"
He had been assisting in a regal spree with those parties for hours.
We dragged him away, and put him into bed.
Of course there was no school report in the Union, and Boggs held me
accountable, though I was innocent of any intention or desire to compass
its absence from that paper, and was as sorry as any one that the
misfortune had occurred. But we were perfectly friendly.
The day the next school report was due the proprietor of the Tennessee
Mine furnished us a buggy, and asked us to go down and write something
about the property--a very common request, and one always gladly acceded
to when people furnished buggies, for we were as fond of pleasure
excursions as other people.
The "mine" was a hole in the ground ninety feet deep, and no way of
getting down into it but by holding on to a rope and being lowered with a
windlass.
The workmen had just gone off somewhere to dinner.
I was not strong enough to lower Boggs's bulk, so I took an unlighted
candle in my teeth, made a loop for my foot in the end of the rope,
implored Boggs not to go to sleep or let the windlass get the start of
him, and then swung out over the shaft.
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