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"Drum, de drum, drum, drum, Come let us join,
Do, de, dro, dro, drum our cheerful songs,
Drum, drum, drum, dro, de dro drum, with angels
Dro, dro, dro, round the throne."

Bill had just fired up his pipe, and was preparing for a good cruise against Old Time, Hard Luck, and Dame Fortune. Boyce, the "author of Blamstown, a novel," had unrolled his musty and undecipherable manuscript, and, leaning over a chest, was carefully reading it, as he alone could read it, and at the same time soaked a hard crust in harder cider, thus essaying to feed at the same time both soul and body. (Poor Alanson, his last manuscript would not sell. "The Trade" refused to take the risk, and its author being too poor to print it himself, retired first to a small third-story room, where he lived cheap, and then to a garret where he lived on -- nothing. Driven thence by a remorseless landlord, he finally took out into the country, roving here and there, wandering about until he at last fell within the limits of Crampton, and the "authorities" took him in a very weak and half-starved condition to the poor-house. Here he has been for two or three years, no publisher appearing to print his last work, despite his former celebrity as the author of a work that run through ten editions in six months. Poor Alanson Boyce! He has spent his ten per cent. copyright, and now there is but "a wreck of him left behind." Accustomed to hard fare, he will not immediately "drop off," but he will gradually go down. He has got near the last round of his ladder. He is a tall, dark-eyed, slender-framed man of thirty. His black hair falls down over his face, hiding in part his sunken, shrivelled, and wan features, that still betray no ordinary intelligence. Boyce has seen better days, and came to America from England. When he walks, he bends over his staff and warily picks his way, lest the least obstruction should throw him down. His hand trembles violently as he lifts the glass to his lip, or conveys food to his mouth. His hat is broken, the buttons to his coat are worn through, the white lining of the elbow reveals itself, pants and shoes are seedy. He is moneyless, friendless -- nay, the girl named Roxy befriends him, and occasionally pats him on the cheek, gives him a cracker, picks up his cane, gives him her seat by the fire, begs him a cup of warm tea, and bids him "cheer up." Jims always loves to hear him read his "stories" from his papers, and takes his part against the churls of the establishment. The pious widow reads to him from her worn Bible -- so he is not wholly friendless. But the busy world has nearly forgotten him -- indeed few, if any of his readers and former admirers, know the first word of his present misery. Through the long, cold, and damp winter of forty, Boyce, the fine writer and agreeable gentleman of other days, dragged the weary months away in the poor-house of Crampton, a state pauper.) Some are walking here and there, or looking out of door or window. Blind Hetty threads her way through the dingy abode to seek aunt Prescott -- still Jims rouses not, nor seems to be any nearer the end of his sonorous sleep. Sweet is sleep, even to the poor and miserable vagrant. Sleep -- that boon of God to man universal. It comforts the weary, it restores the sick and drooping, it shortens the up-hill of life, it graduates human experiences for the time being, it obliterates present woes, and gives one strength for future ones.

We know not how much longer Jims might have slumbered, but for the approach of Dan -- surly, heavy-treading, hateful, prison-escaped Dan. He came on the errand of beating up and breaking up the quarters of Bill and Jims, by the mandate of Dick Bunce.

"Where's Bill?" said he, in a coarse, gruff tone, as he came to the door and encountered the girl Roxy.

"He's in," said she, dodging away from him. Dan looked after her with a frown, but she passed on without looking back.

"Bill," said he, "the team's ready."

"What's Bill care if 'tis?" inquired the sapient negro.

"Why, you'll just go with Dick and me and Jims."

"Where's Jims? Oh, I hear the brat 1 You'll go over to Savage's for a load; and so be up and stirring, old fellow, or the Captain himself'll be in your hair."

Poor old Bill grumbled bitterly to be ordered off just then, "but s'posed he must go." Dan passed on, and rousing Jims with a heavy kick, exclaimed --

"Get up here, you young scamp -- get off that blanket, you lazy cuss, or I'll tallow you. Don't you hear folks calling? If you don't get up in less than no time, I'll kick you into the fire where you'll finally go, if there is any. Hey?"

Jims was now thoroughly awake. Raising himself partly up, he encountered the fierce glare of Dan, who had so unceremoniously broken up his sleep, and for a moment quailed before it. But this was only for a moment. Springing to his feet, and staring back into the old pauper's eyes a fierceness equalling his own, he exclaimed --

"What do you want of me, old Brimstone, hey? Go to the devil, for all I care. Kick me, will you, old cider-drinker!"