Part 13 (1/2)

Tom slammed on the back-action, and as we slowed to a standstill a unnel, same as a house looks out of its s, and I laid down and died I one for as much as a minute or more; then I come to, and Toiant and was holding the balloon steady with it whilst he canted his head back and got a good long look up at that awful face

Ji up at the thing in a begging way, and working his lips, but not getting anything out I took only just a gliain, but Tom says:

”He ain't alive, you fools; it's the Sphinx!”

I never see Toiant's head was so big and awful Awful, yes, so it was, but not dreadful any more, because you could see it was a noble face, and kind of sad, and not thinking about you, but about other things and larger

It was stone, reddish stone, and its nose and ears battered, and that give it an abused look, and you felt sorrier for it for that

We stood off a piece, and sailed around it and over it, and it was just grand It was a er's body a hundred and twenty-five foot long, and there was a dear little temple between its front paws All but the head used to be under the sand, for hundreds of years,the sand away and found that little temple It took a power of sand to bury that cretur; most as much as it would to bury a steamboat, I reckon

We landed Ji to protect hin land; then we sailed off to this and that and t'other distance, to git what Tom called effects and perspectives and proportions, and Ji all the different kinds of attitudes and positions he could study up, but standing on his head and working his legs the way a frog does was the best The further we got away, the littler Jiot, till at last it was only a clothespin on a dos out the correct proportions, To he was, they was too close to him

Then we sailed off further and further, till we couldn't see Jier was at its noblest, a-gazing out over the Nile Valley so still and soles that was scattered about it clean disappeared and gone, and nothing around it now but a soft wide spread of yaller velvet, which was the sand

That was the right place to stop, and we done it We set there a-looking and a-thinking for a half an hour, nobody a-saying anything, for it made us feel quiet and kind of sole over that valley just that sahts all to itself for thousands of years, and nobody can't find out what they are to this day

At last I took up the glass and see so around on that velvet carpet, and so up the cretur's back, and then I see two or three wee puffs of white smoke, and told Tos No--hold on; they--why, I believe they'rea long ladder up onto the Sphinx's back--now ain't that odd? And now they're trying to lean it up a--there's souns! Huck, they're after Ji We was there in no tist them, and they broke and scattered every which way, and soo all holts and fell We soared up and found hi andfor help and partly fro time--a week, HE said, but it warn't so, it only just see him so They had shot at him, and rained the bullets all around him, but he warn't hit, and when they found he wouldn't stand up and the bullets couldn't git at hi down, they went for the ladder, and then he knowed it was all up with hinant, and asked hi and command them to GIT, in the name of the United States

Jim said he done it, but they never paid no attention Toton, and says:

”You'll see that they'll have to apologize for insulting the flag, and pay an indeit off THAT easy”

Jim says:

”What's an indemnity, Mars Toits it, Mars Toy?”

”The United States Or, we can take whichever we please We can take the apology, if ant to, and let the gov'ment take the money”

”How ravated case like this one, it will be at least three dollars apiece, and I don't know but more”

”Well, den, we'll take de y Hain't dat yo' notion, too? En hain't it yourn, Huck?”

We talked it over a little and allowed that that was as good a way as any, so we agreed to take the money It was a new business to ized when they had done wrong, and he says:

”Yes; the little ones does”

We was sailing around exa the pyramids, you know, and noe soared up and roosted on the flat top of the biggest one, and found it was just like what the man said in the Sunday-school It was like four pairs of stairs that starts broad at the bottoether in a point at the top, only these stair-steps couldn't be clumb the way you clih as your chin, and you have to be boosted up from behind The two other pyra about on the sand between looked like bugs crawling, as so high above them