BOXER CREATES A STIR.
When Frank and Bart came out of the hotel, with Boxer at their heels, they found a group of men on the steps engaged in earnest discussion. Immediately, on sight of the two young men and the dog, the babel of voices fell to a hush and the men all squared about and stared. But Merry immediately noticed that it was not at Bart or himself that they were staring, but at Boxer. The dog seemed to observe this, likewise, for he stopped short, with one paw uplifted, surveyed the men, and Frank, who was a clever ventriloquist, made the animal apparently say:
"Say, Frank, what do you suppose the ginnies are gawking at?"
"Mother av Moses!" cried an Irishman in the group. "Oi swear be all the saints the baste did spake!"
"Yah! yah!" chattered a pig-tailed Chinaman by the name of Sing Lee, who ran a laundry in town. "Dogee talkee allee samee likee Chinyman."
"Go on, you rat-eater!" contemptuously exclaimed the dog. "If I couldn't talk better than you I'd go drown myself!"
Needless to say this brought the excitement of the crowd to a high pitch.
Benchy and Spikes were on hand, and now the former appealed to Frank.
"Is that your dog?" he asked.