Chapter VI: A Water Trail

“A rather close organization, you see,” said Pawlinson finally, and with a placidity that was galling.

“What do you mean?” I queried shortly and a bit irritably. The incident hadn’t improved the temper of either of us.

“I mean that Stroth had everything pretty nicely arranged, didn’t he? For your reception, that is. Even to depositing you way out here, where----”

“Hold on!” I snapped sharply. “You yourself were duped as well as I was, and we’ve got no time for words. What do you make out of this?”

“What do you make out of it yourself? According to your own account, you left Stevens yesterday headed off somewhere in the launch from College Point.”

“But that certainly was he just now,” said I.

“Most positively; and his little scheme has thus landed us not only well out of the way of the whereabouts of Stroth, but I know enough of this town to know that we can’t get another cab inside of fifteen minutes. How do you figure the little devil happened in Portland, anyway?”

Pawlinson again favored me with one of those searching looks which were making me hate him more and more heartily.

Fact was, I was getting vastly sick of the entire job. But a sudden thought did, momentarily, throw me into ejaculation.

“By Jove, I’ve got it!” I cried. “Berth number nine!”

“Berth number nine! Here, come, man, we’ve no time to waste! We’ve got to get onto some track immediately.”

“And you must have been the one who occupied number three on the sleeper last night,” I continued.

“You deduce well,” said he, with a grin.

“Well, when I got my own reservation, the ticket seller told me that berth nine was taken from Stamford. So that’s it. Stevens, after running the launch somewhere up the Sound toward Connecticut, left it there and boarded the same train, and from there on----”

“And from there on,” grunted Pawlinson, “even I can follow. But look here. Why didn’t you come out with this sooner?”

“I didn’t connect the thing at all,” I replied.

“No; it seems not.”

“What I can’t make out, though,” I went on, unheeding his manner, “is this: Why in thunder all the care taken to effect the boarding of the Portland steamer by launch from Port Washington?”

“Simply enough understood, Grey,” he said, “when you realize that I had every dock and railway station covered. And a mighty good scheme it was--that of handling the thing by water. I might have known----”

He broke off short. A thought had hit him which brooked not an instant’s further delay in speculation. Much as I had come to dislike the man, I could but admire his promptitude and vim.

He tugged me into a brisk run, and we caught a trolley car which he had managed to whistle to a stop on the instant it was crossing the nearest avenue’s corner.

“To the water,” said he, in indefinite explanation, when we were seated. “The water, that’s it! The cue word in this little job, I believe.”

“What do you mean?”

“Not until to-day have I ever known Stroth to use Stevens for a thing but water work. Fact is, where Stevens is there’s a water trick.”

“You mean that you think----”

“I mean that I’d be willing to stake a hefty sum that the schooner is lying this very minute not two hundred yards off Orr’s Island, right here in Casco Bay.”

“The schooner?”

“Stroth’s boat--the one I was telling you about.”

“But, heavens and earth, man,” said I, raising my voice a bit from the whisper we had kept in the car, “open and aboveboard, broad daylight like this?”

“Didn’t I explain that she carries yacht papers, and isn’t even suspected by a soul?”

“But you seem to know all about her, and I can’t see----”

“I agree with you heartily, my boy. You certainly can’t.”

What kept my hands off of him, I don’t understand, unless it was the reverence I had come to have at his very name as handled among us cubs. And whatever retort I might have mustered was broken short by his jumping off the car suddenly.

“This way,” said he, leading a brisk pace that kept my shorter legs almost trotting.

After three blocks of silence, which our speed necessitated, he whirled sharply upon me. We stood on the sidewalk before police headquarters.

“What kind of a gun do you carry?” he barked out.

“Automatic,” I replied, tapping my chest nearly under my left arm where I favor carrying a firearm.

“Know how to use it?”

“Yes,” said I.

My answer must have carried conviction.

“Then I’ll keep you in on the game a bit longer,” he decided, talking more to himself than to me. “I wouldn’t have time now to acquaint a new man with the facts sufficiently. Come on in.”

I followed him up the stoop, through the door, and across the hall. I recognized the man at the desk. It was Sergeant Hallins, a man who had once been with Chief Garth.

“Why, hello, Grey!” cried the sergeant heartily, thus proving that the recognition was mutual.

I was distinctly pleased at his genial greeting for two reasons. For one thing, I had a very favorable impression of him from my short, former acquaintance; but, at this moment, it suited me nicely enough thus to prove to Pawlinson that I was not exactly a nonentity.

But Pawlinson, for some reason, did not appear at all to like the fact that we knew each other; though it was apparently not because Hallins failed, in turn, to recognize him.

“Sergeant Hallins,” said he, “you got my wire from New York yesterday at this office?”

For a moment Hallins looked from him to me, and back again, until finally I tumbled to the fact that this was the first time they had met each other.

“Mr. Pawlinson,” said I, by way of introduction. “You gentlemen must pardon me, for, of course, I thought that you knew each other.”

Hallins shot Pawlinson another swift glance, a puzzled one, before he replied:

“You mean the wire about the schooner, Mr. Pawlinson?”

“Naturally; since it was the only one I sent,” drawled the Washington detective in that sarcasm which I now saw was not for me alone. “Did she arrive in Portland Harbor to-day?”

“Yes,” replied Sergeant Hallins. “The schooner _Ruby Light_ arrived here shortly after dawn, and dropped her hook off Orr’s Island, as usual.”

There was a distinct hesitancy, coupled to what was almost bewilderment, in Hallins’ tone.

“And you have kept note of her movements to-day?”

I could see the imperiousness of the tone grated upon Hallins as much as it had upon me; but he replied civilly enough:

“One of my men in the rôle of a bumboatman was on her decks for upward of an hour. It seems that she is fitting out for a rather longer run than usual.”

“Ah!” grunted Pawlinson sharply. “And she sails--when?”

“That he was not exactly able to gather; for the boatswain, a decidedly uncommunicative chap, had to be handled softly.”

“Uh!” broke in the other. “The boatswain was in command?”

“Yes. It seems that he was waiting for Captain Stevens.”

In spite of myself, I started at the name; for as yet I hadn’t stumbled to what way Hallins could have known more about the vessel than I myself. But it came out next breath.

“You must pardon me, Mr. Pawlinson,” continued Hallins haltingly, but as though he must put in the words, “but are you quite positive that you are on the right trail? Dead positive, that is?”

“Why do you ask?” snapped out Pawlinson viciously.

“Simply because I could be almost as dead positive that everything is right in that quarter. I’ve known that boat for some years now. Even when I was working in New York, I used to spend my vacations in Casco Bay, and she has been owned all that time by Mr. Stroth. Why, I’ve even met the owner myself, and upon one occasion was his guest aboard for an afternoon.”

“When was that?” gritted Pawlinson, in a voice which, for all its harshness, carried some uneasiness.

“About four summers ago. Now, what I’m getting at is,” went on the sergeant hurriedly, “the schooner is still owned by the same gentleman, a known yachtsman and above suspicion.”

“Oh, is he?” Pawlinson came to finality. “Well, now, to come to the point, yes. I do know exactly what I am doing; and, furthermore, I’ve no time to waste starting to do it. You say your man who got aboard to-day couldn’t get even an inkling when the start was to be made?”

“Nothing from those on board. But this my man did gather: The vessel can’t start without gasoline; or, at least, the _Ruby Light_ usually does carry considerable.”

“How is that? Can’t start? What’s to keep her?” Pawlinson’s was intense as he fired the questions.

“Why, it happens that the supply tank at the club float where she usually fills sprang a leak early in the day, and the consignment of reserve barrels of ‘gas’ can’t reach her till eight-fifteen at the earliest.”

“Good!” “Fine!” fairly chortled Pawlinson, rubbing his hands together delightedly. “No, you’re right, Hallins, she’ll not start without gasoline, and plenty of it. She never does. She uses her engine a lot.”

Then his voice whirled from gloating to practicality; then to a bit of uneasiness as he glanced over his shoulder out of a window where the sky was dimming to dusk. “What time is it now?”

Hallins glanced at his watch.

“Five to seven.”

“As late as that?” cried Pawlinson. “I can’t believe it. But here, man, we’ve still time to make it. I want ten of your best men, which, with myself and Grey here, will make twelve. And I want the police launch--she’s fast, isn’t she?”

“The police launch?” cried the sergeant bewilderedly.

“Why, yes, of course! You have such an article, haven’t you? Come, come, man, I’m in no mood for delay!”

“But your later wire!” blurted out Hallins.

“My _later_ wire?” Pawlinson fairly yelled. “What in thunder are you getting at?”

“Here!”

Hallins strode hurriedly over to his desk and caught up a yellow telegraph blank.

“I received that not thirty minutes before you stepped in yourself. I thought, of course, you knew what you were about when you sent it.”

“I sent it? _I?_” shrieked Pawlinson, as he tore open the sheet, where we both read:

“Send patrol launch well manned immediately to Trawly’s Rock. My
orders from Washington.

“PAWLINSON.”

“And you have sent it?” cried Pawlinson.

“I did wonder that the thing wasn’t in cipher,” admitted Hallins, getting scared. “But I didn’t dare disregard the command from Washington. But who did send it?”

“I wonder if that Stevens----” I broke in excitedly.

“Oh, you do wonder, do you, Grey?” Pawlinson snarled. “Well, for once I shouldn’t be surprised if you were right.”

Nothing could quench the biting vitriol of his tongue.

“Checkmated at every turn! And a pretty pair of asses we are!” he was pleased to put himself thus in with me.

“Now look here, Hallins,” he went on, while I inwardly admired the rapidity with which he shifted the greatest chagrin to action. “And look sharp! When did you send the patrol launch?”

“I guess it must have been ab----”

Here the door swung open, and a clean-limbed young fellow strode over to Hallins.

“Launch’s gone, pop,” said he boyishly. “And the men’re tickled to death at the little outing.”

Then the lad sensed the tenseness of us all.

“Why, what’s the matter?”

“Matter enough!” said Pawlinson shortly, “But no time now to explain to you, boy. Now look you, quick? You have just come from the water front?”

“Yep!” answered the lad, not a bit abashed. “I was here when dad gave the order--he’s training me for the game, you know--and I trotted on down to see ’em start, and----”

“You like the water--know boats? Most boys do. Eh, what?”

Young Hallins grinned.

“Hear that, dad?” he cried. “Me like boats, eh?”.

“The boy’s crazy,” explained Hallins, regaining his composure somewhat. “He’s got the fastest thing in the harbor--built it himself, too.” The proud parent showed here.

“She’s good for twenty-five an hour flat,” boasted the youth.

“Where is that boat now?” barked out Pawlinson, and then I caught his drift.

“Down at the float. Old Pete looks out for her for me.”

“What’s she worth?” snapped Pawlinson. “Don’t be afraid to make it high, my boy. Washington’s paying for her. I’ve got to have her.’

“Don’t want to sell her,” came the reply, in as sharp a decision as Pawlinson’s own. “But you can have her to use on that kind of lay for nothing.”

The boy warmed to the snap of adventure.

“But do you know how to run one?” came his next query. “I’ll go myself and run her for you.”

Pawlinson cast an interrogative glance at Hallins.

“No,” declared the father decidedly. “He’s a bit young for his spurs yet, Mr. Pawlinson. But, by all means, take the launch. Anything we can do to right matters, and to----”

“Why, of course! Why didn’t I think of it before?” interrupted my companion. “You, Grey, are up on motors. Yesterday proved that; and I’m glad now I kept you--even after to-day. Come, lad, lead us to that speed boat of yours; and, take my word for it, you won’t lose by it.”

A five-minutes fast run brought us to the waterside; and there, moored cleverly in a sheltered nook behind some piling, lay a slim, gray craft of which that boy builder might well be proud.

Pawlinson and I clambered into the cramped cockpit, and luck favored us in that I was familiar with the make of engine.

I immediately took hold and started her.

“Good! You know ’em!” chuckled the boy; and I felt the genuine compliment.

“How far to Trawly’s Rock, lad?” cried Pawlinson, taking the wheel.

“About ten miles from here, and right past Peak’s Island,” yelled young Hallins. “That’s the quickest way.”

Then he raised his voice even higher, for the engine was no silent affair:

“But if you’re intending to land at the rock, you’ll have to have a dink.”

“A dinghy?” grumbled Pawlinson petulantly. “What for? Seconds count now, you know.”

“Here, I’ve got you,” replied the boy, whirling on an old fossil who had been silently viewing our departure. “Old Pete’ll lend you his punt. She tows like a breeze. She will cut down your speed; but you just got to have one if you mean to land there.”

Old Pete mumbled something around his pipestem;

“How’s that?” I queried impatiently.

“Oh, that’s all right,” assured young Hallins. “I’ll make it all right with Pete after you’ve gone.”

And, without further parley, he passed me the painter of one of those small scows that have justly won their way into favor among yachtsmen as tenders.

At first mention of this small delay, Pawlinson had gritted out an impatient imprecation; but a glance I later cast at him saw his brow clear at a thought.

A quickly thrown clove hitch of the punt’s painter; then I threw in the propeller. The shaft was chain-driven.

She picked up speed immediately; and, even towing the small boat as we were, I reckoned on about seventeen miles an hour. But, notwithstanding, I was impatient at the check, for I soon saw that the lad had not overestimated when he spoke of twenty-five for the beauty.

“Confound that scow!” I ejaculated as we headed out into the bay.

“Can’t be helped, my boy,” replied Pawlinson almost genially. “It might come in useful, you know.”

I believe now that he must have had his plan cooking even then.

TO BE CONTINUED.

HAZING THE PROFESSOR.

A party of smart young students in a small town in Kentucky, last winter conceived the brilliant idea of hazing their new teacher. It was decided to invite him to accompany them coon-hunting some night, and, after leading him about in the woods until completely bewildered, to abandon him, and leave him find his way back to the village or remain in the woods all night. Now, as the pedagogue was a stranger, and weighed nearly two hundred pounds, this scheme seemed too funny for anything, and many a hearty laugh did they have over it. The invitation was given and accepted, and the appointed night came, cold and clear, with several feet of snow on the ground. Everything moved on as per arrangement, the professor seeming guileless and unsuspecting, but from beneath his puffy eyelids now and then gleamed an amused twinkle. The party had plodded through the snow for several hours, and the ringleader was about to give the signal to disperse, when the professor sank to the ground with a groan of agony.

“Oh, oh!” he moaned; “oh, one of my attacks again! Quick, boys, for mercy’s sake, get me to a place of shelter, or I’m a dead man!”

Talk about scared boys! Here they were five miles from the nearest house, and an apparently dying man on their hands. Something must be done, and quickly, too. A litter was hastily improvised, with coats for cushions, and the suffering professor gently laid thereon, and homeward they started, a sorry set of practical jokers, taking turns at carrying their massive preceptor. No sounds were heard but the heavy breathing of the professor and the grunts of the students, who were straining every nerve to keep from jostling the patient. After what seemed to be scores of miles, the weary, bedraggled fellows carefully set down their burden, to snatch a few minutes’ rest before entering the town, which was within a stone’s throw, when, what was their surprise to see the professor rise leisurely from his comfortable couch, and coolly observe:

“Much obliged, boys! much obliged! But one word: The next time I wished to play practical jokes I wouldn’t select an invalid for a subject.”

The boys are not over it yet.

THE PERILS OF COAL MINING.

To perceive fully the dangers of a coal miner’s life, it is necessary to review the extraordinary conditions which threaten it.

If workmen in coal mines had no other reason for complaint than that of toiling in perpetual lamplight and in an overheated and impure atmosphere, they would have no more cause to regret their fate than have many other men who live by the labor of their hands. But although the ordinary conditions of a workingman’s life are often oppressive and injurious, they are in almost every instance less violent and destructive than those to which colliers are exposed in their daily work.

As soon as an opening is made in a bed of coal, chemical and mechanical changes of serious importance are commenced, and they are all more or less opposed to the permanence of the work. The oxygen of the atmosphere, aided by the force of gravity, lessens the barrier between the imprisoned gases and the opened places of the mine. Of these the most abundant and dangerous are carbonic-acid gas or choke damp, and carbureted hydrogen or fire damp.

Carbonic-acid gas accumulates in disused workings, and not unfrequently escapes into the roads and workings. As it has a greater specific gravity than any other gas found in a coal mine, it drops to the floor of the opening in which it happens to accumulate. For this reason, the upper part of a driving or a wicket may have a comparatively pure atmosphere, while the floor and parts immediately above it are occupied by a gas, which, if breathed, would be destructive to animal life.

When opening old works, or when approaching places partly opened, the miner must be cautious for his life’s sake. He is meeting, without the power to resist, an invisible and insidious enemy--a life-threatening agent, that strikes without warning. If a system of ventilation exist in the mine, there will be a means at hand of driving from its hiding places a considerable accumulation of the deadly gas, if care be taken to watch the approach of the enemy. If there be no sufficiently comprehensive scheme of ventilation, the choke damp must be diluted, or, in other words, the gas must be mixed with the overlying atmospheric air. This is often done when the accumulation is locally inconsiderable, by the wafting of a miner’s jacket backward and forward till the air can be safely breathed.

The other kind of gas just mentioned, is not less dangerous to the workmen. This gas is known as carbureted hydrogen, or fire damp. As it is lighter than atmospheric air, it rises to the roof of the mines in which it is found, and is there mixed with the mine atmosphere, by occasional disturbances or by the process of diffusion. Unmixed with other gas, carbureted hydrogen destroys human life. But when the gas is largely diluted by atmospheric air--say, thirty parts by volume of atmospheric air to one part of the gas--the presence of fire damp is made known to the miner by a pale-blue cap with a brownish tinge over the top of the lamp flame. This gives a warning more and more imperative, until the proportion is only thirteen parts of air to one of fire damp, when the mixed gases become explosive. This quality continues until the proportion is one of fire damp to four or five of atmospheric air, when the explosiveness of the mixture is lost, and ordinary lights of the mine are extinguished.

AN UNEXPECTED MEETING.

“The northern limit of the brown bear’s habitat is as yet undetermined, but I have seen them in the interior of Alaska as far as latitude sixty-seven degrees, and they probably range still farther,” said Uncle John, when the boys had asked him for some points about these beasts. “My first encounter with one of these animals was a startling experience for me, and, I have always thought, equally so for the bear.

“We have been working up against the strong current of the Koowak River all day, and toward nightfall pitched our tent at the base of a high bluff forming the right bank of the stream.

“While supper was being prepared, I climbed the bluff to get a look at the country, and was walking leisurely along, with my gun carelessly held in my left hand. The top of the bluff was densely covered almost to the edge with spruces and alders, and the undergrowth was so thick that it was impossible to see more than a few feet through it. Ahead of me a cluster of rocks offered a temporary place to sit down and enjoy the view, and I made for it.

“Just as I reached the nearest rock, a tremendous shaggy animal rose apparently from under my feet, and I immediately recognized in him the brown bear, of whose fierceness the natives had been telling me for weeks.

“My first instinct was to shoot, and I probably would have done so had my gun been in my right hand; but at the first motion I made, the bear reared on his haunches and was so formidable looking that I concluded to wait and see what he intended doing. After a moment’s hesitation, he dropped on all fours, and, with wonderful quickness, turned and sprang out of sight in the dense undergrowth.

“When I returned to camp and related my experience, Tah-rok, my native guide, assured me that the bear must have recently concluded a heavy meal, as otherwise he would have most certainly attacked me.”

Some officers from one of the vessels of the Bering Sea fleet went ashore at Herendeen Bay during the summer on a deer hunt, and one of the party saw a bear about one hundred yards distant, eating berries.

Without a thought of the consequences, he raised his gun and fired at the animal. The shot went wide of the mark, but at the report of the gun the bear started for the hunter on the dead run. His charge was met by a shower of bullets from the officer’s repeater. Although badly wounded, the infuriated brute did not hesitate an instant, but rushed straight at his enemy.

When within about ten feet of the hunter, the bear rose on his haunches and prepared to close. Blood was pouring in streams down his body. One bullet had shattered his upper jaw, but he was still so full of fight that the outcome of the struggle would have been extremely doubtful had not another of the party arrived and ended the fight by shooting the brute through the brain.

An examination of the bear’s body showed that it had been struck six times. Three of the shots were in parts of the body ordinarily considered vital, and would doubtless have ultimately caused death, but the vitality of these animals is almost incredible, instances having been cited of their running over one hundred yards after being shot through the heart.

TWO SAD CASES.

A professional beggar was standing with a board in front of him, with the inscription: “I am blind,” when a gentleman threw a dime on the ground.

The blind man instantly picked it up.

The gentleman said:

“Why, I thought you were blind.”

The fellow, after a moment’s hesitation, looked at the board, and then said:

“I’m bless’d if they haven’t made a mistake, and put a wrong board on me this morning. I’m deaf and dumb.”

The above reminds us of another affecting story of a kind-hearted lady who was passing a street beggar who bore on his breast a placard declaring that he was deaf and dumb. The kind lady read the placard, and said to the beggar:

“My good man, how long have you been deaf and dumb?”

“Ever since my birth,” the man ingenuously answered.

“What a heart-touching affliction,” said the good lady, as she placed half a dollar in the poor fellow’s outstretched palm, and passed on.

THE NEWS OF ALL NATIONS.

More Money for Farmers.

The important farm crops of the United States this year are worth $104,000,000 more than the value of the same crops last year. The total value of the important crops is given as $5,068,742,000 by the government authorities. Adding the value of the other crops, to be announced later, will make a record figure in the nation’s production.

This year’s wheat and corn crops are the most valuable ever grown, the wheat and apple crops are record harvests, and the potato crop is the second largest ever raised. The huge wheat crop and the increased price of that cereal, the large corn and apple crops, and the increased price of oats, barley, and rye more than offset the loss in the value of the cotton crop resulting from the war.

The values of the important crops, based on the average prices paid to producers on November 1, and their values last year, follow:

1914. 1913. Corn $1,885,867,000 $1,730,021,000 Wheat 858,056,000 587,863,000 Oats 484,390,000 425,150,000 Barley 100,839,000 97,469,000 Rye 34,387,000 26,153,000 Buckwheat 13,297,000 10,444,000 Potatoes 219,396,000 230,741,000 Sweet potatoes 42,751,000 44,706,000 Hay 803,353,000 786,062,000 Cotton 462,483,000 880,360,000 Flaxseed 18,960,000 21,192,000 Apples 144,963,000 124,470,000

A corn crop of 2,706,000,000 bushels is estimated by the government. This yield compares with 2,447,000,000 bushels a year ago, or an increase of 150,000,000 bushels. The crop has turned out much better than was expected early in the season.

Woman Builder of Death Machines.

A charming, gentle young woman--“Bertha Krupp,” as she is called by the soldiers; the Baroness von Bohlen, as she is known in Germany--is associated with the European war in many fantastic ways.

Bertha Krupp, as the principal owner of the great Krupp works at Essen, is the kaiser’s gun maker. When she was to be married she was so important a personage that the kaiser acted as her godfather. The young nobleman, Baron Gustave von Bohlen und Halbach, was the choice of his majesty. Not only have the Krupp works furnished a vast amount of efficient field artillery to the Germans, but they have supplied the monster siege guns with which the Belgian and French forts have been smashed.

Modest and unassuming, the young mistress of the Krupp works is beloved by all who know her, and especially by the thousands of workmen at Essen, whose admiration she aroused when, shortly after her father’s death, she began supervising the operation of the works and bravely remained close to the big guns while they were being tested. From the income from the manufacture of the guns a fund is set aside by Bertha Krupp to help some of her fifty thousand pensioners. At large orphan asylum is supported by the Krupp money. Throughout Germany the baroness is noted for the charities that she supports with her immense fortune.

And the soldiers, whenever they hear the noise of the terrible Krupp guns, say: “Bertha is talking again.”

Girl Soldier’s Escape.

A girl soldier’s thrilling escape from death or capture is thus described by a correspondent at Petrograd, Russia:

“The daughter of Colonel Tomilobbskaya, of the Russian army, who, in male uniform, distinguished herself in the fighting at Avgustovo some time ago, has been wounded for the third time. She is in East Prussia with her father’s command. While on a scouting tour, she unexpectedly came upon a patrol of German hussars. She quickly wheeled her horse and dashed away, but was hotly pursued in the direction of a stream which the hussars evidently thought she would not attempt to cross. When near the stream, her horse was struck by bullet, and fell, but the girl disengaged herself, and, plunging into the water, swam across. She was wounded in the arm, but managed to stop the flow of blood and got to the Russian lines.”

A large number of women are serving in the Russian army, several have met death in battle and others have been sent back wounded. In last week’s _Blade_ mention was made of a famous Cossack girl trooper who has been at the front.

Engine Hurls House One Hundred Feet.

A freight train went wild in Chicago, plunged across Sheffield Avenue, picked up a two-story house occupied by two families of sleepers, carried the building bodily almost half a block, then stopped. Two children, one four and the other two years old, were instantly killed. Four other persons who were sleeping in the house were rescued by firemen practically unhurt.

Edward Kranch, and Helen, his sister, were the ones killed. Their father and mother, sleeping in another room on the ground floor, escaped, being thrown wide of the house. The family of Edward Matison, including his wife and two children, were safe on the second floor.

Man Kills Dog With His Fist.

James G. Harvey, of Hazleton, Pa., who at the age of nineteen defeated John L. Sullivan in a calf-lifting contest, showed his strength by killing a dog with a blow of his fist, when the animal had been rounded up to be killed and no revolver was handy.

Giants May Train in West.

Manager John J. McGraw, of the Giants, is considering a plan to take the New York club to California next spring to train. Secretary John B. Foster stated recently that nothing definite had yet been done in the matter, although the club was considering it carefully. When McGraw visited California last year with the world tourists he was impressed with the fine climate in southern California, and was advised to train there by Charles A. Comiskey, of the White Sox, who has taken his team to the coast for several seasons.

Manager McGraw does not mean to desert Marlin Springs, Texas, entirely, because the Giants have a permanent training camp and baseball park there. If the plan goes through, the Giants will spend three or four weeks on the coast and then go to Marlin for a couple of weeks to put on the finishing touches of the training work.

It is believed that the Giants would be a big attraction on the coast next spring, because there will be thousands of Easterners there to attend the Pacific-Panama Exposition. The Giants have trained at Marlin Springs for several seasons, and, as the place is so well suited for the purpose, it is not likely that the Giants will abandon their camp there. Secretary Foster is already arranging several exhibition games to be played, throughout the South on the Giants’ return trip North.

Hunter Shot by Playful Hound.

Theron Ferguson, twenty years old, of Wilkes-Barre, Pa., was shot by his own dog while hunting on the mountains. He received a full charge in the hip, and his condition is serious. Stopping to rest after a long tramp, Ferguson was examining the shotgun, when his hound playfully jumped upon him. The foot of the dog touched the trigger, and the cartridge exploded.

Disobeyed His Orders, Killed 600 Germans.

At the battle of Vailly the French were obliged to fall back, and were unable to get away with all their guns. They had time to bury most of them, though, and the only one they did not bury was spiked so that the Germans could not make any use of it.

It was with this gun that a gunner of the battery covered himself with glory. The gun crew had been ordered back, but he declared that he would not abandon the gun while any ammunition was left. He methodically emptied shell after shell into the Germans, who were moving up in serried ranks only a half mile away. Closer and closer they came, firing volleys as they advanced, but the gunner stood his ground and still had a dozen shells left when they were not more than three hundred yards away. At this distance he bowled them over like ninepins, but nothing could stop them. He let fly his last shell at only fifty yards, and did such awful execution that he was able to remove the breechblock and make good his escape, notwithstanding that he had received a bullet between his ribs.

Hardened as they were to slaughter, some of those who witnessed the deed turned faint at the ghastly sight of the mangled Germans, more than six hundred of whom were blown to pieces within five hundred yards of the gun.

War Cuts Canal Income.

John Bucklin Bishop, former secretary to the Isthmian Canal commission, who returned recently from Panama on the United Fruit steamship _Tenadores_, said that the income of the canal for October amounted to $376,000, which, if continued, would mean $4,500,000 a year.

“Governor Goethals has said,” Mr. Bishop asserted, “that the operating expenses of the Panama Canal amount to four million dollars, so that the canal will clear five hundred thousand dollars. The war in Europe has made a big difference in the traffic through the new waterway, and the increase when peace is proclaimed will be considerable.”

“What about the slides in Culebra Cut?” he was asked.

“Colonel Goethals is not worrying over the slides in the canal,” he said. “The big dredges were ready for just such an emergency, and made short work of the two slides on the other side of Culebra Hill.”

Mr. Bishop said that ships could be passed through the canal in ten hours now, instead of twelve hours, as previously estimated.

Courtney, at 65, Works as Usual.

In fine health and full of vigor in body and mind, Charles E. Courtney, since 1883 the coach of the Cornell oarsmen, recently celebrated his sixty-fifth birthday. He received a number of congratulatory messages, and a group of the oarsmen called upon him that evening, but the old man did not take a holiday. He went to the boathouse at eight o’clock, as usual, and did not return home until six-thirty o’clock in the evening. Courtney seems no older than he was at sixty, and his capacity for work appears to be undiminished.

“Boy Zeppelin” Earns Coin from War Kites.

In a little workshop in Cleveland, Ohio, a twelve-year-old boy spends his spare hours these days turning out big, ferocious-looking “war” kites, which he sells to his playmates. The boy is Stuart Jenney, a seventh-grade pupil.

Young Stuart caught his war spirit almost from the day he read that the European powers had declared hostilities. For several years he has been the most skillful kite maker of his district, and has sold many kites to his playmates, but he has abandoned the conventional types for the fighting kind.

Stuart’s “flyers” soar skyward in flocks after school hours, pirates of the air, their long tails armed with jagged bits of glass designed to cut the cords of rival kites that are not maneuvered cleverly enough to dodge their foes.

For overparticular strategists Stuart designs and makes special warriors, collecting, of course, special prices for these models. He carefully selects the wood, linen, and paper that go into their construction, and will not let a kite leave his “factory” until he has personally tested it.

Kite battles mean more orders, for once a cord is severed while the kite is sailing high, that particular pirate reaches the earth a mass of broken sticks and torn paper, totally beyond repair.

Penn Out of Aquatics.

Pennsylvania does not expect to do anything wonderful in an aquatic way this winter, but Yale, Columbia, and Princeton are figuring on winning the intercollegiate championship. The swimming season will not begin in earnest until after the holidays, but long before that time the coaches will know just about where their teams will finish. Princeton will not be able to get its water-polo team out until late, for nearly all the men on this team played on the football team also.

Yale looks forward to a brilliant season. Two of the last year’s champion intercollegiate squad and three members of the record-breaking relay team are available, besides splendid material in every other event. There is no doubt but what the New Haven swimmers will take a lot of beating. The title bearers in question are the fancy diver, McAleenan, and the plunger, Smith; the relay record holders, Captain Summers and Marr and Hoadley.

In addition to these star performers, the squad has several likely veterans, including sprinters Schlaet and Mayer and the middle distances, Gould and Moise, and some most promising new recruits. Leaders among the latter are Rosener, of Andover, credited with breaking the fifty-yard standard in practice; Wooley, one of the speediest dash swimmers seen at New Haven this fall, and Ferguson, of Chicago, heralded a real comer at the furlong. Evidently there isn’t a weak spot in the team.

Prospects for water polo are not quite so good, though they may improve. At present, Van Holt, the best backfield player, is suffering from an injury sustained in football, and there is a question of Leish, the great scoring forward, being in the line-up. Should they prove available, Captain Steiner will have the nucleus of a strong sextet, for Kent, Mayer, and Smith are experienced men. Otherwise it may be difficult to find candidates of championship caliber for the vacant positions.

The swimmers of Harvard will be again obliged to use the Brookline baths for practice, since the dormitory pools are too small for the purpose, and the long-promised natatorium at Cambridge still remains a pious wish.

Matthew Mann, the advocate of the elementary crawl, will coach the squad. He says the Crimson has excellent material, but it is hopeless to believe that it can be promptly developed, owing to the difficulty of getting the candidates to take often the inconvenient trip between Cambridge and Brookline.

Among the best watermen trying for positions in the varsity team are Captain Fullerton, able to do around 1:00 for 100 yards and 2:40 for the furlong; Seymour, almost as fast at the two distances, and Gibbs, Wentworth, Jackson, and Darling, good for about 0:27 at 50 yards, and warranted to furnish likely representatives of the sprints and relay races.

Elopers Drowned in River.

Ivan Heer and his sweetheart, Miss Ruth Rechman, both of Cave-In-Rock, Ill., were drowned in the Ohio River a few miles below Evansville, Ind. Heer and Miss Rechman were in a skiff eloping to Caseyville, Ky., where they were to have been married. Their skiff struck a snag and the craft rapidly sank. Occupants of a launch near by tried to save the elopers, but were unsuccessful.

Heer was about twenty-two years old and Miss Rechman was twenty, and a popular young woman of Cave-In-Rock.

Tires of Looking at His Own Gravestone.

Francis M. Collins, eighty-eight-year-old war veteran, has grown tired and lonely sitting at the foot of his own grave in Forest Home Cemetery, at Milwaukee, Wis., admiring the flowers and the monument--especially the monument. Collins has decided that man was not meant to be alone, on the earth or under it, and is planning to get married.

For twelve years Collins has been a daily visitor at the grave. For a long time it was a source of pride for him to look at his name and war record carved in a solitary magnificence on the handsome tombstone. He prepared for his burial by a budget filed with a certificate for five hundred dollars with a local bank.

The solitary name on one side of the stone began to look forlorn and lonely. The veteran got the habit of romancing on how nice it would be to have another name--her name--on the opposite side. There was no particular woman then. But there is now. Her name is Orrie Viola--something--but Collins will not tell the rest of it.

The other day a stone carver came trudging through the cemetery with his tools. He hunted around in the vicinity of the chapel until he found a plot that looked like a little garden, and beside it was an old man with a patriarchal beard. When the stone carver left, the name “Orrie Viola Collins” smiled back at the afternoon sun, and Collins was smiling up at the newly carved name.

Some New Inventions.

A cotton manufacturer of Westbrook, Maine, has patented a machine for the harvesting of cotton which has just been successfully demonstrated at Fairwold, S. C. The harvester picks the cotton by sucking the lint out of the bolls by compressed air, somewhat on the order, apparently, of the vacuum cleaner.

A mechanic of St. Louis, Mo., has invented a “non-skidder,” which is intended to prevent the possibility of accident to an automobile by making it impossible for the car to slide off the road. The attachment consists of two shoes fastened to the rear of the car, between the wheels. When the car begins to skid, the driver touches a button, and the shoes instantly drop to the surface of the road, stopping the car. The shoes are about eighteen inches long and three inches wide, made of hard metal with a corrugated undersurface.

A device perfected by an inventor of Wakefied, Mass., enables the motorman of a street car to see the entire interior of the car or to have an unobstructed view down the outside. It consists of a series of mirrors arranged at angles in a small tube, through which images of any object are reflected.

For use in small gatherings there has been invented an attachment for phonographs that illustrates songs as they are sung by projecting lantern-slide views on a screen hung in front of the phonograph horn.

Bears Eating Farmers’ Pigs.

Bears are causing the farmers around Grifton, N. Y., annoyance. Although there has been no drought to drive them from the swamps, the animals, for some unexplainable reason, have come out of the low grounds in numbers, and their inroads upon the farmers’ hogs and other stock have caused the latter to take steps looking to the eradication of the bears.

Mayor F. I. Sutton and J. E. Forrest, of Kingston, are out in quest of bear in the vicinity of Stonington Creek, and hope to bag one or more of the intruders.

Pushing Buttons President’s Job.

Pushing buttons is one of President Wilson’s jobs. Nothing of big national interest is properly “opened” except by the president. The latest request was for him to press a button at the White House officially opening the new Houston, Texas, ship canal. In a like manner the president the other day opened the new union passenger station at Kansas City, Mo.

The cost of clearing a line for one official flash, involving the suspension of service over thousands of miles of wire, and the attention of scores of men, is borne by any telegraph company over whose line it goes. There is a tacit understanding between the telegraph companies and the White House that the wire service will be free for all events of sufficient importance to merit the president’s attention.

The greatest button-pushing event in the history of the White House was the president’s flash which blew up the Gamboa Dike in the Panama Canal and allowed the water to enter the big ditch for the first time.

The next big event of this kind will be the opening of the Panama-Pacific Exposition, at San Francisco, next year.

Several days before the date of the official opening the telegraph offices at points along the route selected for the flash will be notified that at a certain hour, on a certain day, the president will open the exposition. About thirty minutes before the time set the Washington office will “cut in” a wire from the White House and attach it to one of a certain number of wires assigned for exclusive service between Washington and Chicago. It is the custom to rig two circuits out of Washington, to prevent possible accidents or mistakes that would delay the message.

Chicago is notified that wires, say No. 119 and No. 104, Washington and Chicago, will be used for the flash. During the full half hour prior to the sending of the flash these wires are kept absolutely clear of messages, except the signals of the wire chiefs, who are rigging the circuit. “Repeaters” are placed at frequent intervals along the route. The “repeaters” are simply instruments used to add further energy to the circuit at different points. They do not really repeat the president’s flash. The initial impulse given at Washington carries straight through to the coast.

When the Chicago office learns that Washington is using wires 119 and 104, these wires are promptly hooked up with other wires through to Omaha, Neb., or Ogden, Utah, and the word passes along the line. The Ogden operator finishes the circuit and San Francisco is advised to make ready for the flash.

At precisely the time named the president steps to a button in the White House offices, gives it a push, and the exposition opens.

It is the special nature of the flash that wears on the nerves of the telegraph men. If a presidential message should go wrong, they would account it a big blot upon their records. As soon as the flash has gone through the circuit is dismantled and the telegraph traffic flows on.

Four-room Dwelling Hacked from Rock.

James Homer, of Inez, Ky., is building, or rather making, one of the strangest houses ever heard, told of in this section of the country. He has undertaken to pick and hack a four-room dwelling place out of a solid rock, which is seventy-five feet high and projects out of the mountainside some forty or fifty feet. Homer claims he will have it finished by 1916. He said, in a recent interview:

“Some people may think I am crazy, but I am perfectly sane. This is a vast undertaking, but I consider nothing is impossible to the man that has a will. ‘Where there’s a will there’s a way,’ you know.

“I think this will be an ideal home for my wife and four children, and when I have it finished I am going to give a house party, one that will be a surprise, indeed, to the people of Rockcastle Creek, for this will be the only house of the kind that I ever heard of, and probably the only one that any of my neighbors have ever seen.”

Gives His Life for Science.

G. R. Mines, a professor of physiology at McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, met death mysteriously in his laboratory at the university. Just what caused his death is not known, but Principal William Peterson believes Professor Mines, in the course of experiments upon himself in his chosen branch of physiology, dealing chiefly with the phenomena of the heart action and respiration, lost his life through the apparatus which was attached to his body getting out of order in some unknown manner.

Wireless an Aid to Science.

Actual difference in time between Washington, D. C., and Paris, France, has been established by the recent series of exchanges of wireless telegraph signals between the big naval wireless station at Arlington and the French government station at Eiffel Tower.

The results of the tests are hailed by scientists as a distinct step forward toward errorless calculation of time and distances. It is approximately 4,000 miles from Washington to Paris and the greatest distance over which previous tests of a like nature has been made was 600 miles.

England Training 1,250,000 Soldiers.

All England is talking of the stirring address which Lord Kitchener, the war secretary, made at the Lord Mayor’s banquet, in which he combined high praise for the army now in the field and appearing for war, with an appeal for further recruits to carry the arms of Britain to success.

Lord Kitchener said:

“The British empire is now fighting for its very existence. I want every citizen to understand this cardinal fact, for only from a clear conception of the vast importance of the issue at stake can there come that great national and moral impulse without which governments and war ministries and even armies and navies can do but little.

“We have numerous advantages of resources, men, and material, and that wonderful spirit of ours which has never understood the meaning of defeat. All these are great assets, but must be used judiciously and effectively.

“I have no complaint whatever to make about the response to my appeals for men. The progress of the military training of those already enlisted is remarkable, but I shall want more men and still more until the enemy is crushed. Armies cannot be called together as if with a magician’s wand. In the process of their formation there may have been discomforts and inconveniences in some cases--even downright suffering. I cannot promise that these conditions will wholly cease, but I can give you every assurance that they have already greatly diminished, and everything that administrative energy can do to bring them to an end assuredly will be done.

“The men who have come forward must remember that they are enduring for their country’s sake just as their comrades are in the shell-torn trenches. The introduction of elaborate destructive machinery with which our enemies had so amply and carefully supplied themselves has been the subject of much eulogy on the part of military critics, but it must be remembered that in the matter of preparation those who fix beforehand the date of war have a considerable advantage over their neighbors.

“So far as we are concerned, we are clearly open to no similar suspicion.

“Our losses in the trenches have been severe, but such casualties are far from deterring the British nation from seeing the matter through. They will act rather as an incentive to British manhood to prepare themselves to take the places of those who have fallen.”

In paying tribute to the leadership of Sir John French, commander of the British expeditionary force, and his generals, and to the high efficiency and courage of the army, the war minister said:

“I think that it has now been conceded that the British army has proved itself to be not so contemptible an engine of war as some were disposed to consider it.” He concluded:

“Although our thoughts are constantly directed toward the troops at the front and the great tasks they have in hand, it is well to remember that the enemy will have to reckon with the forces of the great Dominion, the vanguard of which we already have welcomed in this country, in the very fine body of men forming the contingents from Canada and Newfoundland, while from Australia, New Zealand, and other parts are coming in quick succession soldiers to fight for the imperial cause. And, besides all these, there are training in this country more than one and a quarter million of men eagerly waiting for a call to bear their part in the great struggle.”

Ridding Country of Cattle Plague.

How did the foot-and-mouth disease start its epidemic in America?

The answers to questions like this are always lost in mystery. But at the great Chicago stockyards, closed for the first time since 1865, the story is told that at Niles, Mich., where the plague first broke out a few weeks ago, there is a tannery which imports hides. It imported a sizable consignment of water buffalo hides, so the story runs, and imported them via Italy. They came packed in Italian straw. They were unpacked and the straw carelessly thrown to one side.

A Polish farmer in the vicinity, with the sound thrift of the Old World, saw this straw, and inquired about its eventual use. He was told he could have it if he would haul it away. He hauled it. He fed it to his little herd of cattle.

But the cattle, instead of waxing fat and prospering, began to grow thin. They developed a fever. They put their heads down and began to lick their hoofs. The local veterinary authorities had their attention directed to the case. The government came in, and the foot-and-mouth disease was officially declared extant in the United States.

The foot-and-mouth disease, which has caused a quarantine on live stock in so many States, is violently contagious among animals. It is characterized by sensitive sores on the tongue, palate, and hoofs of the animals. The sores become red and raw within a very short time, and cause the disease to spread rapidly to other cattle. Government experts have declared that the only way to stamp out the disease is to destroy all animals affected.

In the world-famous Union stockyards of Chicago infected cattle were killed in great droves, regardless of value, and were buried in quicklime to prevent any possible spread of the disease. Similar methods have been followed by cattle raisers of States where the quarantine is in force. The work of cleaning up and disinfecting the Chicago stockyards progressed rapidly. The only sign of excitement coincident with the shutting down of the yards was a shotgun onslaught on the hundreds of thousands of pigeons ordered killed by the State and government authorities. They were doomed as disease-germ carriers. The work of driving the rats from the yards was started. Poison fumes were sprayed into the holes and crevices in the brick pavements in those pens in which the work of cleaning and disinfecting had been completed.

In all the vast acreage of cattle pens, ordinarily marked by tossing horns and eddies of sheep and swine, there was little life save where men handling the disinfecting machine waged battle against the germ of the costly malady. The twenty-five miles of streets and alleys within the inclosures were wintry in appearance, snow white with the lime spread over them.

The resumption of slaughtering at the Chicago yards will not mean the restoration of business to its normal volume because the business in stockers and feeders will be affected. Two of the greatest cattle-producing States, Illinois and Iowa, are under the government ban because of the presence of the foot-and-mouth contagion. When Delaware was put under quarantine it was the thirteenth State in the list. By special order of the United States department of agriculture, Canada was included in the quarantine area. No evidence of foot-and-mouth disease had been discovered in the Dominion, but it was learned that infected cars had been sent over the border and the order was issued to prevent their return.

The government authorities took steps to prevent the disease from getting a foothold in the ranges and grazing sections of the West. “The government will kill all infected animals,” said Secretary of Agriculture Houston. “It will stop all movement of infected cattle from infected areas, and will do everything to localize the epidemic.”

That the foot-and-mouth disease cannot be transmitted to human beings by eating the flesh of diseased animals, but can be contracted by drinking unboiled milk or butter made from the milk of an infected cow, is the statement made by doctors who have studied the disease.

Fate Calls Upon a Modern Valjean.

This is a story of a few sheets of legal cap paper faded and yellow with age, a modern Jean Valjean, whose quarter of a century of peace and industry may end in a black cloud of misery and death, and a passionate crime in which brother slays brother.

Unlike Victor Hugo’s celebrated character, this modern Valjean has not mounted the rostrum of justice to proclaim his guilt and true self before the wide world, but, to the contrary, the man accused refuses to acknowledge the alleged facts and criminating evidence that the hand of the law spreads before him.

Recently carpenters moving an old desk in the district attorney’s office in Pittsburgh, Pa., accidentally broke open a locker, from which tumbled a number of dusty papers. Among them were the verdict and minutes of a coroner’s inquest and an indictment for murder. The papers recalled the crime of almost a quarter of a century ago.

In 1892, Joseph Gantt and his brother Frank were ex-convicts. Both had served their time, reformed, gone to work, and were living with their parents in Pittsburgh.

On the day before the murder, just twenty-two years ago, Frank Gantt was picked up by the police on the strength of his former record.

At the dinner table the following night, Joseph accused Frank of returning to his old ways of crime and bringing more disgrace on their aged parents. The charge resulted in an argument. The table was upset as both men jumped to their feet. The lamp was dashed to the floor and the room was in darkness.

When lights were restored, Frank was dead on the floor from a knife wound and Joseph was gone.

The story was told at the coroner’s inquest. Sisters and brothers were brought before the grand jury, and an indictment was returned.

Then Fate smiled on the man who wished to reform, tucked the papers in an out-of-the-way corner of the district attorney’s desk, and left them a score of years until her smile faded.

When Assistant District Attorney John Dunn brought the papers to the office of the county detective department in Pittsburgh, Detective E. E. Clark was interrogating Miss Ethel Reese in regard to another case. The girl is not as old as the musty papers.

“Ever hear of Joe Gantt?” asked Dunn.

“Not that I remember,” replied the detective.

“I have,” spoke up the girl. “He’s my uncle. His name is Clark now, and he lives in Chicago. Why?”

“Oh, nothing,” said Dunn, as he walked out of the office, making notes on his cuff.

Dunn and Detective Edeburn came to Chicago. With the assistance of Captain Halpin, of the detective bureau, and two other Chicago detectives, they began to hunt for “Clark.” They located the man. His arrest followed. Then Miss Reese arrived in Chicago with Detective Clark.

“That’s Uncle Joe,” she said, when she confronted “Clark” in Captain Halpin’s office. “He came back to Pittsburgh to visit us last spring. Why is he arrested?”

“He is wanted for the murder of your Uncle Frank,” replied the captain. The girl fainted.

Meanwhile, the man--whether Clark, Gantt, or Ghent, as the Pittsburgh newspaper twenty-two years ago called him--is silent except to insist that he is Frank J. Clark and not Gantt. He refuses to recognize the girl.

During the last twenty-two years the man says he has lived “clean.” He worked all over the country. He served his country against Spain in ’98. He fought at Santiago as a member of the Fifth Mississippi Volunteers--known as “the Immunes,” because all the men in it were immune to tropical fevers.

Last of all, Gantt married and settled down in a little home at 2128 West Harrison Street. He has been working as a structural ironworker.

His wife is a deaf mute--the man himself is now approaching the sixty-year mark--and the smile of the kindly Fate has faded.

Ocean-to-ocean Auto Travel.

With the exception of such slight improvements as may be made during the winter months, the principal transcontinental routes are now in approximately the shape they will be at the beginning of the heavy travel to the Pacific Coast Exposition early next year.

Late reports to the American Automobile Association from all quarters indicate that the road improvements on the principal cross-country lines during 1914 have been underestimated. This is particularly the case on the western end of the “Northwest Trail.”

The cities, counties, and towns on the line of the Lincoln Highway in the Far West have also made very great improvements. The “All-Southern Route” as a whole has been greatly improved during 1914, and will not present very serious difficulties to tourists who decide to go leisurely across that way in 1915.

Maps and specific information can be had by addressing A. A. A. headquarters, Riggs Building, Washington, D. C.

Indian Waif-king to Assemble Tribe.

He is king of the remnant of a great race now scattered to the winds--David Seattle, of the Snohomish tribe. Lean as a wolf was the king, and footsore with far travels, when he entered the office of the _Seattle Star_, asking that paper to help him in locating his widely dispersed tribesfolk.

Until a few moons ago he did not know he was king, this stolid Indian lad, who had been placed in St. Joseph’s School, in Tacoma, when a baby. He did not remember when he came or who brought him there. On the register he is simply “David Seattle.” No hint of royal inheritance appeared to mar his democratic playing and boyish quarreling with school companions. Assertions of kinship would only have served to call down upon him the wrath of his playmates, and who were certain that royalty rode on magnificent chargers and was heralded with blaring trumpets.

Charlie David Seattle, only living son of Chief Seattle I., waits for death. He is very old, and his work is done.

There came to him not long ago in Snohomish an Indian of another tribe. “I met one of your people in Seattle,” he confided. “His name is like yours--David Seattle.”

The old man, strangely excited, came to the city and found David.

“Where,” he asked, “were you born? And who was your father?”

“I do not know,” said the young Indian. “I was put in St. Joseph’s School when a baby.” And he told the old patriarch all he knew, which was little enough, though it served.

“It was I who put you there,” said Charlie David Seattle. “Your father was dead some time before. I took you from your dead mother’s arms. You are the oldest son of the oldest son of Chief Seattle. You are the head of the Snohomish people.”

It was thus plain David Seattle learned he was a king.

Chief David Seattle has been visiting as many of his people as he has been able to locate. Sometimes he bought railroad tickets. At other times he stole rides on freight trains. And often he walked. He went to Oregon, wandering east of the Cascades, journeying to remote corners of the Olympic Peninsula. Finally he reached the northern end of British Columbia. Wherever he heard of Snohomish Indians there he went.

“There are,” he said, “two thousand three hundred of my people left. Of these I have visited two thousand. They were glad to see me.”

That is why he appealed to the white man’s newspaper--to help him find the other three hundred.

The Nick Carter Stories

ISSUED EVERY SATURDAY BEAUTIFUL COLORED COVERS

When it comes to detective stories worth while, the =Nick Carter Stories= contain the only ones that should be considered. They are not overdrawn tales of bloodshed. They rather show the working of one of the finest minds ever conceived by a writer. The name of Nick Carter is familiar all over the world, for the stories of his adventures may be read in twenty languages. No other stories have withstood the severe test of time so well as those contained in the =Nick Carter Stories=. It proves conclusively that they are the best. We give herewith a list of some of the back numbers in print. You can have your news dealer order them, or they will be sent direct by the publishers to any address upon receipt of the price in money or postage stamps.

692--Doctor Quartz Again. 693--The Famous Case of Doctor Quartz. 694--The Chemical Clue. 695--The Prison Cipher. 696--A Pupil of Doctor Quartz. 697--The Midnight Visitor. 698--The Master Crook’s Match. 699--The Man Who Vanished. 700--The Garnet Gauntlet. 701--The Silver Hair Mystery. 702--The Cloak of Guilt. 703--A Battle for a Million. 704--Written in Red. 707--Rogues of the Air. 709--The Bolt from the Blue. 710--The Stockbridge Affair. 711--A Secret from the Past. 712--Playing the Last Hand. 713--A Slick Article. 714--The Taxicab Riddle. 715--The Knife Thrower. 717--The Master Rogue’s Alibi. 719--The Dead Letter. 720--The Allerton Millions. 728--The Mummy’s Head. 729--The Statue Clue. 730--The Torn Card. 731--Under Desperation’s Spur. 732--The Connecting Link. 733--The Abduction Syndicate. 736--The Toils of a Siren. 737--The Mark of a Circle. 738--A Plot Within a Plot. 739--The Dead Accomplice. 741--The Green Scarab. 743--A Shot in the Dark. 746--The Secret Entrance. 747--The Cavern Mystery. 748--The Disappearing Fortune. 749--A Voice from the Past. 752--The Spider’s Web. 753--The Man With a Crutch. 754--The Rajah’s Regalia. 755--Saved from Death. 756--The Man Inside. 757--Out for Vengeance. 758--The Poisons of Exili. 759--The Antique Vial. 760--The House of Slumber. 761--A Double Identity. 762--“The Mocker’s” Stratagem. 763--The Man that Came Back. 764--The Tracks in the Snow. 765--The Babbington Case. 766--The Masters of Millions. 767--The Blue Stain. 768--The Lost Clew. 770--The Turn of a Card. 771--A Message in the Dust. 772--A Royal Flush. 774--The Great Buddha Beryl. 775--The Vanishing Heiress. 776--The Unfinished Letter. 777--A Difficult Trail. 778--A Six-word Puzzle. 782--A Woman’s Stratagem. 783--The Cliff Castle Affair. 784--A Prisoner of the Tomb. 785--A Resourceful Foe. 786--The Heir of Dr. Quartz. 787--Dr. Quartz, the Second. 789--The Great Hotel Tragedies. 790--Zanoni, the Witch. 791--A Vengeful Sorceress. 794--Doctor Quartz’s Last Play. 795--Zanoni, the Transfigured. 796--The Lure of Gold. 797--The Man With a Chest. 798--A Shadowed Life. 799--The Secret Agent. 800--A Plot for a Crown. 801--The Red Button. 802--Up Against It. 803--The Gold Certificate. 804--Jack Wise’s Hurry Call. 805--Nick Carter’s Ocean Chase. 806--Nick Carter and the Broken Dagger. 807--Nick Carter’s Advertisement. 808--The Kregoff Necklace. 809--The Footprints on the Rug. 810--The Copper Cylinder. 811--Nick Carter and the Nihilists. 812--Nick Carter and the Convict Gang. 813--Nick Carter and the Guilty Governor. 814--The Triangled Coin. 815--Ninety-nine--and One. 816--Coin Number 77. 817--In the Canadian Wilds. 818--The Niagara Smugglers. 819--The Man Hunt.

NEW SERIES

NICK CARTER STORIES

1--The Man from Nowhere. 2--The Face at the Window. 3--A Fight for a Million. 4--Nick Carter’s Land Office. 5--Nick Carter and the Professor. 6--Nick Carter as a Mill Hand. 7--A Single Clew. 8--The Emerald Snake. 9--The Currie Outfit. 10--Nick Carter and the Kidnapped Heiress. 11--Nick Carter Strikes Oil. 12--Nick Carter’s Hunt for a Treasure. 13--A Mystery of the Highway. 14--The Silent Passenger. 15--Jack Dreen’s Secret. 16--Nick Carter’s Pipe Line Case. 17--Nick Carter and the Gold Thieves. 18--Nick Carter’s Auto Chase. 19--The Corrigan Inheritance. 20--The Keen Eye of Denton. 21--The Spider’s Parlor. 22--Nick Carter’s Quick Guess. 23--Nick Carter and the Murderess. 24--Nick Carter and the Pay Car. 25--The Stolen Antique. 26--The Crook League. 27--An English Cracksman. 28--Nick Carter’s Still Hunt. 29--Nick Carter’s Electric Shock. 30--Nick Carter and the Stolen Duchess. 31--The Purple Spot. 32--The Stolen Groom. 33--The Inverted Cross. 34--Nick Carter and Keno McCall. 35--Nick Carter’s Death Trap. 36--Nick Carter’s Siamese Puzzle. 37--The Man Outside. 38--The Death Chamber. 39--The Wind and the Wire. 40--Nick Carter’s Three Cornered Chase. 41--Dazaar, the Arch-Fiend. 42--The Queen of the Seven. 43--Crossed Wires. 44--A Crimson Clew. 45--The Third Man. 46--The Sign of the Dagger. 47--The Devil Worshipers. 48--The Cross of Daggers. 49--At Risk of Life. 50--The Deeper Game. 51--The Code Message. 52--The Last of the Seven. 53--Ten-Ichi, the Wonderful. 54--The Secret Order of Associated Crooks. 55--The Golden Hair Clew. 56--Back From the Dead. 57--Through Dark Ways. 58--When Aces Were Trumps. 59--The Gambler’s Last Hand. 60--The Murder at Linden Fells. 61--A Game for Millions. 62--Under Cover. 63--The Last Call. 64--Mercedes Danton’s Double. 65--The Millionaire’s Nemesis. 66--A Princess of the Underworld. 67--The Crook’s Blind. 68--The Fatal Hour. 69--Blood Money. 70--A Queen of Her Kind. 71--Isabel Benton’s Trump Card. 72--A Princess of Hades. 73--A Prince of Plotters. 74--The Crook’s Double. 75--For Life and Honor. 76--A Compact With Dazaar. 77--In the Shadow of Dazaar. 78--The Crime of a Money King. 79--Birds of Prey. 80--The Unknown Dead. 81--The Severed Hand. 82--The Terrible Game of Millions. 83--A Dead Man’s Power. 84--The Secrets of an Old House. 85--The Wolf Within. 86--The Yellow Coupon. 87--In the Toils. 88--The Stolen Radium. 89--A Crime in Paradise. 90--Behind Prison Bars. 91--The Blind Man’s Daughter. 92--On the Brink of Ruin. 93--Letter of Fire. 94--The $100,000 Kiss. 95--Outlaws of the Militia. 96--The Opium-Runners. 97--In Record Time. 98--The Wag-Nuk Clew. 99--The Middle Link. 100--The Crystal Maze. 101--A New Serpent in Eden. 102--The Auburn Sensation. 103--A Dying Chance. 104--The Gargoni Girdle. 105--Twice in Jeopardy. 106--The Ghost Launch. 107--Up in the Air. 108--The Girl Prisoner. 109--The Red Plague. 110--The Arson Trust. 111--The King of the Firebugs. 112--“Lifter’s” of the Lofts. 113--French Jimmie and His Forty Thieves. 114--The Death Plot. 115--The Evil Formula. 116--The Blue Button. Dated December 5th, 1914. 117--The Deadly Parallel. Dated December 12th, 1914. 118--The Vivisectionists. Dated December 19th, 1914. 119--The Stolen Brain. Dated December 26th, 1914. 120--An Uncanny Revenge.

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