TOM SAWYER ABROAD

reckoned it would come out all right, so we went on

steering east, but went up on a higher level so we

wouldn’t hit any steeples or mountains in the dark.

It was my watch till midnight, and then it was Jim’s;

but Tom stayed up, because he said ship captains done

that when they was making the land, and didn’t stand

no regular watch.

Well, when daylight come, Jim give a shout, and we

jumped up and looked over, and there was the land

sure enough — land all around, as far as you could see,

and perfectly level and yaller. We didn’t know how

long we’d been over it. There warn’t no trees, nor

hills, nor rocks, nor towns, and Tom and Jim had took

it for the sea. They took it for the sea in a dead

ca’m; but we was so high up, anyway, that if it had

been the sea and rough, it would ‘a’ looked smooth, all

the same, in the night, that way.

We was all in a powerful excitement now, and

grabbed the glasses and hunted everywheres for Lon-

don, but couldn’t find hair nor hide of it, nor any

other settlement — nor any sign of a lake or a river,

either. Tom was clean beat. He said it warn’t his

notion of England; he thought England looked like

America, and always had that idea. So he said we

better have breakfast, and then drop down and inquire

the quickest way to London. We cut the breakfast

pretty short, we was so impatient. As we slanted

along down, the weather began to moderate, and

pretty soon we shed our furs. But it kept ON moder-

ating, and in a precious little while it was ‘most too

moderate. We was close down now, and just blistering!

We settled down to within thirty foot of the land —

that is, it was land if sand is land; for this wasn’t any-

thing but pure sand. Tom and me clumb down the

ladder and took a run to stretch our legs, and it felt

amazing good — that is, the stretching did, but the

sand scorched our feet like hot embers. Next, we see

somebody coming, and started to meet him; but we

heard Jim shout, and looked around and he was fairly

dancing, and making signs, and yelling. We couldn’t

make out what he said, but we was scared anyway, and

begun to heel it back to the balloon. When we got

close enough, we understood the words, and they

made me sick:

“Run! Run fo’ yo’ life! Hit’s a lion; I kin see

him thoo de glass! Run, boys; do please heel it de

bes’ you kin. He’s bu’sted outen de menagerie, en

dey ain’t nobody to stop him!”

It made Tom fly, but it took the stiffening all out of

my legs. I could only just gasp along the way you do

in a dream when there’s a ghost gaining on you.

Tom got to the ladder and shinned up it a piece and

waited for me; and as soon as I got a foothold on it

he shouted to Jim to soar away. But Jim had clean

lost his head, and said he had forgot how. So Tom

shinned along up and told me to follow; but the lion

was arriving, fetching a most ghastly roar with every

lope, and my legs shook so I dasn’t try to take one of

them out of the rounds for fear the other one would

give way under me.

But Tom was aboard by this time, and he started the

balloon up a little, and stopped it again as soon as the

end of the ladder was ten or twelve feet above ground.

And there was the lion, a-ripping around under me,

and roaring and springing up in the air at the ladder,

and only missing it about a quarter of an inch, it

seemed to me. It was delicious to be out of his reach,

perfectly delicious, and made me feel good and thank-

ful all up one side; but I was hanging there helpless

and couldn’t climb, and that made me feel perfectly

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49

Leave a Reply 0

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *