WELL, I got a good going-over in the morning from old Miss Watson on account of my clothes; but the widow she didn't scold, but only cleaned off the grease and clay, and looked so sorry that I thought I would behave awhile if I could. Then Miss Watson she took me in the closet and prayed, but nothing come of it. She told me to pray every day, and whatever I asked for I would get it. But it warn't so. I tried it. Once I got a fish-line, but no hooks. It warn't any good to me without hooks. I tried for the hooks three or four times, but somehow I couldn't make it work. By and by, one day, I asked Miss Watson to try for me, but she said I was a fool. She never told me why, and I couldn't make it out no way.
I set down one time back in the woods, and had a long think about it. I says to myself, if a body can get anything they pray for, why don't Deacon Winn get back the money he lost on pork? Why can't the widow get back her silver snuffbox that was stole? Why can't Miss Watson fat up? No, says I to my self, there ain't nothing in it. I went and told the widow about it, and she said the thing a body could get by praying for it was "spiritual gifts." This was too many for me, but she told me what she meant -- I must help other people, and do everything I could for other people, and look out for them all the time, and never think about myself. This was including Miss Watson, as I took it. I went out in the woods and turned it over in my mind a long time, but I couldn't see no advantage about it -- except for the other people; so at last I reckoned I wouldn't worry about it any more, but just let it go. Sometimes the widow would take me one side and talk about Providence in a way to make a body's mouth water; but maybe next day Miss Watson would take hold and knock it all down again. I judged I could see that there was two Providences, and a poor chap would stand considerable show with the widow's Providence, but if Miss Watson's got him there warn't no help for him any more. I thought it all out, and reckoned I would belong to the widow's if he wanted me, though I couldn't make out how he was a-going to be any better off then than what he was before, seeing I was so ignorant, and so kind of low-down and ornery.
Pap he hadn't been seen for more than a year, and that was comfortable for me; I didn't want to see him no more. He used to always whale me when he was sober and could get his hands on me; though I used to take to the woods most of the time when he was around. Well, about this time he was found in the river drownded, about twelve mile above town, so people said. They judged it was him, anyway; said this drownded man was just his size, and was ragged, and had uncommon long hair, which was all like pap; but they couldn't make nothing out of the face, because it had been in the water so long it warn't much like a face at all. They said he was floating on his back in the water. They took him and buried him on the bank. But I warn't comfortable long, because I happened to think of something. I knowed mighty well that a drownded man don't float on his back, but on his face. So I knowed, then, that this warn't pap, but a woman dressed up in a man's clothes. So I was uncomfortable again. I judged the old man would turn up again by and by, though I wished he wouldn't.
We played robber now and then about a month, and then I resigned. All the boys did. We hadn't robbed nobody, hadn't killed any people, but only just pretended. We used to hop out of the woods and go charging down on hog-drivers and women in carts taking garden stuff to market, but we never hived any of them. Tom Sawyer called the hogs "ingots," and he called the turnips and stuff "julery," and we would go to the cave and powwow over what we had done, and how many people we had killed and marked. But I couldn't see no profit in it. One time Tom sent a boy to run about town with a blazing stick, which he called a slogan (which was the sign for the Gang to get together), and then he said he had got secret news by his spies that next day a whole parcel of Spanish merchants and rich A-rabs was going to camp in Cave Hollow with two hundred elephants, and six hundred camels, and over a thousand "sumter" mules, all loaded down with di'monds, and they didn't have only a guard of four hundred soldiers, and so we would lay in ambuscade, as he called it, and kill the lot and scoop the things. He said we must slick up our swords and guns, and get ready. He never could go after even a turnip-cart but he must have the swords and guns all scoured up for it, though they was only lath and broomsticks, and you might scour at them till you rotted, and then they warn't worth a mouthful of ashes more than what they was before. I didn't believe we could lick such a crowd of Spaniards and A-rabs, but I wanted to see the camels and elephants, so I was on hand next day, Saturday, in the ambuscade; and when we got the word we rushed out of the woods and down the hill. But there warn't no Spaniards and A-rabs, and there warn't no camels nor no elephants. It warn't anything but a Sunday-school picnic, and only a primer-class at that. We busted it up, and chased the children up the hollow; but we never got anything but some doughnuts and jam, though Ben Rogers got a rag doll, and Jo Harper got a hymn-book and a tract; and then the teacher charged in, and made us drop everything and cut. I didn't see no di'monds, and I told Tom Sawyer so. He said there was loads of them there, anyway; and he said there was A-rabs there, too, and elephants and things. I said, why couldn't we see them, then? He said if I warn't so ignorant, but had read a book called Don Quixote, I would know without asking. He said it was all done by enchantment. He said there was hundreds of soldiers there, and elephants and treasure, and so on, but we had enemies which he called magicians; and they had turned the whole thing into an infant Sundayschool, just out of spite. I said, all right; then the thing for us to do was to go for the magicians. Tom Sawyer said I was a numskull.
"Why," said he, "a magician could call up a lot of genies, and they would hash you up like nothing before you could say Jack Robinson. They are as tall as a tree and as big around as a church."
"Well," I says, "s'pose we got some genies to help US -- can't we lick the other crowd then?"
"How you going to get them?"
"I don't know. How do THEY get them?"
"Why, they rub an old tin lamp or an iron ring, and then the genies come tearing in, with the thunder and lightning a-ripping around and the smoke a-rolling, and everything they're told to do they up and do it. They don't think nothing of pulling a shot-tower up by the roots, and belting a Sunday-school superintendent over the head with it -- or any other man."
"Who makes them tear around so?"
"Why, whoever rubs the lamp or the ring. They belong to whoever rubs the lamp or the ring, and they've got to do whatever he says. If he tells them to build a palace forty miles long out of di'monds, and fill it full of chewing-gum, or whatever you want, and fetch an emperor's daughter from China for you to marry, they've got to do it -- and they've got to do it before sun-up next morning, too. And more: they've got to waltz that palace around over the country wherever you want it, you understand."
"Well," says I, "I think they are a pack of flatheads for not keeping the palace themselves 'stead of fooling them away like that. And what's more -- if I was one of them I would see a man in Jericho before I would drop my business and come to him for the rubbing of an old tin lamp."
"How you talk, Huck Finn. Why, you'd HAVE to come when he rubbed it, whether you wanted to or not."
"What! and I as high as a tree and as big as a church? All right, then; I WOULD come; but I lay I'd make that man climb the highest tree there was in the country."
"Shucks, it ain't no use to talk to you, Huck Finn. You don't seem to know anything, somehow -- perfect saphead."
有一回，在后面的树林里，我坐下来把这事儿想了许久。我心想，要是一个人祷告什么就能得到什么，那么，为什么狄肯·韦恩卖猪肉亏的钱就要不回来呢？为什么寡妇被偷走的银鼻烟盒求不回来呢？为什么华森小姐不能胖起来呢？不，我心里琢磨，天底下压根没有这回事儿。我去给寡妇说了这事，她说一个人祷告所能得到的东西是"精神的礼物"。这我就不明白了，但她说她的意思是--我应该帮助别人，为别人做我能做的事，时刻照顾他们，永远不去想自己。照我看，她这话也有华森小姐的意思。我走出树林，又翻来覆去想了很长时间，我看不见一点好处--除非是对别人--因此，打那以后，我就不再为这事儿伤脑筋了，随它的便吧。有时，寡妇把我拉到一边，把上帝说得叫人流口水，但是，或许就在第二天，华森小姐又说一套，把寡妇的话全给推翻了。我的判断是，我看出有两个上帝，一个可怜的家伙跟寡妇的上帝在一起还会有些机会，可如果是华森小姐的上帝把他给弄走，他可就一点儿折儿也没有了。我想通了，觉得我该属于寡妇的上帝，当然如果是他要我的话；尽管我弄不清楚他有了我会对他有什么好处，因为我既无知又下作，脾气还坏。
爸已经一年多没露面了，这叫我觉得日子好过，我不想再看到他。从前，只要他没喝得烂醉，只要他可以抓住我，总会猛揍我。虽然他在这一带的时候，我多半会逃进树林里。可能就在这个时候，有人发现他在河里淹死了，在镇的上游12 英里的地方，人们是这么谈论的。人们猜着是他；说这个淹死的人身段和他一样，穿着破衣服，头发很长很长--这些特征倒有些像爸--不过，他们认不清那人的脸，由于在水里浸泡的时间过长，根本就不像脸样儿了。他们说他是仰脸漂在水上的，他们把他捞上岸，埋了。可我没有踏实多久，因为我猛地想了起来：一个淹死的男人，不应该仰着漂，而应该是脸朝下。因此，我明白了，那人不是爸，而只是一个穿着男人衣服的女人。所以，我又不舒服起来。我猜测老子不久就会露面，不管我是否乐意见到他。
我们时常装作强盗玩儿，过了一个月我退出了。大家会都退出了。我们什么人也没枪，也没杀，都是假装。我们总是跳出树林，冲着放猪的小孩儿和坐大车卖菜赶集的妇女冲过去，但是，我们从未扣押过什么人。汤姆把猪叫"金块"， 萝卜青菜叫"珠宝"， 回到洞中，大谈特谈我们的所作所为，还会数数我们打死了多少人，给多少人打了帮号。可我看不出这里头有什么好处。有一回，汤姆派一个男孩拿一根火棍到镇上跑了一圈儿，他说是集合信号，接着，他说他从间谍那里得到密报：第二天，有一大队西班牙商人和有钱的阿拉伯人会在"山谷洞"宿营，带两百头大象，六百只骆驼，另外还有一千多匹驮货的骡马，全载着钻石，他们仅仅有四百名士兵护卫。因此，我们要打个伏击战。他是这么说的，杀掉那帮人，掠夺财物。他说要擦亮刀枪，做好准备。哪怕是追辆萝卜车，他也要让大家把刀枪擦亮，说到底，只是些木片儿，扫帚把儿，你就是累死，它也比不擦的时候也不会亮到那里去。我不信我们能胜过一群西班牙人和阿拉伯人，但是，我想看看骆驼和大象。所以，第二天，也就是周六，我参加了伏击。一接到命令，我们就冲出树林，跑到山下。可是，那里既没有西班牙人和阿拉伯人，也没有什么骆驼和大象。啥也没有，只是个主日学校的野餐会，而且还只是个初级班。我们冲散了它，将那些小孩儿往山谷上赶，我们却什么东西也没抢到，只有一些油炸饼和火腿，罗杰得了个布娃娃，哈波得了本赞美诗，另外还有小册子，后来，学校老师冲了过去，逼得我们把东西全扔下，撒腿就逃。我没见到钻石，就给汤姆说了。他说反正那里有成担的钻石，他还说有阿拉伯人，以及大象等等。我说，我们为什么看不见呢？他说要不是我那么无知，只要看过一本叫《堂·吉诃德》的书，不用问我就会一清二楚的。他说那都是魔法变的。他说那儿有好几百士兵，还有大象和财宝等等，有魔法师与我们为敌，他们把那些东西都变成了一所小孩儿主日学校，全是出自恶意。我说那么好吧，那我们要做的事儿就是去找那些魔法师了。汤姆·索亚说我简直是个笨蛋。
"嗨，"他说，" 魔法师会召集一大群妖怪，你连叫一声都来不及，他们就能把你切成碎块。妖怪都长得像树一样高，像教堂那么大。""那好办，"我说，" 如果我们找些妖怪帮我们的忙--不一样能把那帮妖怪打垮了吗？""你想怎么找啊？""我不知道。他们是怎么找的呢？""嗨，他们擦旧锡灯或铁圈儿，妖怪就飞跑过来，又响雷又打闪，浓烟遍布，不管叫干什么，他们立刻就干。他们一点也不考虑是把一座炮楼连根拔起，砸到一个主日学校学监的头上--或是别的人头上。""谁能让他们那样飞跑过来呢？""嗨，无论是谁擦了那盏灯或那个铁圈儿。他们就听那人的，叫干什么干什么。如果叫他建一座宫殿，40 英里长，用钻石建成，里面装满口香糖，或任何你想要的东西，并且从中国接来公王来跟你结婚，他们也得做--他们还得在第二天早上太阳升起来以前就办妥这一切。不仅如此--他们还得按你的吩咐把宫殿搬到全国任何地方，明白了吧。""哎呀，"我说，" 我瞧着他们是一堆大傻瓜，不把这座宫殿留给自己用，却替别人瞎忙活。还有啊--我如果是这么个妖怪，那我宁愿跑到天边去，也不会由于他擦擦锡灯，就丢下自己的事不管，跑到他身边去。""你怎么可以说这话，哈克·芬。他擦的时候你只能来，不管你是否愿意。""什么，我不是跟树一样高，跟教堂一样大吗？那好吧，我来，可我准能把那家伙吓得爬到全国最高的树上去。""呸，跟你说话真没意思，哈克·芬。你好像啥也不懂，不管怎么说--一个标准的大笨蛋。"我把这些话思谋了两三天。后来，就想看看究竟有没有道理。我找了个旧锡灯和一个铁圈儿，到了树林里，擦呀擦呀，擦得我汗流浃背，心里盘算着建造个宫殿再卖掉，可根本没一点儿用，一个妖怪也没来。于是，我就断定，这一切只不过是汤姆·索亚的想象而已。我认为他是真相信有那些阿拉伯人和大象，可对我而言，我可不这么想。那明明白白地是一个主日学校。