CHAPTER I.
YOU don't know about me without you have read a book by the name of TheAdventures of Tom Sawyer; but that ain't no matter. ?That book was madeby Mr. Mark Twain, and he told the truth, mainly. ?There was thingswhich he stretched, but mainly he told the truth. ?That is nothing. ?Inever seen anybody but lied one time or another, without it was AuntPolly, or the widow, or maybe Mary. ?Aunt Polly--Tom's Aunt Polly, sheis--and Mary, and the Widow Douglas is all told about in that book, whichis mostly a true book, with some stretchers, as I said before.
Now the way that the book winds up is this: ?Tom and me found the moneythat the robbers hid in the cave, and it made us rich. ?We got sixthousand dollars apiece--all gold. ?It was an awful sight of money whenit was piled up. ?Well, Judge Thatcher he took it and put it outat interest, and it fetched us a dollar a day apiece all the yearround--more than a body could tell what to do with. ?The Widow Douglasshe took me for her son, and allowed she would sivilize me; but it wasrough living in the house all the time, considering how dismal regularand decent the widow was in all her ways; and so when I couldn't standit no longer I lit out. ?I got into my old rags and my sugar-hogsheadagain, and was free and satisfied. ?But Tom Sawyer he hunted me up andsaid he was going to start a band of robbers, and I might join if Iwould go back to the widow and be respectable. ?So I went back.
The widow she cried over me, and called me a poor lost lamb, and shecalled me a lot of other names, too, but she never meant no harm byit. She put me in them new clothes again, and I couldn't do nothing butsweat and sweat, and feel all cramped up. ?Well, then, the old thingcommenced again. ?The widow rung a bell for supper, and you had to cometo time. When you got to the table you couldn't go right to eating, butyou had to wait for the widow to tuck down her head and grumble a littleover the victuals, though there warn't really anything the matter withthem,--that is, nothing only everything was cooked by itself. ?In abarrel of odds and ends it is different; things get mixed up, and thejuice kind of swaps around, and the things go better.
After supper she got out her book and learned me about Moses and theBulrushers, and I was in a sweat to find out all about him; but by andby she let it out that Moses had been dead a considerable long time; sothen I didn't care no more about him, because I don't take no stock indead people.
Pretty soon I wanted to smoke, and asked the widow to let me. ?But shewouldn't. ?She said it was a mean practice and wasn't clean, and I musttry to not do it any more. ?That is just the way with some people. ?Theyget down on a thing when they don't know nothing about it. ?Here she wasa-bothering about Moses, which was no kin to her, and no use to anybody,being gone, you see, yet finding a power of fault with me for doing athing that had some good in it. ?And she took snuff, too; of course thatwas all right, because she done it herself.
Her sister, Miss Watson, a tolerable slim old maid, with goggles on,had just come to live with her, and took a set at me now with aspelling-book. She worked me middling hard for about an hour, and thenthe widow made her ease up. ?I couldn't stood it much longer. ?Then foran hour it was deadly dull, and I was fidgety. ?Miss Watson would say,"Don't put your feet up there, Huckleberry;" and "Don't scrunch uplike that, Huckleberry--set up straight;" and pretty soon she wouldsay, "Don't gap and stretch like that, Huckleberry--why don't you try tobehave?" ?Then she told me all about the bad place, and I said I wishedI was there. She got mad then, but I didn't mean no harm. ?All I wantedwas to go somewheres; all I wanted was a change, I warn't particular.?She said it was wicked to say what I said; said she wouldn't say it forthe whole world; she was going to live so as to go to the good place.?Well, I couldn't see no advantage in going where she was going, so Imade up my mind I wouldn't try for it. ?But I never said so, because itwould only make trouble, and wouldn't do no good.
Now she had got a start, and she went on and told me all about the goodplace. ?She said all a body would have to do there was to go around allday long with a harp and sing, forever and ever. ?So I didn't thinkmuch of it. But I never said so. ?I asked her if she reckoned Tom Sawyerwould go there, and she said not by a considerable sight. ?I was gladabout that, because I wanted him and me to be together.
Miss Watson she kept pecking at me, and it got tiresome and lonesome.?By and by they fetched the niggers in and had prayers, and theneverybody was off to bed. ?I went up to my room with a piece of candle,and put it on the table. ?Then I set down in a chair by the window andtried to think of something cheerful, but it warn't no use. ?I feltso lonesome I most wished I was dead. ?The stars were shining, and theleaves rustled in the woods ever so mournful; and I heard an owl, awayoff, who-whooing about somebody that was dead, and a whippowill and adog crying about somebody that was going to die; and the wind was tryingto whisper something to me, and I couldn't make out what it was, and soit made the cold shivers run over me. Then away out in the woods I heardthat kind of a sound that a ghost makes when it wants to tell aboutsomething that's on its mind and can't make itself understood, and socan't rest easy in its grave, and has to go about that way every nightgrieving. ?I got so down-hearted and scared I did wish I had somecompany. ?Pretty soon a spider went crawling up my shoulder, and Iflipped it off and it lit in the candle; and before I could budge itwas all shriveled up. ?I didn't need anybody to tell me that that wasan awful bad sign and would fetch me some bad luck, so I was scaredand most shook the clothes off of me. I got up and turned around in mytracks three times and crossed my breast every time; and then I tiedup a little lock of my hair with a thread to keep witches away. ?ButI hadn't no confidence. ?You do that when you've lost a horseshoe thatyou've found, instead of nailing it up over the door, but I hadn't everheard anybody say it was any way to keep off bad luck when you'd killeda spider.
I set down again, a-shaking all over, and got out my pipe for a smoke;for the house was all as still as death now, and so the widow wouldn'tknow. Well, after a long time I heard the clock away off in the towngo boom--boom--boom--twelve licks; and all still again--stiller thanever. Pretty soon I heard a twig snap down in the dark amongst thetrees--something was a stirring. ?I set still and listened. ?Directly Icould just barely hear a "me-yow! me-yow!" down there. ?That was good!?Says I, "me-yow! me-yow!" as soft as I could, and then I put out thelight and scrambled out of the window on to the shed. ?Then I slippeddown to the ground and crawled in among the trees, and, sure enough,there was Tom Sawyer waiting for me.