Mr. Slingsby, our assessor and tax-collector, holds on too.  He is another model member of our civil service.  The principal characteristic of Mr. Slingsby is enthusiasm.  He has an idea that whenever a man gets anything new it ought to be taxed, and he is always on hand to perform the service.  I had about fifteen feet added to one of my chimneys last spring; and when it was done, Slingsby called and assessed it, under the head of “improved real estate,” at eighty dollars, and collected two per cent. on it.  A few days later, while I was standing by the fence, Slingsby came up and said,

“Beautiful dog you have there.”

“Yes; it’s a setter.”

“Indeed!  A setter, hey?  The tax on setters is two dollars.  I’ll collect it now, while I have it on my mind.”

I settled the obligation, and the next day Slingsby came around again.  He opened the conversation with the remark,

“Billy Jones told me down at the grocery-store that your terrier had had pups.”

“Yes.”

“A large litter?”

“Four.”

“Indeed!  Less see:  tax is two dollars; four times two is eight—­yes, eight dollars tax, please.  And hurry up, too, if you can, for they have a new batch of kittens over at Baldwin’s, and I want to ketch old Baldwin before he goes out.  By the way, when did you put that weathercock on your stable?”

“Yesterday.”

“You don’t say!  Well, hold on, then.  Four times two is eight, and four—­on the weathercock, you know—­is twelve.  Twelve dollars is the exact amount.”

“What do you mean by four dollars tax on a weathercock?  I never heard of such a thing.”

“Didn’t, hey?  Why, she comes in under the head of ’scientific apparatus.’  She’s put up there to tell which way the wind blows, ain’t she?  Well, that’s scientific intelligence, and the apparatus is liable to tax.”

“Mr. Slingsby, that is the most absurd thing I ever heard of.  You might just as well talk of taxing Butterwick’s twins.”

“Butter—­You don’t mean to say Butterwick has twins?  Why, certainly they’re taxable.  They come in under the head of ‘poll-tax.’  Three dollars apiece.  I’ll go right down there.  Glad you mentioned it.”  Then I paid him, and he left with Butterwick’s twins on his memorandum-book.

A day or two afterward Mr. Slingsby called to see me, and he said,

“I’ve got a case that bothers me like thunder.  You know Hough the tobacconist?  Well, he’s just bought a new wooden Indian to stand in front of his store.  Now, I have a strong feeling that I ought to tax that figure, but I don’t know where to place it.  Would it come in as ‘statuary’?  Somehow that don’t seem exactly the thing.  I was going to assess it under the head of ‘idols,’ but the idiots who got up this law haven’t got a word in in reference to idols.  Think of that, will you?  Why, we might have paganism raging all over this country, and we couldn’t get a