudgel. Botts, having put Scipio, Hannibal, and Caesar to flight, had glory enough for one day, and without waiting to encounter another antagonist, hastily returned to his companions. Pate and Perch were in great agitation, while Toney and Tom were convulsed with laughter. The Professor stood quietly looking on with a grave and serious aspect. After relieving himself by the discharge of a quant.i.ty of profanity, Botts was somewhat pacified by Pate. The trunks were loaded on a wheelbarrow by a st.u.r.dy Hibernian, and conveyed to their place of destination; and Perch and his companion, bidding their friends an affectionate farewell, entered a car and were soon wafted away from the beautiful town of Bella Vista.

Pate and Wiggins returned to the hotel, while Toney, Tom, and the Professor sauntered around until a train of cars stopped, and three daintily dressed young men got out. These gentlemen all recognized Toney Belton, and were introduced by him to his friends as Messrs. Love, Dove, and Bliss.

CHAPTER XIV.

After an interchange of salutations, Dove, who was a little man, about five feet three inches in height, most elaborately dressed, tapped the toe of his highly polished French boot with an elegant cane, so fragile that it seemed to have been constructed for the purpose of beating off b.u.t.terflies and other annoying insects, and then asked after M. T. Pate, and inquired the way to the hotel. Having received satisfactory information from Toney in response to his inquiries, he took Love by the arm, and, followed by Bliss, proceeded up the street.