All rights reserved, including that of translation into the foreign languages, including the Scandinavian

Printed in the U. S. A.

DEDICATION

To the actors in the comedies and tragedies of real life presented in these stories, without whose efforts and sacrifices the stories could not have been so interesting and true, this volume is with grateful acknowledgments most respectfully dedicated. As the parts played by the actors were not rehearsed, the performances have required a little retouching in the interest of the reader, the author having subordinated history to story rather than story to history.

Hudson Maxim.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PAGE
Introduction[1]
The Forgotten Bit of Fulminate[25]
Hell Swazey Breaks up the Dance[29]
The Poet’s Uplift[34]
How Bender Lowered the Price of Dynamite[39]
Foolhardy Kruger[42]
Discharging Pat[45]
Lines to a Lady[47]
He Separated[50]
The Well-Digger’s Casualties[53]
The Rival Editors[55]
The Passing of “Jeopardy”[58]
The Involuntary Attack[59]
Hoist with His Own Petard[62]
The Forgotten Precaution[64]
The Fatal Hat[67]
A Drop too Much[68]
A Close Call[70]
A Pickaninny’s Treasure Trove[72]
Not to Be Buncoed[73]
Sir Frederick’s Bonfire[76]
The Irreverent Native[79]
At Folly’s Mercy[80]
The Watchman’s Double Vision[82]
The Zealous Fool[84]
Some Lively Cotton Waste[87]
Saving Time[88]
The Broken Scale[90]
The Singular Good Fortune of a Gentle Englishman[92]
The Match at the Peep-Hole[94]
The Flask of Liquor[96]
Impertinence Punished[97]
Curiosity’s Uplift[99]
Proud even unto Death[101]
The Dog That Ate Dynamite[104]
Insecure Security[106]
The Loaded Chinaman[108]
Living Bombs[110]
Ships That Passed in the Night[112]
A Wild Projectile[114]
The Bomb and the Train[115]
The Missing Vessel[117]
The Drunken Messenger[118]
Nitroglycerin by Automobile[122]
The Jets of Blue[127]
The Wisdom of Retreat[129]
The Race with Death[131]
The Indomitable Poet[134]
Scattered[136]
A Lively Dead One[138]
Incidents in the Development of Motorite[139]
The Mule Gun[152]
How Gussie Got Loaded[154]
Dynamite’s Freak[155]
Explosive Vagaries[157]
The Turkey That Went to Bed[160]
Bill Bennett, Detective[162]
Winning the Ox[164]
A Duel to the Death[166]
The Bewitched Flintlock[168]
When He Shirked[171]
The Elevation of Womanhood[173]
Didn’t Know It Was Loaded[178]
The Wrong Tap[180]
“Whence All but Him Had Fled”[182]
Breaking His Nerve[184]
The Grizzly Cannon Ball[186]
The Joke Was Not on the Chinamen[188]
Chinese Fireworks[190]
Brown, the Gunner[193]
The Happening of the Unexpected[195]
When the Wash Vanished[207]
The Frightened Fisherman[211]
The Colonel Was Provoked[213]
When the Darkies Turned Pale[215]
The Dog That Was a Real Mascot[218]
Weary Willie’s Discomfiture[220]
Lo, the Poor Indian![224]