Chapter I: Front Matter

Copyright, 1896, by HARPER & BROTHERS. All Rights Reserved.

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PUBLISHED WEEKLY. NEW YORK, TUESDAY, DECEMBER 22, 1896. FIVE CENTS A COPY.

VOL. XVIII.--NO. 895. TWO DOLLARS A YEAR.

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JOHN HENRY.

BY MARY E. WILKINS.

Two days before Christmas John Henry sat on the top rail of the fence which separated the seven-acre lot from the oat-field. There were five rails in the fence, on account of two cows addicted to jumping being kept in the seven-acre lot, and consequently John Henry was perched at quite a dizzy height from the ground. His mother would have been exceedingly nervous had she seen him there. He was her only child; his two older brothers had died in infancy; he had himself been very delicate, and it had been hard work to rear him. The neighbors said that Martha Anne Lewis had brought up John Henry wrapped in cotton-wool under a glass shade, and that she believed him to be both sugar and salt as far as sun and rain were concerned. "Never lets him go out in the hot sun without an umbrella," said they, "and never lets him out at all on a rainy day--always keeps him at home, flattening his nose against the window-pane."

Poor John Henry's mother was afraid to have him climb trees or coast down hill, and he might never have enjoyed these boyish sports had it not been for his father. When he was quite small, his father took him out in the pine woods and taught him how to climb a tall tree.

"Don't you be afraid, sonny. A boy can't live in this world and not be picked on unless he can climb."

John Henry went to the top of the tree in triumph, and when his mother turned pale at the recital, his father only laughed.

"I'd have caught him if he'd fallen, Martha Anne," he said; "and John Henry has got to climb a tree, unless you want to set him up for a girl and done with it."

However, Mrs. Lewis stipulated that John Henry should not climb unless his father was with him, and also that he should not go coasting without him. The result was that until John Henry was twelve he had had very few boy-mates. He went to the district school, but that was only a quarter of a mile from his home, and he did not have to carry his dinner, and he always came straight home, because his mother was so anxious if he was late.

"Better humor your mother, sonny, and not stay to play with the boys, she gets so worried," his father told him.

So John Henry always trudged faithfully home, in spite of cajoling shouts, and sometimes taunts about being tied to mother's apron-strings. However, the taunts were rather cautiously given; John Henry, mother's boy though he was, had still a pretty spirit of his own, and his small fists were harder than they looked. Once or twice there had been a scuffle, in which he had not been worsted. His mother had chided and wept over him on his return, and held anxious consultations with the teachers and the other boys' mothers, but John Henry had gained his firm footing in school, in spite of his pink face, his smooth hair, his little ruffled shirts, and the cake and sugared doughnuts which he brought to eat at recess. None of the other boys brought such luncheons; indeed, the most of them were dependent upon spruce gum and the cores of their friends' apples, and none of them wore such fine clothes.

It was quite a grief to Mrs. Lewis that she could not exercise as much taste upon a son's personal adornment as she could have done upon a daughter's, but she did all she was able. John Henry wore ruffled shirts, and carried hem-stitched pocket-handkerchiefs, his mittens were knitted in fancy stitches, and he had little slippers with roses embroidered on the toes to wear in the house. She also feather-stitched his blue-jean overalls.

John Henry's father, who was a farmer, insisted that his son should learn to work on the farm, and his mother, though she would have preferred to have had him in the house with her making quilts and pin-cushions, had to consent. Every day John Henry was arrayed in overalls, and did his task in field and garden; but his mother feather-stitched the overalls with white linen thread, though all the neighbors laughed, and John Henry was privately ashamed of them. However, his father bade him humor poor mother, and he never objected to the decoration. John Henry wore the overalls now, for he had been working with his father all the morning. There was no school all the next week, on account of Christmas holidays. It was only a half-hour before noon--John Henry's father had sent him home, lest his mother should think he was working too long, and the boy had sat down on the fence to take an observation on the way. John Henry was rather given to pauses for reflection and observation upon his little way of life.

Although it was late in December, the day was quite mild; there was a warm haze in the horizon distances, and the wind blew in soft puffs from the south. John Henry had taken his jacket off--it lay on the ground beside the fence. He shrugged his blue-jean knees up to his chin, clasped his hands around them, and stared ahead with blue reflective eyes. He did not see a boy coming across the field; he did not even hear him whistle, though it was a loud pipe of "Marching through Georgia." He did not notice him until he had reached the fence and hailed with a gruff "Hullo!" Then he looked down and saw Jim Mills.

"Hullo!" responded John Henry.

Jim Mills was carrying a sack of potatoes; he let it slip to the ground, and leaned against the fence with a sigh.

"Heavy?" inquired John Henry.

"Try it an' see."

"Where did you bring it from?"

"Thatcher's. Thought I'd come across lots, 'cause it was shorter. Where you been?"

"Been workin' in the wood-lot."

Jim Mills looked mournfully at the potato-sack. "I've got to be goin'," said he. "Mother wants these for dinner."

John Henry jumped down from the fence and gave the sack a manful tug from the ground. "I'll carry it as far as my house," said he.

"You can't."

"Can, too."

The two boys moved on across the old plough ridges of the field, John Henry a little in the rear, swung sideways by the potato-bag like a ship by its anchor.

"Going to the tree Tuesday night?" he panted, presently.

"Ketch me!" responded Jim Mills, surlily.

"Why ain't you going?"

"What would I be going for, I'd like to know?"

"There's going to be a Christmas tree, an' you'll have something."

"What'll I have?" demanded Jim Mills, fiercely.

He turned around in the cart path and faced John Henry. He was a thin boy, very small for his age, with a fringe of pale hair blowing under his old cap, over big gray eyes sunken in pathetic hollows. Many people thought that Jim Mills looked as if he did not have enough to eat.

"What d'yer s'pose I had last year?" asked he.

John Henry shook his head.

"Well, I'll tell you. I had a candy-bag and an orange and a girl's book from the teacher. She said she was sorry there wasn't enough boys' books to go round. When I got home I gave the candy-bag to the baby, and the orange to little Hattie and 'Melia, and 'Liza Ann she had the book. I ain't going to any more Christmas trees."

"Maybe you'll get something more this year," ventured John Henry, feebly.

"Where'll I get it? Tell me that, will you? Father an' mother can't give me anything. There's nobody but the teacher. Reckon I'll get another girl's book from her, an' then I'll have the candy-bag an' the orange, same as all the others, out of the school money. What would you think, John Henry Lewis, if that was all you was goin' to have?"

John Henry shook his head vaguely.

"Guess you wouldn't go to the Christmas tree any more than some other folks," said Jim Mills. "There you've got your father and your mother, and your uncle Joe and your aunt Jane, and your aunt Louisa and your grandfather and grandmother Lewis and your grandmother Atkins, to bring presents to the tree for you. How'd you feel if you had to go there and hark for your name to be called, and hear it: 'John Henry Lewis'--then you march out before 'em all and git a little candy-bag; 'John Henry Lewis'--then you march out and get an orange; 'John Henry Lewis'--then you march out and get a girl's book, and all of them things that everybody else has? Guess you'd be ashamed to go to Christmas trees as much as me. If your folks be poor and can't have things, I guess you don't want to tell of it before everybody."

Jim Mills turned about and went on with a defiant stride; John Henry followed, tugging the potato-sack. When the boys reached the house his mother called out of the window to set it down directly, he would lame his shoulders, and Jim Mills flushed all over his little pinched face.

"Told you it was too heavy for you," he muttered.

"It's as light as a feather, mother," called John Henry.

He ran around to the wood-shed and got a little wheelbarrow and loaded the potato-sack into that.

"There! you can carry it easier this way," he said; and Jim Mills trundled off, without any thanks save an acquiescent grunt. Jim Mills had so few favors shown him that sometimes they seemed to awaken within him an indignant surprise, instead of gratitude.

John Henry was so abstracted during dinner that his mother feared he was ill, and wished him to take some tincture of rhubarb. After dinner he went out in the barn, and curled himself up in the hay-mow to think. During the next two days he seemed to be in a brown study. Monday, the day before Christmas, Jim Mills brought the wheelbarrow home, and John Henry beckoned him into the barn.

"Look here, Jim; you'd better go to that tree to-morrow night."

"What for, I'd like to know?"

"Oh, 'cause you'd better."

"Why had I better? I ain't going to tramp half a mile to that old school-house to get a candy-bag and an orange and a girl's book."

"Say, Jim, you go."

"What for?"

"Oh, something," replied John Henry, mysteriously and evasively.

Jim Mills's gray eyes took on a sudden sharpness. "What d'yer mean?"

"Oh, nothing. I rather guess you'll get something more this time, though."

"Say what you heard, John Henry Lewis!" Jim Mills questioned, eagerly.

"I didn't say I'd heard anything. You just better go to the Christmas tree, though; if you don't, you'll be sorry."

"You're fooling?"

"No, I ain't fooling!"

Finally Jim Mills agreed to go to the Christmas tree; in fact, John Henry made him promise solemnly, though he would not give his reason. However, Jim Mills went home in a state of bewildered expectation and elation. He was finally convinced that somebody was going to hang something fine on the Christmas tree for him, that John Henry knew it, and had promised not to tell. The tree was to be in the district school-house. All Tuesday afternoon John Henry, with some other boys and girls, worked hard decorating the school-house with evergreen. The tree had been set up in the morning, and people had begun to bring the presents; the teacher and some of the older girls were tying them on. Now and then John Henry made a détour in that direction, and peeped furtively. Before he went home he made quite sure that all the presents which he expected were there. He counted them over as he trudged home over the moonlit snow-crust. A deep snow had fallen on Sunday, and so averted the danger of a green Christmas. The moon was full, and considerably above the horizon, though it was still early. John Henry hurried, for he had much to do.

Supper was all ready when he reached home, and he ate it so hastily that his mother was afraid he would have indigestion. After supper he went up to his room and put on his best clothes, which his mother had laid out on the bed for him. Then he watched his chance--standing at the head of the stairs, and making sure that the doors below were shut--of stealing softly down and out of the front door.

It was about an hour before the time set for the Christmas festivities. He sped along through the moonlight. Twice he saw some one coming far down the road, and slunk to the cover of a bush, like a rabbit. One man went crunching past without a pause, but the other stopped when he neared the bush, and stared about him incredulously.

"I swan, I thought I see somebody ahead here," John Henry heard him say. He hugged close to the shadow of the bush until the squeaking crunch of the man's footsteps were out of hearing, then he came out and ran for the school-house, which was not far distant.

The windows were quite dark, and the door was locked. John Henry, however, was not dependent upon a door; he raised a window, and climbed in easily enough. The little interior was full of the spicy fragrance of evergreen, which had also a subtle festive suggestiveness. John Henry stole across to the desk, took a match from his pocket, and lighted a lamp, and then the tree blazed out. It was a fine tall tree, festooned with garlands of pop-corn, and grafted, as it were, into splendid and various fruit bearing. John Henry was not long in the school-house. He had brought a lead-pencil and rubber, and had noted the exact hanging places of his presents. It was barely ten minutes before the windows were again dark and John Henry was hurrying home.

His mother, who was very busy putting on a new brown cashmere dress, and his father, who was shaving, had not missed him. He stole in quietly, and sat down by the sitting-room stove. He was elated, but he had some misgivings. He was quite sure of his good motives, and yet there was a little sense of guilt.

When at length he started again, with his father and mother, he was very quiet. His mother asked him two or three times on the way if he did not feel well, and pulled his scarf more closely around his neck.

The district school-house was packed that evening; all the scholars and their families had come. Jim Mills was already there when John Henry entered, and rolled his eyes about at him with a curious expression of mingled hope and doubt.

Poor Jim Mills turned pale when the distribution of gifts began, and listened intently, every nerve strained, for his own name. He had not long to wait. He went down the aisle, his knees shaking, and received--not an orange, not a candy-bag, not the girl's book, of which he had still a bitter suspicion, but a parcel which at the first touch he knew, with a bewilderment of rapture, to contain skates. He had scarcely reached his seat before his name was called again, and forth he went for the second time, and was given a jack-knife with many blades. Then he went up to receive a top, then a boy's book, then another boy's book, then a pair of beautiful red mittens, then a sled. Jim Mills started up at the sound of his name and traversed the school-room until everybody stared, and the teacher began to look puzzled and anxious. She consulted with the committee-man who was distributing the presents, and his wife, who had been helping her that afternoon. Then she went to John Henry's father and mother, and one of his aunts who was there, and they all whispered together. Finally she bent over Jim Mills and whispered to him, and he immediately crooked his arm around his face, leaned forward upon his desk, and began to cry. He was a nervous boy; he had not eaten much that day, and the fall from such an unwonted height of joyful possession was a hard one.

"You must tell me the truth, Jim Mills," the teacher whispered, sharply.

"I--didn't," responded Jim Mills, with a painful cry, as if she had struck him.

"If you did come in here while we were gone and mark John Henry Lewis's presents over for yourself, tell me at once, if you do not want to be very severely punished," said the teacher, quite aloud.

Jim Mills did not repeat his denial; he only gave a great heaving sob. The scholars stood up in their seats to see.

"What a wicked boy!" exclaimed a woman near John Henry.

"He ought to be put in jail," returned another.

"He didn't do it!" John Henry cried out, wildly.

"He must have," said the first woman.

"Yes; you're a real good boy to stand up for him, but he must have," agreed the second woman.

"I tell you he didn't!" almost screamed John Henry; but they paid no more attention. He called the teacher, waving his arms frantically, but she was still busy with Jim Mills, and did not hear or see him. He tried to get up the aisle to her, but it was now blocked. He could not reach his father and mother for the same reason.

Finally John Henry Lewis made a desperate plunge down the aisle, and into the middle of the floor beside the tree. He raised his hand, and everybody stared at him. He was very pale, and his voice almost failed him, but he persisted in the first speech of his life.

"I did it," said he. "He mustn't be blamed. He didn't know anything about it. I told him he'd better come to-night, 'cause he'd get something nice, but that was all he knew about it. All he had last Christmas was an orange and a candy-bag and a girl's book, and he wasn't coming again. I had all the presents and he didn't have anything, and so I swapped. He ain't the one to be blamed; I am."

John Henry, pretty little mother's boy that he was, stood before them all, tingling with the rare shame of a generous action, meeting the astonished faces with the courage of one who invites punishment for guilt.

There was a pause--some one said afterwards that there were five minutes during which you might have heard a pin drop--then a woman caught her breath with something like a sob, and the teacher spoke.

"You may go to your seat, John Henry," said she.

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After the Christmas tree that night there was great speculation as to whether Jim Mills would be allowed to keep John Henry Lewis's presents, and as to what John Henry's folks would say to him.

It was ascertained beyond doubt that Jim Mills did keep the presents, and it was reported that all John Henry's father said to him was that in future he mustn't lay his plans to do anything like that without telling his folks about it. As for John Henry's mother, she and his grandmother Atkins bought him a little silver watch for a New-Year's present, because they felt uneasy about letting him sacrifice quite so much. His grandmother, who was superstitious, said that John Henry had always been delicate, and she was afraid it was a bad sign.

CHRISTMAS AT THE DOOR.

BY MARGARET E. SANGSTER.

Here's Christmas at the door again!
There's never a day so dear,
Nor one we are half so glad to see,
In the course of the whole round year.

It isn't that Santa Claus comes back,
And his hands with gifts are full;
It isn't that we have holidays,
When we need not go to school.

But the air is thrilled with happiness,
The crowds go up and down,
And people laugh and shout for joy
When Christmas comes to town.

There's nobody left to stand outside,
The world is bright with cheer,
For Christmas-time is the merriest time
In the whole of the big round year.

We try to love our enemies now,
And our friends we love the more,
That strife and anger fade away
When Christmas taps at the door.

"THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS."

The author of the famous poem that recounts in such graphic language "The Visit of St. Nicholas" was born in the city of New York, July 15, 1779. His boyhood was passed at the country-seat of his father, called Chelsea, then far remote from the city, but now a very thickly settled portion of it, and embracing a large tract in the vicinity of Ninth Avenue and Twenty-third Street.

Dr. Moore received his early education in Latin and Greek from his father, the venerable Bishop of New York, and in 1798 he graduated from Columbia College. He devoted himself to the study of the Hebrew language, and the result of his labors appeared in the form of a Hebrew and English Lexicon, which was published in 1809, and he was thus the pioneer in the work of Hebrew lexicography. In 1821 Dr. Moore was made Professor of Biblical Learning in the General Theological Seminary of the Episcopal Church. From his magnificent estate he donated to the Episcopal Church the tract on Ninth Avenue between Twentieth and Twenty-first streets, and the Theological Seminary there erected is a lasting monument to his liberality and devotion to the sacred cause.

In the intervals between the time devoted to more serious studies his principal amusement was writing short poems for the amusement of his children, and among them was "The Visit of St. Nicholas," which was written for them as a Christmas gift about 1840. The idea, he states, was derived from an ancient legend, which was related to him by an old Dutchman who lived near his father's home, and told him the story when a boy.

In those days every young lady was supposed to have an "album," and a relative who was visiting the family quickly transferred the verses to hers. They were first published, much to the surprise of the author, in a newspaper printed in Troy. They attracted immediate attention, and were copied and recopied in newspapers and periodicals all over the country. An illustrated edition, in book form, was published about 1850, and since then School Readers have made them familiar to generation after generation of children. They have been translated into foreign languages, and a learned editor informed us of his delight and surprise when travelling in Germany to hear them recited by a little girl in her own native tongue.

After a long life of honor and usefulness, Dr. Moore died, at his summer residence in New York, July 10, 1863. For him may be claimed the peculiar distinction of being the author of the two extremes of literature--learned works on ancient languages for profound scholars, and Christmas verses for little children. The learned works, upon which he spent years of constant labor, have been superseded by works of still greater research, but the man is yet to be born who can write anything to supersede the little poem that has made Santa Claus and his tiny reindeer a living reality to thousands of children throughout our broad land.

THE WORD OF THE GUNS.

BY EARLE TRACY.

The little _Mystery_ was lying off the pier at Martinez's. Night had covered sail-boat and row-boat alike, and while all Potosi gathered towards the front celebrating Christmas eve with the rockets and the fire-crackers that are not once thought of on the Fourth of July, Mr. Martinez and Bascom were silently carrying bags of gold on board the _Mystery_. As the sails ran up in the snapping cold, the mournful cry of her ropes was the only sound on the Back Bay, and it smote Bascom; and Mr. Martinez's grasp and his whispered cautions to Captain Tony, and the solemn gold that he had carried, weighed upon his heart as they put out.

Everything had been arranged on the deck for mounting the one which was best preserved of the six mysterious old cannon that he had found the summer before sunk in Potomoc Bay. It had been left covered by tarpaulins in a row-boat off Captain Tony's point, where they could get it as they passed. They ran the schooner across from Mr. Martinez's to the point, and neither of them spoke along the way. When they reached the boat, Bascom sprang over into it and lifted off the tarpaulins. There was nothing underneath.

"The cannon's gone," he whispered. "What does it mean?"

"Somebody playin' a joke to spoil our fun," said the Captain, and the darkness hid the worried frown upon his face. "Yo' mus' go ashore an' look for it; bud doan' be long."

"Looks like it's too funny for a joke," said Bascom, "less'n it's one of ole Captain Aristide's. I never heard of his playin' one, only he was along here to-day when I was a-polishin' the gun, an' he seemed mighty inter_est_ed. It kind o' shivered me, but I went on sweet an' innocent about our keepin' Christmas, firin' in the channel."

"Aristide?" repeated Captain Tony, and he crossed his arms on the tiller and pulled his hat down over his eyes, and thought, while Bascom rowed ashore. Captain Aristide Lorat was known by every one to be the craftiest man along the coast. His neighbors had never guessed that in his free and gallant youth he had been a pirate neither more nor less. He was too old now to enjoy the personal risk of such enterprises, and he gave his direct attention to a prosaic carrying trade; but his old preferences survived in the form of a few boats which did whatever smuggling or wrecking came in their way. They were seldom seen in Pontomoc Bay, and had never been recognized in their true character nor connected with Captain Lorat, and yet Captain Tony did not like to think that old Aristide had been nosing in their affairs. For it was something unusual that was taking the _Mystery_ out on Christmas eve.

Mr. Martinez, the owner of the great canning-factory for which Captain Tony and Bascom sailed, was the chief of a quiet organization of Cubans who were wealthy enough to make their patriotism of substantial disadvantage to Spain. Just now, in one of the frequent insurrections, there had been an unexpected call on the society for aid. A Cuban boat was secretly coasting off Horn Island, waiting their messenger, for this was at a time when the United States was not much inclined towards sympathy. Martinez had two reasons for sending Captain Tony out to it. Tony was infallibly prudent and brave, and he was trustworthy, both from the integrity of character which made him dislike the mission, and from an indebtedness to his employer which forbade his refusing it. Mr. Martinez had given them the _Mystery_.

"They made a clean job," whispered Bascom, coming back. "They've taken that and the two next best out'n the shed where I was polishin' them. It must have been Captain Aristide. Has he any grudge agin us?"

"None dat I know of," the Captain said; "an' we can't stop an' study 'boud it now. It is of mo' impo'tance dat we do ouah wo'k dan dat we fire guns, even to say dat it is done." Captain Tony's regret at taking Bascom out on a holiday had suggested carrying the best cannon along and firing it, for Bascom had been putting all his savings into ammunition and fireworks for Christmas. Mr. Martinez approved, thinking a water celebration would help to explain their going, and they were to fire him a reassurance when they went through Potosi Channel on their way to the oyster-beds when their mission had been carried out.

The actual fact of the case was that Captain Lorat needed no more than the knowledge that a boat was going out. Other bits of knowledge gained from other sources only required this to piece them to a whole. He decided it would be better not to let Bascom have a gun on board, and while the _Mystery_ was taking her cargo at Martinez's pier, he had all of them that looked as if they might be used loaded upon a schooner that had come into the bay since dark.

Toward three in the morning Bascom found his eyelids growing so heavy that he could scarcely keep from drowsing against the mast in the snug warm lee of the sail. The _Mystery_ was just about to round the Horn when a row-boat load of men swished past her bows. Bascom drew himself together and sprang swiftly to the rail. One of the men was already climbing up the side, but he jumped on board and grappled with the Captain. There was a volley of shots, and the Captain dodged into the cabin, where the gold was stowed. The men swarmed up over the deck. For a moment Bascom had thought they were the Cubans, but now he caught up one of his rockets, lighted it, and held it steady while it rose. The Cuban boat must surely be waiting round the point of the island, and it would see the signal. A man leaped round the mast and knocked him down, but as Bascom rolled over to the rail he saw the rocket singing up to break in scintillating brightness through the night. He wriggled like a cat to the stern and dropped down the hatchway. He pulled the hatches shut, but there was a rush of feet along the deck, and the blade of the anchor came crashing through the cabin-top. Bascom threw himself into a bunk, and before the Captain, who was reloading in a corner, could close his revolver and lift it, the roof was torn from over them; three men poured in, seized the Captain and Bascom, bound them both, and carried off the gold. The lantern hung battered, but its light was not out, and the prisoners looked at each other in despair.

"Reckon I give it to dem better dan I got," he said, "bud I'm t'inkin' 'boud how we can catch dem again an' take ouah money back."

"I'm kind of expectin' comp'ny," said Bascom. "Them Cubans is dumber'n I take 'em for if they don't mosey up to see what my rocket meant. I fired one just as you dodged in the cabin."

"Dere is one question," Captain Tony said. "Get yo'se'f close an' tuhn a little so I can take a bite at dat rope. Yo' signal may have attrac' de government cruiser dat's lyin' off Ship Islan'."

"Oh!" said Bascom. "Well, we got a lot of time before they can steam over." He rolled himself against the Captain, who craned his neck forward and worked with his strong creole teeth at the knots. He was still pulling at them when feet were heard scrambling to the deck again, and two men looked in at the shattered hatch. They spoke to Captain Tony in Spanish, of which Bascom only recognized the pass-word that Mr. Martinez had given them.

"Dey come to yo' rocket," the Captain translated while the men unbound them, "an' dey was in time to see de boat put off from de _Mystery_, so de Cuban schooner has gone after dem, sendin' dese two men in a skiff here."

"Which way've the scalawags gone?" inquired Bascom, jumping to his feet.

"De way dey had to," answered the Captain, hurrying to the deck. "Dey reach deir schooner, an' as de Cubans was comin' from outside, dey had to put in. We'll be ovah-haulin' dem; dese men say de Cuban boat is as good at chasin' as she is at showing her heels. We goin' along too. Reckon yo' has to tek de tiller," he added, and he stood by, with his arm wrapped in a piece of canvas for a sling, and laid the course. Ahead of them they could just see the Cuban boat plying back and forth with a long tack and a short tack, and the _Mystery_ turned eastward. The Cuban boat could not trust herself far inland where she did not know the channels, and the smugglers would take their first opportunity to make a sudden run east into one of the bayous; and Captain Tony determined that the _Mystery_ should cut them off. It was a hare-and-hounds chase, and the hours passed among the stars while the three boats doubled and redoubled at top speed, gaining on one tack, losing on the next. Pale clouds began to drift across the sky, and there was a taste of morning in the wind. The Captain slapped Bascom on the back. "Yo' boy," he chuckled, "dat Cuban boat is de stuff! She's run dem down so fine dat dey's headin' 'cross de shoals, an' dey boun' to stay dere an' wait faw us, by my reckonin'."

Bascom giggled, but the Captain whistled in a new tone. "W'at in de name of reason!" he exclaimed; "dey tu'nin' back across de Cuban's course? Oh ho!"

A cloud of smoke went up, and there was a great rumbling hoarse report such as had not been heard in those waters since the war. "Dey firin'!" the Captain gasped. The sound vibrated among the waves and sank away, and the smoke cleared. The Cuban was not hurt. She turned like a girl courtesying, and a sharper shot came caracoling on the waves, this time from her.

"De mad folly!" shouted the Captain. "Dey wan' to raise de dead, let alone all de cruisers on de coas'!"

Bascom danced at the tiller. He was quivering with his first thrill of war--not only war between the Cubans and the smugglers, but soon with the United States. Over their shoulders he could see the faint line of a cruiser's smoke against the west. The Captain was looking very grave. "Dis'll be de darkes' day de _Mystery_ seen yet," he said. "I 'ain't nevah liked dis job, me, bud it look like we couldn' refuse."

"One thing for the firing," said Bascom, "it's Christmas mornin'."

"Christmas gift," said the Captain, grimly. "Reckon de smugglers is sayin' it! Dey los' a mas' by dat las' shot."

"Christmas--" ejaculated Bascom, and stopped short as the whistle of the wind in the rigging was drowned again by a terrific explosion that shook the sea. As they peered out under the smoke, something dropped like a spent ball on the deck. The Captain picked it up, and after a moment's scrutiny passed it over to Bascom. It was an unmistakable fragment from the muzzle of one of Bascom's guns. The peculiar alloy that was neither brass nor bronze, and that had puzzled every one when the guns were raised, left no opening for doubt.

"Golly," said Bascom, "rather bust than shoot agin its frien's!" He stroked the powder-smelling piece against his cheek and almost kissed it for delight.

The Captain noted the growing trail of smoke in the west and spoke to the two Cubans. One of them pointed at the smugglers' schooner. She was settling fast, and the men on board of her were raising a white flag. The _Mystery_ and the Cuban boat answered the signal, and the three Captains met on board the _Mystery_ to make terms.

The smuggler Captain was a tall, pleasant-faced American of Scotch descent, with a wounded cheek and big fierce-looking mustaches. "I've got the best of myself so bad," he declared, "that you can say what you want, but it'll not be to your advantage to leave my schooner standing on the edge of the bar to tell tales; so what I propose is this: I'll give you back your scads without any more fuss if you'll tow what's left of her into Davis Bayou out of sight and give us permission to skip."

The Cuban Captain declined to do this, and it was finally decided that while the _Mystery_ beat back and forth in the sound, the Cuban should tow the smugglers out of danger and then make good her own escape.

Bascom went across in the tender with the other skiffs to get his guns. "Your boss is grit, ain't he?" said the smuggler Captain as they pulled through the white foam on the bar. "I reckoned on an ordinary skeery creole, but the way things has turned out, it's good I reckoned wrong."

"It would have been gooder for you if you hadn't reckoned on my guns," said Bascom, getting aboard the wreck, among a demoralized crew, and laying his hand on the only piece he saw. "What's gone with the first one? How did you know about 'em, anyhow?"

The Captain preluded his answer with a fair volley of imprecations. "And I wish the fiends had taken 'em before they ever fouled my deck," he finished. "I didn't count on firin' 'em; I jus' took 'em to keep you from makin' a noise, but I brought along your ammunition for prudence an' knowin' it would come handy some day, an' when I was close put I jus' let 'em holler. First one broke loose an' jumped into the water, shootin' at kingdom come, an' the nex' busted an' busted us, so I wish you joy of firin' this third."

"Joy?" said Bascom; "well, I rather guess!" It was the one he had planned for from the first, and which had been stolen from the row-boat. "You wasn't allowing that guns what's seen enough of life to know what side they're on would turn agin their frien's, was you? Just you listen an' you'll hear this one speakin' calm and pleasant when she gets on board the _Mystery_. And I'll give you this pointer," he added, from the boat to which the gun had been lowered, "next time you want to borrow something of mine, jus' remember that my things mos'ly has peculiar workin's, an' I can manage 'em best."

Half or three-quarters of an hour later, when every trace of the wreck was out of sight, and the sails of the Cuban boat were flitting innocently between Horn Island and the shore on the way east, the United States cruiser shone near at hand, trim and slender and dauntless in the sunrise.

"Well," said Captain Tony, as they watched her despatch an officer towards them in a boat, "it's jus' to brass it out now. We've got to do it faw Mr. Martinez. He'll be in mighty bad troubl' if our tale don't satisfy dat young chap comin' dere. Bud if it do, it's good enough faw ev'ybody else--even ole Aristide, although it will disturb him mo' dan he will say--if what we t'ink is true. Dis insurrection an' secret-service business may be all hones' faw de peopl' dat belongs to it, bud it cost me an' yo' an' de little _Mystery_ mo' in small feelin' dan it pay, an' I say dis is de las' time faw enemy or frien'."

"Me too," cried Bascom, "an' the old gun thinks the same. They was dead down on this from the start, an' I reckon that's the word what they've waited so patient to get a chance to say."

The ship's boat drew alongside, and the officer came aboard to inquire, with the commander's compliments, why a little battered schooner was idling among the shoals in a norther, firing cannon.

Bascom and the Captain saluted together. "Christmas gifts," they cried.

"Usses had dese curious ole gun," the Captain explained, "w'at we raised out of de water las' yeah, an' dis boy has been waitin' evah since faw Christmas mornin' to fire 'em. An' I t'ought me dat it would be mo' safe to come out heah an' try dem before firin' in Potosi Channel, as was his wish. An' indeed it has prove dat I was right, for one of dem stepped right off into de water dat it come from, an' de nex' it busted, as you see," and he pointed to the cabin-top and to the bits of cannon that Bascom had gathered for keep-sakes from the sinking boat.

"Usses has been havin' a reg'lar party," Bascom added. "You are our most 'ristocratic callers, but you isn't our first. They'll be takin' the word of the guns clear to Mobile an' as far as you go, whichever way that is."

"Then this is one of the forgotten guns that were raised in Pontomoc Bay last summer?" the Lieutenant said. "I've heard of them." He examined the piece like a toy. He was a young man with straightforward clear eyes that commanded the same frankness they expressed, and had been very uncomfortable to meet until this open subject was reached. The Lieutenant saw Bascom's face light up with responsive enthusiasm, and he ran on: "It may have belonged to one of the old discoverers. Why, I can just see the old chaps that manned it when the ship went down, standing on tiptoe round it, with their swords clanking and their queer old clothes flapping in this very wind perhaps! You know I believe they would like it if we had the old veteran fire a salute."

"Usses would like that too," the Captain said.

Bascom had no answer. He looked across to the ship where the stars and stripes that had fought their way from so much ancient bravery were riding high in the gold sun-light and the wind. He looked until his eyes grew dim and the figure of the Lieutenant priming the cannon became blurred so that all the shadowy old crew seemed to have marshalled themselves aboard the _Mystery_ to man their gun. "Christmas gift," he murmured, and his heart came up into his throat. Then the voice of the gun rolled out, mellow and husky and peaceful after centuries of sleep.

The recoil went from stem to stern like a great thrill of joy. The smoke swept away on the wind, and the Lieutenant touched Bascom on the shoulder. There was an interval of silence, and then the man-of-war saluted the little _Mystery_.

A LOYAL TRAITOR.

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

BY JAMES BARNES.