"That's encouraging, I'm sure," said Mrs. Hopkins, drily.
There was no pie on the table, as Sam noticed, to his regret. However, he was pretty full when he rose from the table.
"Now, Samuel, you may come along with me," said the deacon, putting on his hat.
Sam followed him out to the barn, where, in one corner, were kept the hoes, rakes, and other farming implements in use.
"Here's a hoe for you," said the deacon.
"What are we going to do?" asked Sam.
"The potatoes need hoeing. Did you ever hoe potatoes?"
"No."
"You'll l'arn. It aint hard."
The field was some, little distance from the house, – a two-acre lot wholly devoted to potatoes.
"I guess we'll begin at the further corner," said the deacon. "Come along."
When they had reached the part of the field specified, the deacon stopped.
"Now," said he, "just see how I do it;" and he carefully hoed around one of the hills.
"There, you see it's easy."
"I guess I can do it. Are you goin to stay here?"
"No, I've got to go to the village, to the blacksmith's. I'll be back in about two hours. Jest hoe right along that row, and then come back again on the next. Do you understand?"
"Yes," said Sam.
"I want you to work as spry as you can, so's to make up for lost time."
"What time do you have dinner?" asked our hero.
"You aint hungry so quick, be you?"
"No, but I shall be bimeby. I thought I'd like to know when to quit work, and go to dinner."
"I'll be back before that. You needn't worry about that."
The deacon turned, and directed his steps homeward.
As long as he was in sight Sam worked with tolerable speed. But when the tall and stooping figure had disappeared from view he rested, and looked around him.
"It'll be a sight of work to hoe all them potatoes," he said to himself. "I wonder if the old man expects me to do the whole. It'll be a tough job."
Sam leisurely hoed another hill.
"It's gettin' hot," he said. "Why don't they have trees to give shade?
Then it would be more comfortable."
He hoed another hill, taking a little longer time.
"I guess there must be a million hills," he reflected, looking around him thoughtfully. "It'll take me from now till next winter to hoe 'em all."
At the rate Sam was working, his calculation of the time it would take him was not far out probably.
He finished another hill.
Just then a cat, out on a morning walk, chanced to pass through the field a few rods away. Now Sam could never see a cat without wanting to chase it, – a fact which would have led the cat, had she been aware of it, to give him a wide berth. But, unluckily, Sam saw her.
"Scat!" he exclaimed, and, grasping his hoe, he ran after puss.
The cat took alarm, and, climbing the wall which separated the potato-field from the next, sped over it in terror. Sam followed with whoops and yells, which served to accelerate her speed. Occasionally he picked up a stone, and threw at her, and once he threw the hoe in the excitement of his chase. But four legs proved more than a match for two, and finally he was obliged to give it up, but not till he had run more than quarter of a mile. He sat down to rest on a rock, and soon another boy came up, with a fishing-pole over his shoulder.
"What are you doing, Sam?" he asked.
"I've been chasin' a cat," said Sam.
"Didn't catch her, did you?"
"No, hang it."
"Where'd you get that hoe?"
"I'm to work for Deacon Hopkins. He's took me. Where are you goin?"
"A-fishing."
"I wish I could go."
"So do I. I'd like company."
"Where are you goin to fish?"
"In a brook close by, down at the bottom of this field."
"I'll go and look on a minute or two. I guess there isn't any hurry about them potatoes."
The minute or two lengthened to an hour and a half, when Sam roused himself from his idle mood, and shouldering his hoe started for the field where he had been set to work.
It was full time. The deacon was there before him, surveying with angry look the half-dozen hills, which were all that his young assistant had thus far hoed.
"Now there'll be a fuss," thought Sam, and he was not far out in that calculation.
CHAPTER VI.
SAM'S SUDDEN SICKNESS
"Where have you been, you young scamp?" demanded the deacon, wrathfully.
"I just went away a minute or two," said Sam, abashed.
"A minute or two!" ejaculated the deacon.
"It may have been more," said Sam. "You see I aint got no watch to tell time by."
"How comes it that you have only got through six hills all the morning?" said the deacon, sternly.
"Well, you see, a cat came along – " Sam began to explain.
"What if she did?" interrupted the deacon. "She didn't stop your work, did she?"
"Why, I thought I'd chase her out of the field."
"What for?"
"I thought she might scratch up some of the potatoes," said Sam, a brilliant excuse dawning upon him.
"How long did it take you to chase her out of the field, where she wasn't doing any harm?"
"I was afraid she'd come back, so I chased her a good ways."
"Did you catch her?"
"No, but I drove her away. I guess she won't come round here again," said Sam, in the tone of one who had performed a virtuous action.
"Did you come right back?"
"I sat down to rest. You see I was pretty tired with running so fast."
"If you didn't run any faster than you have worked, a snail would catch you in half a minute," said the old man, with justifiable sarcasm. "Samuel, your excuse is good for nothing. I must punish you."
Sam stood on his guard, prepared to run if the deacon should make hostile demonstrations. But his guardian was not a man of violence, and did not propose to inflict blows. He had another punishment in view suited to Sam's particular case.
"I'll go right to work," said Sam, seeing that no violence was intended, and hoping to escape the punishment threatened, whatever it might be.
"You'd better," said the deacon.
Our hero (I am afraid he has not manifested any heroic qualities as yet) went to work with remarkable energy, to the imminent danger of the potato-tops, which he came near uprooting in several instances.
"Is this fast enough?" he asked.
"It'll do. I'll take the next row, and we'll work along together. Take care, – I don't want the potatoes dug up."
They kept it up for an hour or more, Sam working more steadily, probably, than he had ever done before in his life. He began to think it was no joke, as he walked from hill to hill, keeping up with the deacon's steady progress.
"There aint much fun about this," he thought. "I don't like workin' on a farm. It's awful tiresome."
"What's the use of hoein' potatoes?" he asked, after a while. "Won't they grow just as well without it?"
"No," said the deacon.
"I