Toby Tyler

Toby Tyler, by James Otis

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Title: Toby Tyler
Author: James Otis
Release Date: February, 2005 [EBook #7478] [This file was first
posted on May 8, 2003]
Edition: 10

Language: English
Character set encoding: US-ASCII
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, TOBY
TYLER ***

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TOBY TYLER
or
Ten Weeks with a Circus
by James Otis

I: TOBY'S INTRODUCTION TO THE CIRCUS
"Wouldn't you give more 'n six peanuts for a cent?" was a question
asked by a very small boy, with big, staring eyes, of a candy vender at a
circus booth. And as he spoke he looked wistfully at the quantity of
nuts piled high up on the basket, and then at the six, each of which now
looked so small as he held them in his hand.
"Couldn't do it," was the reply of the proprietor of the booth, as he put
the boy's penny carefully away in the drawer.
The little fellow looked for another moment at his purchase, and then
carefully cracked the largest one.
A shade -- and a very deep shade it was -- of disappointment passed
over his face, and then, looking up anxiously, he asked, "Don't you
swap 'em when they're bad?"

The man's face looked as if a smile had been a stranger to it for a long
time; but one did pay it a visit just then, and he tossed the boy two nuts,
and asked him a question at the same time. "What is your name?"
The big brown eyes looked up for an instant, as if to learn whether the
question was asked in good faith, and then their owner said, as he
carefully picked apart another nut, "Toby Tyler."
"Well, that's a queer name."
"Yes, I s'pose so, myself; but, you see, I don't expect that's the name
that belongs to me. But the fellers call me so, an' so does Uncle Dan'l."
"Who is Uncle Daniel?" was the next question. In the absence of other
customers the man seemed disposed to get as much amusement out of
the boy as possible.
"He hain't my uncle at all; I only call him so because all the boys do,
an' I live with him."
"Where's your father and mother?"
"I don't know," said Toby, rather carelessly. "I don't know much about
'em, an' Uncle Dan'l says they don't know much about me. Here's
another bad nut; goin' to give me two more?"
The two nuts were given him, and he said, as he put them in his pocket
and turned over and over again those which he held in his hand: "I
shouldn't wonder if all of these was bad. S'posen you give me two for
each one of 'em before I crack 'em, an' then they won't be spoiled so
you can't sell 'em again."
As this offer of barter was made, the man looked amused, and he asked,
as he counted out the number which Toby desired, "If I give you these,
I suppose you'll want me to give you two more for each one, and you'll
keep that kind of a trade going until you get my whole stock?"
"I won't open my head if every one of em's bad."

"All right; you can keep what you've got, and I'll give you these besides;
but I don't want you to buy any more, for I don't want to do that kind of
business."
Toby took the nuts offered, not in the least abashed, and seated himself
on a convenient stone to eat them, and at the same time to see all that
was going on around him. The coming of a circus to the little town of
Guilford was an event, and Toby had hardly thought of anything else
since the highly colored posters had first been put up. It was yet quite