stole the apples of a total stranger. The story was so good that I have often wondered whom Mr. Webster got to write it for him.
The old man, it seems, at first told the boy that he had better come down, as there was a draught in the tree; but the young sass-box—apple-sassbox, I presume—told him to avaunt.
At last the old man said, "Come down, honey. I am afraid the limb will break if you don't." Then, as the boy still remained, he told him that those were not eating-apples, that they were just common cooking-apples, and that there were worms in them. But the boy said he didn't mind a little thing like that. So then the old gentleman got irritated, and called the dog, and threw turf at the boy, and at last saluted him with pieces of turf and decayed cabbages; and after the lad had gone away the old man pried the bull-dog's jaws open and found a mouthful of pantaloons and a freckle.
I do not tell this, of course, in Mr. Webster's language, but I give the main points as they recur now to my mind.
Though I have been a close student of Mr. Webster for years and have carefully examined his style, I am free to say that his ideas about writing a book are not the same as mine. Of course it is a great temptation for a young author to write a book that will have a large sale; but that should not be all. We should have a higher
