The Huge Hunter | Page 5

feller 'bout it?'
'Not now; I haven't time.'
As the steam horse was to rest for the present, he was 'put up.' The engineer opened
several cavities in his legs and breast, and different parts of his body, and examined the
machinery, carefully oiling the various portions, and when he had completed, he drew a
large oil skin from the wagon, which, being spread out, covered both it and the steam
man himself.
CHAPTER III.
A GENIUS.
HAVING PROGRESSED thus far in our story, or properly having began in the middle, it
is now necessary that we should turn back to the proper starting point.
Several years since a widow woman resided in the outskirts of St. Louis, whose name
was Brainerd. Her husband had been a mechanic, noted for his ingenuity, but was killed
some five years before by the explosion of a steam boiler. He left behind him a son,
hump-backed, dwarfed, but with an amiable disposition that made him a favorite with all
with whom he came in contact.
If nature afflicts in one direction she frequently makes amends in another direction, and
this dwarf, small and misshapen as he was, was gifted with a most wonderful mind. His
mechanical ingenuity bordered on the marvelous. When he went to school, he was a
general favorite with teachers and pupils. The former loved him for his sweetness of
disposition, and his remarkable proficiency in all studies, while the latter based their
affection chiefly upon the fact that he never refused to assist any of them at their tasks,
while with the pocket-knife which he carried he constructed toys which were their delight.
Sonia of these were so curious and amusing that, had they been securer by letters patent,
they would have brought a competency to him and his widowed mother.
But Johnny never thought of patenting them, although the principal support of himself
and mother came from one or two patents, which his father had secured upon inventions,
not near the equal of his.
There seemed no limit to his inventive powers. He made a locomotive and then a
steamboat, perfect in every part, even to the minutest, using nothing but his knife,
hammer, and a small chisel. Ho constructed a clock with his jack-knife, which kept
perfect time, and the articles which he made were wonderfully stared at at fairs, and in
show windows, while Johnny modestly pegged away at some new idea. He became a

master of the art of telegraphy without assistance from any one using merely a common
school philosophy with which to acquire the alphabet. He then made a couple of batteries,
ran a line from his window to a neighbor's, insulating it by means of the necks of some
bottles, taught the other boy the alphabet, and thus they amused themselves sending
messages back and forth.
Thus matters progressed until he was fifteen years of ago, when he came home one day,
and lay down on the settee by his mother, and gave a great sigh.
'What is the matter?' she inquired. 'I want to make something.'
'Why, then, don't you make it?'
'Because I don't know what it shall be; I've fixed up everything I can think of.'
'And you are like Alexander, sighing for more worlds to conquer. Is that it?'
'Not exactly, for there is plenty for one to do, if I could only find out what it is.'
'Have you ever made a balloon?' The boy laughed.
'You were asking for the cat the other day, and wondering what had become of her. I
didn't tell you that the last I saw of her was through the telescope, she being about two
miles up in the clouds, and going about fifty miles an hour.'
'I thought you looked as though you knew something about her,' replied the mother,
trying to speak reprovingly, and yet smiling in spite of herself.
'Can't you tell me something to make?' finally asked the boy.
'Yes; there is something I have often thought of, and wonder why it was not made long
ago; but you are not smart enough to do it, Johnny.'
'Maybe not; but tell me what it is.'
'It is a man that shall go by steam!' The boy lay still several minutes without speaking a
word and then sprung up. 'By George! I'll do it!' And he started out of the room, and was
not seen again until night. His mother felt no anxiety. She was pleased; for, when her boy
was at work, he was happy, and she knew that he had enough now, to keep him engaged
for months to come.
So it proved. He spent several weeks in thought, before be made the first effort toward
constructing his greatest success of all. He then enlarged his workshop,