Copyright, 1897, by Harper & Brothers. All Rights Reserved.

A WILD DAY IN '48.

BY WILLIAM BLACK.

There was a vague apprehension in the air; every one appeared conscious that something was about to happen, though no one seemed to know precisely what; and so, as childhood is naturally curious, the writer of these lines, being then of the age of seven, managed to escape from the house unobserved, out into the great murmuring town. Half-frightened glances turned towards the east were a kind of guidance; and in that direction he accordingly wandered, until he came in sight of a crowd—not a beautiful, richly colored, processional crowd such as might have gone through the streets of Florence in mediæval times, with boy choristers chanting, and maidens carrying palms, but a black and grimy and amorphous assemblage of men, silent, in deadly earnest, who at the moment were engaged in tearing down the tall iron railing surrounding Glasgow Green, in order to secure weapons for themselves. And this small person of seven thought that he too must be up and doing. The others were wresting these enormous bars from their soldered sockets; why should not he also be furnished with an implement of destruction? And so he tugged and pulled and struggled; and yet the iron bar, about thrice as high as himself, remained obdurate; and again and again he pulled, and dragged, and vainly shook; in the midst of which determined endeavors a hand was swiftly laid on his arm, and a young Highland lass (her eyes jumping out of her head with terror), who had been wildly running and searching all over the neighborhood, dragged away the young rebel from the now marshalling crowd. Perhaps the alarm in her face impressed him; at all events he meekly yielded. That was not the usual expression of her face—when she was telling marvellous tales of children being carried away by eagles and brought up in a nest on a crag; the heroine of these various adventures, I remember, was called Angel; and whatever else happened to her, in the end her constancy, and virtue, and beauty were invariably rewarded by a happy marriage.

But now the surging mass of rioters came along, each man of them with one of those long spikes over his shoulder; and the trembling Highland lass, still clinging tightly to her charge, shrank hiding into an archway, and tried to conceal the child with her substantial skirts, till the man-eating ogres should go by. "Willst du nicht aufstehn, Wilhelm, zu schauen die Prozession?" some one might have asked—but not this Highland girl, who was doubtless thinking (in Gaelic) that the people who dwelt in cities were capable of dreadful things. Well, when one did peep out, there was not much to see—at least, nothing picturesque to attract the wondering eyes of childhood: there were no flags, no Mænads with flowing hair; nor was there any gesticulation, nor any attempt at oratory; only this great dark multitude moving on into the city, with two or three leaders marching in front, these ominously glancing from right to left, as if to judge where the sacking should begin. For they had come to sack a city, had these men. There was a talk at the time of bread riots; and no doubt there was a great deal of distress prevailing, as there generally is; and presumably there was a considerable proportion of these demonstrators honestly protesting against a social system that did not provide them with work. But it was not loaves the instigators of this movement were after, as events showed; rather it was silver teapots, and diamond brooches, and silk umbrellas—in short, a general partitioning of property; and of course there were plenty of vagabonds and ne'er-do-weels only too ready to fall in with that entrancing idea.

By what secret and devious ways the Highland lass managed to get herself and her captive back to our home in the Trongate—the historic Trongate of the ancient city of Glasgow—I cannot now say; but she must have been clever and smart about it; for when one at length reached the eagerly thronged windows, it was found that the fun in the thoroughfare below was only beginning. The whole thing looked strange. Musgrave the gunsmith (his sign was two gold guns crossed) was the first to put up his shutters. Perhaps the police had warned him that the rioters would make straight for his premises, to seize arms and ammunition, though, to be sure, there was not a policeman anywhere visible. No; what was visible was a great, swarming, tumultuous assemblage of men and lads who, at a signal from their leaders, had become stationary in front of a silversmith's shop. The silversmith, like the rest of his neighbors, had hurriedly shut and locked up his shop on hearing of the approach of the mob; but that did not avail him much. Another signal was given. Volunteers rushed forward, and proceeded with their long iron pikes to batter in the panels of the door. Then a hole was made. Then one man stooped and crawled in and opened the door from the inside. The curious thing was that the crowd did not now rush into the shop. Perhaps some instinct told them that they would instantly block up the place, and would thus escheat themselves of the spoils of victory. There was a cheer, doubtless, when the panel was hammered in—a long, hoarse, raucous cheer; but the mass held back; only the leaders entered; and for a few moments there was a dumb expectancy.

What now followed was one of the most singular scenes that any small boy of seven ever set eyes upon. From the wide-opened door flashing white things came flying out; high above the heads of the crowd they came; but as they descended a forest of straining arms and hands received them; and there was cheer after cheer as the plunder went on. It did not matter what it was: silver fish-knives, coffee-pots, biscuit-boxes, cruet-stands, opera-glasses—out they came flying to fall into this or that one's clutch; and again and again the hoarse roar of exultation went up, even from those who could not get near enough to share. These people with the upstretched arms appeared to have no fear whatever of getting their heads cut open by an electro-plated salver, a drawing-room lamp, or a brass candlestick. Out the missiles came; and the covetous fingers grabbed here and there; and the fierce tumult of applause ebbed and flowed. Where were the police? Well, there did not seem to be any police. It is true, a number of special constables had been hastily sworn in (my eldest brother was one of them, and according to his own account performed prodigies of valor); but they could not be everywhere; and meanwhile the poor silversmith's goods were being catapulted out to those clamorous upstretched hands.

Of a sudden a new feature appeared in this changing panorama. Ten or a dozen men (I think they wore some sash or badge of office, but I am not positive on this point) who seemed to have dropped from the clouds were jamming their way through the dense multitude; and when at length they had reached the pavement in front of the silversmith's shop, they began to lay about them lustily with their staves, each blow falling vertically on several heads at once. In Egypt I have seen an old Arab sheik do precisely the same thing, when his young men had become unruly. And in neither case was there the slightest resistance to constituted authority. This great mass of people could have turned upon the handful of special constables and rent them in pieces; but they did not; they tried in a kind of way to move on, though by this time all the central thoroughfares of the city were blocked, and a man who has a cruet-stand or a silver dish-cover concealed under his coat cannot glide easily between his neighbors. Whether the constables succeeded in arresting any of the ringleaders at this particular spot, I cannot recollect; but all the afternoon came wilder and wilder stories of chases, and captures, and seizures of booty. My brother was personally conducting a party of five of the rioters to the police-station, through a very bad neighborhood, when they turned on him, tripped him, and threw him down. But he was up again in a moment, with the cursory declaration that if any one of them advanced a step towards him, or attempted to escape either, he would forthwith split his, the thief's, skull in two. And what is more, he would have done it; for he was a powerful man; and he had a drawn truncheon; and he was never at any time a slave to punctilio. I forget the number of gold and silver watches found in the possession of these rascals.

But now the great event of the day, to the imagination of childhood, at all events, was approaching; for the bruit was gone abroad that the cavalry had been ordered in from their suburban barracks to ride through the streets and disperse the mob, and put an end to any lingering lawlessness. Plundering in the main thoroughfares had by this time mostly ceased; for the chief ringleaders had been arrested and haled off to the police-stations; while the worst of their followers roamed about in a surreptitious way, seeking what they could devour, rather than daring openly to attack the shuttered shops. The central parts of the city still remained congested, notwithstanding the reading of the Riot Act; for many simple country folk had wandered in, perhaps out of curiosity, perhaps anxious about their relatives; and of course they could not well get about, because of the crush. Altogether they formed a restless, half-frightened, elbowing, and struggling crowd; but it was a sombre crowd—especially as the dusk of the afternoon drew on to twilight; so that the delight of one small spectator may be imagined when there appeared in the distance a fringe of color—a splendor of uniforms—the glint of helmet and drawn sabre—the prancing of horses. And now began a wild hurry-and-scurry, the people surging against themselves in their frantic efforts to get free, a chaos and confusion impossible to describe. On came the dragoons, pressing against this nebulous mass of humanity, sparing the women as well as they could, but riding down the men—especially where any disposition was shown to form defiant groups—and striking right and left with the back of their swords. It was all very picturesque and splendid—to one youthful onlooker—here in the gathering gloom: the flash of brass and steel, the clink-clank of bridle and scabbard, the fleeing of fugitives, the pawing and rearing of reined-in chargers where a group of terrified women found themselves incapable of retreat. Why, it was better than the fight with Apollyon in the Pilgrim's Progress; for that was only a picture, in flaming red and yellow colors; whereas this was full of movement and change; and a certain dim fascination of fear. And so the dark came down; and the gases in the house were lit; but out there the dragoons were still riding hither and thither through the night, pursuing and dispersing, with a rattle of horses' hoofs on the stony street.

What happened next was remarkable enough. The fact is, you cannot at a moment's notice drive a welded crowd out of a long and narrow thoroughfare. It is not to be done; and in this case it was not done; for the people, seeing their neighbors here and there knocked over by the horses or slapped on the shoulder by those gleaming blades, forthwith fled pell-mell into the adjacent "closes," lanes, archways, and common stair-cases, which were very speedily choked up. To all outward seeming, the pavements and the causeway, now dimly visible under the yellow light of the street lamps, had been swept clear; but none the less the Trongate held all these innumerable huddled and hiding groups of frightened folk, as we were soon to know. For, through some accident or another, the outer door of our house chanced to be opened for a second, and instantly there burst into the lobby and into the rooms a whole number of women, panting, shaking, haggard-eyed, and speechless.

They made no apology for taking possession of a stranger's dwelling, the simple reason being that in their agony of alarm they were incapable of uttering a word; they did not know what they were doing or where they were; they were entirely bereft of their senses. A friend of mine who was through a long war (I do not mention his nationality, for fear of wounding patriotic sensitiveness) told me that on one occasion, after an unexpected reverse, the regiment in which he served was seized by a perfectly ungovernable panic; there was no withstanding the infection of this madness; the whole lot of them, himself included, took to their heels, and ran, and ran, and ran, hour after hour, until they flung themselves exhausted on the floor of any barn or shanty that chanced to be on their way; and then there was never more than ten minutes' sleep to be snatched, for one or other of them was sure to spring up with the cry, "They're coming!" and off they would set again, in hysterical and insensate flight. It would seem as if a regiment had a nervous system just as a human being has, and that either may find it fail at a critical moment, until reason reasserts itself. I remember regarding with the greatest curiosity these unaccountable visitors who had invaded our home. Decent-looking, respectably-dressed women they were, who obviously had had no more to do with the riot than the man in the moon; most likely they had never heard of such a thing as a Riot Act; but here they were imprisoned, their voice and wits alike gone from them, and no means possible to them of communicating with their friends. Not any one of them appeared to know any other of them. Some stood in the middle of the dining-room, seemingly unable to move another step, pale, trembling, distraught; one or two had sunk helplessly into chairs; one or two were looking out from the windows at the terrors from which they had just escaped, their scared eyes following the clanking up and down of the dragoons, the charging of the horses, the escape of this or that guilty-conscienced runaway along the dark and gas-lit street. And what was to be done with these paralyzed and speechless guests, when once they had partially come to themselves? Among the elder members of the family I gathered there was some talk of our being able to pass them through the lines of the soldiery when our special constable should return; but no one knew at what hour his multifarious duties might be over. Well, that is all I can relate of this peculiar situation of affairs, for now I was taken off to bed; and at what hour, and under what escort these tremulous fugitives were conveyed past the lines of military occupancy I cannot determine. Altogether it was a wild and memorable day, and many and wild and wonderful were the tales thereafter told of it; so that, for the time being, in the case of one small listener, his old friends the Giants Pope and Pagan, Robinson Crusoe and Friday, and even the eagle-captured children of the far West Highlands were quite put into the shade.

[MILADY'S CAST-OFFS.]

I found a garment yesterday
A-lying on the hills;
'Twas rare with radiant coloring
And rich with gleaming frills:
A skirt of crinkled golden-rod
And purple-aster sleeves,
A belt of burning cardinals,
A mantle of brown leaves,
And a bodice of the laces
That the dandelion weaves.
A bonnet trimmed with thistle-blooms
Was lying not far off,
And sandals made of birchen bark
Were satin—brown and buff;
And dainty, dainty mittens
Were lying here and there,
Grown by the loving sumach-tree
For hands both small and fair,
With other witching trinkets that
A woodsy nymph might wear.
I touched the garments tenderly
As they were lying there,
And longed to see the maiden who
Such finery did wear;
So roaming through the woodland dale,
And searching every nook,
I paused at last to listen
To the prattle of the brook,
And all the pretty tale he knew
Just like a little book:
These were the gorgeous autumn robes
Of Nature not long since,
But now she'll dress in gems and white,
For she's to wed a prince—
The wondrous, jolly Winter Prince,
Fast coming from the north,
His heralds speeding on the wind,
Their trumpets shouting mirth;
And soon a snow-white wedding-feast
Will spread all o'er the earth.
Sarah Stirling McEnery.

[GORGONZOLA, THE AUTHOR.]

BY JOHN KENDRICK BANGS.

It was upon the occasion of my second visit to Schnitzelhammerstein on the Zugvitz that my friend Hans Pumpernickel, who, as some of you may remember, is the Mayor of the queer old city, let me into the secret of poor old Gorgonzola's embarrassing situation. We were taking one of our usual summer-evening walks on the banks of the Zugvitz, and on our way back to Hans's residence we passed a gloomy-looking old house on the right-hand side of the Hochstrasse, near the public gardens. With the exception of a dim light which struggled through a window on the top floor, the mansion was in utter darkness, and was, in fact, in such strong contrast to the general air of cheerfulness which is one of the strongest attributes of this broad avenue that I remarked it.

"Dear me!" I cried, as I stood before it. "What a place of gloom! It reminds me of a small black cloud on an otherwise perfect sky. Who lives there?"

"It is the home of poor old Gorgonzola, the author," said Hans, shaking his head sadly. "The light you see is from his study—his den. It is there that he is at work."

I did not like to confess my ignorance by telling Hans that I had never heard of Gorgonzola, the author. For all I knew, Gorgonzola, the author, might be one of the features of the town, and so, wishing neither to betray my ignorance nor to offend my kindly host, I said:

"Oh! Really? How interesting!"

At this remark Hans threw his head back and laughed. "Is it so?" he said. "Indeed, now, how interesting do you find it?"

"Well," I replied, after some hesitation, "we have a word in our language which expresses it. 'Quite' is the word. I find it quite interesting, though, to tell you the truth, my dear Mr. Mayor, I never heard of Herr Gorgonzola before. In our country almost every town of importance has an author of which it is proud, and it was only my desire to be tactful that kept me from asking, when you mentioned Gorgonzola, who on earth he was. The fact that I never heard of him does not prove that he is not a great man. What has he written?"

"Nothing—practically nothing. He hasn't even written a poem for the Schnitzelhammerstein Blaetter."

"Then why do you call him an author?" I asked.

"Because," Hans replied, naïvely, "every man has to do something, and poor old Gorgonzola is nothing else. Besides, he called himself that."

There was a pause. I was more or less baffled to know what to say, and in accordance with the old German maxim, "When you nothing have to say already, do not say it yet," I deemed it well to keep silent. Fortunately, before the silence that followed became too deep, Pumpernickel himself put in with,

"He did not want to call himself an author, but he had to. You know we have a Directory here in our city—a great, thick, heavy book—"

"Which he wrote?" I suggested, desiring to say something, for I had in mind that other old proverb, "He who says nothing, has nothing to say; and having nothing to say, therefore thinks nothing in his brains."

"Not at all, not at all," cried Hans, impatiently. "He merely let them use his name in it for completeness' sake. You see, it was this way," the Mayor continued. "When Bingenburg and Rheinfels went to our Board of Trade and said let us get up the Directory of this city, the Board of Trade said: 'Donner and Blitzen! not unless you make it complete. The last Directory was full of addresses that no one wished to know, and had none that would help a stranger to our town.'

"'We will make it complete,' said Bingenburg and Rheinfels. 'There shall be no living soul in Schnitzelhammerstein on the Zugvitz whose name and occupation and domicile shall not be down in full.'

"'Then,' said the Board of Trade, 'you may make the Directory, but if we find one name left out, or without an occupation and an address, then will we not only not endorse your Directory, but we will say it is bad, and advise the citizens of this town not to go to those addresses which you print.'

"'We will do our best,' said Bingenburg and Rheinfels.

"'That's good,' replied the Board of Trade. 'Go ahead. What we have feared from experience is that you would do your worst.'

"And so," continued Hans Pumpernickel to me, "these persons were commissioned to prepare a Directory for Schnitzelhammerstein on the Zugvitz. They went ahead and got most everybody. In their original manuscript, submitted to the Board of Trade, they had entries like this: 'Hans Blumenthal, baby, Altgeldstrasse, 19 bis.' They had 'Gretchen Frorumelstine, doll-fancier, 4612 Funf Avenue'—in fact, they had every single human being in town, by name and by occupation, however trivial, mentioned.

"Now, of course, to do this they had to see everybody, and among others they saw poor old Gorgonzola, and he willingly gave them his address and his name.

"'But your occupation?' said the agent, instructed beforehand already.

"'I have none,' said he.

"'Then we put you down as "Wilhelm Gorgonzola, nothing,"' said the agent.

"'But I am not nothing,' cried Gorgonzola.

"'Then what are you—a butcher?" said the agent.

"'You are insulting,' said Gorgonzola, indignantly.

"'We may be, but we do not intend to be,' said the agent. 'The man who is nothing is nothing; if he is not nothing, he is something else. Therefore you may be a butcher.'

"'You cannot have my name at all, then,' said Gorgonzola, with an angry wave of his hand.

"'Oh yes, we can,' replied the agent. 'Your name is here. Therefore we have your name and address. Your occupation is what we wish to learn. If you are not occupied, we will put you down as "vacant," or "to let," or as "nothing." We are under contract to the Board of Trade to give them a complete Directory, and we intend to do so. What, then, are you?'

"'Well, you see,' said Gorgonzola, desperately, 'as yet I am nothing, but I hope to be an author—'

"'And how soon do you hope to be an author?" asked the agent.

"'It may come at any time—to-morrow, or the next day—or the day after—'

"'Oh, well, then, it is all right already,' put in the agent, 'for our Directory will not be out before that. Under no circumstances can we have it ready before to-morrow, or the next day, or the day after. I will therefore put you down as an "author," for doubtless you will be one before our Directory is published.'

"To this," Hans continued, "poor old Gorgonzola weakly consented. You see, he fully expected to be one before the Directory came out; but, alas! he was too hopeful. The day of publication arrived, and as yet he had not written a line. He sent word to Bingenburg and Rheinfels, and begged them to wait a month; but they said no, they would wait ten days and no longer.

"'But I have not yet even an idea for my book,' said Gorgonzola.

"'That is not our fault,' replied Bingenburg and Rheinfels. 'You have had six months in which to become an "author"; we grant you ten days more. If you are not one by that time, our Directory will have to come out, anyhow, and inasmuch as we have your authorization to put you down as such, we shall require that you shall be one at least in name by then, for we have promised that the book shall have no errors. If we get into trouble with the Board of Trade on your account, then shall we sue you for the damages!'"

"The poor old fellow," said I, my sympathy aroused.

BINGENBURG CAME IN PERSON TO SEE HIM.

"It was a dreadfully hard position for him, no doubt," said Hans; "but, after all, it was his own fault, and has been so ever since. When the ten days were up, Gorgonzola had even yet not an idea, much less a book, and Bingenburg came in person to see him. Gorgonzola begged him to blot out the word author, but neither he nor Rheinfels would go to the expense, and they threatened that if he ever denied that he was an author, in public or in private, they would ruin him. 'It is all your own doings,' said Rheinfels. 'We would gladly have put you down as a butcher, or a baker, or anything else that is easy to be, and you would not let us. We offered to put you down as a nothing, and you grew angry, and it was yourself that said you expected to be an author before our Directory came out, and we put you down so with your consent. Now our Directory has cost us five thousand thalers to make, and if one mistake is found therein the Board of Trade will decline to take it off our hands, and we shall lose all that money; and so it comes that you have got to keep your promise to us and be what you said you would.'

"'I see,' moaned Gorgonzola; 'I cannot blame you, Rheinfels. But it is awfully hard.'

"'It would have been easier to be a butcher, but you would not,' put in Bingenburg.

"'I know, I know,' said Gorgonzola, 'but I hate butchering.'

"'Well, anyhow,' said Rheinfels, 'the entry is going to attract attention, and the Board of Trade will try to find an error in the book so that they may not have to pay us, and we want you to understand that we hold you responsible for this. If they summon you, you must confess.'

"'Confess?' cried Gorgonzola. 'Confess what?'

"'That you are an author,' said Rheinfels, calmly.

"'But suppose they ask me of what?' pleaded Gorgonzola, wringing his hands.

"'That is your business, not ours,' retorted Bingenburg and Rheinfels in one breath, and with that they left him.

"And so it happened," continued Hans. "The Directory was published, and the Board of Trade appointed a Committee of Three on Errors, who should read the book and see if it should be paid for or confiscated. Ten possible errors were discovered. Nine of them were found not to be errors, but in the case of Gorgonzola they reported that since he was not an author there was clearly one error in the book, and that they therefore recommended the non-acceptance of the Directory. The Board so decided, and Bingenburg and Rheinfels carried their case to the courts. The Board of Trade stated that they had rejected the book upon the agreement in the contract that one error should be sufficient to relieve them of the payment required, and they had fifty witnesses to say that Gorgonzola was not an author, but a mild-mannered gentleman who had struck them as being a querist.

"'A querist?' asked the Judge.

"'Yes,' said the witnesses. 'A querist—one who is only queer and nothing else.'

"Then Bingenburg and Rheinfels called Gorgonzola as a witness. Poor old fellow! he felt awfully about it, but he had to testify.

"'Your name,' said the lawyer.

HANS JOSEF WILHELM GORGONZOLA, AUTHOR.

"'Hans Josef Wilhelm Gorgonzola,' he replied.

"'A good name for an author,' sneered the lawyer. 'What is your business?'

"'I am an author,' said Gorgonzola, with tears in his eyes.

"'He confesses it! he confesses it!' cried Bingenburg and Rheinfels, overjoyed, while the Board of Trade looked blue, and the Judge called the firm to order.

"'Author of what?' asked the lawyer, triumphantly.

"Gorgonzola hesitated, and Bingenburg and Rheinfels held their breath.

"'Of—what I have written,' said Gorgonzola, sadly.

"'And what is that?' insisted the lawyer.

"'I cannot tell,' said Gorgonzola, 'because it—it is my secret. If I told what I have written, some one else might steal it and publish it over his name, and all my work would be gone for nothing, which is hardly fair.'

"'A good point,' said the Judge, nodding pleasantly at Gorgonzola.

"'But you have never published anything?' said the lawyer in a manner so impressive as to affect the jury.

"'No,' said Gorgonzola. 'No, I have never published anything; but that is because I am not a publisher. If I were a publisher, I should publish. As I am only an author, I merely authorize.'

"'Do not authors frequently publish?' asked the lawyer.

"'Often,' returned Gorgonzola. 'But I am not of that kind. It is said by some who seem to know that the best books are still unwritten, much less published. I am writing one of the unwritten and unpublished books.'

"'Yet you have written something?' suggested the Judge, who admired the modest demeanor of Gorgonzola.

"'Yes,' said Gorgonzola. 'I have written the first paragraph of my new book.'

"'Then,' said the Judge, 'the entry is correct. If he has written the first paragraph, or even the first word of his new novel, he is an author, and I so decide. Next case.'

"So," said Hans, "it was decided that Gorgonzola was properly entered as an author on the pages of the Schnitzelhammerstein Directory, and the Board of Trade was compelled to pay for it. That," Hans added, "was twenty years ago."

"As long ago as that, eh?" said I. "And was Gorgonzola's novel published later?"

"No," said Hans. "Not yet. You see, he is still at work on it. That is why you see that dim light from his study window. Gorgonzola begins work at seven in the morning and retires at midnight. He is still at work on the novel, but, having written that first paragraph, we of course allude to him as the Author."

I laughed again. I had to, though I still had a great sympathy for Gorgonzola.

"What was his first paragraph?" I asked, very much interested; "or don't you know?"

"Yes, indeed, I know," replied Hans. "He has read it to me many times. Let's see—it is like this: 'It was a pleasant day in June. The buds were bursting on the trees, and all nature seemed alive, as Gretchen walked down the stairs and out into the garden.'"

"That's a good start," said I. "And tell me, Mr. Mayor, how far has he got in these twenty years?"

"He is still at work on his second paragraph," said the Mayor.

"Well," said I, "there's a good story for you—but, after all, Hans, it hasn't much of a moral."

"Oh yes, it has," retorted Hans. "It has a great moral. In fact you English-speaking people have the very moral well expressed."

"Indeed," said I, anxiously, "what is that?"

"First be sure you write, then go ahead," said Hans, simply.

THE MIDDLETON BOWL.[1]

BY ELLEN DOUGLAS DELAND.

CHAPTER V.

Yes, some one was in the room. Theodora felt a little thrill of excitement as she realized this fact. Was it a robber who had hidden there? Perhaps, though, it was only one of the servants. She felt almost disappointed when this thought crossed her mind—a robber would be so much more uncommon. And yet he might try to kill her; robbers frequently did such things. She withdrew more into the shadow, and waited.

Not another sound was to be heard. Brave as she naturally was, Theodora felt a tremor of fear as she sat there in the silence of the night. She was quite sure that she had heard something; of that there was no doubt. She knew with absolute certainty that some one or something alive was in her aunts' parlor besides herself.

Should she go and call somebody? No, that would not do, for her aunts had had too much excitement already. If they knew that a burglar—for it certainly might be one—was in the drawing-room they would without doubt scream and faint, and that would be bad for her aunt Joanna, to say the least. The servants would be useless, for they were all elderly, and were quite as unstrung as were their five mistresses, and John, the only man of the household, was ill in his room over the stable.

The doctor was upstairs, to be sure, but it was early in the night, and he was in close attendance upon his patient, who was not yet out of danger. All these thoughts passed rapidly through Teddy's mind, and she saw that she must act alone.

"I don't believe a robber would kill a little girl," she said to herself, "and I will speak to him very politely."

Her first act was to walk around the room pulling up all the Venetian-blinds as high as they would go. There were seven windows in the large room—two at each end, and three on the side that had the two fireplaces. On the fourth side of the room were two doors, one leading into the front hall, the other into the back. The parlor occupied the whole of that side of the main house. The kitchens were in the "L" at the back, cut off by a door into the hall.

It required some courage to go from window to window, particularly when Teddy reached that part of the room whence the sound had come, but she felt that she must have as much light as possible. Her fingers trembled as she tried to fasten the cord which held the blinds. Once their strength failed them, and the slats of the blind fell down with a terrifying clatter; but she pulled them up again, and wound the cord firmly about the hook.

At last the seven shades were up, and the room was as light as the world without. Only here and there lay a black shadow which might contain—anything! Teddy then took up her position near the door, that she might escape should affairs become very alarming, and tried to speak. At first not a sound came from her. She cleared her throat, and tried again.

"Is anybody in this room?" she asked. Only the silence and the shadows made reply. "I am quite sure some one is," she continued, gaining courage at the sound of her own voice; "I heard you breathe a little while ago, and I heard you knock something. If you don't come out I shall have to go and call Dr. Morton, who is upstairs. He is with my aunt Joanna, who is very ill. I should lock the parlor doors while I am gone, so you couldn't get out."

She thought this was a brilliant inspiration, quite forgetting the seven windows within easy reach of the ground. To this long speech, however, there was no reply.

"I declare, it is too bad!" went on Teddy. "I do think you might say something. I won't let any one hurt you, and if you are a robber I'll let you get away as easily as anything, if you'll only come out!"

She ceased again, and suddenly a voice replied. It sounded so near, and it was so unexpected—for she had now almost made up her mind that no one was there, after all—that it made Teddy jump.

"Do you mean that?" it said.

"Yes, of course I do," said she, speaking very rapidly, and fixing her eyes upon the old-fashioned sofa with the high back, whence the voice seemed to proceed. "Please come out and tell me who you are and what you want."

The sofa was placed across a corner, and as Teddy watched it eagerly it was pushed slightly from behind, and a boyish figure rose against the wall. There was something about the intruder that seemed familiar to her, and she stepped forward.

"Why—why, is it you?" she exclaimed, as the boy climbed over the sofa and stood in the moonlight.

"Yes, it's me," was the reply.

Sure enough, it was Andy Morse, the boy who stoned the kitten.

"Why, what do you want here?" asked Teddy, all her fear vanishing at sight of this well-known face. "I am so glad it is you, for, do you know, I was really afraid it was somebody come to steal something. What have you come for, and why did you come in such a queer way in the middle of the night?"

The boy shuffled his feet, and looked away from her.

"Is there anything I can do for you?" she continued.

"Yes," said he, in a hoarse whisper; "I'm awful hungry."

"Oh, are you? Well, just wait here, and I'll get you something to eat. Or perhaps you had better come with me, for my aunts don't like to have eating in the parlor. You might drop the crumbs, you know. I often do. We'll go out to the kitchen; but first I must find some matches."

"Here's one," said Morse, diving into his pocket.

He followed her through the door into the back hall. She could not reach the gas-burner, so he lighted it for her both there and in the kitchen. She went to the bread-box and took out a loaf of Catharine's delicious Graham-bread, and then she went to the refrigerator in the hall and procured some butter. A pitcher of milk and some cold mutton were also within reach. These she brought and placed upon the kitchen table, inviting her guest at the same time to draw up a chair. Then, having supplied him with a knife and fork, and some cookies which she found in the store-room, she sat down at the table herself.

"I am hungry too," she remarked, affably. "I have been up all night, and I went after the doctor on a bicycle. It makes you awfully hungry to do so much in the night."

Her guest made no reply to this, but devoted himself to his supper with an avidity which left no doubt of his being hungry himself. Every drop of the milk had disappeared, every scrap of meat upon the mutton bone had been devoured before he spoke. Then he pushed back his chair. "Thank you," said he. "I 'ain't had nothin' ter eat since day before yesterday."

"Oh!" cried Theodora, "I don't wonder you were hungry! Won't you have something more? Why, how did it happen?"

"It happened 'cause I'm tired of askin' folks ter give me somethun when they don't want ter, and I 'ain't had no money ter pay for it, and yer can't get nothin' without payin' for it unless yer wants ter get chucked inter jail. So that is the reason I come here. I thought I'd get ter jail sooner or later, and I might as well try for somethun big first. Yer don't much care what yer do when yer as hungry as I was."

"What do you mean?" asked Teddy. "I don't quite understand what you say about jail."

The boy looked at her in silence for a moment or two. "Look ahere," said he, at last. "I thought I hated yer 'count o' that black eye yer give me long o' that cat. I 'ain't never been set onter by a girl before, and it jest made me rippin' mad. I didn't s'pose I'd ever git over it, and I'd 'a' liked ter 'a' paid yer back over and over again, but I feel diff'runt now. Yer've been mighty perlite, and give me as good a lot o' victuals as I ever tasted. I feel better, now I've got somethun inside o' me, and I'm agoin' ter tell yer somethun. I don't believe, after all, as yer the kind o' girl as would git me inter trouble."

"Oh no; of course not!" said Teddy, earnestly. "I was very mad at you that day, for I do think it is perfectly horrible for any one to hurt an animal. I'm sorry I hurt you very badly, but I may just as well tell you the truth. You had better never do it again if you see me anywhere near, for I am sure, perfectly sure, that it would make me just as mad as it did that day, and I am very much afraid I should attack you the same way. My aunts did not like my doing it at all, and they said it was unladylike, and I suppose it was. But oh! you don't know how angry it makes me to see any one cruel to animals!"

They were standing facing each other, the little girl in her pretty red frock, with the mass of tumbled brown hair falling over her shoulders; the tall ungainly boy in his ragged clothes, twisting his hat in his hands as he listened to this tirade. When she had finished, he lifted his eyes and looked at her admiringly.

"I WON'T STONE NO MORE KITTENS, NOT IF I CAN HELP IT, NOR PUPPIES NEITHER."

"Yer a good one," said he. "I kinder like yer underneath fer it, though yer did give me a black eye and make me mad. And yer've been that good ter me ter-night, givin' me such a lot ter eat, that I'm willin' ter promise yer somethun. I won't stone no more kittens, not if I can help it, nor puppies neither."

"Oh, thank you!" cried Theodora, fervently. "I am so much obliged to you for saying that! Will you really be kind to animals after this? You don't know what a relief to my mind it is. I have often thought of you since, and wondered if you were being cruel; and now I shall feel quite easy about you. The poor kitten died, you know."

Morse said nothing to this.

"And we had a funeral," continued Teddy. "That was a dreadful day altogether, except the funeral. That was nice, but a terrible misfortune happened to our family that day. But you said you were going to tell me something. Was it about being kind to animals?"

"No, it warn't about animals."

"What was it?" asked Theodora, much interested.

"Will yer promise not ter git me inter trouble?" he asked again.

"Of course I'll promise."

"Then I'll tell yer. Do yer know how I got in here ter-night?"

"No; I was going to ask you that."

"Well, yer know when yer went out on the bike?"

"When I went for the doctor? Yes."

"Well, I was down near the gate, a-hangin' round, not knowin' what I was agoin' ter do, and when I seen yer go by, I thinks here's a chance. Most likely she's left a door open or somethun, and I can git in and git somethun or other. Yer see, I was so hungry I was ready for anything. And I found the back door open, and I walked in as easy as anything. I was afraid to hide in the kitchen, for I heard people movin' round, so I crep' inter the parlor, for I knew the big sofa there'd hide me."

"Why, how did you know that?" asked Theodora. "Have you ever been in our parlor?"

The boy dropped his eyes again, and again shifted his hat.

"I jest thought there'd be some place there," said he; "most folks has sofas."

"And what were you going to do? Were you going to stay there all night?"

"I was agoin' ter stay there till the house got quiet, and then I was agoin' ter make a grab and be off."

"A grab?" repeated Teddy, wonderingly.

"Yes, a grab. I was agoin' ter take a lot o' things—them silver things and some o' the chiny—anythin' I could get."

"You mean you were going to steal something?"

"Yes," he said, doggedly.

Theodora drew a step nearer.

"Then you were a robber after all!" she said. "I never saw one before. But oh, I am so sorry it was you! I am too sorry! I was just getting to like you, because you said you would be kind to animals after this. Are, you really a robber?"

"I ain't one yet," said the boy, "and now I dun'no' as I'll ever be one. I feel kinder diff'runt about it, now I've got somethun inside o' me. I guess you'd feel like stealin' if yer hadn't had nothin' ter eat since day before yesterday."

"I do believe I would," said Theodora, compassionately; "it must be perfectly awful! But oh, I hope you won't steal anything. It is such a wicked thing to do. You know there is a commandment entirely about that, so it must be one of the wickedest things there are. Please don't steal!"

"I won't," said Andy Morse. "I feel diff'runt now."

There was a pause, while Theodora rapidly thought over the situation.

"What are you going to do to-morrow?" she asked. "How will you get something to eat then?"

"Dun'no'. Trust ter luck, I guess."

"Haven't you any relations?"

"Only an uncle, and he's drunk most o' the time and won't give me nothin'."

"And won't any of your friends give you anything?"

"'Ain't got none, and I'm tired of askin' people ter give me victuals. There ain't no one as seems ter want ter. Yer see, I've got a kinder bad name round here. That's the reason I can't get no work."

"Wouldn't you like some money?" asked Teddy. "I've got some upstairs I could very well give you, if you would let me. Then you could buy yourself something to eat for a few days, at any rate."

The boy looked at her. "Yer a real good un," said he, after a moment's grateful pause. "If I had a little money ter git some decent clo'es, I might git some work somewhere or other. I'd rather be honest if I can, but a poor shabby-lookin' feller like me don't stand no chance, and everybody in Alden thinks I'm no good. If I could git away from here, I might git somethun ter do somewheres else. Do yer really mean yer'd give me some money?"

"Of course I do," replied Teddy; "I'll go up and get it now. It's in my bank. Suppose we put this light out and go back to the parlor; you can wait for me there."

They reached the drawing-room door, and Teddy, opening it, motioned to her guest to go in and be seated. The moonlight still flooded the room, and it lighted up the old silver snuffers and trays, the tall silver candelabra which flanked both ends of the two mantel-pieces, and even Great-grandfather Middleton's gold snuff-box, which was always kept upon a cabinet in the front of the room.

"Say!" exclaimed Andy Morse, in a sharp whisper; "ain't yer 'fraid ter leave me here with all them things? Ain't yer 'fraid I might steal 'em, after all?"

"Oh no," said Theodora, following him into the room and closing the door; "of course not. You just told me you wouldn't steal, that you were going to be honest, and of course I believe you."

And then she went out of the parlor and left him alone in the moonlight with the gold and the silver, and all the priceless china, from the Middleton bowl down. She was absent about ten minutes. When she returned she carried a small silk bag in her hand, which she gave to Morse.

"It is all in there," she said—"all I have. I just emptied my bank right into that work-bag, for I thought it would be easier for you to carry the money that way. I don't know how much there is there, but I think it is about fifteen dollars, for I've been saving it for some time. It seems heavy, for so much of it is in pennies and five and ten cent pieces, but I don't believe you will mind carrying it."

Andy Morse was speechless. He took the bag, shook it, weighed it, looked at it in the light. Twice he tried to speak, but no words came.

"Do yer—do yer really mean ter give me all this?" he stammered at last.

"Certainly I do," replied Teddy. "I only hope it will be enough for you to get what you want."

"Look ahere," said Andy; "jest yer listen ter me! I solemnly promise I'll act straight after this. I won't steal, and I won't hurt no animals, and I won't do nothin' yer wouldn't like. And if I ever make enough, I'll pay yer back this money, sure 's I'm alive. I'll count it, and I'll pay yer back every cent. Do yer believe me?"

"Yes, indeed I do; but you needn't bother about paying it back, for you really need it a great deal more than I do." As she spoke her glance fell upon the Middleton bowl, gleaming in the moonlight. "Before you go, I want to show you this," she said, moving over to the Chinese table in the window.

"This was broken the day—the day the kitten died, and we can't find out who did it. It is very, very valuable, and all of our family think more of it than anything else we own, because my great-grandfather brought it home and gave it to his son, and when my aunts die it is to go to my father, and then to me. It is never to go out of the family, and now it is broken, and had to be mended. We can't find out who did it, and it has given us lots of trouble. My aunts thought at first that I did it, and sometimes they think so now, I am sure; but I didn't. It makes me so unhappy to think they don't believe me." She paused for a moment and gazed at the bowl. Then she continued. "It isn't nice not to be believed, and that is the reason I am telling you about it. I just happened to think of it. I want to tell you again that I really and truly believe you. I don't want you to feel unhappy about that, the way I do about the Middleton bowl."

Andy looked at it in silence. Then he turned away.

"I'm agoin' now," he said. "Good-by. Yer've saved me, and I'll never forgit it. Would yer please tell me what yer name is?" he asked, shyly. "Yer first name, I mean. Of course I know yer other name's Middleton."

"Theodora," said she, "but everybody calls me Teddy, and I like that best. Good-by! I hope you will be able to get some work. I'm very glad I came down here to-night. If Aunt Joanna hadn't been so ill I shouldn't have come. If I can ever do anything else for you, I wish you would tell me. Please go out the back door, the way you came in, if you don't mind, for I am afraid my aunts might hear the front door shut, and it would frighten them."

She followed him to the back door and watched him walk away in the moonlight, swinging the bag in his hand. Then she closed the door and went back to the drawing-room.

"It must be dreadful to be so hungry," she said, to herself, as she again stood by the Middleton bowl, "and I'm glad I told him I believed him. It certainly is dreadful not to be believed."

[to be continued.]

[A LOYAL TRAITOR.]

A STORY OF THE WAR OF 1812 BETWEEN AMERICA AND ENGLAND.

BY JAMES BARNES.

CHAPTER XVI.

WHY I NEVER REACHED FRANCE.

We drew up our horses before the house nearest to the stone pier or jetty that ran out some hundred feet or more from the shore. On one side of it was a small dock or basin large enough to give shelter to four or five fishing-boats about the size of those we call dories in New England.

As we dismounted, Monsieur de Brissac gave a halloo, and a figure appeared in the doorway. I was surprised to see that it was Monsieur de la Remy. He called back into the room, and a man followed him out and took our horses.

"Ah, De Brissac! you're on time as usual, and I see that you have not forgotten your way," Monsieur de la Remy cried, as he grasped my patron's elbows in his two hands in a half embrace. Then he bowed to me without much effusion. "Good-morning, Monsieur le Marquis," was all he said.

I had not known that my host of the Gloucester Arms was going to be one of us, and so expressed my surprise at seeing him. He made no explanation, but I take it he must have been in London for some time, and that he had come direct from there, although I had not met him at any of the routs or parties I had attended.

"Why should I forget my way, monsieur?" my patron said, laughing, as he paused on the door-step. "Have I not travelled it every month for three years?"

As we entered the house the Marquis de Senez was standing at the door, and greeted us in his usual reserved way. We were in a large room, and I noticed the smell of the same kind of tobacco that the sailors use on shipboard in the English service—a smell that seems to cling to them and to all of their belongings—but apparently none of the gentlemen had been smoking.

"Everything is most propitious," said De Senez, as he brought forward two chairs from the table. "Dame Fortune smiles on us. But pardon me; you have not noticed Monsieur de Rembolez."

It was then that I saw for the first time that there was a figure sitting back in the dark shadows in the corner of the room. I recognized the name, and as soon as the man stepped forward into the light of the single candle, I remembered his face, and that I had seen it in London. He was a sharp-featured, thick-set man—that is, big as to his chest and shoulders, but very light and muscular in his underpinning. His eyes were so black that they appeared all pupils, and his teeth were so large and even that I believe that he could have bitten a tenpenny nail in two with them, as his jaw also looked strong as a vise. I did not like the man, and as I had good cause to remember afterwards, he on his part had conceived no great affection for me.

At the mention of my name he merely glanced up and showed his teeth, at which I was tempted to show mine in return, for the meaning of that display was rather ambiguous. He was to be the fifth one of the party, and I am quite sure he was not of Monsieur de Brissac's choosing.

"It's a good night for the crossing," observed Monsieur de Senez. "Did you see the lookout on the cliff as you came down?"

"I doubt not he saw us," retained my patron. "But he probably kept well hidden. Is everything ready? Is Captain St. Croix here?"

"Yes, and most of his crew within calling distance," returned the steel-jawed man, casting a look over his shoulder.

I saw no door, or anything that would suggest that there was an adjoining room, for the one we were in occupied the whole ground-floor of the house; but behind De Rembolez was a tall oak cupboard that reached almost to the ceiling. There had come a lull in our conversation; De Senez and the host of the Gloucester Arms were talking in whispers, and Monsieur de Brissac was engaged in pulling off his heavy riding-boots. All at once the low grumbling of men's voices in talk was heard, and then an oath in good seafaring English issued apparently from the tall cupboard. I fairly jumped as the door of it was opened outward and a great, black-whiskered man stepped out of it. Then I saw where the smell of tobacco came from, for the smoke rolled out with him, and the ember in his long clay pipe was glowing.

ASTONISHED, I LOOKED PAST HIM, AND SAW THAT THE CUPBOARD CONCEALED A GOOD-SIZED TRAP-DOOR.

Astonished, I looked past him, and saw that the cupboard concealed a good-sized trap-door; it was open, the top of a ladder extended through the floor, and the sound of voices came from below. It was a most ingenious idea. The cellar to which this passageway led was not under the house, but under the garden at the back of it. The floor of the room in which we were was made of hard, dry earth, and digging there would have revealed nothing.

I found out, by questioning afterwards on the voyage over, that the two other houses which abutted on the innocent-looking garden also had passageways that led to the cleverly concealed smugglers' cabin.

The bewhiskered man was addressed by the company as Captain St. Croix, but I would bet a new anchor to a ship's biscuit that he was more English than French, although his accent was fairly good.

"It looks the night for our purpose, gentlemen," he said. "We have brewed a punch below. What say you I send for some of it, and we will pledge a successful passage to the Hirondelle, eh?"

"And destruction to the Corsican upstart," put in he of the beady eyes.

The Captain gave a halloo down the shaft and ordered some one to bring up the punch-bowl. At the same time he set about getting us something to eat from a rough side-board near the fireplace.

Just as a man's head appeared coming up the ladder there were three sharp knocks on the door, and a tall fisher-lad in a dripping great-coat came in.

"It's thick and raining," he said. "I've seen the lights of the old boat. She'll be off the point in a few minutes."

"Then we must bear a hand," said the Captain. "So, gentlemen, let us eat and drink and dispense with ceremony."

I was very hungry, and fell to at once, as did the others. In half an hour we left the shelter of the house, and hurrying down to the dock, we were all crowded into one of the row-boats. Then pulling away, we headed against the driving rain through the half-darkness.

As it was wet when we reached the Hirondelle, I followed the four other gentlemen down into the little cabin, although my love of the sea was returning so strongly that I was tempted to stay on deck and court a soaking.

The little box of a place in which we were sitting was dimly lighted with a swinging lamp, and as we conversed of the plot and object of our trip (of which I shall say nothing), I could tell that we were travelling at a good rate of speed by the rushing and lapping of the water against the bull. The reason I do not give any full account of the plot in which I was supposed to be engaged is that I think even now I should keep it silent, as it concerns neither me nor my story.

After a time we all fell asleep, most of us in a sitting posture, and I was the first to awaken. It was between three and four, and still raining, when I came out of the close musty cabin and breathed the fine air. I noticed we had shortened sail, and that a man in the bow was heaving the lead. He did not call out the soundings, but signalled them to the Captain by motions of his hand. I knew we must be in shoal water, but in how many fathoms I could not tell. All at once the man at the wheel threw the lugger up into the wind, and we lay hove to for probably half an hour. Every one on deck was listening.

Suddenly the dark shape of a great row-boat could be seen approaching, and going below into the cabin I aroused the rest of the passengers; De Rembolez appeared rather nervous.

Where the lugger put off her cargo I do not know, for as soon as the five of us had clambered over her side into the row-boat, and Monsieur De Senez had given a handful of gold to the Captain, the latter stood off presumably to the southward, while we rowed directly to the east.

Not a word had been spoken by the rowers or the man at the tiller, and I was so interested in wondering what next was going to happen that I was perfectly satisfied to curb my curiosity and ask no questions. I was not anxious to anticipate, and felt really sad to think that I was soon to leave M. De Brissac—for what, I knew not.

We were off the coast between Dunkerque and Gravelines, and I should judge that the boat had rowed out some seven or eight miles. The men at the oars looked part Dutch and part French. They were a villanous-looking set, however, and the fellow at the tiller appeared little above them in order of intelligence; but while we were pulling straight ahead, the cockswain suddenly stood up straight in his box.

"Arrêtez!" he whispered, hoarsely.

The men backed-water skilfully, but yet such headway did the boat have on that it required three or four efforts before we came to a stop. There right ahead of us lay a long white, lapstreak boat, sharp at both ends. She had pulled directly athwart our bows. Had we been keeping a sharp lookout we would have seen her long before, as her crew must have had us in sight for some minutes. One glance at them told me that these men were not Frenchmen. De Rembolez had stood up almost as soon as the cockswain, and was looking forward eagerly, but I saw his face change to a puzzled expression.

"Les Anglais!" exclaimed the cockswain between his teeth.

A few strokes of the long oars that the men in the stranger craft wielded, and she was almost alongside of us.

"Un pilote," said a voice with an execrable accent and a drawling twang through the nose. "We want a pilot. Avez-vous un pilote?"

"We have no pilot for you!" answered Monsieur de la Remy, in good English. "Keep away from us."

But what was I doing at this very moment?

It was with difficulty that I was restraining an inclination to plunge overboard and strike out for the whale-boat.

It is almost past believing, but unless my eyes were playing me false, there stood my old friend Cy Plummer of the Minetta, balancing a boat-hook in his hand. This aside, it would have required but a close glance at the wiry, strong-knit figures and the keen sharp-featured faces, for one who knew, to declare that they were no English press-gang bullies, but Yankee sailor-men.

I was trying to find my voice, which had left me in my astonishment, but the nobleman landlord did not notice my condition, and was still continuing his warning.

"Come no closer," he said. "At your peril. We have no pilot for you."

At the same time he drew from the breast of his coat a small double-barrelled pistol.

"Who are you and where do you come from?" put in De Rembolez.

There was evidently some consternation in the white boat at hearing the sound of English. The men were leaning forward preparing to take a stroke, and Plummer was evidently perplexed and at a loss what to do, when I found my tongue.

"Plummer! Cy Plummer! get me out of this," I cried.

We were so near by this time that our oars were almost touching, but the astonishment occasioned on both sides by my sudden outbreak seemed to paralyze all hands.

"Who in the name of Davy Jones are you?" Plummer questioned, quickly.

"John Hurdiss of the Young Eagle," I cried, throwing off my cloak. Just as I was about to dive overboard I felt myself grasped about the arm.

It was De Rembolez who had laid hold of me. The words he hissed I did not catch, but in order to loose myself I drew back my free hand and caught him a blow fairly between the eyes. He did not relax his hold, however, and endeavored to throw me into the bottom of the boat. Although he was a powerful man, he probably did not know much about wrestling. I had the firmer footing, and twisting him round, I turned the tables, and was forcing him away from me, when he sank his great white teeth into the sleeve of my coat. Had he caught my flesh I might have lost the use of my arm, but as it was he laid hold of the cloth only, and the sleeve parted at the shoulder; but the little French cockswain now decided to take a hand, and sprang upon me from behind, but the result was to my helping. I just remembered hearing the sharp snapping of Monsieur de la Remy's pistol, which missed fire, when I went overboard over the gunwale, and with me fell Beady Eyes and the little cockswain. I came up between the two boats. In the mean time both the crews were laying about with their oars over my head, and there was a lusty scrimmage going on. As soon as he felt the water closing over him, De Rembolez released his hold, but the little 'longshoreman in the striped shirt still held on, and before I knew it some one grabbed me and him also, and pulled us both over into the long white boat. Somehow the combatants had drifted apart, and with a quickness that was surprising the Yankees had got out their oars and were giving way.

I scrambled to my feet, and looking over the stern I saw that the other boat was after us, but they never could have caught us had they been pulling two men on a thwart. In five minutes they turned about and made off in the opposite direction.

"Douse my top-lights!" exclaimed Plummer, leaning forward and smearing the blood away from a slight wound on the side of his face. "Where, in the name of goodness, did you come from, lad?"

"From an English prison, in the first place," I said; "but it's a long story. Oh, but I will be glad to see our colors again!"

The French cockswain here interrupted any more questions or explanations by an effort to jump overboard.

"Lay hold of him," cried Plummer to the men in the bow. "Hold the frog-eater!" and in a minute they had pinioned the little Frenchman down. "Pull, larboard; hold, star-board!" Plummer cried all at once, jamming the helm down, and I, following the glance of his eye, saw the outlines of a vessel not five hundred yards away.

"What ship is that?" I asked.

"The Yankee, privateer," my friend replied. "The luckiest vessel ever launched—that's honest truth. Oh, we've some yarns to spin, my son, and so must you, and, ecod! we'll have a time of it. I can scarce believe that it is you at all, lad. But it's just the sort of a thing I might expect would happen on a cruise like the one we've had since leaving Buzzard's Bay."

"Well, I have had some adventures myself, Plummer," I said. "And in the very first place, I owe you a debt of gratitude for the loan of the clothes and cap, my man."

Now upon my soul I did not mean to be condescending in my speech, but there must have been something in my tone that caused the honest seaman to make a change in his.

"I hope they brought you luck, sir," he said.

I noticed that he had said "sir" involuntarily.

"Indeed they did," I returned. "I'll have to tell you all about it."

But now the bowmen were getting in their oars, and we were close alongside of a small topsail schooner, as fine a bit of ship-building as one would wish to see. She was hove to, and the great mainsail was crackling, and the reef-points keeping up a continuous drumming against it; and the sound was good to my ears.

"What have we here?" called a voice over the rail, only a few feet above our heads.

"A pilot and a passenger," answered Plummer, fending the whale-boat off from the side of the schooner with his hands.

A short rope was thrown over to us, and, laying hold of it, I clambered over the bulwarks, and came down on deck, where I found myself face to face with one of the strangest-looking figures that I have met in the course of my adventures.

Before me stood a slight stoop-shouldered man, dressed in a blue broadcloth coat and a long yellow satin waist-coat. He had on a pair of tight-fitting buckskin breeches thrust into heavy sea-boots. The expression on his face was the remarkable thing about him. At first I thought that he was laughing at me, for his light blue eyes had such an eager twinkling light in them that they appeared to show amusement. His mouth was parted in a smile, and a continual lifting and lowering of his eyebrows lent the idea that he considered me or my appearance some huge joke.

"Is this the passenger or the pilot?" he asked, lifting a heavy cocked hat, and giving it a little flourish, as it were, over his head.

"Neither passenger nor pilot," I replied, "but an escaped prisoner from England, who is anxious to get a chance to fight for America again. I was captured from the Young Eagle, privateer."

The man's voice had surprised me. It was as fresh and young as a boy's. When I mentioned the Young Eagle he made a grimace as if he were about to whistle, but he changed it to a little rippling laugh.

"Oh, ho! Temple of Stonington, eh! Such a reckless, careless devil. I know him. Good sailor, though. So you would ship with us?"

"Yes, sir," I answered. "And try to do my duty."

"Oh, we can use you, never fear," the strange man chuckled. "And now where are we?"

"Eh?" I ejaculated.

"What's our latitude and longitude?" he inquired.

This was a puzzler for me, for I hardly knew one from the other, and could not have answered.

"Do you mean to say that you don't know that?" I asked, trying to fend off answering.

"I haven't the slightest idea where I am," he answered. "I don't know whether I'm in the English Channel, the North Sea, or the Bay of Biscay."

This was told to me as if it were another huge joke, but I thought it was a strange condition for the Captain of a vessel to be in.

"We're off the coast of France," I said, "not far from Dunkerque."

"Dunkerque?" repeated the Captain. "Ho, ho! that's fortunate."

At this moment Plummer, with two or three of the crew of the whale-boat, which was being hoisted in, came aft. They had the little Frenchman, who looked half frightened to death, with them.

"Here's the pilot, Captain Gorham," Plummer said, touching his cap.

The Captain's reply to this, and the effect of it, almost took my breath away.

"Ah, Pierre," he said, "c'est donc vous? How is Madame Burron, and the little ones?"

The little Frenchman drew back, and then fell at the Captain's feet, grasping his hand.

"Ah, Capitaine Rieur, bonne fortune!" he cried, and he mumbled something I could not catch.

[to be continued.]