A BOY'S EXPERIENCE WITH TAR MARBLES.

By C.S.N.

Almost all boys, at some period of their lives, devote their spare time to playing with marbles, and I certainly was not unlike other boys in this respect. My fondness for marbles began very early, and when I was about seven years old led me into a curious experience, which I am about to relate. A great rivalry for acquiring marbles had suddenly arisen at that time among the boys of the town, and to possess as many of the little round beauties as my oldest brother owned, soon became the desire of my heart and the height of my ambition.

I had already obtained a large number, when one day I overheard my oldest brother telling one of his schoolmates that he had made the important discovery that marbles could be formed from coal-tar, of which there was a large quantity on a certain street in a distant part of the town. He did not condescend to explain the process of manufacture, but he showed the marbles he had made,—black, round, and glossy. The sight inspired me with ardent desire to possess an unlimited quantity.

My brother told me just where the coveted treasure was to be found, and, in the afternoon, I started off, without confiding to any one my intention, to find the spot and lay in a supply of the raw material, which I could convert into marbles at my leisure. Delightful visions of bags filled with treasure, dancing through my brain, hastened the rate of my speed almost to a run, before I arrived at the goal of my hopes. It was a very hot July afternoon, and I was in a violent heat; but the sight of the heaps of coal-tar put all thoughts of anything unpleasant quite out of my head; it caused me to forget also that I had on a suit of new clothes, of which I had been cautioned by my mother to be extremely careful.

I need hardly remark that I was not very well acquainted with the substance I was handling, and my only idea of its qualities was, that it could be molded into any shape I pleased. I was not aware that it has all the qualities of ordinary tar,—melts with heat, and becomes the toughest, stickiest, most unmanageable of substances with which a small boy can come into contact.

I fell to work to collect what I wanted to carry home. I filled the pockets of my pantaloons, and of my jacket, and lastly, when these were stuffed to their utmost capacity, I filled the crown of my hat so full that it would hardly go on my head. The place was at some distance from my home, and I did not wish to have to return immediately for more.

With a heart filled with triumph, I started off toward home. By this time I began to realize that the weather was not cool. It had been a long walk, and I was pretty tired, but I was also in a great hurry to begin making marbles, so I walked as fast as I could. After a little time I began to be sensible of a disagreeable feeling of stickiness about my waist, and a slight trickling sensation in the region of the knees.

A cloud not bigger than a man's hand flitted across my horizon,—perhaps coal-tar might melt?

I resolved to ascertain; and, like the famous old woman with her "yard of black pudding," I very soon found it was much easier to obtain what I wanted, than to know what to do with it when I had it. A very slight inspection of my pockets satisfied me that coal-tar was capable of becoming liquid, and, if I needed further evidence, the sable rivulets that began to meander down the sides of my face gave ample corroboration of the fact. I tried to take off my hat, but it would not come.

I looked down at my new trousers with feelings of dismay. Ominous spots of a dismal hue were certainly growing larger. I tried to get the tar out of my pockets, but only succeeded in covering my hands with the black, unmanageable stuff, which at that moment I regarded as one of those inventions of the devil, to entrap little boys, of which I had often been warned, but to which I had given no heed. If it was a trap, I was certainly caught; there was no doubt of that. But I was not without some pluck, and in my case, as in that of many another brave, my courage in facing the present calamity was aided by my fear of another still more to be dreaded.

"I LOOKED DOWN AT MY NEW TROUSERS WITH DISMAY."

That I should get a whipping for spoiling my new suit, if I could not manage to get the tar off, I was quite certain, and I had had no permission to go from home, and on the whole the outlook was not cheerful in that direction. Quite driven to desperation, I seated myself on the ground, and tried to scrape off the black spots, which had now extended to formidable dimensions; while I could feel small streams coming down inside of the collar of my shirt, and causing rather singular suggestions of a rope around my neck. My labor was all in vain. I got a good deal off, but there seemed to be an inexhaustible quantity on. I gave it up in despair, and burst into uncontrollable sobs. The flow of tears thinned the lava-like fluid, and it now resembled ink, which covered my face like a veil; but in the extremity of my anguish a hope dawned upon me. I found that I could wipe off with my hand this thinner solution, and if water would do it, water was plenty, and I would wash it off. A cousin of mine lived not very far off, and I knew that in the yard of her house there was a pump. Inspired by this idea, I set off at a run, and did not slacken my pace until I reached the spot. Here another difficulty met me. I could not reach the handle of the pump so as to get the benefit of the stream from its mouth, and it was only a complete shower-bath that would restore me to respectability. I set to work to find a rope, and fastened together quite a complicated piece of machinery, as I thought, by which I managed to pump the ice-cold water upon my devoted head. The effect was not as immediate as I had hoped. But I had faith if a little was good, more must be better. Creak—creak—creak—went the pump-handle, which did more work that afternoon than in half a dozen days' washing.

Creak—creak—creak! But the tar only became harder and harder, until I was encased in sheet-armor, like the famous Black Knight. Presently, my cousin Jenny, an especial friend of mine, hearing such continual pumping, and becoming anxious for the family supply of water, came out to see what was the matter. Seeing a small figure curled up under the spout of the pump, drenched to the skin and black as Othello, she stooped down to investigate the phenomenon. Oh, what was my despair when she discovered who it was, and in what plight!

To say she laughed would be to give a feeble idea of the peals of laughter that succeeded each other as she stood and looked at me. She would try to control her merriment for a moment, only to break forth afresh, until she was obliged to sit down from sheer exhaustion. Every time she glanced at my woe-begone countenance, and drenched condition, she would go into fresh convulsions of fun. At last she recovered breath enough to inquire into my case, and to assure me she would do what she could for me; but she soon found, to my despair, that what she could do was not much to my relief. The clothes could not be got off, and certainly they could never be got clean. She did manage, with a strong pair of shears, to cut off the pockets in my breeches, and then, fearing my mother would be alarmed, she bade me go home, and she would promise to secure me against a whipping.

I fancy she thought this last promise would be easily kept.

Somewhat comforted, I took up my line of march toward the paternal roof, but, as I went along, my heart began to sink again; visions of a rod, with which my not too saintly character had made me somewhat familiar, loomed up before me; but worse than all, the thought of my brother's ridicule made my sensitive spirit quail. I thought I would evade all for that night, however, by going quietly up the back stairs, going to bed, and "playing sick." Fortune favored me. I reached the bedroom without being seen; and, just as I was, with my hat on, for it could only have come off with my scalp, I got into bed, and covered myself entirely up with the bed-clothes. It was now dusk, and I felt for the moment quite safe. Presently my aunt came into the room to get something for which she was looking, and I could hear her give several inquiring sniffs, and as she went out I heard her say: "I certainly do smell tar; where can it come from?" An interval of peace followed, and then in came my mother. "Tar? Smell tar? Of course you do; it's strong enough in this room. Bring a light."

"I COVERED MYSELF WITH THE BED-CLOTHES."

It was the sound of doom!

My mother soon came close up to the bed, and held the light so that it fell full upon me as she tried to turn down the bed-clothing. Probably, if it had not been for several previous scrapes in which I had been involved, she would have been much frightened; but as it was, the sight of her young blackamoor had much the same effect upon her as upon my cousin. Her exclamations and shrieks of laughter brought every member of the household successively to the room, and as one after another came in, fresh zest seemed to be given to the merriment of which I was the unfortunate victim.

But every renewal of the fun was an added agony to me, for I clearly foresaw that it would be rehearsed by Jack and Tom to all the boys in the neighborhood. Beside this, I was not in a condition to be hilarious. Plastered with tar from head to foot; streaming with perspiration at every pore; my clothes drenched; my hair matted together, and my straw hat, soaked with water, fastened upon it, and falling limp and wet about my eyes; I was not rendered more comfortable by the fact that I could not move without taking pillow and bed-clothes with me, as, in my desperate desire to conceal myself from view, I had become enwrapped in the bed-clothing like a caterpillar in its chrysalis; and I was conscious of a dim fear that if I sat up, with the pillow stuck fast on the top of my hat, the sight of me might produce fatal results upon the already exhausted family.

At last the point was reached where I thought patience ceased to be a virtue, and I rebelled against being any longer made a spectacle.

I declared if they would all go away but mother, I would tell her all about it. The crowd retired, commissioned to send up a crock of butter, a tub of hot water, and a pair of shears. Maternal love is strong, but I doubt if it was often put to a severer test of its long-suffering than was that of my mother that night.

THE SHOWER-BATH.

Suffice it to say that, after my clothes had been cut to ribbons, the sheets torn up, my head well-nigh shaved, and my whole person subjected first to an African bath of melted butter, and afterward to one of hot soap-suds, I had had my fill of bathing for one day, and was, shortly before midnight, pronounced to be tolerably clean.

P.S.—I never made any marbles of coal-tar.