



Produced by Annie R. McGuire








[Illustration: HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE
AN ILLUSTRATED WEEKLY.]

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VOL. II.--NO. 73. PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK. PRICE FOUR
CENTS.

Tuesday, March 22, 1881. Copyright, 1881, by HARPER & BROTHERS. $1.50
per Year, in Advance.

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[Illustration: THE LUCK OF THE HORSESHOE.--DRAWN BY W. R. YEAGER.]

TOMMY TUCKER'S HORSESHOE.

BY MRS. FRANK McCARTHY.


Tommy Tucker lives on a "farm" in the city of New York, near the Central
Park. Some people make fun of Tommy's way of living, and call his place
the "sunken lots," and say his family are squatters; but it makes very
little difference to Tommy what remarks were made about his home or his
people, so long as they were happy. And they were happy for a very long
time, so happy that they didn't know what it was to be miserable, and it
makes a wonderful difference to be able to tell one from the other. Up
to the beginning of this winter they had the longest run of luck on
record in any family in that neighborhood. A long while since, a horse
had been turned out to die in a lot near the Tucker's. It wasn't such a
very old horse, but it was dreadfully sick, and something was the
matter with its windpipe, so that Mr. Tucker heard it wheezing away
while he was at work on the farm. He had a very kind heart, and always
did what he could for poor dumb creatures, as well as those that could
tell what was the matter with them; and what with kind treatment and a
wonderful skill Mr. Tucker had with animals, that horse came around so
that you'd hardly know it from a spirited charger of Mr. Croesus--a
gentleman who lives up in that neighborhood. It grew so strong that it
was able to drag a cart-load of vegetables down town to Mr. Tucker's
customers, and Mr. Tucker was able to put another lot or two under
cultivation. And if the lots were a little rough and sunken, it was very
pretty to see them full of "green things a-growing." Up to this last
winter there was almost always something to sell, and pretty soon after
Mr. Tucker cured his horse he got a cow. She wasn't a first-class cow
when Mr. Tucker first traded off some pigs for her, and gave some silver
to boot out of Mother Tucker's stocking. What little milk she had seemed
to be turned to gall, and even that couldn't be got from her until she
was tied to the side of the house; then she would have kicked the whole
mansion down if it hadn't been founded on a rock, like the wise man's
house Mr. Tucker read about in the Bible. Mr. Tucker and Tommy think
there are only two books worth reading in the whole world: one is the
Bible, and the other is _Robinson Crusoe_. Tommy hadn't minded depending
on his goats for milk, because it seemed so much like Crusoe's way of
living; but Mrs. Tucker and Tommy's three little brothers liked cow's
milk the best; for one thing, there was so much more of it, and Tommy's
three little brothers had such excellent appetites. For Mr. Tucker's
wisdom extended to the udders of the cow, and pretty soon she was almost
as good as an Alderney cow around the corner, so called, Mr. Tucker
said, because she belonged to an Alderman.

Tommy Tucker's family prospered exceedingly. The horse drew more and
more vegetables to market, the cow gave more and more milk, the hens
laid more and more eggs, and the cheery chink in Mother Tucker's
stocking became more and more musical to the ear, until the last winter
set in. Then the Tucker luck, which was proverbial in that neighborhood,
suddenly took an evil turn.

First, and worst, Mr. Tucker fell on the ice and broke his leg. You may
know it was a particular kind of ice that could bring Mr. Tucker down.
It was about a dozen layers thick, and very treacherous. The winter had
closed in some time before in a very unusual way. It was bitter cold,
day in and day out; the heavens opened, and the snow fell, and opened
again, and more snow came down, and kept on opening, and more snow kept
falling, until the familiar gullies were all filled up, and the country
around there grew white and level and changed, so that Tommy wondered
sometimes if the world had lost its reckoning, and stopped turning when
it reached the north pole.

And it gave Tommy a dreadful sickly feeling to know that his father's
leg _could_ break. It wasn't natural to see him lying on the bed in the
corner, when he had always been up and doing. Nothing ever seemed so far
gone that his father couldn't fetch it around, and it shook Tommy's
confidence considerably to see the obstinacy of that leg. Tommy had
always gone to bed before his father, and his father had always got up
before Tommy, so that it was a new experience to Tommy to see his father
down.

It took the heart out of all of them, and everything went wrong. It went
on freezing, snowing, and blowing outside; and do what Tommy could, the
live stock began to give out. That charity waif of a horse yielded to
the weakness in his windpipe again, and sprawled his legs and hung his
head in the most ungrateful way; the cow went dry; two of the best pigs
got frost-bitten, so that their squeal mingled with the melancholy
soughing of the north wind around the Tucker mansion; and the hens
wouldn't lay an egg for Mr. Tucker, though the doctor had particularly
ordered it.

And about that doctor: Tommy used to dread to see him come, for instead
of brightening things up, he made them gloomier. He took some of the
cheery chink out of Mother Tucker's stocking every time he came, and Mr.
Tucker seemed none the better for it, but lay with his face to the wall
for hours together, and wouldn't read any book in the Bible but Job; and
Tommy's three little brothers went on eating just the same as when milk
was plenty and times were good.

The music in Mother Tucker's stocking got away down to the toe; and one
morning, when Mr. Tucker had no appetite for anything, and Tommy's three
little brothers had an appetite for everything, even their mother's poor
share of what was left, Tommy saw the shadow of a big wolf called Hunger
prowling around the door-sill, and out he ran and down the road,
frightened, and sobbing as if his heart would break. He thought nothing
of the poor shivering brutes that were left to his care, or thought they
might as well all starve together. Luck was against them; there was no
use trying any more; when all at once, over in the middle of the road,
he saw through his blinding tears something round and shining. It wasn't
a gold piece, nor one of silver, but he plunged through a snow-bank and
over a ditch to get it. He dug it out of a chunk of ice, and cut his
hands and tore his finger-nails; and his honest little face took the
keen and hungry exultation of a miner's just then, though it was neither
silver nor gold, but an old battered-out horseshoe.

For all the music in Mother Tucker's stocking hadn't helped his father's
leg, but Tommy had heard say that a horseshoe honestly found was the
best bit of luck to stumble on in the world.

He warmed the cold bit of metal against his heart, and ran home with it
as fast as he could, never stopping until he reached his father's bed.

"Cheer up, Pop!" he cried. "See! Everything'll come right now. I've
found a horseshoe."

Poor Mr. Tucker