Well, as I was saying, we waited that morning till everybody was settled down to business, and nobody in sight around the yard; then Tom he carried the sack into the lean-to whilst I stood off a piece to keep watch. By and by he come out, and we went and set down on the woodpile to talk. He says:

     "Everything's all right now except tools; and that's easy fixed."

     "Tools?" I says.

     "Yes."

     "Tools for what?"

     "Why, to dig with. We ain't a-going to GNAW him out, are we?"

     "Ain't them old crippled picks and things in there good enough to dig a nigger out with?" I says.

     He turns on me, looking pitying enough to make a body cry, and says:

     "Huck Finn, did you EVER hear of a prisoner having picks and shovels, and all the modern conveniences in his wardrobe to dig himself out with? Now I want to ask you--if you got any reasonableness in you at all--what kind of a show would THAT give him to be a hero? Why, they might as well lend him the key and done with it. Picks and shovels--why, they wouldn't furnish 'em to a king."