Copyright, 1895, by Harper & Brothers. All Rights Reserved.

HARRY BORDEN'S NAVAL MONSTER.

BY W. J. HENDERSON.

It was a bright and beautiful morning in June, 1927. The war between Venezuela and England had been in progress just three weeks, and every one was wondering why the big monarchy had not whipped the little republic off the face of the earth. But the resources of the South American country had been underestimated, and so had the immense difficulties which confronted England in her endeavor to carry on an offensive war at an almost inaccessible distance from her most trustworthy sources of supplies, and in a climate which was formidable to her men. She had succeeded in landing a small force of trained soldiers, fresh from her latest campaign against the Ameer of Afghanistan, who had set up a new boundary-line beyond Herat, and was consequently in hot water with both England and Russia.

These trained Indian curry-eaters had penetrated a vast forest in the interior and had never come out, and it was currently reported that half of them had perished in a swamp, and the other half had been destroyed by fevers and cobras. A strong fleet, under command of Vice-Admiral Sir Wallace Bruce, had been scattered by adverse winds, and two of the ships had fallen in with powerful Venezuelan armor-clads, and had been most impertinently sent to the bottom. Others had sunk three Venezuelan war-ships, but the little republic had three better ones afloat inside of a week, and experts said that they looked very French.

The war had broken out over England's high-handed occupation of an insignificant island off the Venezuelan coast. The Venezuelans had been amazed by the proceeding, but the Marquis of Wintergreen, the Foreign Secretary, had at once declared that the island had been conquered and attached to England by Sir Francis Drake in the course of his first voyage to the West Indies. As Mr. Froude and other English historians had proved that Drake was little better than a pirate, this made every one laugh, except the Venezuelans, who said they were going to fight; and they did. As soon as war was declared, President Roosevelt, of the United States, on the advice of Secretary of State George B. McClellan, Jun., called an extra session of Congress, and the legislative halls at Washington so rang with patriotic speeches about the Monroe Doctrine that the New York Sun got out extras every two hours, day and night, and had illuminated bulletins covering the entire front of the building. Congress at length declared that the United States must act as an ally of Venezuela, whereupon the Sun printed itself in red, white, and blue, and the World despatched correspondents by special balloon to South America. The President ordered the entire National Guard into the service of the United States, and the various regiments at once repaired to their camps of instruction and began field drills. It was expected that they would be fully equipped and prepared for service at the front in about two months. The naval militia was also ordered out, and immediately began a series of cruises alongshore in open boats, landing and sending signals in every direction every four hours. The officers clamored for coast-defense vessels to man, but there were only four such ships, and they were all in dry docks undergoing repairs that would take three months to complete. The Secretary of the Navy issued orders to Rear-Admiral Ward to get the North and South Atlantic squadrons to the Venezuelan coast as quickly as possible, and the Rear-Admiral answered that he would be ready to sail by the end of August.

As soon as the action of Congress had been taken, Harry Borden, of Tickle River, went by express train to Washington. In the obscure sea-coast village of Tickle River Harry was called a genius, and it was said that he had invented things which would be worth millions to the government in such an emergency as that which had now arisen. It was to lay before the Secretary of War one of these inventions that the young man had gone to the capital. He had exhibited a small working model of his contrivance to several wealthy men of his native State, and they had forthwith invested enough money in it to enable the young inventor to build a full-fledged machine, and to go to see the Secretary about its employment in the impending conflict. Harry Borden was a good talker, but he could not talk the government of the United States into prompt action.

"My dear young friend," said the Secretary, "I am sure that your invention will prove of inestimable value to the United States in time of war."

"It's the time of war now, isn't it?" said Harry.

"Yes, yes, to be sure; but this is a matter which must be laid before Congress, and a bill must be introduced regarding it. I should advise you to see the Congressman from your district about that. I will give you a letter to him saving that I heartily approve of your machine."

"But, sir, while all this is going on we are losing valuable time. My machine ought to be down there damaging the enemy."

"Really, my dear young friend, you must allow things to take their course."

"Why can't you give me permission to go ahead on my own hook?"

"Embark in private warfare? Privateering is out of date, my young friend. But, ah—um—I may say that—ah—if you should go down there and succeed in inflicting serious damage on the British fleet, I think—mind, I say only that I think—the government would ignore the irregularity of the proceeding."

"That's enough for me," said Harry, springing to his feet. "If my backers will consent, I'll be there in less than a week; and, mark my word, sir, you'll hear of my machine down there, sir."

And before the astonished Secretary could say more, Harry Borden had bounded from the room.

The British cruiser Ajax III. was steaming at a speed of ten knots through the blue waters of the Caribbean Sea. She had been carrying certain despatches of grave importance from Vice-Admiral Sir Wallace Bruce to the Governor of Jamaica, and was now returning in a leisurely manner, which told of economy in the coal department. The Ajax III. was an armored cruiser of about 6000 tons. She carried armor eight inches thick on her sides, and had a steel protective deck four inches thick. Her main battery consisted of four improved Smith-Dodge-Hopkins 8-inch rapid-firing breech-loaders, capable of discharging four of the new steel-iridium conical projectiles every minute, with a point-blank range of two miles, and an initial velocity of 3000 feet per second. Her secondary battery consisted of six 4-inch revolving guns, discharging seventy shells a minute when operated by electricity. The cruiser had the new compound quintuple engines, capable of driving her twenty-six knots an hour under forced draught. On the whole, she was regarded as a fairly efficient vessel, though some of the leading British critics declared that she belonged to a type that was fast becoming obsolete.

She was moving gently and steadily through the water. The sun was shining brightly, and his gleaming rays made sparkling light along the cruiser's polished brass-work and on the brown chases of her long slender guns. Captain Dudley Fawkes was pacing the after-bridge in conversation with his Executive Officer, Commander Bilton-Brooks, and Lieutenant Sir Edward Avon was the officer of the watch on the main bridge.

"I don't believe," said Captain Fawkes, "that the United States means seriously to take a hand in this light."

"I don't know about that," responded Commander Bilton-Brooks. "Congress has taken action, and the President has called out troops."

"True enough," rejoined the Captain, "but that does not necessarily mean anything. You know the navy must be the aggressive force, and we have yet to see an American ship afloat in these waters."

"That is quite true," said the Executive Officer; "yet, for the life of me, I can't help feeling that there is mischief of some sort in the air."

The Executive Officer's words were more nearly correct than even he suspected, for at that very instant the two lookouts in the foretop were puzzling their eyes and brains to make out a strange object which had appeared on the lee beam. While they were watching it, it dropped from the air, where it had seemed to be floating, and rested on the bosom of the sea, where it presently resolved itself into a cutter-yacht some sixty feet in length.

"It were a bloomin' mirage, Bill," said one lookout to the other, as he lifted his voice and bawled, "Sail, ho!"

"Where away?" came the quick demand from the bridge.

"On our lee beam, sir," answered the man. "Looks like a cutter-yacht, sir."

Now in the year 1927 a cutter-yacht was something of a curiosity, for electricity had supplanted sail-power for small craft, and vessels propelled by canvas were rare indeed. The cutter-yacht seen from the decks of the Ajax III. was on the port tack, close hauled and heading so as to intercept the cruiser's course, provided she had speed enough, which was wholly unlikely. She was under full canvas, and though the breeze was very light, she slipped through the smooth water at an amazing speed. This fact dawned on the minds of the Captain and his Executive Officer at the same time.

"She must have an auxiliary electric screw," said Commander Bilton-Brooks.

"I fancy so," said the Captain. "Owned by some fellow who likes to think he's sailing, but has no patience with light breezes. It's rather curious, though, that he should be cruising in these waters at a time like this, isn't it?"

"It certainly is," answered the Executive Officer. "I don't see any flag—do you, sir?"

"No. I rather fancy I shall have to overhaul this yacht, and make her skipper give an account of her. There's a mysterious air about her that I don't half like."

But it was a good deal easier to talk about overhauling the cutter than it was to do it. The yacht's sails, which were made of some extremely light material, like Chinese silk in appearance, were drawing powerfully, and her electric motor—if it really was electric—was doing astounding work. The yacht flashed through the water like some great fish, and so fine were her lines that she left hardly a bubble in her wake. The Captain of the Ajax III. gave orders to increase the speed of the cruiser, and presently the quick throbbing of her engines and the vibrations of her hull told that she was tearing across the long swells at a 25-knot speed. But still the cutter-yacht flew along, and it was evident that she would pass across the cruiser's bow if both held their courses.

"We must stop her lively skipping," said Captain Dudley Fawkes, and he gave orders to sound the call to quarters. The bugle rang out, and the hearty British tars jumped to their stations.

"Cast loose and provide!" ordered Commander Bilton-Brooks.

The ammunition hoists slipped noiselessly upward bearing the steel-iridium shells for the 8-inch guns, and the electric chains hauled up the 70-pounders for the secondary battery. In forty-five seconds the ship was ready to fight, and the order was given to train all forward guns on the cutter and stand by for orders. Then the Captain and his Executive Officer turned their glasses once more on the cutter.

"What on earth is she up to now?" exclaimed the Captain.

"Taking in sail—and spars, too!" cried Commander Bilton-Brooks.

It was true. Not only had the strange cutter let all her thin sails run down, but she seemed to have folded up her mast, boom, gaff, and bowsprit in some strange way and stowed them out of sight.

"Has she shown any flag yet?" asked the Captain.

"None that I have seen," answered the Executive Officer.

"Then I'll wager a month's pay that she's some Yankee invention," declared Captain Dudley Fawkes.

"What in the world are they doing now?" said the Executive Officer.

A strange misshapen mass was rising above the bulwarks of the cutter with surprising swiftness.

"It's a balloon!" exclaimed the Captain.

"Hadn't we better open fire on her?" asked the Executive Officer.

"Not yet. I think we'd better get close enough to hail her first," answered the Captain. "She may not be anything more than a pleasure craft, you know."

The balloon was inflated by this time, and was tugging at the heavy steel hawsers by which it was attached to the cutter's hull. A cry of surprise broke from the crew of the British cruiser.

"Look! look! She's going up!"

The great balloon, inflated with the newly discovered gas, mercurite, the lightest and most powerful of all known gases, was lifting the cutter bodily into the air. Her curiously shaped hull, modelled after a shark's body, and equipped with a fin-keel for sailing on the wind, was now fully revealed. At the same instant a United States ensign was waved over her stern by a young man.

"Mr. Cortis," called the Captain, who had not thought it necessary yet to enter the conning-tower, "give him a taste of your metal."

"Ay, ay, sir," answered the Lieutenant in command of the forward 8-inch guns.

The next instant there was a terrific concussion, and one of the big shells went screaming toward the cutter: but she was rising so fast that the projectile passed under her, and plunged foaming into the sea a mile away.

"More elevation, sir," cried the Executive Officer.

"Impossible!" answered Lieutenant Cortis: "we're too close to her, and the angle is too high."

"Look at her now!" exclaimed the Captain. "She's rushing toward us!"

"Sailing against the wind with a balloon!" cried Commander Bilton-Brooks.

The shark-bodied cutter, with her fin-keel below and her balloon above, was indeed now moving toward a position above the cruiser.

"Call away the riflemen!" cried the Captain.

The red-coated marines assembled on the superstructures, and began a rapid fire at the balloon, hoping to burst it. But their bullets simply glanced off the fine steel netting with which it was protected. Now the head of the young man once again appeared above the bulwarks of the strange machine, and he took a rapid glance at the British ship. The next instant a small port in the cutter's side opened, and from it dropped a glass globe about half the size of a football. The globe fell upon the forward deck of the cruiser. There was an appalling explosion, and the whole forecastle of the Ajax III. became a hopeless wreck. Another globe was hurled with such fatal accuracy that it fell down one of the smoke-stacks of the now helpless vessel. There was a roar as of thunder away down in her engine-room, and pale-faced men poured on deck.

"We're sinking! The ship's bottom is blown out!" they cried. There was a wild rush to lower away the boats. A few minutes later the Ajax III. sank out of sight under the fine waters of the Caribbean Sea, and Harry Borden, with his balloon stowed and his canvas spread again, was sailing away with a few survivors of the ill-fated cruiser in his strange invention in search of more British cruisers. A month later the war was over.

THE BILBERRY SCHOOL EXHIBITION.

BY SOPHIE SWETT.

Simpsy Judkins was to "speak a piece," and Viola Treddick to read an original composition; there was to be a glee sung by picked voices from the first class—it was all about the deep blue sky, and "the sky, the sky, the sky," was repeated in a very thrilling and effective manner; and Tom Burtis was to display his powers as a lightning calculator. The exhibition was to be given in the new Town-hall, and not only would all Bilberry be there, but a crowd of people from the adjacent towns as well, to say nothing of teachers and pupils from the Normal School at Cocheco; for the Bilberry Hill School exhibitions had acquired a reputation.

In the Treddick family the girls had been obliged to take the family burden upon their shoulders. When Father Treddick died, somewhat less than a month after Mother Treddick, turning his face to the wall, and saying that she had been his backbone and his underpinning and he couldn't live without her (it sometimes happens that way in spite of Mother Nature), the rocks still had the upper hands on the little farm, and Amasa, the only boy, was but eleven. Lizette, who was fifteen, went to work in the stocking factory. Every one thought it was a pity, because Lizette was fond of books and had meant to be a teacher; she was slight and delicate, too, and work in the stocking factory was hard. But Lizette believed in doing "not what ye would, but what you may," with just as good a will as if it were the former. Some people said she had taken warning by her father's example; he had always been trying to invent something in his queer little workshop that was the wood-shed chamber; that was why the rocks had not been gotten out of the farm.

It was Viola who was now spoken of as a remarkably fine scholar, just as Lizette had been before she went into the factory; she was not yet sixteen, but she hoped to get the Pine Bank School to teach in September. There were several other candidates, all older than she, but Viola was at the head of her class, and that original composition which she was to read at the exhibition was expected to make an impression upon the committee-men. The teacher had said to several people that it was really a remarkable production for a girl of Viola's age, and they thought a great deal of literary gifts in Bilberry.

Lizette was very proud of Viola, and so, indeed, was Amasa, who was fourteen now, but whose name was not on the programme at all. To tell the painful truth at once, although Amasa keenly felt the especial need there was that he should be "smart," although he tried his best to be the man of the family in a satisfactory sense, yet he was at the very foot of his class; fractions floored him, and he had a hazy idea that Timbuctoo was out West, and that Captain John Smith discovered America. When it came to chopping wood, Amasa was pretty sure to cut his toe, and if he went fishing he tumbled into the pond. And he couldn't get "jobs," like Cosy Pringle, the boy in the next house, who had money in the bank.

Cosy Pringle boasted that he always "came out top of the heap"; but some people thought he was too "smart."

When the exhibition day came, although Simpsy Judkins had been announced to "speak a piece," it was Cosy Pringle who spoke it; there was a report that he had hired Simpsy to have a sore throat. Simpsy had oratorical gifts, but he did not feel the advantages of appearing in public and having his name in the paper, as Cosy did. Cosy held the second rank in declamation, so Simpsy's sore throat gave him an opportunity to be heard. He wasn't second in his class; he came sympathizingly near to Amasa there; but he had carefully weighed opinions—which he sometimes confided to Amasa—concerning the amount of study that "paid."

Mother Nature provided one of her loveliest days, as she is apt to do for school exhibitions in June. The girls, in fleecy muslin clouds, were so much in evidence that the boys, in the background, were only a little hampered by the embarrassment of full dress. Cosy Pringle wasn't hampered at all; he wore his grandfather's large gold chain and his sister Amanda's moonstone ring, and felt that he ought to attract as much attention as the girls.

Cosy's voice was a little thin and sharp, but he recited one of Macaulay's lays with a great deal of "r-r-rolling drum" very well indeed, having been thoroughly coached by his sister Amanda and the young minister to whom Amanda was going to be married.

But beyond a little mild clapping, the recitation received no attention whatever, while Viola Treddick's composition was, as the Bilberry Beacon reported, received with the greatest enthusiasm. It was on "School-girl Friendships," and there was some real fun in it; and once in a while it was pathetic, or, at all events, the audience laughed and cried, and they couldn't really do that, as Cosy averred they did, because they liked Viola. It closed with a verse of original poetry, and Bilberry began to feel sure that a great poet was to arise in its midst.

Lizette stopped and hugged Amasa behind a juniper-tree on the way home from the exhibition. Viola had staid to a spread that was given to the pupils and their friends; Lizette had to hurry back to her work in the factory; and Amasa had felt that he did not shine in society. Amasa could not remember ever to have seen Lizette cry for joy before; she was not one of the crying kind, anyway.

"She'll have a chance! Viola will have a chance! She'll get the Pine Bank School," she said, rapturously. "I've been so afraid she would have to go into the factory."

Amasa realized suddenly how hard life was for Lizette. Her delicate hands were calloused and knobby, and her shoulders bent; she looked wistfully at the library books, and never had time to read; she knew that she wasn't strong, and she was anxious about their future—Viola's and his.

It was the very next night, as Amasa was going to bed, that Cosy Pringle came under his window and called to him. Amasa went down and unfastened the door, and Cosy followed him up stairs.

He seemed excited and nervous, and kept saying "'Sh!" though there was no one stirring in the house. But it was like Cosy to have some mysterious scheme on foot. Amasa thought that he had at last discovered how Pember Tibbetts made his musk-rat traps, or guessed the conundrum in the County Clarion, for which intellectual feat a prize of five dollars was offered. Or perhaps he had secured the job of weeding Mr. Luke Mellon's onion bed and hoeing his string-beans; last year he was paid three dollars for the job, and hired Amasa to do the work for seventy-five cents. Amasa stoutly resolved not to be the victim of Cosy's sharp business methods this year.

But Cosy's shrewd gray eyes had a twinkle that meant more than onion-weeding or any "jobs."

"That was an awful nice composition that your sister wrote," he said, in an easy, complimentary manner.

Amasa nodded, brightening; it was more like Cosy to make a fellow feel small about his sisters and all his possessions.

"Folks are saying that she'll get the Pine Bank School, if Elkanah Rice, that's school committee, does want it for his niece. A good thing, too, for Lizette is pretty well worn out taking care of you all." Cosy wagged his head with great solemnity. "Aunt Lucretia said she shouldn't be surprised if she got consumptive, like her mother, if she worked too hard."

Amasa's heart seemed to stop beating, and a choking lump came into his throat.

"But Viola'll get the school fast enough," continued Cosy, "if—if folks don't find out that she copied the composition."

"Copied the composition!" Amasa's brows came together in a fierce scowl, and he arose from the side of the bed where he was sitting, and advanced upon Cosy with a threatening gesture.

"Now just look here before you go to making a turkey-cock of yourself," said Cosy, drawing a newspaper from his pocket. "I happened to go down to Gilead this afternoon to swap roosters with Uncle Hiram—made him throw in a pullet and a watering-pot because my rooster had a bigger top-knot than his. There was a pile of newspapers in the wood-shed, and I went to get one to wrap up some things that Aunt M'lissy was sendin' to mother, and I came across this. 'School-girl Friendships' caught my eye. See! it's signed 'Lilla Carryl.' Aunt M'lissy said she believed 'twas a girl over to Gilead Ridge. That paper is two years old now, and Gilead being ten miles away, I suppose Viola thought nobody would ever find her out!"

"She never did such a thing! Don't you dare say she did!" cried Amasa, hoarsely.

But there it was in black and white; there it was word for word. Amasa knew every word of Viola's composition, he had been so proud of it. Cosy whistled softly, with his hands in his pockets, as Amasa ran his eye over "School-girl Friendships."

"There's some mistake," faltered Amasa. "Viola is the honestest girl."

Cosy's whistling ended in a sharp, expressive, little crescendo squeak. "There's no telling what girls will do," he said, sagely. "When folks know it, why, Elkanah Rice's niece will be pretty apt to get the Pine Bank School, and I'm kind of 'fraid Viola'll have to take a back seat altogether. It'll come hard on Lizette."

Cosy folded the Gilead Gleaner, and thrust it firmly and impressively into his pocket. Amasa had been acquainted with Cosy Pringle since they were both in long clothes, and he understood that that paper had its price. If he could pay the price, why, even Lizette need never know!

"I suppose it's my duty to show this paper," said Cosy, with an air of unflinching virtue, "but still, amongst old friends, and if you'll do a little good turn for me that you can do as well as not, why, I'll just chuck the paper into the fire, and agree not to tell anybody, and we'll call it square. I ain't a mean feller."

Amasa's heart thrilled with hope. What was the good turn that he would not do for Cosy on those terms? He thought of his fan-tailed pigeons, and of his dog Trip on whom Cosy had always had his eye because he could do so many tricks; it would be an awful wrench to part with Trip, but to save Viola from disgrace he would not hesitate.

"I only want to go into your wood-shed chamber for a few minutes. There's—there's something there that I want to see. If you'll let me, why, nobody shall ever know about Viola's cheating."

"It's father's old workshop; there's nothing there," Amasa said. "Nobody ever goes near it but Lizette."

Cosy hesitated a little, then he decided that it would be as well to be more frank; Amasa was so stupid. "She's up to something, Lizette is," he said, in an impressive whisper. "I've seen a light burning in that workshop half the night! She's trying to make an improvement on the knitting-machine that they use in the factory. Of course she can't do it—a girl!—but you'd better look out or it will kill her, just as it killed your father. How do I know what she's doing? She told Emily Norcross"—Emily Norcross was the daughter of the owner of the factory—"and Emily told Thad. Thad and I been trying too. We've got things fixed now so'st we expect to get a patent. What I want to see is whether she's got anything that's likely to interfere with us; of course she hasn't really, but then girls think they can."

Amasa felt desperately that this was too great a problem to suddenly confront a fellow like him whom every one knew to be stupid. It seemed a trifle, but Cosy Pringle would want nothing but a good bargain. Still, there was no other way; disgrace to Viola would mean heart-break to Lizette.

"Give me the paper," he said, gruffly, and thrusting it into his pocket, he led the way softly through the corridor to the wood-shed chamber.

Cosy was breathlessly eager over some queer bits of machinery which Amasa could not understand. He staid but a few minutes, as he had promised, but he stammered with excitement when he went away.

Amasa spent three miserable days, filling the wood-box so assiduously that Viola asked him if he thought she was going to bake for the County Conference, and hoeing the string-beans, until Lizette was tenderly sure that his back ached, and advised him to go fishing.

But a boy may have troubles of the mind which even fishing cannot cure.

"VIOLA! AMASA! HE SAYS IT MAY BE WORTH A GREAT DEAL OF MONEY!"

Lizette came home from her work with a radiant face on the third day. "Amasa, how came you to let Cosy Pringle go into the workshop?" she exclaimed. "But I can't scold you, it has turned out so beautifully! I have been trying a little invention—oh, for a long time! I never thought it could really succeed!" Lizette looked as fresh and bright as if all the work and care had been a dream. "Cosy saw it and told Thad Norcross. It seems he and Thad had been trying to do the same sort of thing—mere boys' play, of course—and Thad told his father. Mr. Norcross will help me to get a patent! Viola! Amasa! He says it may be worth a great deal of money!"

Lizette and Viola were crying for joy; but Amasa could think only of the horror of Viola's disgrace, for now, of course, Cosy Pringle would tell.

"You won't think anything now of my little triumph," said Viola, when they had calmed down a little and sat down to supper. "'School-girl Friendships' is to be published in full in the Bilberry Beacon next Saturday, with my own name signed it—not Lilla Carryl, as I signed it two years ago, when I sent it to the Gilead Gleaner. Oh, what a flutter I was in then! and I never dared to let a soul know it! The editor of the Beacon made me write a foot-note, telling all about it."

"I'm an awful jackass," said Amasa, his voice gruff with joy and shame.

"You're the dearest boy in the world," said Lizette. "But I don't want you to associate with Cosy Pringle."

SEA RANGERS.

BY KIRK MUNROE,

Author of "Road Rangers," The "Mate" Series, "Snow-shoes and Sledges," etc.

CHAPTER V.

OVERBOARD GO THE RANGERS.

"Great Scott! Cal's overboard!" cried Will Rogers, as he caught a twinkling glimpse of a pair of rubber-boots disappearing over the sloop's bow. With the young Captain of the Rangers to think was also to act. Thus, even as he spoke he tore off his jacket, sprang to the vessel's side, and dove into the shining waters. He knew that Cal could swim a little, under ordinary circumstances, but he dreaded the dragging weight of those rubber boots, and also feared that the boy might be struck and injured by the vessel as she passed over him.

Apparently every other Ranger on board thought the same thoughts, and was actuated by the belief that it was his duty to rescue Cal Moody; for, even as Will Rogers sprang overboard, all of them but one followed him like a flock of sheep, and in another moment the river behind the now swiftly moving sloop was dotted with the heads of swimming boys. The one Ranger who had not leaped into the water was Abe Cruger, who, realizing the impossibility of swimming in his "Bill Bullseye" garments, contented himself with tumbling into the boat that towed astern and casting her loose. As this boat contained but a single long oar, being only fitted for sculling, and as Abe had never acquired that style of navigation, he found himself about as helpless in his new position as he would have been in the water, and could only shout impracticable advice to the swimmers about him.

All these things happened with such bewildering rapidity as to completely paralyze poor Captain Crotty, and the sloop shot ahead several hundred feet before he recovered his senses sufficiently to again throw her head into the wind, and thus check her progress. Young Jabe was below starting a fire in the galley stove, and knew nothing of what was taking place until summoned on deck by his father's shouts.

"Trim in the jib! Trim in quick! Now bear a hand with this mainsail! Haul her flat! There, steady!" ordered Captain Crotty, and as, close hauled on the wind, the sloop began slowly to work her way back toward the drifting boat, young Jabe for the first time realized that, save for his father and himself, there was not a soul aboard the vessel.

"What's happened?" he almost gasped.

"Don't ask me," replied the other, "for I don't know. All I do know is that them boys is stark raving lunatics every last one of 'em, and if I get 'em back here again I'll head 'em for their homes quick as ever the good Lord'll let me. I never knowed what a fool I could be till I undertook the managing of a passel of crazy boys off on a lark. Now I don't expect nothing else but that the half of 'em'll be drowned, and I'll be held responsible. Sarve me right too!"

By this time all the swimmers had collected about the boat containing Abe Cruger, and, holding on to its gunwales, were pushing it slowly in the direction of the sloop. Its sole occupant stood on a thwart, gazing anxiously over the rippling waters.

"Don't you see anything? Not a sign?" inquired one and another, anxiously.

"No, fellows; I can't make out so much as a bubble," was the hopeless reply.

"Oh, it's awful!" groaned Will Rogers. "Poor little Cal! And his mother! How can we tell her?"

As the boat drifted near the now anchored sloop Abe Cruger mechanically caught the line flung to him by young Jabe, and she was drawn alongside. One by one the swimmers were hauled up from the water by Captain Crotty's strong hands, and when at length they all stood on deck he inquired in a trembling voice, "How many's missing? Where's the little one?"

"I don't know," answered Will Rogers, with something very like a sob choking his speech. "He is the only one missing; but I'm awfully afraid we'll never see him alive again."

"Waal," said Captain Crotty, hoarsely, "I might have knowed something of the kind would happen, and I'm only thankful there's as many of you left as there is. Of course this ends the cruise, and I shall head back for Berks just as quick as I get a fair wind up the river. Till then we'll lie here and do what we can towards recovering the body. Now, you lads, go below, get out of your wet clothes, give 'em to Jabe to dry, tumble into your bunks and stay there. Stay there, d'ye hear, till I give you permission to leave 'em. Yes, you too," he added to Abe Cruger, who was beginning to explain that he had not been in the water. "I don't want to resk having one of ye on deck. Your supper'll be brought to you when it's ready, so there won't be no occasion to stir out of your bunks before morning."

The skipper so evidently meant what he said that the boys saw it would be useless to argue with him. Moreover they were too shocked by what had happened, and too heavy-hearted for the attempt. So they silently and sadly went below, and Captain Crotty followed them to see that his orders were obeyed to the letter. Not until every Ranger had deposited a little heap of wet clothing on the floor, and crawled in between the blankets of his bunk, did the skipper leave them. Then he returned to the deck for a soothing pipe-smoke and a quiet consideration of the situation. He had hardly got his old black brier-wood well alight before it dropped unheeded from his mouth, while the man stood pale and nervous, as though he had seen a ghost. Of course he had not; but he thought he heard one, which was almost the same thing. From somewhere, though he could not at first locate it, a voice was calling, and it sounded like that of the boy whom all on board were mourning as dead.

"Help! help! Will! Hal! help!" This cry had been repeated over and over again for some minutes; but, owing to the confusion on board, and the noise made by the boys, it had not been heard until now.

The skipper glanced along the deck, cast an eye aloft, and then over both sides of the vessel into the darkening waters. No one was to be seen, and the strong man began to tremble with superstitious fear. He made his way forward and peered over the bows, but saw nothing nor heard any thing, save the ripple of the current against the anchor chain. Walking aft he again heard the voice, and, as he leaned over the stern, it seemed to come from directly beneath him. It sounded so close that he instinctively started back.

The small boat had all this time been kept alongside where young Jabe had fastened it. Now hastening to it, filled with hope and dread, and at the same time almost beside himself with excitement, the skipper dropped astern, where he could look under the overhanging counter. There, from out the dark shadow where swung the ponderous rudder, a white face peered at him, and a weak voice uttered an exclamation of thankfulness.

Two minutes later Captain Crotty descended the companion-ladder and entered the sloop's hold. In his arms he bore the dripping, shivering, bareheaded, and barefooted form of little Cal Moody, the well-loved comrade whose tragic fate the Rangers were discussing in subdued tones.

The lad's face and hands were covered with scratches from which blood was oozing; but he could still smile, and still had voice enough to say, "I'm awfully sorry, Will, but the mermaid startled me so that—"

Just here the Rangers, who had been paralyzed into momentary silence, regained their senses, and realizing that he whom they had mourned as dead was restored to them alive and well, broke into such a storm of cheers, shouts, laughter, and questions, that young Jabe, with terrified face, came rushing in from the galley filled with the belief that they had gone sure enough crazy.

Regardless of appearances they leaped from their bunks and crowded forward, eager to shake Cal by the hand, or even to feel of him, and so assure themselves that he was real.

"Where did you find him?"

"Where has he been all this time?"

"How did he get so scratched up?"

"Oh, Cal, it's so good to see you!"

"Now we won't have to go home after all, will we?"

These were some of the questions and exclamations poured forth by the excited boys. But before Cal could reply to one of them, Captain Crotty, striving to conceal his joy beneath a stern exterior, roared out, "Let him alone, ye lubbers, and get back to your bunks afore I murder half a dozen of ye!" Then as the boys meekly obeyed this savage order, he began with clumsy but gentle fingers to strip little Cal of his wet clothing. Not until the lad was rubbed into a glow, and snugly tucked away between warm blankets, was he allowed to explain what had happened to him. Then he said:

"I was looking for mermaids, because the Captain told us to, you know, and, besides, I wanted awfully to see a real truly one. When it came, though, it jumped out of the water so kinder sudden that I tumbled right overboard almost into its arms, and didn't get a good look at it, either. I must have gone down a thousand feet before I got off my rubber boots and began to come up. First I struck something hard and scratchy—"

"Barnacles on the vessel's bottom," explained the skipper.

"Yes, and we never cleaned them off, as you told us to," said Cracker Bob Jones, remorsefully.

"Then," continued Cal, "I caught hold of something, and my head came out of water, and as soon as I could I began to holler. I guess I hollered more'n an hour before Captain Crotty came, and I was afraid nobody ever would come; but now it's all right, only I don't want to have anything more to do with mermaids—never!"

"I found the poor little chap sitting straddle of the rudder," commented the skipper, "and pretty nigh ready to drop off from exhaustion; but, thank God, I was in time."

"Oh!" cried Will Rogers. "Isn't it splendid to have him safe back again, and aren't we just the happiest fellows in the world at this minute? But I say, Captain, we won't have to go back to Berks, after all—that is, not until our cruise is finished—will we?"

"Humph!" answered the skipper, as he turned to go on deck; "I don't know about that."

CHAPTER VI.

MUTINY AND SHIPWRECK.

The Rangers ate supper in their bunks, which they thought great fun, and then in their overflowing joy they skylarked and threw pillows at one another, until an unlucky shot brought the lantern down with a crash. As this disaster not only came near to setting the sloop on fire, but left them in total darkness, it also had the effect of so quieting them that several actually dropped asleep, while the others discussed their prospects in low tones, and wondered if they really would have to go back without finishing the cruise as planned.

By this time young Jabe, with a sailor's happy facility for taking a nap at any time, was sound asleep on deck forward, while the skipper sat aft in a big chair, leaning against the tiller, thoughtfully puffing at his pipe, and so affected by the soothing influences of the night that he was wondering if, after all, he should have the heart to disappoint the boys of their cruise.

THE GHOSTS OF THE "MILLGIRL."

Although a capital sailor and, under most conditions, a very sensible man, the skipper of the Millgirl was inclined to be superstitious. So when, a little later, by the swinging gleam of the sloop's riding light, he saw a dim white figure gliding noiselessly along the deck towards him, he gazed at it in speechless apprehension. To his dismay it was followed by another, and still others, until the deck seemed crowded with the phantom forms. All the stories of ghostly crews that he had ever heard flashed into the skipper's mind, and, as the formless figures silently approached him, his face was bathed in a cold perspiration. He sat motionless until they were about to surround him, when, with a mighty effort and a hoarse shout, he sprang to his feet.

At this the startled ghosts, who were only so many boys enveloped in white blankets, fell backward so precipitately that they tumbled over each other, and rolled on deck with stifled exclamations that at once proclaimed their humanity and identity.

"Oh, you villains!" roared the relieved skipper. "You young pirates! You, you—what do you mean by playing tricks like this on your grandfather, eh? Tell me that afore I murder ye."

"Please, sir, we didn't mean to play any trick," answered one of the blanketed figures meekly. "Only we thought, perhaps, you were asleep, and wouldn't like to be disturbed. You see, we were afraid you might sail back up the river to-night, and thought we'd better explain what we'd decided to do before it was too late; for, you see, we've talked it all over, and made up our minds not to go back until our cruise is finished."

"Oh, ye have, have you?" remarked the skipper, in an interested tone, at the same time throwing a protecting arm about Cal Moody, and drawing the little chap close to him for fear lest he should get cold.

"Yes, sir," answered the voice, which was now recognizable as that of Will Rogers; "but we don't want you to be blamed for anything that may happen, or to have any responsibility unless you want to."

"I don't exactly see how that is to be avoided so long as I'm in charge of the vessel," interposed the skipper.

"Oh, we've settled all that," replied Will, cheerfully. "We'll simply seize the sloop and sail her ourselves, and so take all the risk as well as all the responsibility."

"You'll simply seize the vessel," repeated the skipper, slowly, and in a bewildered tone, as though failing to comprehend what he had just heard. "In that case, what's to become of me?"

"Why, we'll put you in irons, or lock you into your state-room, or let you walk a plank, that is, if you know how walking a plank is done, or set you ashore on a desolate island, or perhaps let you go adrift in the small boat without oars or sail. Of course we'd give you plenty of provisions and water, and you'd probably be picked up, 'cause you know they always are. Anyhow, we'd let you take your choice of all those ways."

"Waal, I'll be blowed!" exclaimed the skipper. "If these young pirates hain't planned out a regular high-sea mutiny, with all the fixin's and trimmings, then I'm a farmer."

"Of course," Will hastened to add, "we would rather have you choose to be put in irons, and so stay on board, because when we get to sea if we should strike a typhoon or anything we might want you to help navigate the ship."

"That's so," reflected the skipper, gravely. "And on the whole, I think I'd better stay aboard anyway. But now I'll tell you what I'll do. If you mutineers will turn in, and promise not to leave your bunks again before sunrise, I'll promise not to make any move toward going back before that time, and not even then till we've talked the whole matter over again by daylight."

This proposition seemed to the Rangers so satisfactory, and they were becoming so shivery in the chill night air, as well as sleepy, that it was promptly accepted; and, without further parley, the young mutineers left the deck and hastened below. Little Cal Moody, cuddling close to the big skipper, was already nodding, so the latter lifted him in his strong arms, and carrying him into the hold again, tucked him snugly into his bunk. Then, after bidding the mutineers a polite good-night, and promising to carefully consider their proposition, the skipper returned to the deck. Here for an hour or more he nearly choked with suppressed laughter, which refused to be stilled, and ever broke out afresh as he contemplated the novel aspects of the proposed mutiny.

"Bless their honest hearts," he finally said, half aloud, "I couldn't no more disappoint them boys by carrying of 'em back than a fish could swim on a railroad track. So I suppose I might as well make a virtue of necessity, and surrender at once."

Thus resolved, Captain Crotty turned in for a few hours' sleep; but he was on deck again by daylight, when, with young Jabe's assistance, he quietly got up the anchor, set the jib, and was merrily dropping down stream long before a single Ranger even thought of opening his eyes.

When the sleepers were at length awakened by young Jabe's lusty shout of "Breakfast!" they tumbled out of their bunks in a hurry, but sought in vain for their clothing. It was not in cabin, hold, or galley; but the mystery of its disappearance was speedily explained by Captain Crotty, who, thrusting his head down the hatch, informed them that the cook, learning of their mutiny, had inaugurated one of his own. "He says," continued the skipper, "that he's going to keep up his mutiny, which is for the purpose of hiding your clothes, just as long as you keep up yourn, but that as soon as you'll give in he'll give in. Now I'm going to set down to breakfast, and only wish you were properly dressed to set down with me, for it's an uncommon good one. I can tell you—corn muffins and flapjacks with maple syrup an—"

Here the speaker was interrupted by a howl from the Rangers, who had just realized how very hungry they were, and how impossible it would be to carry on a mutiny unless properly clad for such an undertaking. Most of them were willing to give in at once, but several held out, until, overcome by a fragrant whiff of coffee that came floating in from the cabin, human nature could resist no longer; so an unconditional surrender was declared, and their clothing, all nicely dried, was restored to them by the grinning Jabe. Five minutes later the recent mutineers were gathered about the smoking breakfast table. As they satisfied their ravenous appetites they also found occasion to rejoice that their mutiny had effected its purpose, for they learned that the skipper had surrendered even before they did, and that the sloop was already headed toward their desired destination.

All that day they sailed down the beautiful river, and at night the sloop was anchored at its mouth, where they were cooled by a sea-breeze and rocked by a gentle swell rolling in from the Sound. The next day they crossed the Sound, and finally drew near the lonely island on which they anticipated such glorious times.

During these two days of sailing the skipper kept the boys from mischief by interesting them in various simple problems of seamanship. He gave them lessons in boxing the compass, splicing, tying knots, naming the various sails, spars, and ropes, and in steering, that caused them to realize with amazement the extent of their former ignorance concerning such matters. Will Rogers was especially interested in all this, and became so expert in steering that the skipper allowed him to hold the tiller for an hour at a time.

"I tell you what, fellows," he said to a group of his comrades, after being relieved from his trick at the helm, "we've learned such a lot on this trip that I feel ashamed to think how little we really knew when we started."

"Yes," replied Cracker Bob Jones, "but we know more now than we even thought we did when we left Berks."

Early in the afternoon the sloop reached the island, on which the excited boys had already distinguished the tops of tents and a number of gayly fluttering flags. There was a good harbor around a point, but the channel to it was very narrow, and so beset with reefs that the skipper was proceeding with unusual caution. Suddenly, as they were close to the point, a fleet of canoes, under full sail and evidently racing, swept out from behind it. So excited were their occupants that they took no notice of the on-coming sloop, and a collision was imminent. To avert it the skipper jammed his helm hard down. The sloop luffed sharply into the wind, and in another moment brought up with a crash that threw every Ranger to the deck. She heeled so far over that they thought she was surely going to capsize, then slowly slid off into deep water and righted. As she did so young Jabe rushed up from below and reported that a torrent of water was pouring into the hold.

[to be continued.]

OAKLEIGH.

BY ELLEN DOUGLAS DELAND.

CHAPTER XVII.

With dripping clothes and a sad heart Cynthia went up to the house after Neal had left her. She was bitterly disappointed and extremely uncomfortable. Her hair, never very securely fastened, had fallen down and lay in a wet mass about her face and neck; her hat felt heavy as lead, and water oozed from her shoes as she walked.

"Nothing will ever be right again," she thought, as she gave a depressed glance at all the familiar objects on the place. "I feel as if it were going to rain forever, and the sun would never shine again. It would have been so different if Neal had only come home!"

Mrs. Franklin was thankful to see her appear, and refrained from reproaching her until she had been thoroughly dried and warmed. Then all she said was:

"I thought you would never come, Cynthia! Was it worth while to go on the river such a morning as this?"

"No, mamma; but you will forgive me when you hear why I went," said Cynthia, setting down the cup of ginger tea which Mary Ann had made so hot and so strong that she could scarcely swallow it. "But tell me how Edith is, first."

"She is about the same. She seems anxious about something. She is restless and uneasy, but it is difficult for her to speak. Perhaps she wants you. I think that is it, for you know I do not satisfy her," added Mrs. Franklin, with a sigh.

Cynthia knelt beside her, and put her arms around her. "Dear mamma!" she said, lovingly.

Mrs. Franklin rested her head on her step-daughter's shoulder. "Cynthia darling, you are a great comfort to me! Are you sure you feel perfectly warm? You must not take cold."

"I'm as warm as toast. It won't hurt me a bit; you know I never take cold. But let me tell you something—the reason I went. You could never guess! I went to see some one."

Mrs. Franklin raised her head and looked at Cynthia.

"You can't mean—"

"Yes, I do. Neal!"

"Child, where is he? Is he here? Has he come back?"

"No, mamma," said Cynthia, shaking her head sadly, "he wouldn't come. I begged and implored him to, but he wouldn't."

"Oh, Cynthia, why didn't you tell me? I could have made him come; I would have gone down on my knees to him! Why didn't you tell me?"

"Because he said I mustn't. He sent me a note yesterday. I knew he would never forgive me if I told."

"Yesterday! You knew he was coming yesterday? Cynthia, you ought to have told!"

"But, mamma, he told me not to, and I didn't have time to think it over, for we were so frightened with Edith's accident. It all came at once. But you could not have made him come."

"Where is he now?"

"He has gone to Pelham to take the train, and he is going to write to me, mamma. He says he—he is going to work."

"My poor boy!" said Mrs. Franklin, going to the window. "Tramping about the country such a day as this without a home! I wonder if he has any money, Cynthia?"

"I don't know, mamma."

Neither of them remembered that Neal had wilfully deserted his home, and that it was entirely his own fault if he had no money in his pockets.

"Cynthia," said Mrs. Franklin, turning abruptly and facing her daughter, "I want you to understand that I don't think Neal took that money. I cannot believe it. I am sure he got it in some other way. Why do you look so odd, Cynthia?"

There was no answer.

"I believe you know something about it. Tell me!"

Still no answer.

"Could you have helped him in any way? Where would you get it? Why, of course! How stupid we have all been! You had Aunt Betsey's present; you never spent it, you would not buy the watch. Cynthia, you cannot deny it; I have guessed it!"

The next moment Mrs. Franklin was enveloped in a vigorous hug.

"You dear darling, I'm so thankful you have! He wouldn't let me tell, but I said this morning I wouldn't deny it if you happened to guess."

"Oh, Cynthia, though I said I didn't believe the other, this has taken a thousand-pound weight from my heart!"

They were interrupted by the entrance of the nurse, who came to say that her patient was growing more uneasy, and she thought some one had better come to her. At the same moment Mr. Franklin arrived, so Cynthia went alone to her sister.

She found her perfectly conscious, with large, wide-open eyes, watching for her. Edith's head was bound up, and the pretty hands, of which she had always been somewhat vain, moved restlessly. Cynthia took one of them in her warm, firm grasp, and leaned over the bed.

"Dearest, you wanted me," she said, in a low voice; "I am going to stay with you now."

But Edith was not satisfied. She tried to say something, but in so faint a voice that Cynthia could not hear.

"I CAN'T HEAR YOU," SHE SAID. "DON'T TRY TO SPEAK."

"I can't hear you," she said, in distress. "Don't try to speak; it will tire you."

But still Edith persisted. Cynthia put her ear close to her sister.

"Did you say 'mamma'?" she asked.

The great brown eyes said "Yes."

"Do you want her?"

No, that was not it. Cynthia thought a moment.

"Oh. I know!" she exclaimed. "You are sorry about the drive, Edith; is that it? You want mamma to forgive you?"

"Yes."

Cynthia flew down stairs.

"Mamma, mamma!" she cried, scarcely heeding her father, whom she had not seen before, "come quickly! I have found out what Edith wants. She wants you to forgive her for going to drive, and you will, won't you?"

And in a few minutes, satisfied, Edith fell asleep with her hand in that of her mother's.

Many people came to inquire for Edith, for the news of her accident spread like wildfire. Cynthia was obliged to see them all, as Edith would scarcely let her mother go out of her sight. Now that her pride had given way, she showed how completely her step-mother had won her heart, entirely against her own will.

Among others came Gertrude Morgan.

"And how is your dear friend Tony Bronson?" asked Cynthia. "He nearly killed Edith; what did he do to himself?"

"Oh, he didn't get very much hurt—at least he didn't show it much. He went home right away. He thought he had better."

"Well, I should think he might have had the grace to come and inquire for Edith, after upsetting her in that style, and almost breaking her neck."

"He seemed to think he ought to get home. He thought he might be a good deal hurt, only it didn't come out just at first. He said there were inward bruises."

"Inward bruises!" repeated Cynthia, scornfully. "I guess the inward bruise was that he was ashamed of himself for letting the horse run away. Now don't you really think so, Gertrude? Don't you think yourself that it was outrageous of him not to find out more about Edith before he went?"

Gertrude was forced to acknowledge that she did think so; and, furthermore, she confessed that her brother Dennis was so enraged at Bronson's conduct that he declared he should never be asked there again.

"I'm glad of it!" declared Cynthia, emphatically. "It's about time you all found out what a cad that Bronson is. If you knew as much as I know about him you would have come to that conclusion long ago."

"Oh, of course you are prejudiced by Neal Gordon! I wouldn't take his word for anything. By-the-way, have you seen him lately?"

"Yes, very lately. He came out to Brenton the other day."

"Did he, really?" cried Gertrude, curiously. "I thought he was never coming back. The last story was that your father had turned him out-of-doors."

"How perfectly absurd! I should think you knew enough about us to contradict that, Gertrude! Will you please tell every one there is no truth in it, at all?"

"But where is he now? Is he here? Why has nobody seen him? Wasn't any of it true?"

"Dear me, Gertrude, you are nothing but a big interrogation point!" laughed Cynthia, who had no intention of replying to any of these questions; and Gertrude, baffled and somewhat ashamed of herself, soon took her departure without having learned anything beyond the fact that Neal had lately been in town and, as she supposed, at his sister's.

Aunt Betsey came from Wayborough as soon as she heard of what happened. It was her first visit there since the death of Silas Green, and naturally she was much affected.

"Cynthy, my dear," she said, after talking about him for some time to her nieces, "let me give you a word of warning: Never put off till to-morrow what can be done to-day! It is a good proverb, and worth remembrance. If I hadn't put off and put off, and been so unwilling to give up my view, I might have made Silas's last years happier. Perhaps he'd have been here yet if I'd been with him to take care of him. Oh, one has to give up—one has to give up in this world!"

They were in Edith's room, and Edith, listening, felt that Aunt Betsey was right. She, too, had learned—many, many years earlier in life than did her aunt—that one must learn to give up.

Miss Betsey did not look the same. The gay dress that she once wore was discarded, and she was soberly clad in black. She really was not unlike other people now, but her speech was as quaint as ever.

She brought Willy's present with her, and was shocked to find that Janet's had never been received.

"Well, now, I want to know!" she exclaimed, rocking violently. "I did it up with my own hands. I remember it exactly, for it was a few days after the funeral, and I was that flustered I could scarcely tie the cord or hold the pen. It was a large rag doll I had made for the child, just about life size, and a face as natural as a baby's. And I made a nice little satchel to hang at the side, and in the satchel was the money. Too bad she didn't get it! I remember I gave it to old Mr. Peters to mail. He was going down Tottenham way, and he said he'd take it to the post-office there. He'd stopped to see if there was anything he could do for me just as I was tying it up, so I let him take it along. He's half blind, and just as likely as not he went to the meeting-house instead of the post-office. He wouldn't know them apart. You may depend upon it, it warn't Government's fault you didn't get it. Of that I'm very sure."

And, true to her principles, the patriotic little lady rocked again. No one told her of the suspicion which had rested upon Neal. It would have distressed her too deeply, and nothing would be gained by it.

"And now, Jack, I must see those little orphans," she said to her great-nephew, when he came home that afternoon. "Poor little things, are they at all happy?"

Jack led her in triumph to the poultry-yard.

"Well, I want to know!" she exclaimed, throwing up her mitted hands when she saw six or seven hundred very contented-looking fowls of all sizes, kinds, and ages, each brood in its allotted habitation, pecking, running, crowing, and clucking, and enjoying life generally.

"You don't mean to say, Jackie, that not one of these hens ever had any mother but that heartless box in the cellar? Well, I want to know! They do look real contented. Do tell!"

Her nephew proudly assured her that they appeared to be exceedingly happy, and that he also was happy; for they paid well, and he would soon be able to return the money that he had borrowed of her.

And indeed in a few weeks Jack travelled out to Wayborough, and with his own hands gave back to his aunt the seventy-five dollars which she so kindly had advanced to him, and which he had earned with his own hard work.

The best part of it all was when his father spoke to him with unqualified praise.

"I am really proud of my son, Jack," he said. "You have done well. I have watched you carefully, and I saw the plucky way in which you met your discouragements. It makes me feel that I have a son worth having. Keep at it, my boy. If you put the same pluck and perseverance into everything you undertake you will make a name some day."

And when Jack remembered how his father had frowned down the idea of the incubator he felt more pleased than ever.

One day a letter came to Cynthia from Neal. It was the first they had received. Mr. Carpenter had written to Mrs. Franklin, telling her that Neal was with him, and that he had taken him into his office; and Hester wrote to her brother at once, but he answered neither that letter nor the many that followed. He was still obdurate. It was an exciting moment, therefore, when Cynthia recognized the bold, boyish handwriting on the envelope.

"Dear Cynth [he wrote],—I promised to write to you, so here goes. I am living with Cousin William Carpenter, and probably shall for the rest of my days. He is in the lumber business, and lumber is awfully poky. However, I'm earning my living. Did you ever see a Quaker? They are a queer lot. It would not do for you to be one, for they never get excited. If the house got on fire Cousin William and Cousin Rachel would walk calmly about and 'thee' and 'thou' each other as quietly as ever. They don't say 'thou,' though. Cousin William says it has become obsolete.

"I do nothing but measure boards and write down figures. Boards are tiresome things. I go to Quaker meeting sometimes, though I should say Friends' meeting. They call themselves Friends. All the men sit on one side and all the women on the other, and the men keep their hats on all through. Sometimes there isn't any sermon and sometimes there are five or six, just as it happens. The women preach too, if they feel like it. One day it was terribly still, and I was just beginning to think I should blow up and bust if somebody didn't say something—had serious thoughts of giving a sermon myself—when I heard a familiar voice, and I looked over, and there was Cousin Rachel preaching away for dear life. And a mighty good sermon it was, too—better than any of the men's.

"Cousin William takes me to see the sights on Saturday (or, rather, Seventh day, as he would say) afternoon, and I have been about myself a good deal. I would like to get to know the people, but have no chance. I wish you would write to a fellow, Cynth. I would like to see you pretty awfully much. How you did give it to me that day on the river! You were a brick, though, to come. I have not forgotten what you said. I am going to show you I am no coward, though you said I was. I'll stick at the lumber trade until I die in the harness, and here's my hand and seal!

"Yours,
"Neal Gordon.

"P.S.—Give my love to Hessie. I hope Edith is coming round all right."

It was better than nothing, though Mrs. Franklin wished that the letter had been to her. Still, it was far, far better than if it had not been written at all. And then he had sent his love to her. It was in a postscript, and was probably an after-thought, but she was glad he did it. He seemed well and moderately happy, and for that his sister was very grateful. Fortunately Hester could not read between the lines, and learn that the boy was eating his heart out with homesickness and a longing to see his only sister.

Neal found this quiet life, so far from his family and friends, very different from that to which he had been accustomed, and sometimes it seemed very dreary and hard to bear. Then, again, he was quite unused to steady occupation, and his cousin demanded unflagging attention to business. It was good for the boy, just what he needed; but that made it none the less irksome.

[to be continued.]

WATER LIFE AROUND NEW YORK.

BY JULIAN RALPH.

What an odd thing a boatman's dream of the water life around New York would be if all the vessels and craft of every kind should take to themselves grotesque shapes and characters, as familiar objects are apt to do in human dreams! We have had some great and notable water parades in our harbor—the last and greatest being that queer hooting and tooting procession of many kinds of craft that swept around the war-ships of ten or a dozen great nations at our Columbus celebration in the early summer of 1893. But the boatman's dream of which I was thinking would be far stranger than that, because the Columbian naval review included only the handy, easily manageable steam-craft of New York, like the steamships and steamboats and tugs and tow-boats. It left out all the really queer floating things that have such shapes as to almost turn a dream into a nightmare.

The dreaming boatman of whom I am thinking would see great water-giraffes, which would really be our floating grain-elevators; and a myriad sea-spiders transformed from our darting tug-boats, and great groaning mother-gulls dragging large coveys of helpless babies in their wake Those would be the tow-boats with their long trains of canal-boats. Turtles he would see by the score—huge flat, almost round turtles—some red, some white, some brown. Those would be the ferry-boats,-which really do look just like great sea-turtles when you are looking down upon their flat backs from a high place like the Brooklyn Bridge. Like fearful black ocean sharks would be the Atlantic steamers—long and thin—out of whose way every other moving thing flies when they approach. Our huge and towering palace boats of the Sound would turn into great white elephants, trumpeting as if they had all caught cold in their long snouts. And we shall see that many another animal and creature would easily appear to the troubled dreamer without greatly altering the shapes of the queer craft that have grown out of nearly three hundred years of needs and developments in the water-life around New York.

THE CANALLERS ON THE EAST RIVER.

I suppose that the reader has heard that almost every Chinaman in this country comes from the water population near Canton. That must be a wonderful phase of life, where so many hundreds of thousands of persons are actually born upon the water, to live out their lives upon the water, and to die upon the water. They form a river population housed in boats that make up a city far more peculiar than Venice—a floating city of stores and work-shops, boarding-houses, amusement places, saloons, and all the rest. We have nothing of the sort around New York. The nearest approach to that condition is to be seen in the large docks on the East River near the Battery, and one at Communipaw on the New Jersey shore, where the canal-boats collect with the boatmen and their wives and children aboard them. There one sees by the kitchen smoke-stacks above the cabin roofs, by the lines of drying linen on the decks, by the sight of women sewing and knitting under cooling awnings, and by the views of children and cats and dogs playing upon the boats—by all these things one sees how truly the canal-boats are floating homes as well as merchant vessels. At night the sounds of singing and fiddling—sometimes the nasal notes of house organs—tell more of this strange water life. Some of the cabins of these canal-boats are quite attractive. They show dainty white lace curtains in the tiny square windows, carpets on the floors, boxes of flowers upon the cabin roofs, and cleanly, neatly clad mothers and little children. This is not the rule, however, and we see enough, whenever we visit the canallers, to show that there is at least some reason for their being generally regarded as a rude and rough class.

Yet, apart from these canallers, we have enough persons who live on the water to form what would be called a city out West. They are mainly men who sleep in bunks and eat in the cabins of tug-boats, steam passenger boats, freighters, and the like. A few women are among them—stewardesses of passenger boats and the wives of the captains of the other sorts of vessels. Of course I do not include here the men on the ships that sail the ocean. Their homes are really at sea. I only refer to the scores of thousands of persons who live upon boats that may be called the horses of the harbor, because they tie up regularly every night at certain piers, and every morning are sent to work, here and there, at this place or that, to carry goods or passengers, or to haul other boats. It is doubtful whether many children are born in these shifting homes, but there is no doubt that very many girls and boys sleep upon them, and are sent from them to the city's schools, and, later, to the factories and shops to earn their living.

Of all the uncommon forms that boats take, the newest, instead of being strange and complicated like most nineteenth-century inventions, are almost as simple as anything that floats. Only rafts of logs are more simple than what we call our "car-floats." They are the newest type of boats we know, and have come into being because New York city is on an island, with only a few railroads crossing to it from the mainland. The other great and little railways, which bring and take goods and people to and from New York, all stop on the opposite shores of our harbor, in New Jersey, Staten Island, and Long Island. Since the cars of one railroad often have to go past the city upon the other roads, these "floats" are used to transport them around our island, so that goods from Boston or Sag Harbor, for instance, can be sent around New York to the tracks of the roads that will carry them to San Francisco without unloading or reloading. The floats that carry these cars are merely boxes, the shape of great dominoes, with railroad tracks laid upon them. Some carry six freight-cars, some carry eight, and some carry ten cars. Tiny little propellers that we call "tug-boats" are warped or hitched alongside of these clumsy floating boxes, where they look as a little kitten would appear beside a big St. Bernard dog, or as a locomotive would look beside a house. But our queer, snorting, fussy little tug-boats march away with every floating thing to which they are hitched—even dragging huge Atlantic steamships at their sides—because they reach deep down into the water, where their big screws, driven by very powerful engines, obtain a mighty hold. Because our tug-boats are so small, and yet so strong, they are able to move swiftly when they have no burdens to carry. In the boatman's dream that I spoke of they would seem like those water-spiders that many of us have seen darting hither and thither on the top of placid pools. But there is one reason why they are not at all alike—that is, that the water-spiders are as silent as death, while the tug-boats are the most noisy, saucy, boisterous of make-believe animals—always gasping, and snorting, and whistling, and thrashing about as very little people are often apt to do.

FLOATING GRAIN ELEVATOR.

The "floats" that carry passengers around New York so that they can go to Boston from Philadelphia or Chicago without changing cars (and even without getting out of bed on the sleeping cars), are not floats at all. They are very powerful and large steamboats, with decks covered with iron plates, with car tracks on those decks, and with arrangements for locking the car wheels fast to the tracks, so that no matter how boisterous the water may be on stormy days, the cars cannot break loose and roll overboard. We have several queer sorts of boats and other floating objects that look like floating houses. Among them are what we call our floating baths, and our floating docks, and our cattle and ice barges. But there is one kind of floating building that looks like a tower or a steeple riding the waters and steering itself around. That strange thing—and we employ many such—is a floating grain-elevator. It is a tall four-sided tower built upon a squat snub-nosed boat. It has a great proboscis, that it sticks down into canal-boats full of grain, which it sucks or dips out so that it can load the grain into the holds of ships that are to carry it to Europe. Our floating baths are square one-story houses, hollow in the middle, where the bathers swim, with lattice-work or perforated boards under them to let in the water without letting out the bathers. They are decorated with little towers and flag-staffs, and look very strange indeed when they are being towed to the city in the early summer to be moored beside a wharf, or when, after the bathing season is over, they are dragged away to be laid up for the winter. Our floating docks, upon which all but the very large ships and steamboats are lifted out of the water to have their hulls painted, cleaned, or repaired, are made of many boxes joined together. These boxes sink when full of water, and thus it is possible to steer a vessel right over them. Then the water is pumped out of the boxes, and the dock (in reality a cradle rather than a dock) rises, and lifts the vessel up high and dry so that workmen can walk all around and under her to scrape off the barnacles that have grown fast to her, or to paint her bottom, or to sheathe it with copper.

ICE-BARGES IN TOW.

The barges for carrying cattle and those for carrying ice are just like the toys that are made for children and called "Noah's Arks." They are houses built upon strong boat hulls. The ice-barges are always white, and canvas windmill wheels are forever whirling above them, just as if they were some new kind of boats made to go by air propellers instead of wheels or screws in the water. The truth is, of course, that these canvas wheels work the pumps that pump out the water made by the constant melting of the ice. But of all the kinds of barges that work in the New York waters the hay-barges are surely the most interesting. They are very large, and the houses built upon their hulls are open at the sides, with only a railing where the walls should be. These are two-storied houses, and the floors that support hay in the winter are dancing platforms in the summer. These hay-barges are our picnic boats also. All winter long, or as long as the waters are unfrozen, they bring down hay from the Hudson River landings, but in the summer they go out of that business, and are hired out to Sunday-schools, political clubs, secret societies, church societies, and the like, to carry picnickers to what are called the excursion parks that are found along the Hudson River and the Sound at several hours' distance from the metropolis. Tug-boats drag these barges to the excursion parks, and the holiday crowds upon the two open decks of the barges dance all the time to the music of the band that they hire for the occasion. The stop at the excursion park is a short one—just long enough for luncheon and a little strolling under the trees, or bathing on the beach. Then the homeward journey is begun, and the dancing on the barge is recommenced and kept up until the city is reached, just before bedtime. Our great excursion steamboats, that run to Coney Island and Rockaway, are built on the same plan—wide open—and carry such great crowds of pleasure-seekers that they are black with passengers. These are sometimes hired by richer and more numerous bodies than those that hire the hay-barges, but I can assure my readers that the real jubilant fun is on the common barges, where the people are apt to be simple and democratic, and ready to surrender themselves to those pleasures of which they enjoy too little.

Our pilot-boats which go out to sea with many brave men, and leave them one by one on the steamships that they meet—in order that those great vessels may be safely steered into port—are very romantic boats, but they look like mere sail-boats or yachts. Some splendid yachts become pilot-boats when they grow too old-fashioned to keep pace with the faster and faster boats that we are forever building. Other such yachts become oyster-boats, and lie beside Fulton Fish Market in company with the tank-steamers that bring fish into New York. These tank-steamers go to Nantucket, or wherever the fishing-smacks are at work, and lie there while sail-boat after sail-boat fill up with fish and bring their loads to be kept in the refrigerated-tanks of the steamer, until she, also, is filled and ready to come to the city.

Of the "whalebacks," or cigar-shaped iron ships that were first made to traverse the great lakes, I will say very little, because they belong to no place in particular, and excite as much curiosity here as anywhere. Our floating pile-drivers, which look like ladders set upon boxes, are very curious-looking vessels, but are familiar at all ports. Perhaps our immigrant barges, which carry the immigrants from Ellis Island (where they are landed) to the wharves of the railways by which they are to seek homes in the West, are peculiar to New York, but they are mere hay-barges like the excursion boats I have already described. The busy craft that carry fresh drinking-water to the sailing-ships are usually very ordinary tug-boats, and are only peculiar because each one carries a great sign bearing the word "WATER" painted upon it. To see such a vessel all by itself upon a great expanse of salt water suggests Coleridge's line in The Ancient Mariner,

"Water, water, everywhere, and not a drop to drink."

If it were not for those water-bearers—serving the same purpose as the camels laden with water-bags upon the desert of Sahara—there truly would not be a drop to drink.

I fancy that what we call our "lighters" are the only descendants that recall the old days of the Dutch on Manhattan Island. They are sail-boats that are used to carry goods from or to vessels that do not come to the wharves, but lie out in the open water. They are very old-fashioned and foreign-looking, built almost solidly of heavy wood, and of a shape very like a turtle and quite as clumsy. Each one carries a short thick mast that looks as if it had been broken off, and a little narrow sail, absurdly disproportioned to the vessel. Everything these lighters carry is put upon their decks, and they are so slow and so hard to steer and so strong that all other craft give them a wide berth. It is only a fancy of mine, yet I never see one without thinking that this style of boat surely descended to us from the Dutch.