Jink's Inside

I had rather be an amanuensis of the Infinite God, as it is my privilege literally to be, than a slave to the fordhlated rules of any rhetorician, or to the opinions of any critic. Oh, the people, the people over and over Let me give something to them that will lighten the every-day struggles of our common life something that will add a little sweetness here, a little hope there something that will make more thoughtful, kind, and gentle this thoughtless, animal-natured man something that will awaken into activity the dormant powers of this timid, shrinking little woman,-powers that when awakened will be irresistible in their influence and that will surprise even herself. Let me give something that will lead each one to the knowledge of the divinity of every human soul something that will lead each one to the conscious realization of his own di ainity, with all its attendant riches, and glories, and powers-let me succeed in doing this, and I can then well afford to be careless as to whether the critics praise or whether they blame. If it is blame, then under these circumstances it is as the crackling of a few dead sticEs on the ground below compared to the matchless music that the soft spring gale is breathing through the great pine forest. RALPH W ALDOT RINE. CHAPTER ONE Jinks turned the corner that led from Paradise Alley into the street on a run, his hands thrust deep within his ragged pockets, the tattered cap he wore perched so far back on his red head it seemed to be sitting on space, for visible anchorage it had none. His mouth was wide open, and his voice, high and sweet, sent a ringing, Who-0-0, Who-o-e-e echoing down the quiet street. - Just at that moment from the opposite direction came the Dog, fleeing as fast as three, frightdriven feet could bring him,-his pink tongue hanging out, the little heart of him almost bursting the silky brown sides, so wildly was it pounding from terror and fatigue. Around the corner he whirled, landing right in the midst of the astonished boy. Straight between Jinks feet he ran,-a panting, brown streak. Right into the snow went the glowing red head, the brown dog serving as an animated cushion to break the fall. The tattered cap skipped nimbly from its precarious perch, and after several giddy gyrations settled down cosily in a drift near a lamp post. The sudden encounter knocked all the breath out of both boy and dog. It also knocked something new and strange into the boy. As he sat up on the pavement spitting the soft snow out of his mouth, and wiping it off his face with his sleeve, Jinks felt a faint stir under the front of his ragged-jacket,-a queer, warm stir it was, that made him suddenly acutely conscious of a newly sprouted liking for dogs,-silky brown dogs especially. For a second the boy sat motionless in the snow, staring with lively curiosity at the quivering, gasping little creature before him. I say, he grinned at last, reaching out a dirty, red hand to pat the brown head. Aint you just the very bungedupest little cuss ever I did see I am that acquiesced the dog, his mournful whimper broken in the middle by a pitiful gasp for the breath so recently knocked out of him...