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Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Chapter 38
Episode 3826th June 2023 • Bite at a Time Books • Bree Carlile
00:00:00 00:17:06

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Join Host Bree Carlile as she reads the thirty-eighth chapter of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

Come with us as we release one bite a day of one of your favorite classic novels, plays & short stories. Bree reads these classics like she reads to her daughter, one chapter a day. If you love books or audiobooks and want something to listen to as you're getting ready, driving to work, or as you're getting ready for bed, check out Bite at a Time Books!

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Transcripts

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Take a look and a buck and let's see what we can find.

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Take it chapter by chapter, one fight at a time so many adventures and mountains we can climb.

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Take it word for word like line.

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One bite at a time my name is Brie Carlyle and I love to read and wanted to share my passion with listeners like you.

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If you want to know what's coming next and vote on upcoming books, sign up for our newsletter at Bit at a Timebooks.com.

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You'll also find our new t shirts in the shop, including podcast shirts and quote shirts from your favorite classic novels.

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Be sure to follow my show on your favorite podcast platform so you get all the new episodes.

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You can find most of our links in the show notes, but also our website.

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Bite at a Timebooks.com includes all of the links for our show, including to our patreon to support the show, and YouTube, where we have special behind the narration of the episodes.

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We're part of the byte at a Time Books Productions network.

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If you'd also like to hear what inspired your favorite classic authors to write their novels and what was going on in the world at the time, check out the Bite at a Time Books Behind the Story podcast.

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Wherever you listen to podcasts, please note while we try to keep the text as close to the original as possible, some words have been changed to honor the marginalized communities who've identified the words as harmful and to stay in alignment with Bite at a Time book's brand values.

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Today we'll be continuing Adventures of Huckleberry.

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Finn by Mark Twain.

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Chapter 38 making them pins was a distressed tough job and so was the saw.

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And Jim allowed the inscription was going to be the toughest of all.

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That's the one which the prisoner has to scrabble on the wall.

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But he had to have it.

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Tom said he'd got to.

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There weren't no case of a state prisoner not scrabbling his inscription to leave behind.

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And his coat of arms.

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Look at Lady Jane Gray, he says.

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Look at Guilford Dudley.

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Look at Old Northumberland.

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Why, Huck, suppose it is considered trouble?

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What you going to do?

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How you going to get around it?

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Jim's got to do his inscription and coat of arms.

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They all do.

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Jim says, Why Mars, tom I ain't got no coat of arm.

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I ain't got nothing but dish year old shirt and you know that.

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I got to keep the journal on that.

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Oh, you don't understand, Jim.

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A coat of arms is very different.

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Well, I says, Jim's right anyway, when he says he ain't got no coat of arms because he ain't, I reckon I know that, Tom says, but you bet he'll have one before he goes out of this, because he's going out, right, and there ain't going to be no flaws in his record.

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So whilst me and Jim filed away at the pins on a brick brat apiece.

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Jim making his out of the brass, and I making mine out of the spoon.

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Tom set to work to think out the coat of arms.

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By and by.

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He said he'd struck so many good ones he didn't hardly know which to take.

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But there was one which he reckoned he'd decide on.

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He says on the scrunchie will have a bend or in the dexter base a saddle muri in the fess with a dog couched for common charge and under his foot a chain embattled for slavery with a chevron vert.

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And a chief engrailed and three invected lines on a field azure with the number of points rampant on a dance.

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It indented crest a runaway servant sable with his bundle over his shoulder on a bar sinister and a couple of ghouls for supporters, which is you and me.

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Motto maggiore.

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Freda minora otto.

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Got it out of a book.

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Means the more haste, the less speed.

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Gee Willikins, I says, but what does the rest of it mean?

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We ain't got no time to bother over that, he says.

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We got to dig in like all get out.

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Well, anyway, I says, what's some of it what's a fess?

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A fess a fess is you don't need to know what a fess is.

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I'll show him how to make it when he gets to it.

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Chucks tom, I says, I think you might tell a person what's a Bar sinister.

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Oh, I don't know.

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But he's got to have it all.

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The nobility does.

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That was just his way.

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If it didn't suit him to explain a thing to you, he wouldn't do it.

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You might pump at him a week, it wouldn't make no difference.

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He'd got all that coat of arms business fixed.

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So now he started in to finish up the rest of that part of the work, which was to plan out a mournful inscription said jim got to have one like they all done.

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He made up a lot and wrote them out on a paper and read them off so.

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One hear a captive heart busted two hear a poor prisoner forsook by the world and friends fretted his sorrowful life.

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Three hear a lonely heart broke and a worn spirit went to its rest after 37 years of solitary captivity.

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Four hear homeless and friendless after 37 years of bitter captivity perished a noble stranger, natural son of Louis XIV.

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Tom's voice trembled whilst he was reading them, and he most broke down when he got done.

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He couldn't no way make up his mind which one for Jim to scrabble onto the wall.

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It was also good, but at last he allowed he would let him scrabble them all on.

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Jim said it would take him a year to scrabble such a lot of truck onto the logs with a nail.

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And he didn't know how to make letters besides.

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But Tom said he would block them out for him and then he wouldn't have nothing to do but just follow the lines.

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Then pretty soon he says, come to think, the logs ain't going to do.

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They don't have log walls in a dungeon.

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We got to dig the inscriptions into a rock.

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We'll fetch a rock.

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Jim said the rock was worse than the logs.

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He said it would take him such a p*** and long time to dig them into a rock.

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He wouldn't ever get out, but Tom said he would let me help him do it.

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And he took a look to see how me and Jim was getting along with the pens.

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It was most pesky tedious, hard work and slow, and didn't give my hands no show to get well of the sores.

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And we didn't seem to make no headway, hardly.

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So Tom says, I know how to fix it.

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We got to have a rock for the coat of arms and mournful inscriptions, and we can kill two birds with that same rock.

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There's a gaudy big grindstone down at the mill and we'll smouch it and carve the things on it and file out the pins and the thaw on it, too.

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It weren't no slouch of an idea and it weren't no slouch of a grindstone another.

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But we allowed.

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We tackle it.

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It weren't quite midnight yet, so we cleared out for the mill, leaving Jim at work.

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We smoutched the grindstone and set out to roll her home.

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But it was most a nation tough job sometimes.

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Do what we could.

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We couldn't keep her from falling over.

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And she come mighty near mashing us every time.

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Tom said she was going to get one of us sure before we got through.

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We got her halfway and then we was plumb played out and most drowned with sweat.

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We see it weren't no use.

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We got to go and fetch Jim.

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So he raised up its bed and slid the chain off the bed leg and wrapped it round and round its neck.

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And we crawled out through our hole and down there.

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And Jim and me laid into that grindstone and walked her along like nothing.

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And Tom superintended.

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He could out superintend any boy I ever see.

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He knowed how to do everything.

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Our hole was pretty big, but it weren't big enough to get the grindstone through.

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But Jim, he took the pick and soon made it big enough.

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Then Tom marked out some things on it with a nail and set Jim to work on them with a nail for a chisel and an iron bolt from the rubbish and the lean to for a hammer, and told him to work till the rest of his candle quit on him.

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And then he could go to bed and hide the grindstone under his straw tick and sleep on it.

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Then we helped him fix his chain back on the bed leg and was ready for bed ourselves.

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But Tom thought of something and says you got any spiders in here, Jim?

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No saw.

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Thanks to goodness.

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I hate Mars Tom.

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All right, we'll get you some.

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Bless you, honey.

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I don't want none.

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As a fear to numb, I just soon as have rattlesnakes around.

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Tom thought a minute or two and says it's a good idea, and I reckon it's been done.

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It must have been done.

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It stands to reason.

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Yes, it's a prime good idea.

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Where could you keep it?

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Keep what, Mars Tom?

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Wild rattlesnake.

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The goodness grace is alive.

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Mars Tom.

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Why, if day was a rattlesnake to come in here, I'd take him bust right out through that log wall.

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I would with my head.

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Why, Jim, you wouldn't be afraid of it.

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After a little, you could tame it.

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Tame it?

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Yes, easy enough.

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Every animal is grateful for kindness and petting and they wouldn't think of hurting a person that pets them.

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Any book will tell you that.

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You try, that's all I ask.

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Just try for two or three days.

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Why, you can get him so in a little while that he'll love you and sleep with you and won't stay away from you a minute and will let you wrap him around your neck and put his head in your mouth.

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Please, Mars tom, don't talk so.

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I can't stand it.

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He'd let me shove his head in my mouth for a favor.

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Hainted.

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I lay he'd wait a power for a long time for I asked him, and more in that I don't want him to sleep with me.

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Jim, don't act so foolish.

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A prisoner's got to have some kind of a dumb pet.

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And if a rattlesnake hadn't ever been tried, why, there's more glory to be gained in your being the first to ever try it than any other way you could ever think of to save your life.

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Why Mars tom, I don't want no Cich glory.

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Snake taken.

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Bite, Jim's.

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Chin off.

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Then where's the glory?

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No, sir, I don't want no cich doings.

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Blame it.

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Can't you try?

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I only want you to try.

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You needn't keep it up if it don't work, but the trouble all done if the snake bite me while I was trying him.

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Mars Tom, I was willing to tackle most anything at all unreasonable.

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But if you and Huck fetches a rattlesnake in here for me to tame, I was going to leave that show.

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Well, then let it go.

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Let it go.

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If you're so bull headed about it, we can get you some garter snakes and you can tie some buttons on their tails and let on their rattlesnakes and I reckon that'll have to do.

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I can stand dim Mars Tom, but blame if I couldn't get along without him, I tell you that.

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I never know before twist so much bothering trouble to be a prisoner.

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Well, it always is when it's done right.

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You got any rats around here?

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No, sir.

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Hate and seed none.

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Well, we'll get you some rats.

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Why Mars?

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Tom, I don't want no rats.

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Days to dad blame this creatures disturb a body and rustle round over him and bite his feet when he's trying to sleep.

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I ever see no sir.

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Gimme goddessnakes if I's got to have them.

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But don't give me no rats.

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I ain't got no use for them schisly.

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But Jim, you got to have them.

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They all do.

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So don't make no more fuss about it.

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Prisoners ain't ever without rats.

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There ain't no instance of it.

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And they train them and pet them and learn them tricks and they get to be as sociable as flies.

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But you got to play music to them.

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You got anything to play music on?

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I ain't got nothing but a coarse comb and a piece of paper and a juice harp.

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But I reckon they wouldn't take no stock in a juice harp.

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Yes, they would.

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They don't care what kind of music tis a juice harp's plenty good enough for a rat.

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All animals like music in a prison.

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They dote on it, especially painful music.

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And you can't get no other kind out of a juice harp.

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It always interests them.

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They come out to see what's the matter with you.

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Yes, you're all right.

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You're fixed up well.

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You want to set on your bed nights before you go to sleep and early in the mornings and play your Jews harp.

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Play the last link is broken.

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That's the thing that'll scoop a rat quicker than anything else.

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And when you've played about two minutes you'll see all the rats and the snakes and spiders and things begin to feel worried about you and come and they'll just fairly swarm over you and have a noble good time.

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Yes, they will, I reckon.

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Mars Tom but what kind of time is Jim having?

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Blessed if I can see depend.

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But I'll do it if I got to.

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I reckon I'd better keep the animals satisfied and not have no trouble in the house.

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Tom waited to think it over and see if there was nothing else and pretty soon he says, oh, there's one thing I forgot.

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Could you raise a flower here, do you reckon?

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I don't know, but maybe I could.

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Mars Tom but it's tolerable dark in here.

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I ain't got no use for no flower know how.

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And she'd be a powerful side of trouble while you try it.

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Anyway, some other prisoners has done it.

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One or dim big cattail looking molen stocks would go in here.

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Maz tom, I reckon.

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But she wouldn't be with half the trouble she caused.

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Don't you believe it.

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We'll fetch you a little one and you plant it in the corner over there and raise it.

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And don't call it molin, call it Pichiola.

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That's its right name when it's in a prison and you want to water it with your tears.

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Why, I got plenty spring water.

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Mars Tom you don't want spring water.

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You want to water it with your tears.

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It's the way they always do.

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Why, Mars Tomilea can raise one or dim molen stalks twist with spring water while another man's, a certain one, with tears.

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That ain't the idea.

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You got to do it with tears.

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She'll die on my hands.

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Mars tom.

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She surely will, because I don't scarcely ever cry so.

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Tom was stumped, but he studied it over and then said Jim would have to worry along the best he could with an onion.

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He promised he would go to the servant cabins and drop one private in Jim's coffee pot in the morning.

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Jim said he would just as soon have tobacco in his coffee and found so much fault with it and with the work and bother of raising the mullen and juice, harping the rats and petting and flattering up the snakes and spiders and things on top of all the other work he had to do on pins and inscriptions and journals and things which made it more trouble and worry and responsibility to be a prisoner than anything he ever undertook.

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That Tom Most lost all patience with him and said he was just loading down with more gaudier chances than a prisoner ever had in the world to make a name for himself.

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And yet he didn't know enough to appreciate them and they was just about wasted on him.

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So Jim, he was sorry and said he wouldn't behave so no more.

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And then me and Tom shoved for bed.

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Thank you for joining Bite at a Time books today while we read a bite of one of your favorite classics.

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Again, my name is Brie Carlyle and I hope you come back tomorrow for the next bite of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

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Don't forget to sign up for our newsletter at Bite at a Timebooks.com and check out the shop.

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You can check out the show notes or our website bitimebooks.com for the rest of the links for our show.

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We'd love to hear from you on social media as well.

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Take a look in the book and let's see what we can find.

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Taking chapter by chapter one at a time so many adventures and mountains we can climb.

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