The surface of that alley consisted of a rolling stretch of elevations and depressions, and neither of us could, by any art known to us, persuade a ball to stay on the alley until it should accomplish something.

Little balls and big, the same thing always happened--the ball left the alley before it was half-way home and went thundering down alongside of it the rest of the way and made the gamekeeper climb out and take care of himself.

No matter, we persevered, and were rewarded.

We examined the alley, noted and located a lot of its peculiarities, and little by little we learned how to deliver a ball in such a way that it would travel home and knock down a pin or two.

By and by we succeeded in improving our game to a point where we were able to get all of the pins with thirty-five balls--so we made it a thirty-five-ball game.