Tom's astonishment was boundless! He scratched his head with a perplexed air, and said: "Well, that beats anything!" Then he tossed the marble away pettishly, and stood cogitating.

The truth was, that a superstition of his had failed, here, which he and all his comrades had always looked upon as infallible.

If you buried a marble with certain necessary incantations, and left it alone a fortnight, and then opened the place with the incantation he had just used, you would find that all the marbles you had ever lost had gathered themselves together there, meantime, no matter how widely they had been separated.

But now, this thing had actually and unquestionably failed.

Tom's whole structure of faith was shaken to its foundations.
He had many a time heard of this thing succeeding but never of its failing before.