Young Folks Magazine: An Illustrated Monthly Journal for Boys&Girls (Vol. I, No. 2), Edited by Herbert Leonard Coggins

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Young Folks Magazine

CHAPTER III
Black Sam

SYNOPSIS OF PREVIOUS CHAPTERS

The story opens in the year 1777, during one of the most critical periods of the Revolution. Hadley Morris, our hero, is in the employ of Jonas Benson, the host of the Three Oaks, a well known inn on the road between Philadelphia and New York. Like most of his neighbors, Hadley is an ardent sympathizer with the American cause. When, therefore, the bearer of dispatches, having been captured on his way to Philadelphia, gives Hadley the all-important packet to be forwarded to General Washington, the boy immediately makes his escape with it, in spite of the risk to his own life from the pursuing horsemen. In the darkness the fleeing boy meets a friendly teamster, Lafe Holdness, in reality a patriot spy and friend of Washington. At his suggestion the boy and his horse take safety in the low, covered wagon just as the closely pursuing horsemen come dashing up the road.

THE covered wagon went creaking on until the officer, wheeling his big steed directly across the road, halted the astonished team of draught horses perforce.

“Who be yeou, Mister, an’ what d’ye want?” drawled the teamster, rising in his seat and throwing the light of his lantern directly into the colonel’s eyes, so that by no possibility he might see into the back of the wagon. “There seems to be a slather o’ folks ridin’ this road ter-night.”

“See you, sirrah!” exclaimed the colonel, riding close up to the driver and scanning his smoothly-shaven, humorous face closely. “Has a boy on horseback just passed you?”

“Wa-al, now, I couldn’t tell whether it was a boy ’r th’ old Nick himself,” declared Holdness, with apparent sincerity; “but suthin’ went by me as slick as er streak o’ greased lightnin’.”

“Honest Injun!” returned Holdness, with perfect truth. “I didn’t ketch much of a sight of him; but he went past. What’s goin’ on, anyway, sir?”

But Colonel Knowles, having considered that he had found out all that was possible from the countryman, paid no attention to his question, but turned to the dragoons who now thundered up. “He’s still ahead of us, men!” he cried. “We must overtake him before he reaches the ferry—”

“Indeed, we must, Colonel,” interposed the sergeant in command of the dragoons. “There will be a force of the enemy at the ferry, it’s likely, and we must not be drawn into any skirmish. Those were my orders, sir, before I started.”

“After him at once!” shouted the older officer. “I tell you, the boy must be stopped. The papers he bears may be of the utmost importance.”

They were all off at a gallop the next instant, and the axles of the heavy wagon began to creak again. “Them fellers seem toler’ble anxious ter see you, Had,” drawled Holdness, turning half around in his seat. “What yeou been doin’?”

Hadley related in a few words the excitement at the inn and his escape from the barn on Black Molly. “And now I want to know what to do with the papers, Lafe. Will you take ’em, and—”

“No, sir! I can’t do it. I’ve orders to perceed just as I am perceedin’ now, an’ nothin’ ain’t goin’ ter stop me.”

“But the papers may be of importance. The man said they were for General Washington.”

“Then take ’em across the river an’ give ’em ter the Commander-in-Chief yourself. That’s what yeou do, sonny!”

“Me go to General Washington?” cried Hadley. “What would Jonas say, anyway?”

“Don’t yeou fret erbout Jonas. I’ll fix him as I go by. I can’t relieve ye of any responsibility; the duty’s yourn—yeou do yer best with it.”

Hadley was silent for a time. “I’ll do it, Lafe!” he exclaimed, finally. “But I don’t know what Uncle Ephraim will say when he hears of it. He’ll think I’ve run away to join the army.”

“Don’t yeou worry erbout ol’ Miser Morris, Had. He’s as mean a Tory as there is in New Jersey, ef he is your kin. I’ll stop right here an’ you git the mare out.”

He pulled up his plodding horses, thus giving Hadley no further opportunity for objection, and the youth leaped up and spoke to Black Molly, who scrambled to her feet at once. She knew what was expected of her, and she squeezed around and stood head to the rear of the big wagon without any command from Hadley. The boy pulled up the curtain, dropped out himself, and then spoke to the intelligent animal. Out she leaped, he caught her bridle, and, while Holdness dropped the end curtain again, the boy mounted the mare and was ready to start.

“Take the lower road,” Holdness advised again, “an’ try to git across the river before midnight. When those dragoons find nobody at the ferry they might take it inter their pesky heads s’arch along the river bank. The Alwoods have got a bateau there—”

“I know. They’re pizen Tories—the hull on ’em. But there’s a long-laiged boy there; what’s his name?”

“’Lonzo don’t like me any too well,” Hadley returned, with a laugh. “He wanted to work for Jonas, and Jonas wouldn’t have him, but took me instead.”

“An’ good reason for it, too,” Holdness said. “Jonas didn’t want one o’ that nest o’ Tories spyin’ on everything that goes on up to the inn. Wa-al, ye’ll hafter do what seems best ter ye when yeou git there, Had. That’s all I kin tell yer erbout it. Ride quick, an’ find some way of crossing as soon as possible.”

Hadley hurried on. Along the road were a few scattered dwellings, mostly inhabited by farmers of more than suspected royalist tendencies. In the house nearest the river lived a family named Alwood, the oldest son of which was in a Tory regiment; the other boy, a youth of about Hadley’s age, was one with whom our hero had come in contact more than once.

Hadley and Lon Alwood had attended the same school previous to the breaking out of the war, and for months before the massacre at Lexington, in the Massachusetts colony, feeling had run high here in Jersey. The school itself had finally been closed, owing to the divided opinions of its supporters; and whereas Hadley had been prominent among the boys opposed to King and Parliament, Lon was equally forward among those on the other side. Many of their comrades, boys little older than themselves, were in one or the other army now, and Hadley Morris thought of this with some sadness as he rode on through the night. But his thoughts were soon in another channel.

“I only hope I won’t run across Lon,” Hadley muttered, as Black Molly clattered along. “I don’t just see how I am to pole that heavy flatboat across the river alone, but I cannot call upon any of the Alwoods to help me. Ah! there’s Sam.”

Not that Hadley saw the individual of whom he spoke ahead of him. Indeed, he could not see a dozen feet before the mare’s nose. But there had flashed into his mind the remembrance of the black man, who was one of the few slaves in the neighborhood. Black Sam belonged to the Alwoods, and, although an old man, he was still vigorous. He lived alone in a little hut on the river bank, and it was near his cabin that the Alwood’s bateau was usually chained. The old slave was a favorite with all the boys, and Hadley Morris had reason to know that Sam was to be trusted.

When the young dispatch bearer reached the river bank and the black man’s hut, his mare was all of a lather and it was upwards of ten o’clock. The Alwood house was several rods away, and, as was the case with all the other farmhouses he had passed since crossing his uncle’s estate, was wrapped in darkness. Nobody would travel these Jersey roads by night, or remain up to such an hour, unless urgency commanded.

A long silence followed, then, to his joy, a voice from within called, “Who’s dar?”

“Want me!” exclaimed the astonished Sam. “Is dat sho’ ’nough you, Moster Had? How come yo’ ’way down yere fr’m de T’ree Oaks? Whadjer want?”

“I’ve got to get across the river—quick, Sam! I haven’t a minute to lose.”

“Why don’ yo’ go up ter de ferry, Moster?” demanded the negro, still behind the closed door.

“Lawsey, Moster Had! It is sho’ ’nough you. How come yo’ ter git in such er fix?”

“I can’t stop to tell you that, Sam.” Then he drew nearer and whispered in the old man’s ear: “I’m going to headquarters. I’ve got dispatches that must reach General Washington.”

Sam went hurriedly down to the boat and unfastened the chain. Then, both putting their shoulders to the gunwale, they shoved the craft down the sloping beach into the water. Sam placed a wide plank from the shore, and Hadley led Black Molly across and urged her into the boat.

Just as they were ready to shove off and the young courier was congratulating himself on the safety of his project, there came a startling interruption. A figure ran down to the landing from the direction of the cabin, and, finding the boat already afloat, the newcomer leaped aboard before Sam and Hadley could push away.

“You black limb! I’ve caught you this time. What are you gettin’ the boat out for at this time o’ night?” demanded a wrathful voice which to Hadley seemed familiar.

Black Sam, who stood beside him, and whom he could feel begin to shake, whispered in his ear: “Dat ar’s Moster Lon—whadjer goin’ ter do?”

CHAPTER IV
MAKING AN ENEMY SERVE THE PATRIOT CAUSE

AT any other time Hadley would not have been so disturbed at meeting Lon Alwood, for, though they were not friends, he was scarcely afraid of the Tory youth. But now, when he was in such haste and so much depended upon his getting across the river in the quickest possible time, the unexpected appearance of young Alwood unnerved him.

“Whadjer goin’ ter do, Moster Had?” whispered the frightened darkey. “Sho’s yo’ bawn, Ah’ll be skinned alibe fur dis.”

“Who’s that with you, Sam?” demanded his young master. “You’re helping some rebel across the river—I know your tricks. I tell you, when father hears of this he’ll make you suffer for it!”

“It’s Had Morris,” said the young courier, before his companion had a chance to answer. “You needn’t come any nearer Lon, to find out. But, as long as you are aboard, you can pick up the other pole and help Sam.”

“Had Morris!” shouted the other boy in astonishment and wrath. “Do you think I’m going to do what you say?”

“Take up your pole, Sam!” commanded Hadley, hastily. “The boat’s swinging down stream. Quick now!”

He had heard a door shut somewhere near, and was quite sure that the elder Alwood had heard the noise at the riverside and was coming to see about it. Hadley stepped to where Lon stood in frozen amazement, and, holding a pistol at a threatening angle, patted each of his enemy’s side pockets and the breast of his shirt. Lon was without arms.

“Lon, you pick up that other pole and set to work, or I’ll shoot you!” commanded the young American, sternly. “If you were in my shoes you’d treat me just as I’m treating you. I’ve got to get across the river, and nothing you can do will stop me. No you don’t!” Lon had half turned, as though he contemplated leaping into the river. Hadley raised the pistol menacingly. “Pick up that pole!” he commanded.

“Lon! Lon! Is that you out there? What air you and Sam doin’ with the boat?”

“Keep on poling and save your wind!” commanded Hadley, threateningly, still with the pistol at Lon’s side.

But the old gentleman’s wrath rose, and, believing that it was not his son aboard the boat, he brought his old-fashioned squirrel rifle to his shoulder. “Stop where you be!” he called, threateningly. “I ain’t goin’ to let you scalawags run off with my property—not by a jugful! Come back here with that boat or I’ll see if a charge of shot’ll reach ye!”

“Don’t shoot, dad!” yelled Lon, in deadly fear of the old man’s gun. “You’ll like enough shoot me instead of him. I can’t help it. He’s got a pistol an’—”

“Don’t you do it, Mr. Alwood,” warned the dispatch bearer. “I’ve got my pistol right against your son’s ribs, and when you fire your gun I shall pull the trigger.”

Hadley nearly choked over his captive’s sudden change of heart, and even black Sam chuckled as he bent his body against the pole at the other side of the boat. They were now well out from the shore and the water was deepening. Suddenly, above the loudly expressed indignation of Farmer Alwood, sounded the clash of accoutrements and the ring of hoofs. A cavalcade was coming along the edge of the river from the direction of the regular ferry.

“What is to do here, sirrah?” demanded a sharp voice, which Hadley knew very well. It was the troop of dragoons with Colonel Knowles at their head. They had not found him up the river, and, suspecting that he had struck out for some other place of crossing, were scouring the bank of the stream. Alwood’s boat was the nearest.

Farmer Alwood explained the difficulty he was in—his son and slave being obliged, at the point of a pistol, to pole the stable boy of the Three Oaks Inn across to the Pennsylvania side of the river.

“Ha! Hadley Morris, you say? The very boy we’re after!” cried the colonel. “Men, give them a volley!”

“No, no!” cried the old man. “That’s my son out there and my servant. You want to commit murder, do ye?”

Colonel Knowles snorted in disgust. For the moment he was evidently sorry that the Alwoods were not the worst rebels in the country, so that he could have a good excuse for firing on the rapidly disappearing boat. Their voices still floated across the water to Hadley, and he heard the sergeant say:—

“We’d best give it up, sir. There’s no way of crossing near here, and the whole country will be aroused if we don’t get back to our command. There are more rebels than Tories in this neighborhood, sir.”

“Keep at it, boys!” Hadley commanded. “I’ve got my eye on you. Lon—don’t shirk. Hurry up there, Sam, you black rascal!”

He could have hugged Sam in his delight at getting away from his enemies: but he did not wish to get the old man into trouble. So he treated him even more harshly than he did Lon all the way across the wide stream. But Lon was in a violent rage when the big flatboat grounded on the Pennsylvania shore.

“You may think you’re smart, Had Morris!” he exclaimed, throwing down the pole as Hadley took Molly’s bridle to lead her ashore. “But you an’ me haven’t squared accounts yet. If you’re running away to join Washington’s ragamuffins, you’d better not come back here on our side of the river. We’ll fix you if you do. Anyway, the British army will be here like enough in a few days, and they’ll eat up the last rag, tag, an’ bobtail of ye!”

Hadley laughed, but kept a grip on the pistol until he got Molly ashore. He knew that, had he dared, young Alwood would have done something besides threaten; he was not a physical coward by any means.

“Don’ yo’ run away wid ol’ Sam’s pistol, Moster Had,” whispered the negro. “Dat pistol goin’ ter sabe ol’ Sam’s life sometime, like ’nough.”

“You’ll get into trouble with the farmers if they catch you with such an ugly thing in your clothes,” Hadley returned, doubtfully, for, like the other whites of the neighborhood, he did not believe in too much liberty for the blacks, although the masters were struggling for their freedom.

“Moster Holdness gib me dat weapon,” responded Sam, “an’ he mighty pleased wid me, Moster Had.”

Hadley handed back the pistol when he heard the scout’s name, for he knew that Holdness must have some good reason for wishing Black Sam to be armed. Lon had not seen this little byplay; but he shouted for Sam now to help pole the boat back across the river.

“Be as slow as possible, Sam!” Hadley whispered, leaping astride his mare. “Those chaps over there might take it into their heads to cross, after all—though they’d be running their necks into a noose. Our people must be all about here.”

Sam pushed the heavy landing plank aboard again and picked up his pole, while Hadley rode up the steep bank and reached the highway.

Black Molly had recovered her wind now, and as soon as she struck the hard road started at a good pace without being urged. Hadley knew the general direction which he was to follow—for the first few miles at least; but he had never been over the road before.

The possibility of falling in with royalist sympathizers on the dark woodroad along which the little mare bore him caused the boy to fairly shake with dread.

Every little noise startled him. If Molly stepped upon a crackling branch, he threw a startled look from left to right, fearing that some enemy lurked in the thickets which bordered the road. It would be an awful thing to be shot down from ambush, and it would scarcely matter whether he was shot by bushwhackers or scouts of the American army. By and by, however, the narrow woodroad opened into a broader highway. He was on the Germantown pike, and there were houses scattered along the roadside—but all dark and silent, save for the baying of watchdogs as Molly bore him on and on, her tireless feet clattering over the hard-packed road. The mist rising from the low lands stretched itself in ribbons across the road, as though to stop his progress. He drew up the collar of his coat and bent low over Molly’s neck, shivering as the dampness penetrated his garments. It was early cockcrow.

Suddenly, from just before him where the mist hid the way, came the clatter of arms. A cry rang out on the morning air, Molly rose on her haunches and backed without her rider’s drawing rein. Hadley was nearly flung to the ground.

“Halt!” cried a voice, and in front of the startled youth appeared half a dozen figures all armed with muskets, and dressed in garments so nondescript that their affiliation, whether with the British or American armies, it would have been hard to guess. “Who are you, Master?” demanded the voice which had cried “Halt!” “Why do you ride so fast on this road at night?”

“See if he has the word, Bumbler,” advised a second man, and the party advanced on the mare and her rider.

“It’s a good horse—but she’s been ridden far,” declared a third. “She’ll sell for something handsome in Germantown.”

At this Hadley was quite assured that he had fallen into the enemy’s hands with a vengeance. He dared not say that he had dispatches for General Washington, for he believed the men who had stopped him to be either royalist sympathizers, or a party of stragglers seeking what unattached property they might obtain, being sure of going unscathed for their crimes because of the unsettled state of the country. Uniforms among the American troops were scarce at best. At this time some of the regiments were distinguished merely by a cockade, or a strap on their coats, while their uniforms were naught but the home-spun garments they had worn on joining the army.

“He’s only a boy, Corporal,” said the first speaker, and a lean, unshaven face was thrust close to Hadley’s. “Get off the horse, lad. It’s too good for you to ride—unless you’re riding for the right side?”

This was said questioningly, and Hadley realized that he was being given an opportunity to answer with the countersign but whether British or American he did not know. And little good would it have done him had he been sure of the affiliation of these men. He knew the countersign of neither army.

“I’m only riding in a hurry to Germantown, sirs,” he said. “I do not know the password. I hope you will not stop me—”

“What are you doing on this road?” demanded the corporal. “And without the word? Didn’t you expect to fall in with the outposts?”

“Ours, of course—the American outposts? Are you one of this Tory tribe with which the country is overrun?”

At this Hadley, scarce convinced, flung much of his caution to the winds and replied: “I am as anxious to reach the American outposts as I can be. I have got to go to headquarters—”

“I believe the lad’s got dispatches, Corporal!” declared Bumbler. “Let’s pull him off that horse and see.” So saying, he grasped Hadley by the collar and dragged him bodily from the saddle.

“Easy with the boy, man!” returned the other. “See if he’s got any papers about him. This is a queer set-up altogether, for a lad to be riding like mad toward headquarters—and over this road.”

Breathless and disposed to believe the worst of his captors, Hadley fought with all his strength to retain the packet; but Bumbler tore open his coat, and his big hand sought the boy’s inner pocket, where the precious papers lay.

CHAPTER V
THE MAGIC OF A NAME

FLAT upon his back on the hard roadway, with the knee of Bumbler pressing upon his chest, Hadley Morris was little able to defend the dispatches which he had received from the injured courier in the yard of the Three Oaks Inn. The man tore his coat apart, felt first in one inner pocket and then in the other, and finally, with a grunt of satisfaction, brought the sealed packet to light.

“Dispatches, Corporal, as sure as aigs is aigs!” he exclaimed, passing the packet up to the officer.

“Huh! we’d better go careful here, Bumbler—we’d better go careful,” said the portly man, doubtfully. “None of you know the boy?”

The men, who had crowded around, all shook their heads. “Like enough he’s no business with the papers,” Bumbler declared. “He’s no regular dispatch bearer, an’ mayhap those papers came from York.”

“Open ’em and see what’s in ’em,” suggested Bumbler, his sharp eyes twinkling. He was still on his knees and holding Hadley on the ground.

There was just enough light now for the boy to see the faces of the men rather more distinctly than at first. The mist grew thinner as the dawn advanced, and there was a faint flush of pink in the east above the treetops.

While he lay there on the ground, wondering how he might escape, his ear caught the sudden rumble of carriage wheels coming swiftly along the pike.

In a few moments a heavy carriage drawn by four fine horses dashed into view. It was indeed a chariot, as the private traveling coaches of England were called at that day, and this vehicle was evidently of English manufacture. Besides the coachman there was a footman, or outrider, on a fifth horse and a darkey in livery sat up behind.

The corporal shouted hoarsely to the coachman, and the presentation of five muskets, Bumbler still holding on to Hadley, quickly brought the carriage to a halt. In answer to the challenge the door of the coach opened and a sharp voice demanded the cause of the disturbance.

“Travelers on this road must have the password, master,” the corporal said. “You are near the outposts of the army.”

The man in the coach at once leaped out and approached the scouting party. He was rather a tall man, dressed in semi-military manner, for he wore a sword at his side and a buff coat with satin facings of blue. His long, clean-shaven face was lean and ruddy, and his hair was rolled up all around the back in the fashion of the day. His nose was aquiline and his chin long and prominent—such a chin as physiognomists declare denotes determination and perseverance. When he removed his hat to let the cool morning air breathe upon his uncovered head, his brow was so high that it fairly startled the beholder. Hadley, from his station beside the road, was vastly interested in this odd-looking gentleman.

“So you wish the countersign, do you, my man?” demanded the stranger, looking the corporal over with hauteur. “What regiment are you?”

The corporal mentioned one of the regiments of State troops which at that time formed a part of Washington’s forces.

“Then you should know me, sirrah, although I have not the countersign,” the gentleman said. “I am John Cadwalader.”

“Colonel Cadwalader—of the Silk Stocking Regiment!” Hadley heard Bumbler mutter.

The corporal looked undecided, and stammered: “Faith, Mr. Cadwalader, ye may be whom ye say; but it’s our orders to let no one pass without an investigation—”

“Investigate, then!” snapped the gentleman. “If you do not know me, send one of your men on with my carriage to the nearest officer. I am on my way to headquarters and should not be delayed.”

“I can spare no men, for I’m foraging,” declared the corporal, still hesitating.

“What do you intend doing, then, dolt?” cried the officer, wrathfully. “Will you keep me here all the morning?” Then, seeing Hadley in the grasp of Bumbler, he added: “And you are keeping that boy prisoner, too, are you? You’ll have your hands full, Sir Corporal, before you get back from this foraging expedition of yours. Your commanding officer is to be congratulated on having such well-disciplined men in his rank and file.” Evidently noticing the disarrangement of Hadley’s garments, he added, looking at the boy again: “And why do you hold this farm lad prisoner, pray?”

At that the boy made bold to speak for himself, for he believed this gentleman must really be somebody of importance. “If it please you, sir, I was hastening to General Washington’s headquarters with dispatches—which, I believe, only yesterday came from New York—when these men stopped me and have taken away my papers—”

“Ha!” exclaimed the gentleman, scrutinizing the youth sharply, “you’re over young to be trusted with important news for the Commander-in-Chief. How came you by these papers?”

In a few words Hadley told of the injury to the dispatch bearer at the Three Oaks Inn, and how he had escaped with the papers and crossed the river.

“Well done!” cried Cadwalader, evidently enjoying the story. “Ye did well. And now these fellows have taken your packet, eh?” He turned a frowning visage upon the corporal. “How is this?” he demanded.

“Return to him the papers and let him go with me in the carriage. His horse looks fagged and had best be left in the care of some loyal farmer nearby.”

At this Bumbler left Hadley’s side and plucked at the petty officer’s sleeve. “Don’t be a fool, Corporal!” he whispered, hoarsely. “It’s Colonel Cadwalader true enough. I’ve seen him in Philadelphia many a time.”

At this assurance the other grudgingly gave up the papers to their rightful possessor again, and Hadley turned a beaming face upon Colonel Cadwalader. “You get right into the carriage, boy, and let my man here lead your mare. We will find a safe place for her ere long, and you can pick her up on your way home—if you return by this road. But a well-set-up youngster like you should be in the army. We’ll need all such we can get shortly, I make no doubt.”

Hadley had no fitting reply to this, but, urged by the gentleman, entered the coach, and the horses started again, leaving the chagrined corporal and his men standing beside the road.

The boy had never heard of John Cadwalader, or the Silk Stocking Regiment, of which he was originally the commander; but the gentleman was prominent in Philadelphia before the war broke out, and was one of Washington’s closest and most staunch friends throughout the struggle for independence.

John Cadwalader, son of Thomas Cadwalader, a prominent physician of the Quaker City, was thirty-three years of age when the War for Independence began. At the time of the Lexington massacre he was in command of a volunteer company in Philadelphia organized among the young men of the élite, or silk-stocking class. But, despite the rather sneering cognomen applied to it, the authorities found the Silk Stocking Regiment well drilled and disciplined, and every member of it was a welcome addition to the State troops.

Hadley Morris might have sought far before finding a more able friend to introduce him into the presence of the Commander-in-Chief of the American forces. So close were the relations between Cadwalader and Washington that later, after the battle of Monmouth, the former took up the commander’s personal quarrel and fought and wounded the notorious Conway in a duel near Philadelphia.

As the heavy coach hurried on, they were stopped half a dozen times, but at no point was there any difficulty. There was always somebody who knew Colonel John Cadwalader. The magic of his name opened the way to the very presence of the Commander-in-Chief, into whose hands Hadley had been told to deliver the packet in his possession. The boy was finally aroused from his uneasy sleep when the traveling coach stopped before the door of a large residence beyond Germantown, which happened, for the nonce, to be the headquarters of General Washington.

“General Washington is exceedingly busy this morning, Colonel,” said one of the officers, doubtfully, as the two alighted from the coach. “Unless this be an important matter—”

John Cadwalader’s head came up and his keen eyes flashed. “Tell the General that Mr. Cadwalader awaits his pleasure,” he said, briefly, “and that he brings a lad with him whom it would be well for his honor to see.”

He turned his back upon the group and waited with marked impatience until a servant came with a request from the Commander-in-Chief for Colonel Cadwalader and his charge to come into the house at once.

“Follow me, lad,” the gentleman said. “You have risked much and traveled far to do the cause a service, and you shall have fair play!”

CHAPTER VI
A GREAT MAN’S COUNSEL

OFFICERS stood about in the hall of the house, as they did outside, and many spoke to Colonel Cadwalader as he led his protégé in; but he answered them but briefly. Evidently his pride had been touched by the incident of the moment before, and he was struggling to keep his temper in check. He was kindness itself to Hadley Morris, however.

“Have no fear of your reception by General Washington,” he whispered. “The dispatches you bear will be sufficient introduction.”

But Hadley was afraid. Not, perhaps, that he feared any unkind treatment; but in kind with most youth of his bringing up and station in life, he looked in actual awe upon such a great man as the Commander-in-Chief of the American forces. Nor did his fear lessen as they entered the room.

Washington sat at a little deal table, which evidently at the moment served him as a desk. In those days his headquarters were scarcely the same twenty-four hours at a time. When he glanced up, seeing Colonel Cadwalader, he arose to greet him, coming forward a pace to do this with much cordiality.

“We have great need of you, Mr. Cadwalader,” the General said, waving Hadley’s new friend to a seat near the little table. “You come from the river?”

“Aye, General. But I can give you little news of a satisfactory character, I fear. However, here is a young lad who bears something which may prove of moment.”

Washington glanced swiftly at Hadley, who stood, plainly ill at ease, and wringing his old cap in his hand. The brilliant, if travel-stained, uniforms of the officers who surrounded the general contrasted oddly with the patched and soiled garments the boy wore. He had ridden away from the Three Oaks Inn in his stable dress, and he felt the incongruity of his presence now more keenly than before.

“Come forward, my lad,” Cadwalader urged. “Give the General your packet.”

With trembling fingers Hadley unbuttoned his coat and drew forth the sealed papers. He knew all the time that those keen eyes were looking him over. They seemed to penetrate even the wrapper of the packet.

“From—from the Three Oaks Inn,” stammered Hadley. In his own ears his voice sounded from a long way off.

Hadley stammered worse than ever in trying to tell this, and John Cadwalader took pity upon him. “So many strangers confuse the lad, General. But he’s by no means a youngster without resources. From his own story I reckon him a youth of action rather than of words,” the colonel said, smiling.

“Egad!” exclaimed one of the amused officers, under his breath, “it’s boys like him we want, then.”

Rapidly Cadwalader related the story of the injury to the dispatch bearer at the Three Oaks Inn, of Hadley’s escape from the dragoons with the papers, and of his adventures on the road; just as the boy had told it to him in the carriage. Meanwhile General Washington had slit the wrapper of the packet and unfolded the papers it contained. He nodded now and then as Cadwalader’s story progressed, but at the same time he glanced hastily over the papers.

“Ha! the boy has done us all a service,” the Commander said at length. “These matters are most important. The papers come direct from New York, gentlemen, and we have here at last a sure outline, I believe, of His Lordship Howe’s intentions. It is well, my lad,” he said, glancing again at Hadley, “that you let not the packet fall into the hands of the enemy. Our work would have been put back some days,—perhaps crippled. I must see more of you. You seem heartily in sympathy with our country’s cause. Why have you not enlisted?”

“Egad, General!” exclaimed the same subordinate who had before spoken, “I’ll set him to drilling myself if he’ll enlist. He’s a man’s stature now, if not a man’s age.”

The boy flushed and paled by turns as he listened to this. “Come, speak up, Master Morris!” exclaimed Cadwalader, encouragingly.

“I—I cannot enlist, if it please your honors,” the boy said. “My uncle will not let me.”

“And who is this precious uncle of yours who’d keep a well-set-up lad like you out of the army?” demanded the second officer.

“Ephraim Morris is his name, sir. We live hard by the Three Oaks, across the river. I work for Jonas Benson, who keeps the inn.”

“We have record of this Ephraim Morris,” said a dark-faced man in the corner, looking from under lowering brows at the boy. “As rank a Tory as there is in all Jersey. I’d not put too much trust in what the boy brings, gentlemen, if he’s Miser Morris’s nephew.”

The words stung Hadley to the quick. Unconsciously he squared his shoulders, and his eyes flashed as he looked in the direction of the last speaker. “My uncle refuses me permission to join the army, it is true,” he said, chokingly; “but he has no power to change my opinions.”

For an instant there was silence. Washington flashed a glance at Colonel Cadwalader.

“Master Morris,” Washington said, “we doubt not that you have good reasons for not enlisting. But I believe you are in sympathy with us and heed your country’s peril. You live in a community where you may be of great benefit to us in the future. You have mentioned a man named Holdness. You know him well?”

“Then deliver this note to him when next he passes the Three Oaks Inn. He will return on the morrow or next day, I hear. Meanwhile be always ready to serve the cause as you did last night, and, despite your uncle’s prohibition against your joining the army, we shall count you among our most useful servants. What say you, Mr. Cadwalader?”

“This will pass you through the outposts,” the Commander said, handing the two papers he had written to Hadley. “The colonel tells me you have a horse not many miles from here. I wish you a safe return.”

Too disturbed to scarce know what he replied, young Morris got out of the room, and not until he reached the open highway did he take a free breath. And all the way back to the farmhouse where Molly had been left, he grew hot and cold by turns as he thought of the awkward figure he must have cut in the presence of the leader of the American cause. It was mid-afternoon ere he recovered his horse and started for the river. Molly had been refreshed and carried him swiftly over the road to the regular ferry, where he had been unable to cross the night before.

He met with no difficulty in passing the outposts and such scouting parties of the American army as he met. There was no sign of British soldiery upon this side of the river. He crossed the ferry at dark, and three hours later rode quietly into the inn yard from the rear and put Black Molly into her stall. Then he approached the house, wondering what reception he should meet if Colonel Knowles and his daughter were still sheltered there.

THE bell was tolling for the vesper service. The students trooped out of the various buildings and wended their way, more or less hastily, towards the chapel. The last stroke had just ceased to vibrate as two girls slipped into opposite ends of a rear seat and dropped down side by side. As soon as it was safe, one of them pulled a note from her pocket and stealthily tucked it into the hand of the other.

“Girls:—The Sophs have got news of our banquet, so we have changed from the Watson House to the Goodwin. Everybody go down to Fanny Berginrose’s right after chapel. The fish have come.”

Within ten minutes every member of the Freshman class had read the note, and it is to be feared that during the next half-hour their minds were less occupied with the services than with curiosity and the thought of planked white fish.

A party of Sophomore boys gathered behind the chapel and eyed the retreating Freshmen suspiciously.

“There’s something up, fellows, sure,” said Bert Loranger. “We’d better shadow the Freshies.”

“You and George go, Bert,” said Theodore Lathrop. “They’ll smell a mouse if a crowd follows. We’ll go up to Chapin Hall and you can ’phone us the news.”

The party separated, and George and Bert strolled down the path leading through the campus toward town. The girls were in sight as they crossed Pleasant Street and turned up Public Avenue. Bert slipped behind the Parsonage and watched them cat-a-cornered through its bay window.

“And there come two more Juniors, with another crowd of girls, down the hill.”

“That’s all right,” declared George Nelson. “Come on down to Blake’s. We’ll ’phone the fellows from there.”

The boys hastened over to the livery stable. “Hello, there, Ted! We’ve tracked the girls to Fanny Berginrose’s. You know the scheme. Hurry down.”

“Everything’s moving,” said Bert Loranger. “We’ve ordered two ’buses. We’ll go down to Fanny’s in a body and politely offer to escort the Fresh-Ladies. Once in, we’ll drive them over to Rockton and across to Freeville, and keep them going till midnight.”

As soon as the ’buses were ready the boys sprang in and started for the Berginrose mansion. As they drew up in imposing array along the curb, they stood up and, swinging their hats, gave the Freshman yell: “Siss, bang! Boom-a-lang! Roar! Vive-la, Belmont! 1904!”

“The Sophomores! What shall we do? Don’t let them in!” cried they in a chorus.

“We’ve come to offer our services as escorts to the hotel,” said Ted, bowing as gracefully as possible to a second-story window.

“They’re up to some trick,” whispered Edith Latta. “Anyhow, they still think we’re going to the Watson House. That’s good.”

“Declined with thanks,” responded Fanny, slowly withdrawing her head and closing the window.

The boys began to get out of the ’bus, and very deliberately surrounded the house.

“I do believe they’re going to try to break in,” cried one of the younger girls. “Call up the police.”

Fanny considered for a moment, but the sounds below dispelled her doubt. Going to the ’phone, she called up the city marshal.

His laugh could be heard through the ’phone. “All right,” he shouted; “I’ll be up with force big enough to quell all disturbances.”

In a few moments the officials appeared, followed by three Juniors. Fanny let them in and bolted the door behind them.

“Do! Jump into the ’buses and we’ll see that the drivers carry you all to wherever you want to go. And at their expense, too,” he said, chuckling at the thought. “Here, you boys,” to the Juniors, “no time for coats.”

The girls put on their wraps. The marshal threw the doors open and shouted, “The girls accept your offer. Clear the way!”

The girls followed the marshal into the ’buses. The Sophomores surrounded them and attempted to climb over the wheels. But the policemen, by some well-directed rib-poking with their clubs, were enabled to free the ’bus. The three Juniors mounted to the drivers’ seats, and then, leaving a crowd of chagrined and disgusted Sophomores on the sidewalk, the ’buses rattled down the street.

At the hotel the Freshmen boys greeted the new arrivals from the steps and escorted them to the parlors.

“Sneaked,” responded Addison Meyers, briefly. “Three or four of the boys are putting themselves a good deal in evidence over at the Watson House, just to keep up appearances. They’ll come later.”

Then the party proceeded to take sole possession of the second floor of the hotel. There was a cozy little dining-room on that floor, just large enough for their use. Their rather sudden descent upon his establishment had evidently taken the landlord by surprise, and, red of face and short of breath, he was now doing his best to catch up.

“I’m actually faint,” declared Belle Shephard, twenty minutes later. “I hope the spread ’ll be ready on time. This terrible excitement makes me hungry.”

Kauffman responded gallantly. “What, ho, landlord!” he said, rapping vigorously on the door of the dining-room. Immediately a shuffling step was heard within, and the door was opened but a few inches.

“Mein Herr, these ladies are ravenous. They demand planked white fish or your life. How soon—”

“Planked white fish?” interrupted the landlord, in indignant astonishment. “I give you not one white fish. I promised them not. For so little money, it is not—” But Kauffman had suddenly shut the door upon his protesting countenance, and turned to the group behind him.

“Oh! Oh! Oh!” exclaimed Edith Latta, tragically grasping the two girls within her reach, and drawing all eyes in her direction. “We forgot to have them sent down. We were scared out of our wits and we forgot everything.”

Jack Kauffman, who seemed to thrive on bad luck, made straightway for the ’phone, his first resort in all such cases. He rang up Klumpf, the baker.

“Taken? Who— Say! what was he like? Tall, light hair, wore a spotted vest and patent leathers. Well, I—”

“I say, fellows and gentlemen, we’re done for. The Sophs have hooked our fish. Jim Wilmore and that crowd—”

“Hello!” The door flew open suddenly, and Bill Winters, one of the Juniors, burst in.

“Here’s something for you fellows. The Sophs sent it over to the Watson House, thinking you were there.” As he spoke he handed what looked like a letter to Jack Kauffman. “Looks as if they have taken your coats,” he added.

“Coats!” exclaimed Crawford, in sudden surprise. “Why, I left mine in the ’bus.”

“Ye green and verdant Freshmen are cordially invited to attend an auction sale of coats, to be held in the lower hall of the Goodwin immediately after the Sophomores partake of their white fish supper. We would state privately that in the pockets of these garments will be found many rare and valuable relics, such as autograph letters, signed by your own classmates, unpaid laundry bills, etc. These will be sold to the lowest bidder.”

Embarrassment and indignation were plainly visible on the faces of the Freshmen, and both feelings were reflected in no small degree in the countenances of the girls.

“White fish!” exclaimed Crawford, who was the first to recover from the general consternation. “That explains it.”

“Why! How!” exclaimed the girls, who could not fully take in the situation. Kauffman looked up with a grim smile that was not entirely mirthful. “In other words,” he began, and his teeth seemed to cut each syllable, “they have scooped our coats and obtained our planked white fish under false pretenses. Now they propose to eat the fish under our very noses and sell the coats at public auction. Can such things be?” He looked about him upon the comical dismay of the group. Then a storm of indignant protests filled the air.

“See here, Jack.” Crawford plucked Kauffman by the elbow and led him to one side. There was a hurried consultation between the two and a sudden decision. When it was reached Crawford slipped from the room and left the hotel by the little street in the rear. Presently those nearest the front windows became aware of some unusual commotion at the entrance to the hotel, and, when somebody cautiously raised the window and reclosed the inside blinds, the sound of Crawford’s voice was distinctly heard.

“Blame you fellows,” he was saying; “give me my coat. I left something valuable in the pocket. It’s a mean trick, anyway.”

“What was it, Freshie?” came from a lower window in a taunting voice. “Handkerchief?”

A laugh and a chorus of derisive responses sounded at once, some of the latter expressing deep sympathy, others suggesting more or less practical substitutes for the supposedly missing handkerchief.

The Freshmen above could see that Crawford was the centre of a rapidly increasing crowd of Sophomores, to whom he continued earnestly to appeal for his missing coat. There was a whine in his voice that none of his classmates ever remembered to have heard before, and which stirred the Sophomores to wonderful flights of sarcasm.

“What does he mean?” whispered Fanny Berginrose, in genuine perplexity, to the girls about her. “He must know that that kind of talk will never do any good. Catch me begging them for anything. John Kauffman, what’s this all about. Why—where is John?”

Nobody knew. He had slipped away unobserved. So, also, had Addison Meyers and Harry Bartlett. While the girls were still expressing their wonder, sounds of cautious footsteps were heard upon the narrow back stairs which connected the second floor with the kitchen. The door was pushed open, and Kauffman appeared, bearing a great covered platter, which was just all he could handle. But he was grinning. Behind him were Meyers and Bartlett, ears deep in heaping armloads of coats.

Jack passed into the little private dining-room in which the spread was now ready. For a few minutes there came sounds of protest and explanation, and then Jack and the landlord came in together. Suddenly, as if he had forgotten something, the latter went to the window and gave a low whistle.

In a minute, Crawford, bubbling over with laughter, came up the stairs two steps at a time.

CHAPTER IV
The Stranger’s Name

SYNOPSIS OF PREVIOUS CHAPTERS

THRUSTING back the hair that had fallen over her eyes, Margot sprang up and stared at the floundering mass of legs, arms, and wings upon the wide lounge—a battle to the death, it seemed. Then she caught the assailant in her strong hands and flung him aside, while her laughter rang out in a way to make the stranger also stare, believing she had gone crazy with sudden fear.

But his terror had restored his strength most marvelously, for he, too, leaped to his feet and retreated to the furthest corner of the room, whence he regarded the scene with dilated eyes.

“Of course he’s an eagle. Aren’t you, dear? The most splendid bird in Maine, or maybe Canada. The wisest, the most loving, the— Oh! You big, blundering, precious thing! Scaring people like that. You should be more civil, sir.”

“Tame as Angelique’s pet chicken. But mischievous. He wouldn’t hurt you for anything.”

“I wish you’d put him outdoors, or shut him up where he belongs. I want to sit down.”

“There’s no reason why you shouldn’t,” she answered, pushing a chair toward him.

“Uncle found him when he was ever so young. Somebody or something, a hunter or some other bird, had hurt his wing and one foot. Eagles can be injured by the least little blow upon their wings, you know.”

“Oh! I hope so. They’re delightful to study. Tom is very large, we think. He’s nearly four feet tall, and his wings—Spread your wings, sir! Spread!”

Margot had dropped upon the floor before the wide fireplace, her favorite seat. Her arms clasped her strange pet’s body, while his white head rested lovingly upon her shoulder. His eyes were fixed upon the blazing logs, and the yellow irises gleamed as if they had caught and held the dancing flames. But at her command he shook himself free, and extended one mighty wing, while she stretched out the other. Their tips were full nine feet apart and seemed to fill and darken the whole place.

In spite of this odd girl’s fearless handling of the bird, it looked most formidable to the visitor, who retreated again to a safe distance, though he had begun to advance toward her. And again he implored her to put the uncanny monster out of the house.

Margot laughed, as she was always doing; but, going to the table, filled a plate with the fragments from the stew, and, calling Tom, set the dish before him on the threshold.

“There’s your supper, Thomas the King! Which means, no more of Angelique’s chickens, dead or alive.”

The eagle gravely limped out of doors and the visitor felt relieved, so that he cast somewhat longing glances upon the table, and Margot was quick to understand them. Putting a generous portion upon another plate, she moved a chair to the side nearest the fire.

“You’re so much stronger, I guess it won’t hurt you to take as much as you like now. When did you eat anything before?”

“Day before yesterday—I think. I hardly know. The time seems confused. As if I had been wandering, round and round, forever. I—was almost dead, wasn’t I?”

“Yes. But ’twas Angelique who was first to see it was starvation. Angelique is a Canadian. She lived in the woods long before we came to them. She is very wise.”

He made no comment, being then too busy eating; but at length even his voracity was satisfied, and he had leisure to examine his surroundings. He looked at Margot as if girls were as unknown as eagles; and, indeed, such as she were—to him, at least. Her dress was of blue flannel, and of the same simple cut that she had always worn. A loose blouse, short skirt, full knickers, met at the knees by long shoes, or gaiters of buckskin. These were as comfortable and pliable as Indian moccasins, and the only footgear she had ever known. They were made for her in a distant town, whither Mr. Dutton went for needed supplies, and like the rest of her costume, after a design of his own. She was certainly unconventional in manner, but not from rudeness so much as from a desire to study him—another unknown specimen from an outside world. Her speech was correct beyond that common among school girls, and her gaze was as friendly as it was frank.

“Why—you are not old! Not much older than Pierre, I believe! It must be because you are so dirty that I thought you were a man like uncle.”

But she had no intention of offense. Accustomed all her own life to the utmost cleanliness, in the beginning insisted upon by Angelique because it was proper, and by her guardian for health’s sake, she had grown up with a horror of the discomfort of any untidiness, and she felt herself most remiss in her attentions that she had not earlier offered soap and water. Before he realized what she was about, she had sped into the little outer room which the household used as a lavatory, and whirled a wooden tub into its centre. This she promptly filled with water from a pipe in the wall, and, having hung fresh towels on a chair, returned to the living room.

“I’m so sorry. I ought to have thought of that right away. But a bath is ready now, if you wish it.”

The stranger rose, stammered a little, but accepted what was in truth a delightful surprise.

“Well, this is still more amazing! Into what sort of a spot have I stumbled? It’s a log house, but with apparently several rooms. It has all the comforts of civilization, and at least this one luxury. There are books, too. I saw them in that inner apartment as I passed the open door. The man looks like a gentleman in the disguise of a lumberman, and the girl—what’ll she do next? Ask me where I came from, and why, I presume. If she does, I’ll have to answer her, and truthfully. I can’t fancy anybody not telling the truth to those blue eyes. Maybe she won’t ask.”

She did, however, as soon as he reëntered the living room, refreshed and certainly much more attractive in appearance than when he had the soil and litter of his long wandering upon him.

“Oh! how much more comfortable you must be. How did you get lost? Is your home far from here?”

“A long, long way,” and for a moment something like sadness touched his face. That look passed quickly and a defiant expression took its place.

“What a pity! It will be so much harder to get word to your people. Maybe Pierre can carry a message, or show you the road, once you are strong enough again.”

“Mother Ricord’s son. He’s a woodlander and wiser even than she is. He’s really more French than Indian, but uncle says the latter race is stronger in him. It often is in his type.”

“Yes. Uncle makes it so interesting. You see, he got used to teaching stupid people when he was a professor in his college. I’m dreadfully stupid about books, though I do my best. But I love living things; and the books about animals and races are charming. When they’re true, that is. Often they’re not. There’s one book on squirrels uncle keeps as a curiosity, to show how little the writer knew about them. And the pictures are no more like squirrels than—than they are like me.”

“I don’t know what you mean. No matter. It’s the old stupidity, I suppose. How did you get lost?”

“The same prevailing stupidity,” he laughed. “Though I didn’t realize it for that quality. Just thought I was smart, you know—conceit. I—I—well, I didn’t get on so very well at the lumber camp I’d joined. I wasn’t used to work of that sort, and there didn’t seem to be room, even in the woods, for a greenhorn. I thought it was easy enough. I could find my way anywhere, in any wilderness, with my outfit. I’d brought that along, or bought it after I left civilization; so one night I left, set out to paddle my own canoe. I paddled it into the rapids, what those fellows called Rips, and they ripped me to ruin. Upset, lost all my kit, tried to find my way back, wandered and walked, forever and ever, it seemed to me, and—you know the rest.”

“But I do not. Did you keep hallooing all that long time? How did it happen we heard you?”

“I was in a rocky place when that tornado came, and it was near the water. I had just sense enough left to know the rocks would shelter me and crept under them. Oh! that was awful—awful!”

“It must have been, but I was so deep in our cave that I heard but little of it. Uncle and Angelique thought I was out in it and lost. They suffered about it, and uncle tried to make a fire and was sick. We had just returned home when we heard you.”

“After the storm I crawled out and saw you in the boat. You seemed to have come right out of the earth, and I shouted, or tried to. I kept on shouting even after you were out of sight, and then I got discouraged and tried once more to find a road out.”

“I was singing so loud I suppose I didn’t hear at first. I’m so sorry. But it’s all right now. You’re safe, and some way will be found to get you to your home, or that lumber camp, if you’d rather.”

“Maybe not. Especially as I don’t know how I would be received there. What if I was foolish and didn’t know when I was well off? What if I ran away, meaning to stay away forever?”

“Well, if it hadn’t been for the rocks, and me, it would have been forever. But God made the rocks and gave them to you for a shelter; and He made me and sent me out on the lake so you should see me and be found. If He wants you to go back to that home, He’ll find a way. Now, it’s queer. Here we’ve been talking ever so long, yet I don’t know who you are. You know all of us: Uncle Hugh Dutton, Angelique Ricord, and me. I’m Margot Romeyn. What is your name?”

“Mine? Oh! I’m Adrian Wadislaw. A good-for-nought, some people say. Young Wadislaw, the sinner, son of old Wadislaw, the saint.”

The answer was given recklessly, while the dark young face grew sadly bitter and defiant.

After a moment, something startled Margot from the shocked surprise with which she had heard this harsh reply. It was a sigh, almost a groan, as from one who had been more deeply startled even than herself. Turning, she saw the master standing in the doorway, staring at their visitor as if he had seen a ghost, and nearly as white as one himself.

CHAPTER V
IN ALADDIN LAND

IT seemed to Margot, watching, that it was an endless time her uncle stood there gazing with that startled look upon their guest. In reality it was but a moment. Then he passed his hand over his eyes, as one who would brush away a mist, and came forward. He was still unduly pale, but he spoke in a courteous, almost natural manner, and quietly accepted the chair Margot hastened to bring him.

“Oh! please don’t ‘Mister’ me, sir. You’ve been so good to me, and I’m not used to the title. Though, in my scratches and wood dirt, this young lady did take me for an old fellow. Yes, thanks to her thoughtfulness, I’ve found myself again, and I’m just Adrian, if you’ll be so kind.”

There was something very winning in this address, and it suited the elder man well. The stranger was scarcely out of boyhood, and reminded the old collegian of other lads whom he had known and loved. Wadislaw was not a particularly pleasing name that one should dwell upon it, unless necessary. Adrian was better and far more common. Neither did it follow that this person was of a family he remembered too well; and so Mr. Dutton reassured himself. In any case, the youth was now “the stranger within the gates,” and therefore entitled to the best.

“Adrian, then. We are a simple household, following the old habit of early to bed and to rise. You must be tired enough to sleep anywhere, and there is another big lounge in my study. You would best occupy it to-night, and to-morrow Angelique will fix you better quarters. Few guests favor us in our far-away home,” he finished, with a smile that was full of hospitality.

Adrian rose at once, and, bidding Margot and Angelique good-night, followed his host into a big room which, save for the log walls, might have been the library of some city home. It was a room which somehow gave him the impression of vastness, liberality, and freedom—an inclosed bit of the outside forest. Like each of the other apartments he had seen, it had its great fireplace and its blazing logs, not at all uncomfortable now in the chill that had come after the storm.

But he was too worn out to notice much more than these details, and, without undressing, dropped upon the lounge and drew the Indian blanket over him. His head rested upon great pillows stuffed with fragrant spruce needles, and this perfume of the woods soothed him into instant sleep.

But Hugh Dutton stood for many minutes, gravely studying the face of the unconscious stranger. It was a comely, intelligent face, though marred by self-will and indulgence, and with each passing second its features grew more and more painfully familiar. Why, why had it come into his distant retreat to disturb his peace? A peace that it had taken fifteen years of life to gain, that had been achieved only by bitter struggle with self and with all that was lowest in a noble nature.

But none the less because of the bitterness would this man be unjust. His very flesh recoiled from contact with that other flesh, fair as it might be in the sight of most eyes, yet he forced himself to draw with utmost gentleness the covering over the sleeper’s shoulders, and to interpose a screening chair between him and the firelight.

“Well, one may at least control his actions, if not his thoughts,” he murmured, and quietly left the place.

A few moments later he stood regarding Margot, also, as she lay in sleep, and all the love of his strong nature rose to protect her from the sorrow which she would have to bear sometime, but—not yet! Oh! not yet! Then he turned quickly and went out of doors.

There had been nights in this woodlander’s life when no roof could cover him. When even the forest seemed to suffocate, and when he had found relief only upon the bald, bare top of that rocky height which crowned the island. On such nights he had gone out early and come home with the daybreak, and none had known of his absence, save, now and then, the faithful Angelique, who knew the master’s story but kept it to herself.

Margot had never guessed of these midnight expeditions, nor understood the peculiar love and veneration her guardian had for that mountain top. She better loved the depths of the wonderful forest, with its flowers and ferns, and its furred or feathered creatures. She was dreaming of these, the next morning, when her uncle’s cheery whistle called her to get up.

A second to awake, a swift dressing, and she was with him, seeing no signs of either illness or sorrow in his genial face, and eager with plans for the coming day. All her days were delightful, but this would be best of all.

“To think, uncle dear, that somebody else has come at last to see our island! Why, there’s so much to show him I can hardly wait, nor know where best to begin.”

“Suppose, Miss Impatience, we begin with breakfast? Here comes Adrian. Ask his opinion.”

“Never was so hungry in my life!” agreed that youth, as he came hastily forward to bid them both good-morning. “I mean—not since last night. I wonder if a fellow that’s been half-starved, or three-quarters even, will ever get his appetite down to normal again? It seems to me I could eat a whole wild animal at a sitting!”

“So you shall, boy; so you shall!” cried Angelique, who now came in, carrying a great dish of browned and smoking fish. This she placed at her master’s end of the table and flanked it with another platter of daintily crisped potatoes. There were heaps of delicate biscuits, with coffee and cakes galore; enough, the visitor thought, to satisfy even his own extravagant hunger, and again he wondered at such fare in such a wilderness.

“Why, this might be a hotel table!” he exclaimed, in unfeigned pleasure. “Not much like lumberman’s fare: salt pork, bad bread, molasses-sweetened tea, and the everlasting beans. I hope I shall never have to look another bean in the face! But that coffee! I never smelled anything so delicious.”

“Had some last night,” commented Angelique, shortly. She perceived that this stranger was in some way obnoxious to her beloved master, and she resented the surprise with which he had seen her take her own place behind the tray. Her temper seemed fairly cross-edged that morning, and Margot remarked:—

Don’t mind Mother Angelique. She’s dreadfully disappointed that nobody died and no bad luck followed her breaking a mirror, yesterday.

“No bad luck?” demanded Angelique, looking at Adrian with so marked a manner that it spoke volumes. “And as for dying—you’ve but to go into the woods and you’ll see.”

Here Tom created a diversion by entering and limping straight to the stranger’s side, who moved away, then blushed at his own timidity, seeing the amusement with which the others regarded him.

“Oh! we’re all one family here, servants and everybody,” cried the woman, tossing the eagle a crumb of biscuit.

But the big bird was not to be drawn from the scrutiny of this new face; and the gravity of his unwinking gaze was certainly disconcerting.

“Get out, you uncanny creature! Beg pardon, Miss Margot, but I’m—he seems to have a special grudge against me.”

“Oh! no. He doesn’t understand who you are yet. We had a man here last year, helping uncle, and Tom acted just as he does now. Though he never would make friends with the Canadian, as I hope he will with you.”

Angelique flashed a glance toward the girl. Why should she, or anybody, speak as if this lad’s visit were to be a prolonged one? And they had, both she and the master. He had bidden the servant fill a fresh tick with the dried and shredded fern leaves and pine needles, such as supplied their own mattresses; and to put all needful furnishings into the one disused room of the cabin.

“But, Master! When you’ve always acted as if that were bein’ kept for somebody who was comin’ some day. Somebody you love!” she protested.

“I have settled the matter, Angelique. Don’t fear that I’ve not thought it all out. ‘Do unto others,’ you know. For each day its duty, its battle with self, and, please God, its victory.”

“He’s a saint, ever’body knows; and there’s something behind all this I don’t understand. But, all the same, I wish my hand had shivered before I broke the glass!” she had muttered, but had done his bidding, still complaining.

Commonly, meals were leisurely affairs in that forest home, but on this morning Mr. Dutton set an example of haste that the others followed; and as soon as their appetites were satisfied he rose and said:—

“I’ll show you to your own room now, Adrian. Occupy it as long as you wish. And find something to amuse yourself with while I am gone, for I have much to do out of doors. It was the worst storm, for its duration, that ever struck us. Fortunately, most of the outbuildings need only repairs, but Snowfoot’s home is such a wreck she must have a new one. Margot, will you run up the signal for Pierre?”

“Yes, indeed! Though I believe he will come without it. He’ll be curious about the tornado, too, and it’s near his regular visiting time.”

The room assigned to Adrian excited his fresh surprise; though he assured himself that he would be amazed at nothing further, when he saw, lying upon a table in the middle of the floor, two complete suits of clothing, apparently placed there by the thoughtful host for his guest to use. They were not of the latest style, but perfectly new, and bore the stamp of a well-known tailor of his own city.

“Where did he get them, and so soon? What a mammoth of a house it is, though built of logs. And isn’t it the most fitting and beautiful of houses, after all? Whence came those comfortable chairs? And the books? Most of all, where and how did he get that wonderful picture over that magnificent log mantel? It looks like a room made ready for the unexpected coming of some prodigal son! I’m that, sure enough; but not of this household. If I were—well, maybe—Oh! hum!”

The lad crossed the floor and gazed reverently at the solitary painting which the room contained. A marvelously lifelike head of the Man of Sorrows, bending forward and gazing upon the onlooker with eyes of infinite tenderness and appealing. Beneath it ran the inscription, “Come Unto Me”; and in one corner was the artist’s signature—a broken pine branch.

“Whew! I wonder if that fellow ran away from home because he loved a brush and paint tube! What sort of a spot have I strayed into, anyway? A paradise? Um! I wish ‘the mater’ could see me now. She’d not be so unhappy over her unworthy son, maybe. Bless her, anyhow. If everybody had been like her—”

He finished his soliloquy before an open window, through which he could see the summit of the bare mountain that crowned the centre of the island, and was itself crowned by a single pine tree. Though many of its branches had been lopped away, enough were left to form a sort of spiral stairway up its straight trunk to its lofty top.

“What a magnificent flagstaff that would make! I’d like to see Old Glory floating there. Believe I’ll suggest it to the Magician—that’s what this woodlander is—and doubtless he’ll attend to that little matter. Shades of Aladdin!”

Adrian was so startled that he dropped into a chair, the better to sustain himself against further Arabian-Nights-like discoveries.

It was a flagstaff! Somebody was climbing it—Margot! Up, up, like a squirrel, her blonde head appearing first on one side, then the other, a glowing budget strapped to her back.

Adrian gasped. No sailor could have been more fleet or sure-footed. It seemed but a moment before that slender figure had scaled the topmost branch and was unrolling the brilliant burden it had borne. The Stars and Stripes, of course. Adrian would have been bitterly disappointed if it had been anything else this agile maiden hoisted from that dizzy height.

In wild excitement and admiration the watcher leaned out of his window and shouted hoarsely:—

The cheer died in his throat. Something had happened. Something too awful to contemplate. Adrian’s eyes closed that he might not see. Had her foot slipped? Had his own cry reached and startled her?

CHAPTER VI
A ONE-SIDED STORY

ADRIAN was not a gymnast, though he had seen and admired many wonderful feats performed by his own classmates. But he had never beheld a miracle, and such he believed had been accomplished when, upon reaching the foot of that terrible tree, he found Margot sitting beneath it, pale and shaken, but, apparently, unhurt.

She had heard his breathless crashing up the slope and greeted him with a smile and the tremulous question:—

“Was it you, then? I heard something, different from the wood sounds, and I looked quick to see. Then my foot slipped and I went down—a way. I caught a branch just in time, and—please, don’t tell uncle. I’d rather do that myself.”

“You should never do such a thing. The idea of a girl climbing trees at all, least of any such a tree as that!”

He threw his head back and looked upward, through the green spiral, to the brilliant sky. The enormous height revived the horror he had felt as he leaped through the window and rushed to the mountain.

“I can sew, but I don’t like it. Angelique does that. I do like climbing and canoeing and botanizing and geologizing and astronomizing and—”

“Well, girl, without the adjective. Suits me rather better,” and she laughed in a way that proved she was not suffering from her mishap.

“This is the strangest place I ever saw. You are the strangest family. We are certainly in the backwoods of Maine, yet you might be a college senior, or a circus star, or—a fairy.”

“Fairies don’t grow so big. Why don’t you sit down? Or, if you will, climb up and look toward the narrows on the north. See if Pierre’s birch is coming yet.”

Again Adrian glanced upward, to the flag floating there, and shrugged his shoulders.

“Excuse me, please. That is, I suppose I could do it, only, seeing you slip—I prefer to wait awhile.”

There was no sarcasm in the question. She asked it in all sincerity. Adrian was different from Pierre, the only other boy she knew, and she simply wondered if tree-climbing were among his unknown accomplishments.

It had been, to the extent possible with his city training and his brief summer vacations, though unpracticed of late; but no lad of spirit, least of all impetuous Adrian, could bear even the suggestion of cowardice. He did not sit down, as she had bidden, but tossed aside his rough jacket and leaped to the lower branch of the great pine tree.

“Why, it’s easy! It’s grand!” he called back, and went up swiftly enough.

Indeed, it was not so difficult as it appeared from a distance. Wherever the branches failed the spiral ladder had been perfected by great spikes driven into the trunk, and he had but to clasp these in turn to make a safe ascent. At the top he waved his hand, then shaded his eyes and peered northward.

“He’s coming! Somebody’s coming!” he shouted. “There’s a little boat pushing off from that other shore.”

Then he descended with a rapidity that delighted even himself and called forth a bit of praise from Margot.

“I’m so glad you can climb. One can see so much more from the tree-tops; and, oh! there is so much, so much to find out all the time! Isn’t there?”

“Yes. Decidedly. One of the things I’d like to find out first is who you are and how you came here. If you’re willing.”

Then he added, rather hastily: “Of course, I don’t want to be impertinently curious. It only seems so strange to find such educated people buried here in the north woods. I don’t see how you live here. I—I—”

But the more he tried to explain the more confused he grew, and Margot merrily simplified matters by declaring:—

“You are curious, all the same, and so am I. Let’s tell each other all about everything, and then we’ll start straight without the bother of stopping as we go along. Do sit down and I’ll begin.”

“There’s so little, I shan’t be long. My dear mother was Cecily Dutton, my Uncle Hugh’s twin. My father was Philip Romeyn, uncle’s closest friend. They were almost more than brothers to each other, always; though uncle was a student and, young as he was, a professor at Columbia. Father was a business man, a banker or a cashier in a bank. He wasn’t rich, but mother and uncle had money. From the time they were boys, uncle and father were fond of the woods. They were great hunters then, and spent all the time they could get up here in northern Maine. After the marriage mother begged to come with them, and it was her money bought this island, and the land along the shore of this lake as far as we can see from here. Much farther, too, of course, because the trees hide things. They built this log cabin, and it cost a great, great deal to do it. They had to bring the workmen so far, but it was finished at last, and everything was brought up here to make it—just as you see.”

“Was it? I don’t know much about ideals, though uncle talks of them sometimes. It was real, that’s all. They were very, very happy. They loved each other so dearly. Angelique came from Canada to keep the house, and she says my mother was the sweetest woman she ever saw. Oh! I wish—I wish I could have seen her! Or that I might remember her. I’ll show you her portrait. It hangs in my own room.”

“Yes, when I was a year old. My father had died long before that, and my mother was broken-hearted. Even for uncle and me she could not bear to live. It was my father’s wish that we should come up here to stay, and Uncle Hugh left everything and came. I was to be reared ‘in the wilderness, where nothing evil comes,’ was what both my parents said. So I have been, and—that’s all.”

Adrian was silent for some moments. The girl’s face had grown dreamy and full of a pathetic tenderness, as it always did when she discussed her unknown father and mother, even with Angelique; though, in reality, she had not been allowed to miss what she had never known. Then she looked up with a smile and observed: “Your turn.”

“Yes—I—suppose so. May as well give the end of my story first—I’m a runaway.”

He parried the indignation of her look by some further questions of his own. “Have you always lived here?”

“I never saw a girl, only myself in that poor broken glass of Angel’s; and, of course, the pictured ones—as of the towns—in the books.”

Margot’s brown face flushed. She wanted nobody’s pity, and she had not felt that her life was a singular or narrow one till this outsider came. A wish very like Angelique’s, that he had stayed where he belonged, arose in her heart, but she dismissed it as inhospitable. Her tone, however, showed her resentment.

“I’m not poor. Not in the least. I have everything any girl could want, and I have—uncle! He’s the best, the wisest, the noblest man in all the world. I know it, and so Angelique says. She’s been in your towns, if you please. Lived in them, and says she never knew what comfort meant until she came to Peace Island and us. You don’t understand.”

Margot was more angry than she had ever been, and anger made her decidedly uncomfortable. She sprang up hastily, saying:—

“If you’ve nothing to tell I must go. I want to get into the forest and look after my friends there. The storm may have hurt them.”

She was off down the mountain, as swift and sure-footed as if it were not a rough pathway that made him blunder along very slowly. For he followed at once, feeling that he had not been fair, as she had accused, in his report of himself; and that only a complete confidence was due these people who had treated him so kindly.

Just there he caught his foot in a running vine, stumbled over a hidden rock, and measured his length, head downward on the slope. He was not hurt, however, though vexed and mortified. But when he had picked himself up and looked around the girl had vanished.

HOW OWL BECAME A NIGHT BIRD.

WHY anybody, especially such a sociable fellow as Owl, should stay indoors all day and go out only after the other birds are asleep, would be hard to guess. Yet there is a reason, and a good one, too.

It was the third year after the king’s reception that Owl moved into Birdland. He was a stranger to every one and, moreover, he seemed reserved, seldom joining in any of the social functions. Indeed, he was considered by many to be a wizard, so eccentric was he. Wren had once remarked, Owl always seemed to have something on his mind. Whereupon Brown Thrasher, with his usual sarcasm, replied that he didn’t think that Owl had any mind. Of course, this created a laugh at Owl’s expense, but he took it good-naturedly, for he knew that Thrasher’s opinions were as airy as his flight.

Owl’s first great trouble was house hunting. He had been brought up and accustomed to live in a hollow tree, and, if the truth must be told, he was far too clumsy to build such a house for himself. No wonder, then, that he was overcome with gratitude when Flicker offered him the one which he had built the year before. Like all the woodpeckers, Flicker was a good deal of a carpenter and always persisted in building himself a new house each spring, even though it might be but a short flight from his last year’s home.

Flicker had taken quite a liking to Owl, who always behaved like a gentleman, but the real reason was because of Thrasher’s attempt to tease him. Flicker and Thrasher were not very good friends. Many years ago Thrasher had insinuated that Flicker wore a black patch of feathers on his breast so that he might claim relationship with Meadow Lark. This, of course, was not true, and Flicker, who, by means of the red mark on the back of his head, could trace his ancestry back to the great Ivory Bill, could well laugh at the accusation. Nevertheless, he had always remembered it, and it was, therefore, with a double pleasure that he let Owl occupy his last year’s house.

As for Owl, it mattered little as to the real reason of his getting the house. So pleased was he that he even contemplated holding a reception in his new home. But then, as he thought how plain and old-fashioned it would seem to such a fastidious housekeeper as Oriole, his desire left him.

Now, when Sparrow Hawk, who had just arrived in Birdland, learned that Flicker had given one of his houses to Owl, he was very angry, for he had wanted it himself. He resolved to outwit Owl. Being rather stupid himself, he could not believe that Owl was really a bright fellow. So, with this object in view, Sparrow Hawk chose a nice, quiet spot in the nearby underbrush. Song Sparrow, who lived in the thicket, moved to the other end. He had never been fully satisfied as to how Sparrow Hawk received his name. However, Sparrow Hawk did not disturb him in the least, but remained hidden in the brush. “When Owl goes out to dinner,” thought he, “I’ll take possession of his house.” But Owl saw through his plan with half an eye and remained at home. At night, as soon as it became dark, he would slip quietly out and get himself a very comfortable meal. Then he would go back chuckling to himself as he thought of Sparrow Hawk’s plan. This went on for many days, and each morning Sparrow Hawk would say to himself, “He must come out to-day or he will starve.” Little did he know how Owl was getting ahead of him.

At length Sparrow Hawk became tired of hiding and flew up to Owl’s door. He expected to find the latter dead from starvation, or at least too weak to make any resistance. But when he saw Owl, plump and healthy, puff out his chest with an angry snap of his bill, he changed his mind and left in a hurry.

He was at a loss to account for Owl’s sleek condition. One day, however, he overheard one of his neighbors say that he had seen Owl fly out of his house late on the evening before.

Sparrow Hawk was more angry than ever. He saw that Owl had outwitted him. He resolved to be revenged, yet he knew that he could not stay awake all night to get possession of Owl’s house. Instead, he made up a lot of scandalous stories about Owl, and even went so far as to say that he ate other birds. At first Birdland would not believe these stories about Owl, but, when finally they learned his queer habits, they began to think that they must be true. So it happened that Owl became confirmed in his night-going habits.

One time he stayed out later than usual, and it was daybreak when he got near home. Instead of going in immediately, he remained in a nearby pine tree. It was so much more pleasant outside than in the house. His eyes had been troubling him of late, so he closed them. Then, before he knew it, Owl fell asleep. Very soon the sun rose and all Birdland was in a great bustle. Suddenly Chick-a-dee, who was searching for his breakfast, gave a startled little shriek. Who was that in the pine tree? It must be Owl. Blue Jay, too, was excited when Chick-a-dee, breathless and with feathers in disorder, hurried to him with the news. And so it spread. Everybody was indignant, for they remembered the stories told by Sparrow Hawk. Owl, they thought, should be put out of the way. This they whispered excitedly to each other as they surrounded the tree. Flicker was the only one who had heard the news and would not join the gathering. He sat on his doorstep watching them as they silently approached Owl, and he trembled, for it would be a very easy matter to kill poor Owl while he was asleep.

Sparrow Hawk was exultant. Now at last he would be revenged. Everybody believed Owl to be a villain and wished to kill him.

But to tell the truth, the birds were afraid of Owl. Even Sparrow Hawk hesitated about attacking him. Finally, it was planned that every one should fly at him at once while he slept, unconscious of his danger. As Flicker understood their plan, he became alarmed almost to distraction, and then, as if on a sudden thought, his anxious voice rang out, “Wake up! Wake up! Wake up! Wake up!”

For a moment the birds were speechless. Then, “Kill him! Kill him! Kill him!” cried Sparrow Hawk, and at that instant they all flew at him. Owl’s big eyes popped open and his feathers stood on end. So large did he appear and so terrible did the snap of his bill seem that, for the minute, his enemies stopped half way in their flight, and then, before they could collect their scattered wits, Owl darted noiselessly into his house.

It is very easy for us to understand now how all the scandals about Owl were started and why he lives such a hermit’s life. We know, too, why Flicker and Sparrow Hawk cannot get along together since the former saved Owl’s life. To tell the truth, Flicker is not a bit afraid of Sparrow Hawk, but when he sees him coming, hides behind a tree and calls, “Wake up! Wake up! Wake up!” just to anger him. Sparrow Hawk knows well that he would have little chance of catching Flicker, who can dodge around the tree as nimbly as any squirrel, so his only retort is to call out to an imaginary ally, “Kill him! Kill him! Kill him!”

CHAPTER III
MISS POMEROY COMES

SYNOPSIS OF PREVIOUS CHAPTERS

POLLY ran out of the room, and Mrs. Manser hurried through the house to open the front door; she stepped out to the wagon to greet Miss Pomeroy, and stood with the breeze fluttering her scanty front locks till Polly reappeared.

“I don’t know as she’ll be what you want, at all,” said Mrs. Manser, blinking up at the grave, kind face above her, for the sun shone in her eyes. “I’ll leave you to find out what sort of a child she is, as I told you the other day, for nobody can tell what will suit anybody else. I’ve tried to bring her up well, but, of course, she hasn’t had advantages, though she’s pretty bright in school, her teacher says.”

“I’m glad it’s vacation time,” said Miss Pomeroy, cheerily. “Polly and I will have so much better chance to get acquainted with each other, and become friends whether she stays with me always or not. Is she pleased to go, Mrs. Manser?”

“I guess she realizes what a great chance ’tis for her, and how good you are,” said Mrs. Manser, avoiding the direct gaze of the keen gray eyes. She began to wish she had left unsaid a few things, with which she had charged Polly’s mind. “Of course, ’tisn’t as if she had the sense of a grown person,” she added, somewhat vaguely.

“I don’t know about that,” laughed Miss Pomeroy; “it seems to me that little people have a wonderful amount of sense sometimes.”

“Well, I don’t know,” said Mrs. Manser, dubiously, “perhaps they have.”

Meanwhile Polly had run out to the shed, where the old people were waiting to say good-by to her. They had been marshaled into a line by Uncle Sam Blodgett, so that Polly might be hugged and kissed by each in turn, without loss of time; but the line wavered and broke as the little figure they all loved to see came flying in at the door. Poor Bob Rust, from his humble stand at the rear, gave a strange, sorrowful cry and turned to go out of the shed.

“Here,” called Polly, peremptorily, “I’ll kiss you first of all, on your forehead, because I don’t like all your whiskers, you know,” and the man stooped for his good-by, and then ran, stumbling, out of the shed and away to the cow pasture.

“I said good-by to the cows and all the hens and the pigs when I first got up,” said Polly, turning to her friends; “and I gave Prince some oats and said good-by to him right after breakfast. Now, Uncle Blodgett, it’s your turn.”

“Here,” he said, as he set her down, “you take this bunch o’ slippery elm to keep me in mind, and you take this knife. One blade’s all right, and ’twould be an extra fine article if the other blade was fixed up a bit.”

“Oh, thank you,” said Polly, fervently, as she slipped her two presents into her petticoat pocket, “you’re just as good as you can be. Perhaps I shall come back here to stay, but, anyway, Miss Pomeroy would let me come to see you all, sometimes, I’m sure.”

“I reckon you’ll never come back here,” muttered Uncle Blodgett to the chopping block, “not to stay, if that Pomeroy woman has got eyes and a heart.”

Mrs. Ramsdell pressed Polly fiercely to her breast, and then let her go, after a searching look into the brown eyes.

“There, that’s over with,” she said, firmly. “One more thing gone, along with all the rest.”

“But I shan’t forget you,” faltered Polly, whose eyes were getting very misty indeed.

“Of course you won’t, dear child,” quavered Aunty Peebles, as she folded Polly in her arms, and as she released the little girl she pressed a tiny pin cushion into her hand, which speedily found a hiding-place with the slippery elm and the bladeless knife.

Last of all came Grandma Manser, who smoothed Polly’s curls with her trembling hands and could hardly bear to say good-by at all.

“If you get adopted, my lamb,” she whispered in Polly’s ear, “daughter Sarah says it’s likely she can buy me something to hear with, and Uncle Sam Blodgett’s promised to read to us now you’re going. But if you aren’t happy at Miss Hetty’s, dear, you come back, and nobody will be better pleased than I to see you; ’twill joy me more than an ear-trumpet!”

Polly swallowed hard, and dashed something from her eyes as she ran into the house. She said a hasty good-by to Father Manser, who was washing his hands at the kitchen sink for the third time since breakfast, and hurried out of doors with the big enamel cloth bag which contained her wardrobe.

She courtesied to Miss Pomeroy, and gave a faint “good-morning, ma’am,” in response to the cheery salutation from her new friend. Mrs. Manser gave her a peck on the lips and a forlorn “Good-by, child, and be as little trouble as you can to Miss Pomeroy,” and then Polly climbed into the wagon.

In another minute the wagon was rolling quickly down the road, the chorus of good-bys from old, familiar voices had hushed into silence, and Polly, stealing a glance at the gray eyes so far above the brim of her Sunday hat, felt that old things had passed away, and a new, strange life stretched out before her.

“Let me see, Mary, you are ten years old, aren’t you? When does your birthday come?” Miss Hetty asked suddenly, when they had gone a little way down the hill toward the village. The voice was kind and friendly, but the unwonted “Mary” which she must expect always to hear now, gave Polly a homesick twinge.

“It’s come,” she answered, glancing timidly up at Miss Hetty. “I had my birthday two weeks ago, and I was ten—if you please,” added the little girl, hastily.

“I guess I was just as polite as Eleanor that time,” she thought, and the idea that she had made a fair start cheered Polly, so that she smiled confidingly at Miss Pomeroy, who smiled at her in return.

“You don’t look as old as that,” she said, kindly, but her voice had a sober sound at which Polly took alarm.

“Yes’m. I’m small for my age,” she said, slowly, “but I’m real strong. I’ve never been sick, not one single day.” And then she thought, “Oh, dear! probably Eleanor was tall! I’m going to see if I can’t stretch myself out the way Ebenezer did when he was little. I can lie down on the floor in my room and reach my arms and legs as far as they’ll go—What, ma’am?” said Polly, quickly, as she realized that Miss Pomeroy was speaking.

“I was saying that I suppose you’re accustomed to play out of doors a good deal,” said Miss Hetty, a little sharply, “for you have such rosy cheeks. What are you thinking about, my dear?”

“I was thinking about Ebenezer, for one thing,” said Polly, truthfully. “Yes’m, my cheeks are always pretty red.” Then she was seized with dismay; probably Eleanor’s cheeks were white, like snowdrops. “They aren’t quite so red when I’m in the house,” she ventured, bravely, “and, of course, I shall be in the house a great deal now I’m getting on in years.”

Polly felt that this phrase, borrowed from Mrs. Manser’s stock, was most happily chosen. Miss Hetty made an inarticulate sound, and touched up her brown mare, but all she said was, “Who is Ebenezer?”

“Ebenezer is Mrs. Manser’s cat,” said Polly, glad to be on safe ground, “and he knows a great deal, Father Manser says. He is nearly as old as I am, and he has caught forty-three rats to Uncle Blodgett’s certain sure knowledge, and nobody knows how many more. He has eaten them, too,” said Polly, gravely, “though I don’t see how he could ever in this world; do you?”

“They wouldn’t be to my taste,” said Miss Pomeroy, briskly. “Who is Uncle Sam Blodgett? I mean, is he any relation of yours?”

“Oh, no, ma’am; he isn’t any relation of anybody,” said Polly. “His kith and kin have all died, he says, and he is a lonely old hulk—that’s what he told me he was,” she added, seeing a look which might be disapproval on Miss Hetty’s face. “He’s had adventures by land and sea and suffered far and near, and it’s a tame thing for him to saw and split now that his days are numbered.”

“Mercy on us!” ejaculated Miss Pomeroy. “Where did you ever get such a memory, child?”

“From—from my father, Mrs. Manser said,” faltered Polly. Here was a new cause of anxiety; evidently Eleanor’s memory had been quite different from hers. Polly looked steadily before her, and set her little mouth firmly. “Perhaps Arctura Green, that they’ve spoken of, can tell me about Eleanor’s memory,” she thought, suddenly; “maybe I can ask her about a good many things.”

Just then Daisy, the pretty brown mare, turned the curve at the foot of the long hill, and they were in the main street of Mapleton.

CHAPTER IV
POLLY’S FIRST JOURNEY

“NOW, I have some errands to do,” said Miss Pomeroy; “perhaps you’d like to get out of the wagon at Burcham’s and see the new toys.”

“No, ma’am, thank you; I will stay here and hold the horse,” said Polly, and, after a keen look at her, Miss Pomeroy drove to the butcher shop and alighted, leaving Daisy in her charge.

“I guess that is what Eleanor would have said,” remarked Polly, in a low, confidential tone to the horse, as she carefully flicked an early fly from Daisy’s back; “and, truly, I don’t care a bit about seeing the dolls or anything to-day. Of course, I mustn’t tell stories, trying to be like Eleanor; I’ve just got to stop wanting to do things, so I can tell the truth.”

As she faced this tremendous task, Polly sat so still and erect that she looked like a stern little sentinel, and her motionless figure attracted the attention of a number of people whom she did not see. In a few moments Miss Pomeroy came out of the butcher’s and went across the road to the post office. The butcher brought out a package in brown paper and stowed it carefully in at the back of the wagon. Then he stepped around to pat Daisy and speak to Polly. He was a red-faced, hearty man who had lost two front teeth and talked with a slight lisp. He and Polly had always been on excellent terms.

“How d’ye do, Polly?” he said, reaching up his unoccupied hand to grasp the little girl’s; “thso this is the day you thstart in to live with Miths Pomeroy? Well, you’re going to have a fine home, and she’ths an exthtra good woman, when you get uthsed to her being a mite quick and up-and-coming.”

“Mr. Boggs,” said Polly, anxiously, “you know I’m Mary Prentiss now. You mustn’t please call me by my old name any more—not unless Miss Pomeroy decides not to adopt me. I don’t suppose you ever saw Eleanor, Miss Pomeroy’s niece that died? No, of course you couldn’t have.”

“I thsaw her when thshe came here, a year-older,” said Mr. Boggs, as he turned to greet a customer; “just like mothst children of that age, thshe looked, for all I could thsee. I reckon her qualitieths weren’t what you could call developed then. Well, good-day to you, Miths Mary Prentiths, and the bethst of luck,” he said, with a laugh and a low bow as he gave Polly’s hand a final shake.

Just then Miss Pomeroy came across the road with her hands full of papers and letters, and with a little white bag, which she put in Polly’s lap as she took her seat. The bag had a deliciously lumpy feeling, and Polly’s mind leaped to gum-drops in an instant.

“Open it and let us see what they are like,” said Miss Pomeroy, as she gathered up the reins, which had slackened in Polly’s hands during the interview with Mr. Boggs. “Chocolate creams and gum-drops. I suspect you’ll like the chocolates best, but I am very fond of gum-drops; so I’ll take one of those. One piece of candy is all I allow myself in a day, so you may carry off the bag to your own room when we get there, to keep me from being tempted.”

Polly took one bite of a big chocolate drop after Miss Pomeroy had been served to her taste, and then she gave a little sigh of delight.

“I never tasted a chocolate cream before,” she said, slowly. “I don’t suppose there’s anything else so nice to eat in all the world, is there? I wish Aunty Peebles had some of these. I shall save her half; that is, if you’re willing,” she added, hastily.

“I’m afraid they’ll be pretty hard and dry before you see Aunty Peebles again,” said Miss Pomeroy, and Polly’s heart sank in spite of the delicious taste in her mouth.

“I don’t expect she’s going to let me see Manser Farm again, till next Christmas, probably, if she adopts me,” thought Polly. “Of course, candy is good for ’most a year if you keep it carefully, but it does begin to get a little hard. I know, because those two peppermints Father Manser gave me yesterday were the last of the ones he bought for Thanksgiving, and they were just a little hard, though, of course, they were nice.”

“Maybe I could give some of them to the butcher to take to Aunty Peebles, if—if he comes to Pomeroy Oaks,” ventured Polly, after a short silence, during which Daisy was trotting along the road, out of the village, past the square white church with its tall steeple, past the tinsmith’s shop, on toward the meadows beyond which lay Polly’s undiscovered country.

“He comes twice a week,” said Miss Pomeroy; “but wouldn’t you like to send Aunty Peebles a little box of fresh candy by mail, some day, to surprise her? You could put it in the post office, and Mr. Manser would get it when he goes for the mail, and take it to her.”

“Oh!” said Polly, her eyes brimming over with gratitude; “Oh, aren’t you good! Why, Aunty Peebles hasn’t ever had anything from the post office excepting once a year her second cousin from way out West sends her a paper with the list of deaths in the town where she lives, and sometimes there’s an ink mark to show it’s been a friend of her second cousin’s family; but,” said Polly, shaking her head, “it ’most always made Aunty Peebles cry when it came, and I believe she would rather not have had it.”

“I should say not, indeed,” assented Miss Pomeroy; “just hear that bird, Mary! He’s telling cheerful news, isn’t he?”

Polly hugged herself with sudden joy. Miss Pomeroy evidently liked birds, or she would never have spoken in that way. “Probably she’ll leave the windows open, so I can hear them when I’m reading and sewing and doing quiet things, like Eleanor,” she thought, happily; but all she said was, “Oh, yes’m; isn’t he glad spring has come, don’t you believe?”

“I believe he is, my dear,” said Miss Pomeroy; “and now, if you look ahead, you can see through the trees the roof of the house where you are going to live for a little while, at any rate.”

“For always,” said Polly, firmly, to herself. “Miss Pomeroy’s good as she can be, and there’s Grandma Manser’s ear trumpet, and Mrs. Manser’s poor health, and all I’ve got to do is to learn to like to sew and read better than to play, and to stay in the house and be quiet instead of running wild outdoors. That isn’t much,” said Polly, scornfully, to herself, “for a big girl like me.”

Past the rich meadows through which ran the little brook that joined Ashdon River, over the wooden bridge that rumbled under her feet, along the brook road beneath the arching willows, up the easy hill, and into the avenue of stately oaks that gave Miss Pomeroy’s home its name, trotted Daisy, carrying her mistress with the grave, kind eyes and little, eager-faced Polly. The child gazed with awe and excitement at the flying panorama, and gave quick, short breaths as the pretty mare made a skillful turn and stopped before a porch over which was trained an old grape vine. In the porch stood Arctura Green, Miss Pomeroy’s faithful helper, and at the foot of the steps Hiram, Arctura’s brother, waited to take Daisy, who rubbed her nose against his rough hand and gave a little whinny of pleasure before she crunched the lump of sugar which Hiram slipped into her mouth.

“Here we are, my dear,” said Miss Pomeroy, briskly, and Polly, feeling as if she were sound asleep and wide awake all together, jumped out of the wagon.

CHAPTER V
AT POMEROY OAKS

“THIS is little Mary Prentiss,” said Miss Pomeroy to Arctura Green, who stood beaming down on Polly.

“Well, I’m glad enough to see you,” said Arctura, heartily, reaching out her long arm and drawing the little girl close to her side; “something young is just what we need here. We’re all growing old, Miss Hetty and Hiram and I, and Daisy and the cows and all hands; we’ve got a couple of kittens, to be sure, but they’re always busy about their own affairs and don’t talk much, so they’re no great company.”

“Why, Arctura, I don’t know when I’ve heard you make such a long speech,” said Miss Pomeroy. “I hope you have something good for dinner, for Mary and I have had a long drive and a great deal of excitement, and we shall be hungry pretty soon.”

“It’s only just turned half-past eleven,” said Arctura, releasing Polly after a good squeeze against her big checked apron, “so there’ll be an hour to wait. Where’s the little girl’s baggage, Miss Hetty?”

“It’s there in the back of the wagon,” said Miss Pomeroy; “a big black bag.”

“If you please, I can carry it, Miss Arctura,” said Polly, stepping forward to take the bag. “I’m real strong.”

“I want to know,” said Arctura, placidly. “Well, considering how many times as big as you are I am, supposing you let me lug it upstairs for you just this once. I shouldn’t know I was hefting more’n a feather’s weight,” and she swung the bag jauntily as she marched into the house after Miss Pomeroy, gently pushing the little girl before her.

Hiram stood looking into the house for a moment. His mouth had fallen open, as was its wont in times of meditation. Hiram had what his sister frankly called a “draughty countenance,” with a large-nostriled nose, big, prominent ears, and bulging eyes, but the same spirit of good-nature that illumined Arctura’s face shone from her brother’s.

“She’s a neat little piece,” remarked Hiram to Daisy, as he headed her for the barn; “a neat little piece, if ever I saw one, but she looks a mite scared, seems’s if. This is a kind of a quiet place for a young one to be set down, no mistake, and there ain’t any passing to speak of. Children like to see things a-going, even if they’re a-going by, seems’s if. She gave me a real pretty smile, say what you’ve a mind to,” he insisted, as if Daisy had expressed violent remonstrance.

The side porch led into a small, square hall; opposite the porch door was one which Arctura opened, and Polly saw that it was at the foot of a flight of stairs. Arctura and the black enamel cloth bag vanished from sight as the door closed. In the hall stood a hat-tree with curved mahogany branches, tipped with shining brass.

“Now, I hang my everyday coat and hat here,” said Miss Pomeroy, suiting the action to the word, “and you’d better do the same. What’s the matter, child?” she asked, at the sight of Polly’s face.

“These—these are not my everyday hat and jacket, Miss Pomeroy, if you please,” said Polly. “My everyday jacket is a shawl, and my everyday hat is a sunbonnet sometimes, and sometimes it isn’t—it hasn’t been anything. These are my Sunday best, and they are used to lying in a drawer on account of the dust—though I don’t believe there’s one speck of dust here,” she added, politely.

“Arctura would be pleased to hear that,” said Miss Pomeroy. “I think we may venture to leave the Sunday hat and coat here until after dinner. When you go upstairs, you will find a drawer in which you can put them, I’m sure.”

Then Miss Hetty led the way through a door at the left of the hall into a big, comfortable room, the walls of which were lined with book-cases. There was a bow window around which ran a cushioned seat; there were lounging chairs and rocking chairs, and a long sofa; a great round mahogany table covered with books and papers; and, best of all, a fireplace with a bright fire burning under the black pot which hung on the iron crane; and, guarding the fire, were two soldierly figures with stern profiles.

“These were my great-great-grandfather’s andirons,” said Miss Pomeroy, as she watched Polly’s eyes. “Suppose you sit down by the fire and get warmed through, for there was a little chill in the air, after all; and you might take a book to amuse yourself. I have to be busy with something for awhile. Would you—I suppose you wouldn’t care to look at the newspaper?” questioned Miss Pomeroy, doubtfully. “The child looks so absurdly young,” she thought, “and yet she talks as if she were fifty.”

“No’m, thank you,” said Polly; “I will just look at the fire and the books;” so Miss Pomeroy opened another door that led into the great front hall, and went out of the room. She left the door open, and Polly could hear a solemn ticking. She tiptoed to the door and, looking out into the hall, saw a tall clock with a great white face, above which there was a silvery moon in her last quarter. Polly looked at the slowly-swinging pendulum with shining eyes.

“That must be Mrs. Ramsdell’s clock,” she said, softly. “I mean her father’s. She described it just that way, and she said its like was never seen in these parts; no, it was those parts,” said Polly, correcting herself, “for it was ’way off in Connecticut. Well, then, there must have been two made alike, and Mrs. Ramsdell never knew it; I guess I won’t tell her, for she might be sorry.”

Polly stood a moment in the doorway; she could hear the sound of Miss Pomeroy’s voice in some distant part of the house. She tiptoed back into the library. The carpet was so thick and soft that Polly knelt down and rubbed it gently with her little hand; then she put her head down and pressed her cheek against the faded roses.

“It feels like Ebenezer’s fur,” said Polly. “I wonder if Ebenezer will miss me.”

Polly sat still for a moment with wistful eyes, and then hastily scrambled to her feet as the door into the side hall opened partway and Arctura stuck her head in.

“Here,” she said, dropping a struggling heap on the floor, “I thought maybe you’d like to see these two little creatures; I call ’em Snip and Snap, and I’ve had a chase to find ’em for you. There’s nothing they can break in the library, so Miss Hetty lets ’em run wild once in a while. I’ll just shut that other door.”

Arctura marched across the floor and shut the door into the front hall; then she marched back toward her own quarters. “If I were in your place,” she said, looking at the kittens instead of Polly, “I wouldn’t make a practice of sitting on the floor. I don’t know as it’s any harm, really, but a chair looks better for little girls.”

“Yes’m,” said Polly, with scarlet cheeks, as Arctura vanished with a good-humored smile. “I expect she thought I was turning somersaults, maybe,” said Polly to the kittens; “oh, dear!”

But the kittens were quite undisturbed by Arctura’s remarks. As Polly stood still for a moment, they began an acrobatic performance which always gave them keen enjoyment. Snip made a clutch for the hem of Polly’s skirt in front at the same instant that Snap sprang upon her from the rear. They secured a good hold on the pink gingham, and clambered up to Polly’s shoulder as fast as they could go. There they met and shifted positions with considerable scratching of their sharp little claws, and descended, Snap in front and Snip at the back, tumbling around Polly’s feet, and then scampering away from each other sidewise with arched backs and distended tails.

“Oh, you little cunnings!” cried Polly, forgetting all her troubles in a minute. To the window seats flew Snip and Snap, and there they swung back and forth on the stout curtain cords, and made dashes at each other; then they were off to the seat of an old leather-covered chair. Snip mounted to the top of the back and patted Snap on the head with a paw whose claws were politely sheathed, as often as he started to spring to his brother’s side. Over and under chairs and tables they went, and Polly, full of delight, followed them, catching up one or the other whenever she could.

At last the kittens grew tired of play, and when Miss Hetty opened the library door they were comfortably seated on Polly’s shoulders, and there was a sound in the room as of two contented little mill wheels.

FOLIAGE is the most prominent feature of the plant world. Trunks and branches are large and grand, the parti-colored flowers are, at first glance, more beautiful, but the leaf is the most conspicuous part of the vegetation. If flowers and leaves, and wherever is now a leaf we should have a blossom, the eyes would soon tire of the glare of vivid color, and we should long for the soft, restful green of leaves.

Early in April we find the leaf buds unfolding upon the sides of the stems, or pushing up through the ground. Some of these buds are placed opposite to each other upon the stem, others are set alternately, others spirally, so that if you follow with a thread the placing of a certain number of buds you will see that the thread has made a complete circuit of the stem, and then another. Where the leaves are in a spiral placement it is merely a whorl drawn out; where there is a whorl it is merely a compressed spiral.

Let us look at a leaf blade. The woody fibre which makes up the main stem and, bound into a little bundle, composes the foot stalk, spreads out into a light, woody framework for the leaf. This framework is usually in two layers, like the nervures in a butterfly’s wing. The central line of the frame is called the mid-rib, the other parts are styled the veins. Some of these veins are coarser and stronger than others, as, for example, those which expand in the large side lobes of the maple and oak leaves; other veins are as fine as spider’s web. Every student of botany should make studies in venation, by soaking leaves until the green part has decayed, then laying them on black cloth, and brushing the pulp away gently with a fine brush, when perfect specimens of framework will remain. It is this framework which gives the form to the leaf.

Leaves were not created for beauty, but for use. Animals and plants alike are indebted to the shade of foliage for much comfort, and for some further possibilities of life and growth. You suggest, as another use, the supply of food. Yes, the grasses and many herbage plants are greedily browsed by animals; thus we owe to them indirectly our food supply.

Yet we have not reached the most important function of the leaf. To the plant itself the leaf serves as a food purveyor, gathering perhaps the larger portion of plant food from air and moisture by absorption. The leaf is also the main breathing apparatus of the plant; the leaf spreads out to air and sunlight the food received by the entire plant, and thus secures chemical changes in it similar to assimilation and digestion. The leaf makes possible the circulation of the sap. Thus the leaf serves the plant as throat, lungs, and stomach. What the human being would be without such organs the plant would be without the leaf, or some part modified, as in the cactus family, to serve the purposes of the leaf.

So, when in April, we see the trees on all sides bursting forth in verdant foliage, let us remember the manifold purposes of the leaf.

WITH THE EDITOR

THE launching of a new magazine can fairly be compared to the opening of a new house. In it there are various rooms—which we call departments—to be opened and furnished.

Our house-warming was well attended. At our fireside were seen the faces of young folks from all parts of the United States, from Canada, England, and even far-off Hawaii. To please such a gathering it is necessary to meet many requirements.

Although gratified by the praise which we have received in good measure, and so encouraged to new ambitions, we, nevertheless, desire the guidance of earnest criticism. In the spirit of mutual helpfulness, then, we ask your opinion upon the departments already begun and your advice as to the opening of others.

Young people starting out with the ambition to accomplish something of importance in the world naturally place great stress upon the element of originality. To them, at first glance, the world’s great discoveries and inventions seem based upon a learning totally new—the sudden flash of genius rather than the natural growth of knowledge. But a closer study of each achievement, even of genius itself, will show that in reality it is but the finishing touch upon work already nearly accomplished.

For example, let us consider Darwin and Wallace. Important as were their services, their greatness does not rest upon the element of originality. The knowledge necessary for the construction of the theory of evolution had been accumulating in the minds of men for centuries. These two did but observe and utilize that knowledge. Others, whose names have been forgotten, have, doubtless, worked just as earnestly and just as intelligently. How many of us have ever heard of Lamarck, or even of Charles Darwin’s grandfather. Yet each of these men, separately, brought the theory of evolution almost to the threshold of public belief. Their lives were spent in building the foundation, while Darwin and Wallace, using their data, finished the work thus made possible. The men whom the world remembers are the ones who recognize these chances and make perfect use of the past.

To-day, we see several minds struggling to interpret the problem of wireless telegraphy. Their experiments are going on before the eyes of the world. It is no sudden stroke of genius. What is in its effect a decided originality, is largely the ability to make practical application of past labor. Our knowledge of electricity has been accumulating. The step is certain. The telegraph, the telephone, and the electric light have long since ripened. Soon we may know who will give wireless telegraphy its finishing touch.

Let us remember, therefore, that the great opportunities of the present lie, not so much in the shaping of new castles of imagination, as in patiently and carefully building upon the foundations already laid.

St. Louis Exposition

An event which stands prominently before us is the Exposition to be held in St. Louis in the summer of 1903. Its double purpose is to portray civilization in its most advanced state and to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Louisiana Purchase—the historic transaction whereby the United States purchased from France the territory lying between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains.

The ground area of the proposed fair is nearly 1200 acres and the appropriation, raised by the united efforts of the city of St. Louis, the State of Missouri, and the national government, will reach thirty millions of dollars.

The principal departments are Education, Art, Manufacture, Machinery, Liberal Arts, Electricity, Transportation, Agriculture, Horticulture, Forestry, Mining and Metallurgy, Fish and Game, Anthropology, and Physical Culture. Each of these is to be represented by a building and the whole group will be arranged in a symmetrical fan-shaped figure.

Through the center of this, extending from what we might term the handle to the outer arc, will be a boulevard six hundred feet in width. Where this intersects the circumference, some sixty feet above the general level of the grounds, will be the Art Palace. It is to be a permanent building and will cost at least one million dollars.

As much as possible the exhibits will show the process of manufacture and development of the articles displayed. Raw materials also will occupy a prominent place. St. Louis is the commercial center of the Mississippi Valley—one of the world’s great areas of production.

The Louisiana Exposition as planned should be most convincing that the United States has well utilized the territory purchased in 1803.

Interior Heat

Professor T. C. Mendenhall has recently suggested that the internal heat of the earth might be used as a source of power. In such an age we are bound to be a little cautious in pronouncing anything impossible. Experiments show that the temperature of the earth, as we descend into its depths, increases one degree for every sixty feet. At this rate it would be necessary to bore ten thousand feet to obtain the temperature necessary to convert water into steam.

Professor William Hallock, of Columbia University, has already a plan in mind. A few feet apart he would sink two parallel pipes into the earth to the distance required. Both of these would terminate in a subterranean reservoir which could be made by the explosion of dynamite cartridges.

Then through one of the pipes a supply of water would be introduced into the reservoir. Here, by the earth’s heat, it would be converted into steam, and in this form conducted, by the other pipe, to the surface, where it would be utilized.

Prince Henry

Although the name Prince Henry has been in our ears for several weeks past, some of us may not know his relation in the royal family.

He is the second son of an emperor and the brother of the present Emperor of the German Empire. He is a descendant of the line of Prussian kings which included one of the world’s greatest generals, Frederick the Great.

On one side his grandfather, William I, of Prussia, was the first emperor of the modern German Empire. On the other, his grandmother was Queen Victoria of England. His wife is the granddaughter of the latter sovereign.

A Change In the Cabinet

On March 10, the Hon. John D. Long, Secretary of the Navy, tendered his resignation from office. Mr. Long has been in the Presidential Cabinet since 1897.

William H. Moody, who, like the former, hails from the State of Massachusetts, has been appointed as his successor.

Mr. Moody is forty-nine years old, a lawyer by profession, and has been a member of Congress for the past seven years. He will take up the duties of his office on May 1.

The New States

Bills are now before the House of Representatives for the admission to Statehood of our remaining Territories—New Mexico, Arizona, Oklahoma, and Indian Territory.

The chief objection raised at present is, that most of the inhabitants are of Mexican and Indian descent and are unfit for the responsibility of citizenship.

The Irrigation Bill

In the bill on irrigation recently passed in the Senate, provisions were made for what is known as a Reclamation Fund. This is to be formed from the proceeds of the sales of public lands and will be devoted to the irrigation of the arid districts in the United States.

By means of such a movement it is proposed to reclaim and utilize a great area of land which has heretofore been worthless to agriculture.

Methuen’s Defeat.

By a night attack made on March 7, 1902, General Delarey, with a force of fifteen hundred Boers, captured, near Vryburg, several hundred British soldiers, all their supplies and four guns. Among the prisoners was General Methuen, the commander of the British.

Such a demonstration of reserve strength upon the part of the Boers should make the British Government cautious in declaring the war in South Africa to be at an end.

Photography In Colors

Mr. A. H. Verrill, of New Haven, Conn., has discovered a method in photography for reproducing all natural tints and colors. He terms it the autochromatic process. Its success is due to the paper used, which is five times as sensitive to red and yellow light as ordinary paper, and to the sharpness of the lenses. These latter were made under his own direction.

IN-DOORS

PARLOR MAGIC

Magical Production of a Coin.—Come forward with a coin palmed in the right hand. Draw attention to the left hand, showing it back and front as empty, and, as if in illustration of what you say, give the palm a smart slap with the right hand, leaving the coin behind, and slightly contracting the fingers so as to retain it; now show the right hand empty, pulling up the sleeve with the left, which masks the presence of the coin, then close the left hand and, after one or two passes over it with the right hand, produce the coin.

A New Coin Fold.—Take a piece of paper four inches by five inches, place a coin on it, and fold the top of the paper down over the coin to within one inch of the bottom. Then fold the right-hand side of the paper under the coin, treating the left-hand side in a similar way. You must now fold the one inch of paper at the bottom, under the coin, and you will, apparently, have wrapped it securely in the paper; but really it is in a kind of pocket, and will readily slip out into either hand at pleasure.

Allow several persons in the audience to feel the coin through the paper, then take it from the left hand to the right, letting the coin slip out into the left hand, which picks up a plate from the table. You may burn the paper in the flame of a candle, and, dropping the ashes on the plate, the coin is found to have disappeared.

To Vanish a Marked Coin from a Tumbler and Cause it to Appear in a Small Box Wrapped in Paper in the Centre of a Large Ball of Wool.—For this very surprising trick you will require to make the following preparations:

Procure a tumbler having a slit cut flush with and parallel to the bottom, which should be flat. The opening should be just large enough to allow a half-dollar dropped into the tumbler to slip through into your hand (see Fig. 6).

Obtain a small metal box large enough to take the coin easily, also a flat tin tube just wide enough for the half-dollar to slide through it. Place one end of this tube inside the box and close the lid on it, keeping it in position by passing an elastic band over the box. You now wrap the box in paper and wind a quantity of wool around it until you get a large ball with the end of the tube projecting about one inch. Place the ball thus prepared on the table at the rear of the stage, and you are ready to perform. Show the tumbler, and draw attention to the fact that it is an ordinary one by filling it with water, which can be done by holding the forefinger around the slit. Empty the tumbler and borrow a half-dollar, which has been marked by the owner, allowing him to actually drop it into the glass. Cover the tumbler with a handkerchief, shaking it continually to prove that your coin is still there, and then place it down on your table, securing the coin through the slit as you do so. Going to the back of the stage for the ball of wool, you insert the coin into the tube and withdraw the latter, when the action of the elastic band closes the box. Bring the ball forward in a large glass basin and have the wool unwound, disclosing the box; on this being opened the marked coin will be found within.

Coin, Wine Glass, and Paper Cone.—This very pretty and amusing table trick consists in causing a coin placed under a wine glass, the whole being covered with a paper cone, to disappear and return as often as desired.

The following arrangements are necessary: Take a wine glass and, having placed a little gum all around its edge, turn it over on a sheet of white paper, and when dry cut away the paper close to the glass. Obtain a Japanese tray and on it lay a large sheet of paper similar to that covering the mouth of the glass, and stand the glass, mouth downward, on it. Make a paper cone to fit over the glass, and you are ready to present the illusion.

Borrow a penny and lay it on the large sheet of paper by the side of the wine glass; cover the glass with the paper cone, and place the whole over the coin. Command the penny to disappear, and, on removing the cone, it will seem to have done so, as the paper over the mouth of the glass, being the same color as that on the tray, effectively conceals the coin. To cause it to reappear, you replace the cone and carry away the glass under it. This can be repeated as often as desired.

To make the experiment more effective, use colored paper, which shows up against the coin more than white.

The Pocket Vanish.—Take a coin in the right hand and make believe to place it in the left, really palming it. The left hand is closed as if it contained the coin and held away from the body. The right hand pulls back the sleeve slightly, as if to show that the coin has not been vanished in that direction. This movement brings the right hand over the outside breast pocket, into which the coin is allowed to fall unperceived. The coin is now vanished from the left hand in the orthodox manner, and both hands are shown empty.

Should you desire to regain possession of the coin, have the outside pocket made communicating with an inner one on the same side of the coat; when, having shown the right hand unmistakably empty, you produce the coin thence, in a magical manner.

To Pass a Coin Into an Ordinary Matchbox Held by One of the Spectators.—Prepare a matchbox as follows: Push open the sliding portion about one inch. Then fix between the top of the slide and the back end of the box a coin, the greater part of which is overhanging the box, the whole being out of sight of the casual observer. Arranged thus, give the box to someone to hold, with instructions that when you count three the box is to be closed smartly. This will have the effect of jerking the coin into the box.

You may now take a duplicate coin by means of the “Pocket Vanish,” or any other convenient method, counting “One! two! three!” when, acting according to your instructions, the person will close the box, and the coin will be heard to fall inside.

THE OLD TRUNK

This department we believe is destined soon to become one of the most popular features of the magazine. Not only shall we spare no pains upon our part, but we also earnestly ask your co-operation in providing puzzles of all shapes and descriptions to bewilder and tangle the most ingenious of intellects. To each of the first three persons who shall correctly solve all the following puzzles, we will give a year’s subscription to Young Folks Magazine, to be sent to any desired address.

The following are the names of the first three persons to solve correctly the puzzles in last month’s number and who are, therefore, each entitled to a year’s subscription to Young Folks Magazine:

Perfect solutions were also received from many other young people and, as we offer the same inducement for this month, we hope to hear from them again.

AQUARIUM

DIAGONAL

When you have guessed correctly the following eight-letter words and placed them one above the other in the order given, the diagonal from upper left to lower right-hand corner will spell the name of one of the very first men to explore America.

TWISTED RIVERS

The names of the following rivers do not run as smoothly as they might. Can you straighten them?

ENIGMA

I am composed of eighteen letters.
My 9-16-2 is that which covers the greater part of the world.
My 3-6-8 is an abbreviation and a title.
My 15-4-12-18 is something from which water is obtained.
My 1-10-15-4-17 is a gem.
My 11-7-13-18 is to quiet.
My 5-14-12-4 is part of a shoe.
My whole is a well known author.

DOUBLE CROSSWORD ENIGMA

*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK YOUNG FOLKS MAGAZINE, VOL. I, NO. 2, APRIL 1902 ***

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FRONTISPIECE—Valley Forge—Washington and Lafayette		PAGE
WITH WASHINGTON AT VALLEY FORGE (Serial)	W. Bert Foster	37
Illustrated by F. A. Carter
THE FRESHMAN BANQUET	Harriet Wheeler	48
Illustrated by H. M. Brock
MR. NOBODY		51
A DAUGHTER OF THE FOREST (Serial)	Evelyn Raymond	52
Illustrated by Ida Waugh
APRIL—Selected from “In Memoriam”		61
WOOD-FOLK TALK	J. Allison Atwood	62
LITTLE POLLY PRENTISS (Serial)	Elizabeth Lincoln Gould	64
Illustrated by Ida Waugh
APRIL LEAVES	Julia McNair Wright	71
WITH THE EDITOR		72
EVENT AND COMMENT		73
IN-DOORS (Parlor Magic, Paper II)	Ellis Stanyon	74
THE OLD TRUNK (Puzzles)		76
WITH THE PUBLISHER		77

1.	Feldspar.
2.	Independence Hall.
3.	Kinglet.
	Bluejay.
	Robin.
	Blackbird.
	Crow.
	Woodthrush.
4.	Alice in Wonderland.
5.	Saratoga.
6.	Beaver.
	Bear.
	Weasel.
	Puma.
	Deer.
	Otter.
	Seal.
	Ferret.
	Elk.
7.	Donkey.
	Turnkey.
	Monkey.
	Whiskey.
	Lackey.
	Turkey.

The Project Gutenberg eBook of Young Folks Magazine, Vol. I, No. 2, April 1902

YOUNG FOLKS MAGAZINE

CONTENTS FOR APRIL