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No. 19. NEW YORK, December 7, 1912. Price Five Cents,

 

Frank Merriwell, Junior’s, Substitute;
Or, MAKING GOOD ON THE DIAMOND.

By BURT L. STANDISH.

CHAPTER I.
“wWwARMING UP.”

“Ho, hum!” yawned Owen Clancy, stirring drowsily
in his chair on the veranda of the Ophir House, “this
is certainly the easy life. Trouble is, fellows, it’s too
darned easy. About all the exercise we get is when
we mosey out to the athletic club and boot the pigskin
around. I’m getting sluggish.”

“Come over and slug me,” Billy Ballard invited, from
the other end of the veranda. “Feeling kind of slug-
gish myself, Red, and if you’re pining for exercise, here’s
your chance.”

“Tush, tush!” scoffed the red-headed chap. “Taking
a fall out of you, Pink, wouldn’t be exercise, but a walk-
away. Everything’s too deuced humdrum around here
to suit me. Say, Chip, can’t you mix }us up something
with real snap and ginger in it? Nothing has happened
for a week—not since Ballard and I got back the bullfon
that had been stolen from the Ophir Mine.. That livened
up things a whole lot.”

Young Merriwell looked up from the paper he was
reading. |

“Ten yards in four downs,” he remarked) absently.
“The new football rules this year will bring a revival
of the old smashing line drives of the past. I wish we'd
got this news before Ophir played the Gold Hillers.”

Merry showed a disposition to become absorbed once
-more in the article he was reading. Clancy headed him
off.

“Bother the new rules! I asked you if you couldn't
fix up a little excitement for us, Chip. Life in southern
Arizona is becoming flat, stale, and unprofitable. Every
morning the prof makes us grind to the limit ; every after-

noon we loaf around until four, and then go out to
the club field and punt, tackle the dummy, or fall on the
ball. It’s getting mo-no-to-nious.” !'

“IT guess the climate is playing hob with you, Clan,”
grinned Merry, throwing aside the’ paper. “Early De-
cember, and here we are in our shirt sleeves, loafing in
the shade and trying to be comfortable. But buck up.
It won’t last forever. It won’t be long now before we'll
be pulling up stakes and hiking toward the ice and snow.”

“What’re we waiting for?”

“The prof’s mining deal is hanging fire. Almost any
mail from.the East may bring the letter that winds it up.”

“Then I wish things would warm up while the deal
is being wound up.”

“That’s always the trouble with a chap that’s got |
brick-red hair,” complained Ballard. “He’s a volcano, —
and can’t be happy unless he has a violent eruption every
fifteen minutes.”

“I’ve got a notion,” scowled Clancy, “to imitate an
earthquake and shake you off the porch.”

“Go on and shake,” urged Ballard, chuckling. “I'd |
like to get a strangle hold on an earthquake just once ©
and make it behave.” . a

With a whoop the red-headed chap projected himself —
out of his chair and in the direction of his chum. But —
he never reached Ballard’s end of the porch. Merry.
put out a foot and neatly tripped ‘him. '"

“Here, now!” protested Clancy, slamming into a porch ©
post and grabbing it in his arms to keep from going
down. “Who invited you to take a hand in this, Chip?
Maybe you want me to roll you off the porch before I
do business with Pink?”

“Spell ‘able,’” said Merry, squaring around in his
chair. \

  

 
  

 

 

   

  

Oe ah ani Ne tte i eh mh mam tiene neem fa + het eet

 

“Too hot,” answered Clancy, after a moment’s reflec-
tion.

“Oh, slush!” muttered Ballard disgustedly, “It’s too
hot now, but a moment ago he was anxious to have things
warm up, He’s bluffing, that’s all.”

Clancy took no notice of the good-natured gibe, but
crossed the veranda to a thermometer that hung beside
the hotel door.

“Only seventy-five,’ he announced, then reached for
the newspaper Merry had dropped and tore off a piece of
it, ‘It ought to be more than that,” he added,

Taking a match from his pocket he fired the scrap of
paper and held it close to the bulb of the thermometer.

“What's that for?” demanded Ballard.

“Warming things up,” answered Clancy. “Beginning
with the thermometer. . Gee, look at the mercury climb!
Eighty-five, ninety, ninety-five a

“Here!” interposed Merry.
the town’s official thermometer?
tinker with the weather bureau, Clan.
Ophir swears by that instrument.”

“T’ll have ’em swearing at it before long?’ was Clancy’s
calm rejoinder. “A hundred and fifteen,” he added, as
he dropped the charred paper. ‘“That’s going some.”

Just as he was backing away from the thermometer,
Woo Sing, the Chinese roustabout, came blandly out on
the veranda. .He looked cool and comfortable in his
roomy silk: kimono.

“Velly fine day, Missul Melly,” he grinned.

“Pretty hot, Sing,” answered Merry, pretending to mop
his face with a handkerchief.

“You callee hot?’ demurred Woo Sing.
glacious! Me allee samee cool as cucumber.”

He took a slant in the direction of the thermometer,
gave it a casual glance, then jumped and brought his eyes
closer to the top of the column of mercury.

. “Gee Klismus!”’ he gasped, and the sweat began to
_ start out on his parchmentlike face. “Him plenty hot—
hot as blazes. My gettee fan befo’ my gettee sunstluck !”
_ With that he slumped weakly back into the hotel, peel-
ing off his kimono as he went.

“That proves,” said Merry, joining in with the laugh-
ter of his chums, “that this climate business is about
two-thirds imagination,”

“Sh-h!” whispered Clancy, “here comes the prof, He
looks about as warm as a hundred and fifty pounds of
ice. Let’s see what effect the thermometer has on him.”

Merry pulled his shirt open at the throat, fell back in
his. chair, and began mopping his face, Ballard leaned
over the veranda rail and gasped like a spent fish.
Clancy was also panting, seemingly in the last stages
of exhaustion.

Professor Phineas Borrodaile had a book in his hand,
one finger between the leaves to mark his place. He
was bareheaded, and was evidently coming: out to sit
-in the shade and read comfortably,

“Well, well, young gentlemen,’ he murmured, com-
ing to a startled halt as his eyes rested on the-boys, “you
act as though you were overcome with the heat. Why,
I had not noticed that the weather was at all uncom-
fortable. It seems to me very pleasant, ve-ry pleasant.”
. “Look—at the thermometer!” gasped Merry huskily,
smothering his face in his handkerchief,

- The professor walked over to the instrument and
studied it. Another moment.and he was tremendously
excited,

 

“Don’t you know that’s
You might as well
Everybody in

“Goodness

NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY.

“What is this?” he cried. “A—a hundred and ten
degrees Fahrenheit? Mirable dictu! There must» be
something wrong with the thermometer.”

In spite of the professor’s guess that there was some-
thing wrong, the perspiration began to bead his brow.
Taking his book under one arm, he allowed a hand to
grope for a handkerchief in the tail pocket of his long
black coat.

“Who says there’s anything wrong with that there
thermometer?” growled a voice. “Why, the hull town
gits its temperature from that machine! Whenever it
says the weather’s so and so, you can gamble your
spurs that’s what it is.”

Pophagan, proprietor of the hotel, shoved out upon
the veranda,

“But look, Mr. Pophagan,” quavered the professor,
dabbing at his bald head with his handkerchief and be-
ginning to loosen his collar. “It’s one hundred and ten
in the shade!”

“That’s right,” whispered Pophagan faintly, staring
at the instrument. “Sufferin’ sinners,’ but it’s hot.
Hadn’t noticed it before. Hottest early December I ever
seen in, Ophir,”

“There are some new spots on the sun,” remarked
the professor, unbuttoning his vest and fanning himself
with his book, “and they always have the effect of dis-
arranging the seasons, Mercy! I feel as though I was
suffocating.”

Pophagan threw off his hat and jerked off his coat.

“It come on sudden,” he panted. ‘I’m allers sub-
ject to heat spells like this. Purty nigh got done up
oncet with a sunstroke in the Harqua Halas.”

“Merriwell,” queried the professor, in alarm, “you are
not light-headed, are you? You don’t feel as though
you were going to succumb to this excess of solar
calorie?” ,

Merry, handkerchief over his face, was squirming in
his chair. .

“I’m all right, professor,’ he answered, in a smothered
voice,

Clancy stood at the end of the porch, leaning against
the wall of the hotel with his back to the professor and
Pophagan, His shoulders wene heaving convulsively,

Ballard continued to lean over the rail, keeping his
face averted and doing his best to stifle his laughter,

“Better go into the hotel, young gentlemen,” suggested
the professor, “and get some fans. I’m going. I feel as
though I was being incinerated,”

“Me, too,” chimed in Pophagan. “If this gits much
worse, we'll all be burnin’ up. Can’t remember a time
like this since the summer 0’ ninety-six, You could fry
eggs in the sun that year.
grilled in the desert afore they could hunt their holes.

There was a drummer stoppin’ with me then, an’ he —
5, pie *

wore a celluloid collar. He went out to sell a bill o
goods an’ the collar exploded, Pair o’ rubber boots I
had melted into a chunk. Whoosh!” .
Pophagan, closely followed by the professor, melted
into the hotel. The youngsters on the porch pulled them-
selyes together, exchanged glances, and went into an-
other spasm of laughter,
“Got to keep this going,” sputtered Clancy, lighting

another piece’ of, paper .and fanning it back and forth —
“This is the most.

around the bulb of the thermometer.
fun I’ve had since Pop and Woo Sing went hunting
cats,” wl

Rattlesnakes an’ coyotes got —

   
 

     
   
   

 

 

 

 

 

 
     

 

    
       
     
     
     
      
 

  
   
 

   
 

     

“We'll have the whole town fried to a frazzle,” hic-
cuped Ballard. ‘I never thought a thermometer made
the weather before, but this seems to prove it.”

“You don’t have to do that; boys, to get things warmed
up,” remarked some one, with a laugh, from the foot
of the veranda steps. “I’m bringing you a proposition
that will do more to warm things up than all the over-
heated thermometers in Arizona.’

All the lads whirled to give their attention to the man
who had just spoken.

“Colonel Hawtrey!

9

exclaimed Merriwell.

CHAPTER II.
A CHALLENGE.

How long the mining magnate from Gold Hill had
been enjoying the performance on the veranda, the boys
‘did not know. He had caught Clancy red-handed, how-
ever, trying to drive the mercury out of the top of the
thermometer.

“It beats all,” laughed Clancy, “what a fellow can
make people do just by fooling with a thermometer.”

“The power of suggestion is tremendous,” said the
colonel, “if rightly handled. It is so in everything, my
lads. Start a train of suggestions properly and, if they
lead in the right direction, you can mold nearly any one
to your will. But that isn’t what I came over here
to talk about.”

The colonel had climbed the veranda steps while talk-
ing, and he now shook hands warmly with Merry and
his chums. Ballard pushed out a chair for him, and
he lowered himself into it with a genial smile, while his
eyes roved from one to another of the glowing young
faces in front of him.

In some things Colonel Hawtrey was a stern old
martinet. The better part of his life had been spent
in the military service of his country, and this may have
developed the relentless side of his nature. He had a
will of iron, backed by a judgment that was apt to make
a mountain of errors out of a molehill of mere mistakes.

He was a lover of sports, however, and was the back-
bone and mainstay of the Gold Hill Athletic Club. . He
believed that, quite apart from physical prowess, the
tight spirit in athletics developed inevitably all a youth’s
manly qualities. And he had no patience with any one
in whom manliness and personal integrity were lacking
in the slightest degree.

That something of an unusual nature had brought
the colonel from Gold Hill that afternoon Merriwell
was positive. And that it might prove as interesting
‘as it was unusual was evident from the colonel’s manner.

“What’s in the wind, colonel?’ queried Ballard curi-
ously. “Clancy, here, is feeling like a castaway on a
two-by-four island. If he can’t have a little healthy ex-
citement before long, his pranks will probably get us all
into trouble.”

“I’ve got everybody in a’sweat around this hotel,” said
Clancy; “that is,” he added,
Chip and Pink.”

“We're all in it,”..acknowledged Merry.
sort of a proposition have you got, colonel r

“Darrel suggested the idea last night,” returned the
colonel, ‘‘and it struck me as being a pretty good one.
How long before oe re going to leave this part of the
country, Merriwell?’

_ “As soon as the professor and Mrs. Boorland get the

“But what

 

“with the kind assistance of.

 

NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY. | 3

money for that mine.
the East.”

“Do you think you’d have time to match an Ophir
nine against a team from Gold Hill? This would be a
very pleasant diversion, it seems to me, and I know it
would be highly enjoyed by all the fans in both towns.”

“Bully!” exclaimed Clancy, all enthusiasm on the
instant.

“Now you are shouting, colonel!’ seconded Ballard,
with equal zest.

“Fine idea, colonel!” said Merriwell. “All the big
teams go South for their spring practice, and here in
southern Arizona we'll be getting ahead of them by two
or three months,”

“Back at Farnham Hall,” went on the red-headed
chap, enthusing more and more as the idea took firmer
hold of him, “they’re thinking of skates,.and toboggans,
and ice hockey, and here we’re planning to go out on a
diamond and bang the horsehide through the balmy air.
Chip,” and he turned to his chum, “if that letter came
from the East before the game, I guess we could delay
our start for the North long enough to take a fall out
of the Gold Hillers, couldn’t we?”

“Sure,” Merry heartily agreed. “I suppose this game
would be pulled off in a few days, colonel?”

“Why, yes,’ was the answer, “just as soon as you
can pick up a nine. We had thought of playing next
Saturday, on the theory, you understand, that we’d have
to hurry matters if we succeeded in getting a game with
you before you left. If you can stay longer, make it a
week from next Saturday, if that suits you better, or
any other day that tallies with your convenience.”

“This is Wednesday,” Frank mused, ‘“‘and that would
leave only two days for getting a team together and
practicing a little in case we play on the last day of
this week. But we’d better make it next Saturday,” he
added.

“Good!” exclaimed the colonel. es ou’ve run up a
long score of athletic victories since you’ve been in Ophir,
Merriwell, and I give you fair warning that Gold Hill
is going to do its best to give you a parting shot you'll
long remember.”

“Of course,” said Merry, “if Gold Hill didn’t work
hard to win, the game wouldn’t be worth while.”

“We'll have the advantage of you, unless the Ophir
Athletic Club can give you all the players you need who
are up to snuff. Our boys will come direct from our
own club, and they have been playing ball ever since
that football game a few weeks ago. Bleeker, and the
rest of those who had gone into camp in the gulch, got
back to Gold Hill several days ago, and they have been
gingering up on the diamond ever since.” ¢

“Tt’s a cinch, then, that your team will have a big ad-
vantage. I can use a few from the Ophir Club; Clancy,
Ballard, and I will play, and then we'll have to go
hunting for the rest of our material. It will be quite
a job to get the team together and pound it into any
sort of shape in two days; btit—well,” and Merry smiled,
“there’s a spice about doing things on short notice,
colonel, and it rather appeals to me. We fe

At this moment, Pophagan, palm-leaf fan in one hand
and a handkerchief ins the other, came slowly out on
the veranda. He appeared surprised to find those on the

The \check has to come from

 

veranda paying so little attention to the weather.
“Howdy, kunnel,” said he.
none?”

“Ain't you feelin’ the heat

  
 

  

'“T’m very comfortable, thank you, Pophagan,” the
colonel answered, with a sly wink at the boys.

“Don’t mean to say you haven’t looked at the ther-
mometer ?”

“What's the use? I don’t look to a thermometer for
information as to whether I’m comfortable or not.”

“No? Well, all of Ophir gits its temperature right
from this here weather machine o’ ‘mine. I want to
tell you, Colonel Hawtrey, that we’re havin’ a spell o’
weather right this minute that ain’t been equaled since
ninety-six. Whoosh! Jest take a look at that mercury
and see how.high she is.”

“You look, Pophagan,” laughed the colonel, “and re-
port.”

The proprietor of the hotel lurched over to the ther-
mometer and recoiled from it in amazement,

“Jumpin’ sand hills!” he exclaimed. “I'll be dad-
burned if this don’t beat all get-out. What d’ye think?”
and he whirled on Colonel Hawtrey with popping eyes.
“That there thermometer has gone down more’n thirty-
five degrees in half an hour. Blamed remarkable, that’s
what I call it. Dern nigh gives me a chill.”

Pophagan threw away the fan and put his handkerchief
in his pocket.

“Reckon I better go and tell the perfesser an’ the
chink afore they catch their death o’ cold tryin’ to be
comfortable.” ,

With that he vanished through the hotel door. Colonel
Hawtrey cast an amused glance after the lank, retreating
form.

“It would be hard for a person to believe that a thing
like that could happen,” he remarked, “unless he wit-
nessed it with his own eyes. The whole affair is absurd
on the face of it, and yet there is no doubt of the gen-
uineness of -Pophagan’s sentiments. Well, well! That
is carrying suggestion to an extreme.”

“T wonder,” said Ballard, a little pensively, “if he’s
trying to turn the joke on us?”

“Not on your life,” answered Clancy. “If that ther-
mometer registered zero, when the temperature was really
where it is now, Pop would put on his ear muffs and
his fur-lined overcoat.”

“That’s the trouble with a good many of us,” said
the colonel. “Often we’re not ruled by common sense,
but by a very foolish habit.”

There were several things connected with this incident
of the thermometer which Merriwell was to remember
later; and the most of them had, for a basis, the few
comments made by Colonel Hawtrey.

“Tt’s definitely settled, then,” went on the colonel, “that

_the ball game is to be played next Saturday?”

“Yes,” Merriwell answered. “We'll have to do a
little hustling to get our nine together, but I think we
can make it,”

“You know pretty well where you’re to get your
material ?”

“T’ve been going over that in my mind, colonel, and
I think I have every position filled.”

“You'll pitch, of course?” . ;

“Sure thing,” put in Clancy promptly. “We couldn't
get along without Chip in the pitcher’s box.”

“You're our stumblingblock, Merriwell,” the colonel
“

laughed. “Gold Hill is full of rumors regarding your
wonderful ability as a pitcher. I don’t suppose we have

- any one who can hold a candle to vou, and we'll have

* \ ‘ .

NEW TIP. TOP WEEKLY.

to make up what we lack by good work on other parts
of the diamond.” .

“Who will be the battery for Gold Hill?”

“Darrel and Bleeker. Darrel was always our star
pitcher, and perhaps it was a good thing for our boys
that he fractured his left arm some time ago instead of
his right.” ,

Hawtrey frowned as he remembered the events con-
nected with the fracturing of that left arm of Ellis
Darrel’s.

“What sort of a catcher is Bleek?” Merry asked, more
by way of getting the colonel’s mind off a disturbing
train of reflections than for the purpose of acquiring
any useful information.

“He’s good anywhere,” was the answer, “and par-
ticularly good behind the bat.” The colonel got up.
“We'll be here Saturday afternoon,” he added, “and
you can count upon facing a team that will make the
affair interesting to you.”

With a friendly nod he passed down the steps and
made his way up the street.

“This gives us something to take up our time, any-
way,’ remarked Clancy, with a good deal of satisfac-
tion.

“We're up against a hard proposition,” said. Ballard,
looking very much concerned. “Chip, it will never do for
us to leave Arizona with a defeat behind us.” :

“T don’t think we’re going to,’ Merry answered. “Vou
can bet your last copper, though, that we’re not going
to have a walk-away. » Let’s figure out the make-up, fel-
lows. Pink, take a pencil and paper and put Jode Len-
ning’s name at the head of the list.”

Ballard and Clancy straightened suddenly in their
chairs and gave Merriwell a startled look.

CHAPTER III.

THE LINE-UP.

There was some cause for the surprise displayed by
Clancy and Ballard. Jode Lenning, the fellow suggested
by Merry to head his list of prospective players, occu-
pied somewhat of an equivocal position at that time.

Lenning and Ellis Darrel were half brothers, and both
were nephews of Colonel Hawtrey. They had made
their home with the colonel until, through unscrupulous
scheming on the part of Lenning, Darrel had been cast
adrift. Later, befriended by Merriwell, Darrel had re-
gained his place in the colonel’s confidence and affection,
and Lenning’s perfidy had been unmasked. Then it was
that the fiery old colonel had flung off Lenning, and the
lad, taking up with an unscrupulous, irresponsive com-
panion named Billy Shoup, had gone from bad to
worse.

Through treachery on the part of Shoup, Lenning came
near losing his life. Merriwell and Clancy, by quick
work, had saved him. This break with Shoup was the
best thing that could have happened to Lenning, and
the lad, seeing as never before the error of his way, de-
termined to turn over a new leaf.

He applied to the superintendent of the Ophir Mine
for a job as night watchman at the cyanide works, His.
record was against him, and he was only given the place
through the intercession of Merriwell. [Frank stood
sponsor for Lenning, in the face of violent objections by

Lenning’s uncle and against the advice of Mr, Bradlaugh,

"

   
   

   

 
  
  
   
  
  
   
 
 
 
 
 
     
   
  
   
   
   
  
  
   
   
   
 
   
 
   
   
   
 
 
  
   
   
   
 
   
    
 
      
    
  

 

a

a

so FR a

BS? F.

 

 

 

    
   
     
   
     

   
    

 

 

    
  
 
   
  
   
   
   
    
     
  

  

  
    
  
  
   
  
 

 

 

_ Merriwell, “and Mr, Bradlaugh was telling me about him

NEW TIP

general manager for the mining company and president
of the Ophir Athletic Club.

The very night Lenning went on duty four bars of
bullion were stolen from the big safe at the cyanide
works—and Lenning had disappeared! It seemed a fore-
gone conclusion that Lenning had made off with the
bullion; and yet, as it turned out, Shoup and an un-
known man were the thieves. By blind luck, Clancy and
sallard recovered the bullion, and Lenning was found in
the solution tank of the cyanide works, bound and gagged.

Everybody except Merriwell had been positive that
Lenning was the one who had made off with the bul-
lion. So it followed that the discovery that he had
been foully dealt with, and had been true to his trust,
rather astounded those who had been so quick to think
evil of him.

Merry’s friendship for Lenning had been dead against
the sentiments and the judgment of Clancy and Ballard.
That Merry’s insight into the fellow’s nature had been
more keen and more correct than their own, Clancy and
Ballard were forced to admit. Nevertheless, they still
felt that Lenning was more or less of a crook, and it
surprised them to have Merry mention his name at all
in connection with the prospective nine.

“What's biting you?” asked Frank, meeting the stare
of his chums good-naturedly.

“Can’t you find enough players without taking on Len-
ning?” queried Ballard.

“Possibly, Pink, but I want him.”

“The rest won’t stand for it, Chip,” blurted out Clancy.

“Why won’t they?”

“Well, it’s—it’s Oh, hang it, you know why they
won't, Chip, without my going into details,”

“Whom do you mean oe ‘they,’ Red?”

“The Ophir fellows—and the Gold Hillers, too. Len-
ning has proved that he isn’t square. I guess that’s
enough to make every one give him the cold shoulder.”

“Tf you’re going to dig into a fellow’s past, Clan, and
judge him by what he was rather than by what he is
now, of course I haven’t got anything to say. But I
don’t call that being square, either.

“We were off a bit when we accused Lenning of help-
ing Shoup run away with the bullion,” put in Ballard,
“but we haven’t had much proof, as yet, that Lenning
has squared away and intends to do the right thing from
now on.”

“We're going to give him a chance, fellows,” Merry
cried, “and we'll begin by selecting him for this pick-up
nine.” s

“There'll be objections

“All right,” cut in Merry impatiently, “if the objec-
tions come I'll try and meet them. Put down Jode Len-
ning’s name first, Red.”

Clancy secured jpencil and paper and, not without some
reluctance, wrote/as his chum directed.

“Where will Lenning play?” queried Ballard, striving

 

 

to make the most of what he considered an unwise selec-,

tion.

“Don’t know about that yet,” was the answer. “For
the next man put down Mexican Joe for backstop.”

Again Clancy and Ballard displayed astonishment, but
this time it was of another sort.

“Who the mischief is Mexican Joe?” Ballard inquired.

~ “Never heafd of him before.”

.“He works in the blacksmith shop at the mine,” said

 

£5 RET ICT

  

TOP WEEKLY. 5

only the other day. He used to catch for a Mexican
fest and they say he has the prettiest throw to second
of any amateur in Arizona. We’ve got to have Mexican
Joe,”

“I wonder,”
in the greaser Jingo?
get b balled up.”

“T'll-chance that part of it, old man,” said Merry. “Put
down Owen Clancy for the first bag and Bi ly Ballard
for center field.”

“Got that,” reported Clancy, writing rapidly,
Chip Merriwell for pitcher.”

“Bradlaugh, junior, for short.”

“Check,”

“Barzy Blunt, second base.

“He’s a pitcher, isn’t he?” struck in Ballard.

“He is, and a good one, but I’m told he’s equally good
as a baseman. If I have to be relieved, Barzy can be
shifted to the pitcher’s box. Mose Handy will ne the
third sack, and Jerry Spink will take care of left field.”

“You've got your nine, Chip,” reported Clancy, totting
up, “and Lenning is left for right field. Want any sub-
stitutes ?”

“Got to have.
on the benches and be prepared to fill in.
good all-around ball players.”

“It’s a good team,” commented Clancy, after study-
ing the list for a few moments, “with possibly one or
two exceptions.”

“Strikes me, fellows,”

grinned Clancy, “if he’ll do his signalling
If he does, Chip, you’re liable to

“and also

Benaway, Shaw, and Reckless will sit
I hear they are

said Merry, “it’s a mighty fine
line-up. I'll go over to Mr. Bradlaugh’s office and speak
for Mexican Joe, Lenning, and Brad. I wish you two
fellows would hunt up the others. If you can find them,
have them all report at the Ophir athletic field not later
than four this afternoon. This will be just preliminary
to some hard work to-morrow.” ns

Merry grabbed his cap from the veranda floor, where
he had dropped it, and started briskly to his feet.

“You can count on Pink and me to interview the rest
of the fellows, Chip,” returned Clancy.

“Stir around, * Frank answered, on his way down the
veranda steps. “‘There’s not much time between now
and four. If some of the fellows can’t get out to the
clubhouse by four, then any time up till five will do.”

It was not many minutes until Merry was in the office
of the general manager of the Ophir ‘Mining Company. —
Mr. Bradlaugh greeted him with a smile and a warm
handclasp. or

“Have you heard,” the lad asked, “that we’re to have
a ball game here next Saturday?”

“T have,’ was the answer, “and I’m pleased almost
to death, Merriwell. Colonel Hawtrey left this office
not more than five minutes ago. - He told me about it.
You'll have to do some tall hustling, my lad, if you dig
up a nine that can a the Gold Hillers. Of course, —
our nine has got tofwin. We can’t consider any other
result. It would be too bad to have you wind up your
stay in Ophir with a defeat on the ball field.’’ 7

“I believe we’ve picked a winning team,” said Merry.
“Here’s the line-up, Mr, Bradlaugh,” and he handed
Clancy’s list to the general manager.

Mr. Bradlaugh leaned back in his office chair and began _
examining the list. i
eyes to the first name than he gave a-start, and looked up.
“Lenning, Merriwell ?”

 

 

 

He had no more than dropped his _

   
 

   

“Yes,” nodded Frank. “He’s a good player, if all I
hear is true, and we need him.”

“Er-hem!” coughed the general manager. “No doubt
he’s a good player, and would be a decided acquisition, but
is it a judicious selection?”

“T think so,” answered Frank calmly.

“There are liable to be objections,” suggested Mr.
Bradlaugh, “and if you persist in keeping Lenning in the
nine, in spite of them, there will be discontent among the
players. You know too much about sports, Merriwell,
for me to remind you what discontent means among
a lot of players.”

“The point is here, Mr. Bradlaugh,” Frank observed,
with considerable warmth: “Lenning is doing his best
to be square, but nobody seems to have much use for
him. He needs friends, and he hasn’t any. Here’s a
chance for him to win back a few of the friends he has
lost. I believe in giving him the chance.”

The general manager wrinkled his brows dubiously.

“I appreciate what you are.trying to do, and the gen-
erous motive back of it,’ said he; “but is it wise to
arouse discontent and pave the way for a possible de-
feat? I’m putting the thing up to you frankly.”

“T’ll tell you just as frankly, Mr. Bradlaugh,” said
Merry, with spirit, “that I don’t see why there should. be
any discontent. Let’s go ahead with Lenning until we
see what happens, anyhow.” .

The general manager nodded, still dubious, but con-
tent to leave the matter in Merry’s hands. He studied the
rest of the list.

“With the probable exception of Lenning,” he reported,
“I think you have made wise selections. I'll arrange to
give Mexican Joe a three days’ vacation. He’s a wonder
as a backstop. Brad, of course, will be delighted. If

_Lenning plays, I’ll have Burke lighten his duties at the
cyanide werks. Perhaps you’d better go out to the mine
and see Joe personally?”

“Thank you, Mr. Bradlaugh; I had thought of that.
And when I see Mexican Joe,’ I’ll also talk with Len-
ning.”

The general manager nodded. “My car’s in front,”
said he, “and I have nothing pressing for the rest of
the afternoon. I'll take you out to the mine.”

As Mr. Bradlaugh pulled down the roll top of his desk,
preparatory to leaving, Frank noticed that his face wore

_atroubled look. Was it, he asked himself, because he had
selected Lenning for one of his players? It hardly
seemed Pyssible that so small a matter could affect the
general manager so seriously.

- CHAPTER IV.
LENNING YIELDS TO PERSUASION.

The short mile separating Ophir from the mine was
quickly covered by the big car. There was-little time for
conversation during the ride, and what little talk the gen-
eral manager indulged in had nothing to dd with Len-
ning, but concerned Mexican Joe entirely.

“Burke got hold of Joe less than two weeks since,”
remarked Mr. Bradlaugh. “The boy came here from a
mine near Wickenburg, with the best recommendations I
ever saw for a Mexican. He’s as strong as a horse and
as spry as a wild cat; what’s more to the point, he knows
his business, and is straight as a string. Just now, Mer-
riwell, Joe is a comparative stranger. He flocks by him-
self pretty much, but he is well liked by those who have

\ {

NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY.

 

x

come to know him. Burke, the superintendent, can’t say
too much in his favor.”

“How old is he?” Frank asked.

“Highteen.” =

A disappointment awaited the general manager and
Merriwell when they stopped at the blacksmith shop
for a few words with Mexican Joe. Joe had been given
leave of absence by Burke to go to the bedside of a sick
relative who lived near Gold Hill.

The superintendent, who saw the car at the blacksmith
shop, strolled down from the little headquarters office to
find out what the general manager wanted. His face
lighted up when he heard about the forthcoming ball
game.

“You've got to have Joe, Merriwell,” he declared. “Our
miners play ball a little, between shifts, and I’ve seen Joe

, behind the bat. He’s a wonder as a backstop.”

“But if he’s away,” Frank answered, intensely disap-
pointed, “how can we possibly have him?”

“He'll be back to-morrow morning, and I’ll arrange to
have him go out to the clubhouse whenever you say.”

“Good! Make it to-morrow afternoon at two-thirty.”

“He'll be there; and I can promise you that, on the day
of the game, there’ll be a big attendance from these dig-

/gings. But don’t you let Gold Hill down you!”

“We're going to do our best, Burke,” laughed Merri-
well. “Where is Lenning?”

“Lenning?” the super echoed, giving Frank a quick
glance, and then shifting his gaze to the general man-
ager.

“Merriwell,’” Mr. Bradlaugh explained passively, “has
chosen Lenning for one of his players.”

It seemed, for a moment, as though Burke was going
to voice a-protest of his own against the availability of
Lenning. He thought better of it, however.

“Lenning ought to be at the bunk house now,” said he.
“He’s still the night watchman, you know, and doesn’t go
on duty until seven-thirty.”

“You go over*to the bunk house, Merriwell, and talk
with him,” suggested Mr. Bradlaugh. , “I'll stay here
with Burke.”

Frank was glad that he was to be alone when he talked
with Lenning. In a private interview there would be
less restraint, and a freer expression of views and mo-
tives, than could have been the case if the general man-
ager or the superintendent had been present.

Lenning was found sitting on a bench in the shadow
of the bunk-house wall. His back was against the wall
and his eyes were turned upward, staring into vacancy,
Evidently he was in a thoughtful mood, and gave no heed
to Frank when he came around the corner of the bunk
house.

At a little distance, Frank halted. The friendly shout
which was on his lips was smothered, and he stood silently
at gaze for a few moments studying the form on the
bench. :

Lenning had a sinister face and eyes that showed a
tendency to wavereand shift about, looking anywhere but
at the person with whom he happened to be talking.
Neither face nof eyes, it must be admitted, were calcu-
lated to inspire confidence. And yet, as Merry knew
well, such appearances are not to be taken as final in
judging a person’s character. |

Just at that moment, Lenning’s face wore an over-
whelming expression of sadness, perhaps of contrition.

 

 

 

  

~

   
   
  
   
 
   
    
 

 

”

He did not have to go far into his past to find abundant
cause for self-reproach and regret.

Lenning, when he had posed as the fayorite nephew of
Colonel Hawtrey, had been allowed everything for his
comfort that money could buy. His only work had been
to act as his uncle’s secretary, and he had worn expen-
sive clothes and had been supplied with more of the good
things of life than often come the way of most boys,

Now, by contrast, he was an ordinary hand at the
cyanide plant, and the serviceable corduroys in which he
was clad, were frayéd and stained with oil ‘and dust.
From almost a drone, living on another’s bounty, Jode
Lenning had become a worker, and was earning his own
support.

Here was proof of Lenning’s resolve to be different
from what he had been, and it was one of the things that
had impelled Merriwell to befriend the fellow when all
others had turned against him, With an odd feeling
of heightened respect for the lad on the bench, Frank
moved forward with a cheery, ‘Hello, Jode!”

Lenning gave a start, lowered his eyes, and turned.
The next moment he had started to his feet, a pleased
smile wreathing his lips,

“Howdy, Merriwell?” he called, taking the neweomer’s
outstretched hand. “What brings you over this way?
Had a notion you’d left Arizona by this time.” |

“T wouldn’t do that, Len,” answered Frank, “without
coming around to say good-by, Can’t tell just how soon
we'll go, but it won’t be for a few days yet. What sort
of a ball player are you, old chap?”

The question rather surprised Lenning,

“Oh,” he answered noncommittally, “I know the game,
after a fashion. But I’m no great shucks at it,”

“I guess you’re pretty good, from what I hear. I’m
picking up some fellows for a game next Saturday.
How'd you like to make one of the nine?”

“You—you don’t want me, do you?” Lenning inquired

_ curiously.

“Sure I want you,”

“Who's going to play?” ,

‘Ballard, and Clancy, and I; then Mexican Joe, if we
can get him, and a few chaps from the O. A. C.”

“J reckon you better count me out,” said Lenning, turn-
ing his face away. “It wouldn’t be pleasant for your
chums, or the O. A. C. fellows, to have me around.”

“Bother that! I’m bossing this nine, and I guess that
whatever I say will have to go. Don’t be foolish, Len.
I’ve got a special reason for wanting you in that game,”

“What reason?” Lenning, steadily enough, brought
back his gaze and fixed it on Merriwell,

“For one thing,” explained Frank, “there’s nothing like
a good, stiff contest on a hall field to level the differ-
ences one chap may have against another, I’ve seen out-

_and-out enemies play together, help each other in a pinch,
according to league rules, and then, when the game was

done, forget that they’d ever had a grouch, Something
queer about what the diamond can do in a case of that
kind, but it’s a fact, all the same.”

, Lenning’s face clouded and filled with distrust.
»“You think, Merriwell,” said he, “that I hayen’t any

. friends, and that this game would probably make some for
- me. - Is, that it?” >

“Well, yes, something like that,” |
“Don’t you know,” went on Lenning, paling a little

under his tan, “that if I failed in a close play some one

NEW TIP TOP: ‘WEEKLY.

. expression quickly drove away the flash of feeling,

   
   
   
   
   
   
   
  
   
 
  
  
   
 
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
   
   
         
     
        
     
   
       
     
       
       
     
       
       
     
       
   
   
       
     
         
   
     
     

  

ot 7

would say that I was trying to throw the game? No-
body has any confidence in me. Every one has the notion
that I’m a crook, and can’t get over it. My cueistokeep  —
away from people. I’m sorry, Merriwell, because if
there’s one person on earth I’d hate to disappoint, it’s
you.”

“T don’t think that’s.the proper spirit, Lenning,”’ in-
sisted Frank. “You're all right, but how is any one going
to know it if you don’t get out and show them? I’m
planning on you. You’re one of the first fellows I thought
about when the idea of the game was sprung on me this
afternoon.”

“Who sprung it?”

“Colonel Hawtrey.”

“And your pick-up nine is going to play a team: from
Gold Hill?”

*Ves.’”?

“That does settle it.. Even if I could get along with —
the Ophir crowd, I’ll bet the Gold Hillers would refuse to
play if they knew I was in the game.”

There was bitterness in the boy’s voice,

“Why,” he went on, “the colonel himself would be the -
first to kick up trouble. I’m asking no odds of my uncle.
He’s cut loose from me, and I’m not blaming him. I’ve
got my own way to make, and I’m going to do it. with-
out trying to curry favor with Colonel Hawtrey.. You'll
have to find another player in my place, Merriwell.”

Frank had not expected Lenning to take such a stand.
Although it was beginning to look as though his choice of
Lenning for the nine, if not unwise, might be hopeless, yet
he continued to try persuasion, .

“I’ve got my heart set on this,” said he, ‘and you might
at least go over to the athletic field with me and join in
the preliminary round-up.” |

“Haven't time for athletics,” was the answer... “I have
fe work nights, you know, so I can’t yery well stay up all

ay.

“Mr. Bradlaugh says that he’ll relieve you of your work
between now and Saturday, if you’ll play.” ao
Lennjng’s interest showed itself immediately. a

“Mr. Bradlaugh said that, did he?” he asked, as though |
surprised. .

“Ves,”

“Did he say he thought it was all right for me to get
into that game?” |

“That part of it was left with me, Len,” Frank an-
swered. ‘You like to play ball, don’t you?” aaetiie

Lenning’s face lit. up with a sudden glow, and his eyes
sparkled. But it was only for a moment. A dejected

 
 

“I don’t think that has anything to do with it, Merri-—
well,” he returned. as

“Then, you won’t play? You won’t give yourself a
chance to make good on the diamond ?” “ae ee

‘There was something about the phrase “make good”
which evidently struck the right chord in Lenning’s new
resolutions. pa

“I'd do a heap for you, Merriwell,” said he, in a low
tone, “and if you really are anxious to have me go over.
to the clubhouse grounds this afternoon, and it’s all right
with Mr. Burke, I'll go. But I won’t promise to play
until I see how matters stack up on the diamond. How
does that strike you?” ee

“Get your hat, Len, and come along,” answered Mer-
riwell, pleased to secure even that much of a concession
TOMS atau ea
 

  

NEW TIP

CHAPTER V.
PLAIN ENGLISH.

Clancy and Ballard were not successful in ‘rounding up
all the fellows Merriwell had asked them to see. On such
short notice, however, they did very well.

Jerry Spink, who was-bookéd for left field, had gone
to the Tin Cup Ranch with an important letter for his
father, who was part owner of the cattle outfit. He was
expected back some time Thursday, and the boys left
word for him to report at the clubhouse by two-thirty
Thursday afternoon, if he got back in time.

Benaway, picked for one of the reserves, was a clerk
in the general store and post office. The proprietor of
the store had sent him to a placer mine to collect a bill,
and it was expected that he would return some time dur-
ing the evening. A message was likewise left for him.

Shaw was down with tonsilitis, and he set up a terrible
wail of disappointment when he learned what was going
on, and realized his inability to help out.

Barzy Blunt, Mose Handy, and Lin Reckless were all
the fellows Ballard and Clancy could get together. Spink
and Benaway would be on hand the following day, how-
ever, without fail.

The six lads, brimming over with enthusiasm because
of the game scheduled with Gold Hill, reached the Ophir
clubhouse at about four-thirty. Neither Merry, nor any
of those he had gone to see, had arrived.

“Chip will be along before many minutes,” said Clancy.
“Let’s get a couple of balls and begin limbering up on the
diamond.”

They were hard at it when the Bradlaugh car halted at
the clubhouse and unloaded Mr. Bradlaugh, his son, Han-
nibal—who had been picked up on the way through town
—Jode Lenning, and Merriwell.

The party came onto the athletic field by a passage be-
tween the end of the clubhouse and the gymnasium.
Merriwell was first to come into view of those on the
diamond.

“Hoop-a-la!” shouted Barzy Blunt, waving his cap.
_“Here’s Chip with the rest of the bunch. You can bet
a ripe persimmon he wouldn’t 3

The rest of the cowboy athlete’s remark did not appear.
Words suddenly froze on his lips. Just behind Merri-
well was Lenning, and for Lenning, Blunt had no use
whatever.

“Suffering cats!” muttered Blunt, as soon as he could
recover the power of speech. “Say, Ballard, why is that
no-account juniper trailing Chip?”

Clancy and Ballard had kept quiet about Merry’s de-
termination to work Lenning into the nine. They had a
feeling that their chuni’s move was to prove distinctly
unpopular, and they fought shy of mentioning it. The
secret would soon be out, now, and Clancy and Ballard
awaited the result with a good deal of trepidation.

Blunt was a firm friend of Merriwell’s, but when fate
gave him Blunt for a surname she indicated his character
unerringly. He was blunt of speech and had a hot tem-
per, and it was a habit of his to flash out his’ feelings
in plain English, with small regard for consequences.

Nor was the cowboy the only one on the diamond who
had been jolted into silence by the sight of Lenning.
Handy and Reckless likewise manifested all the symp-
toms of severe frost.

_ Clancy and Ballard tried to save the situation by a little
joshing and horseplay. It was a half-hearted attempt,
Wh ! :

“3

f

 

TOP WEEKLY.

however, and could not make a breach in the forbidding
wall with which Blunt, Handy, and Reckless had sur-
rounded themselves.

Merry was quick to sense the chill in the air, and he
hurriedly seconded the efforts of Clancy and Ballard to
put matters on a better footing. Brad, on the ride out to
the clubhouse, had had several minutes to accustom him-
self to the presence of Lenning. Loyally he rallied to
Merry’s support. Brad’s father, also, did what he could
to ease off the tension.

“Hello, fellows!”’. Frank called good-naturedly. “I
wonder if you’re all as hungry to get after the horsehide
as lam? This game with Gold Hill suits me right up to
the handle. Barzy, you look like a three-time winner.

Handy, you look as fit for the national game as you did

for the gridiron, a few weeks ago.
how’s tricks?” —~

In this breezy fashion, Frank strove to smooth out the
disagreeable twist in the situation. Lenning was there
by his persuasions, and he felt that the fault would be his
if the lad was humiliated in any way.

“I think we owe a vote of thanks to Colonel Hawtrey
and Chip Merriwell for this chance to clash with Gold
Hill on the diamond,” piped Brad. “We’ve got to work
like the dickens, though,*if we get in shape for the game
between now and Saturday.”

“You must all pull together, my lads,” put in the gen-
eral manager significantly.

Neither Blunt, nor Handy, nor Reckless had a word to
say. After their first cool scrutiny of Lenning, they pro-
ceeded to ignore him.

“Where’s the wonderful Mexican backstop, Chip?”
queried Clancy,

“Couldn’t get hold of him to-day,’ Frank answered,
“but he’ll be along to-morrow. What about Spink, Ben-
away, and Shaw, Clan?”

Clancy reported/as to the three players Merry had men-
tioned.

“That’s tough about Shaw,” Merry observed, “but, on
the whole, we’re making out a good deal better than I ex-
pected. I can depend on you fellows, can I?” ' The ques-
tion was aimed particularly at Blunt, Handy, and Reck-
less.

Reckless, old chap,

“I reckon you can, Chip,” drawled Blunt, a gleam of
temper playing in his sloe-black eyes. “How have you »

fixed the make-up of the team?”

“You’re down for second, Barzy, and if they hit me
too hard you'll probably have to move up to the pitcher’s
box.”

“That’s a joke,” and the grin that half formed itself
about the cowboy’s lips led Merry to think he was for-
getting Lenning. “You’re the best amateur twirler in
these parts, and if you can’t handle the Gold Hillers
there'll be no use calling'on me. I’m satisfied to hold
down the second bag. You and this greaser from the
mine will be the battery for Ophir, eh?”

“Probably. Clancy’s at first, Handy’s at third, and
Brad: goes to short. Ballard, Spink, and Lenning will
be in the outfield.”

Here Handy proceeded to take part in the conversa-
tion. “Lenning?” he echoed.

Merry faced around and gave Handy a square look,

“I said Lenning would be in the outfield,” he remarked.

“Oh!” Handy grunted. That was all, but if ever a
monosyllable shook its rattles and got ready to strike that
one did, >

i he as.

 

 

 

 
 

   

ere

 

 

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+2 Sa Fe ew
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ea

Aves cg Nee

 

 

 

 

  
   
   
 
  

   

He was

The nature of Lin Reckless belied his name.
canny, and just at that moment realized the value of

holding himself in check. He had both balls, and he began
juggling them with one hand, and whistling softly.

“T reckon I might as well tune up my bazoo and go
on record right here, Chip,’ said Blunt. “You ought
to know, by now, that I never walk around a ten-acre
lot in order to call a spade an agricultural implement. I’m
not going to do it now. I’d hate myself for a-month of
blue moons if I ever played ball w ith a snake in the grass
like Jode Lenning. Instead of leaving Reckless on the
bench, you can put him in the outfield. Lenning will
have his hands full looking after that job you got for
him, if I’m any prophet.”

It was a barbed shaft, and Lenning squirmed when it
struck him. His face went white on the instant.

Frank’s face was almost as white as Lenning’s. With
a quick move he placed himself alongside the lad under
discussion. Before he could speak, Handy broke in.

“Blunt’s got it about right, Chip,” said he. “I don’t
want to hurt Lenning’s feelings, or put you in any sort of
hole, but I can’t see w hy you should expect us fellows to
play ball with Lenning.”

“T expect you to have some consideration for me,” said
Frank hotly, “even if you haven’t any for Lenning. He’s
here by my invitation. I have asked him, just as I asked
you, to help make up the nine. If you don’t want a

‘team, and don't care for a game with Gold Hill, say so

here and now, and we'll declare it off.”

Merriwell resented, with all the force of his nature,
these flings at Lenning. He felt that his anger was get-
ting beyond control, and he was glad that Mr. Bradlaugh
took a hand in the matter at that moment.

“You ought to know better than to talk that way,
Blunt,” said Mr. Bradlaugh. sharply. ‘And you, too,
Handy. Merriwell is getting the team together, and you
ought to have enough confidence in him to approve of
whatever he does.”

‘Whenever I’ve got anything on my mind,” answered
Blunt, “I try to get rid of it in plain English, Now that
I’ve had my say about Lenning, I'll drop in a few words
for Chip. You’re the clear quill, pard,” he went on to
Merry, “and I’d fight for you any day you can find in
the almanac; but when it comes to associating with a
crook and a schemer, I reckon I’ve got a right to pick and
choose for myself.”

“Sure you have,” approved Handy.

Reckless was still whistling and juggling the two balls.
He seconded everything that Blunt and Handy were say-
ing, but felt that some consideration was due Merriwell
in the matter, and declined to express himself.

“It’s a darned shame,” blurted out Brad indignantly,
“that you two chumps couldn’t have talked this over pri-
vately with Chip instead of shooting off a big noise where
it will do the most harm. You make me tired!” and he
turned on his heel and walked off.

Truth to tell, the helpless writhing of Jode Lenning was
more than Brad could endure. Lenning himself suddenly
turned and moved away in the direction from which he
had come, his head bowed dejectedly.

“Blunt,” said Merriwell scathingly, ‘
ought to be ashamed of yourselves. Is it your style to
jump on a fellow when he’s down? If I put into this
plain English you’re harping about all I think of you two
it would be different from what you’ve said about Len-
ning, but it would sound a whole lot worst.
\

‘you and Handy

NEW. TIP TOP WEEKLY.

You might

    

have had the common decency to keep still while Lenning
was around,”

The vigor with which Merry expressed himself rather
startled Blunt and Handy. But Frank was not yet done.

“Look back a little in your own life, Blunt,” said he
meaningly. “I guess you will find something there that
7 help you to understand how you have made Lenning

eel,”

The cowboy fell back a step, with twin devils blazing
in his eyes. Merriwell’s words had probed a sore only re-
cently healed, and for a second Blunt felt all the old
agonizing smart caused by the rongh handling. Then, as
quickly, his rage passed.

“I reckon you got me there, Chip,” said he. “I went
a heap farther with Lenning than I meant to, but that’s
how I feel.”

Frank did not answer. Turning, he hurried after Len-
ning, vanishing between the end of the clubhouse and
the south wall of the gymnasium building.

‘Fine business, I must say,” growled Ballard. “If this
kind of a spirit lasts up till next Saturday, I can see where
we get off.”

“Tt won’t last,” said Handy. “Lenning’s out of it now,
just as he ought to be, and everything is all right.”

But Mr. Bradlaugh shook his head forebodingly.

9

CHAPTER VI.
GETTING THE NINE IN SHAPE.

Lenning was well started on the trail to Ophir when
Merriwell overtook him.

“T’m mighty sorry,’ was all Frank could say,
dropped a hand on the other’s arm.

‘You see how it is, Merriwell,” Lenning returned, in
a tense voice, lifting his pale, drawn face for a quick look

as he

. at his companion.

“Yes, I see how it is,” Frank acknowledged. “I had
no right to put you in that position.”

“T should have had sense enough not to come. Don’t
blame yourself any. And don’t find too much fault with
Blunt and Handy. I mixed the dose for myself, and it’s
no more than right that I should swallow it.”

During the walk back to town Frank did what he could
to soothe Lenning’s injured feelings. Lenning listened
quietly to his talk, and really seemed in a better frame
of mind when he and Frank parted in front of the Ophir
House. .

While waiting for Clancy and Ballard to arrive, Frank
had ample time for a little hard thinking on the veranda.

At first he had been tempted to throw up the pro-
posed game with Gold Hill and have nothing further to
do with it. He was beginning to see now that such a
move on his part would be childish.

He had had ample warning not to try to drag Lenning
into the baseball game. He had gone ahead in spite of
the warning, and for the disaster of the afternoon he
alone was to blame.

When his reflections took stock, of Blunt and Handy,»
he felt the hot blood beginning to pound in his veins.
But this was childish, too. Lenning, not so very long

before, had given ev erybody abundant excuse for think.

ing of ‘him just what Blunt and Handy thought. \

After all, Lenning was only paying the score he had
run up. It was a debt he had to meet. When he was
through with the battle, he would be all the better for a
few scars to remind him of it.
 

   
  

   
 

  

IO

This train of thought put Frank himself in a more
tolerant mood by the time Clancy and Ballard got back
to the hotel. They went in to supper together, and, by
tacit agreement, dismissed the incident of the afternoon
without any further discussion.

On the following morning there came a grind at the
books under the eagle eye of Professor Borrodaile; then,
after dinner and early in the afternoon, Frank and his
chums went out to the baseball grounds and were greeted
by the whole team, as originally selected by Frank, with
the exception, of course, of Lenning and Shaw.

Mexican Joe was introduced to Frank by Brad. Joe
was of about the same height and build as Jode Lenning,
and, in addition, the two had a facial resemblance that
was most remarkable. Naturally, the Mexican lad’s face
was of a swarthier hue, and this of itself made the differ-
ence between them most pronounced,

While -Benaway and Reckless pounded out flies and
grounders for most of the team, Merry and Joe were off
to one side warming to the work with jump balls, drops,
and curves. Merry showed a skill and control that caused
the Mexican backstop to open his eyes, and Joe, on his
part, convinced Merry that he was all that Mr. Bradlaugh
had cracked him up to be. |

That Thursday afternoon’s work brought Frank en-
tirely under the spell of the game—the sport he loved best
of all. For weeks he had not had the leather sphere in
his hands, and now the very touch of it thrilled him
through and through.

On first meeting Blunt and Handy, Thursday after-
noon, Frank was conscious of a feeling toward them that
was distinctly unfriendly; and_they, on their part, had
as little to say to Frank as possible. But when, at five
o'clock, a grand rush was made for the bathrooms in the
gym, the magic of baseball had wrought its work, and
every member of the team was full of hope, and enthusi-
asm, and friendly consideration for the rest of his team-
mates. Merriwell, Blunt, and Handy met and mingled
just as they had always done, and just as though the dis-
agreeable incident of the preceding afternoon had never
happened. ?

This is not to say that Frank had forgotten Lenning,
for such was far from being the case. He was still sorry
for the friendless chap, and still eager to do him a good
turn. What is more, he believed more firmly than ever
that many barriers between Lenning and his former
friends might be leveled if Lenning ‘could have a part
in Saturday’s game. It was queer how that conviction
persisted and intensified in Merriwell’s, mind.

Friday afternoon the Ophir nine played a game with
a scrub team. The second nine was poor, for Merriwell
had gathered in all the good material, and the regular
team had no difficulty in running up a good, big score.

More and more Frank was pleased with the excellent
work of Mexican Joe. The backstop was about as talka-
tive as a cigar-store Indian. He played silently, swiftly,
surely, and his signals showed such an intelligent com-

_ prehension of the right balls that Frank’s admiration was
aroused.

_“You’re a corker, Joe!” he declared, slapping the Mex-
ican youth on the back when the afternoon’s work was

 

NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY.

over with. f

A gratified smile crossed Joe’s swarthy face.

“You more of a corker as me,” he averred, and so

eased himself of the only remark he had made during an
_ hour and a half of hard work.
fyi e 4 Wie.

vi J

When Frank and his chums got back to the Ophir
House, late that Friday afternoon, they were all tired,
but happy and confident.

“We've got a fast nine,” declared Ballard, “and we’re
going to put it all over that Gold Hill team. You hear
me |”

“They’re a snappy lot, no two ways about that,” agreed
Clancy. “I hate to give Darrel, Bleek, Hotchkiss, and the
rest of that outfit the sort of a jolt they’re due for to-
morrow, but if they’re bound to have a game they’ll have
to take the consequences.”

“That’s right,” said Merriwell. “They’re going to make
it pretty interesting for us, though, and it’s just possible
that they’ll open a bag of tricks that will surprise us.”

“What sort of a pitcher is Darrel?” queried Ballard.
“It’s mighty odd that, all the time he was with us up
Mohave Cafion, he never let out a peep about being a
ball tosser.”

“He’s good,” asserted Merriwell.

“How do you know, Chip?” demanded Clancy.

\““T know because Darrel’s the sort that doesn’t do things
by halves. If he set out to learn to pitch, you can. bet
he has trained his ‘wing’ in a way to make us sit up and
take notice. There'll be an exciting time on the ball
ground to-morrow afternoon. Bank on that, Red.”

“I'll be disappointed if there isn’t, Chip,” grinned
Clancy, “but you and that greaser marvel are going to take
care of Darrel and Bleeker, with ground to spare.”

“T hope you're right.” .

“T know I’m right! When Darrel opens his box of
tricks, Chip, he’ll find that you have got a few on tap that
are just a little better.”

“Thanks, old man,” laughed Merry. “It would be hard
for me to do any worrying while you’re around,”

“Everything’s going swimmingly, Chip,” remarked Bal-
lard, ‘“‘and there hasn’t been a hitch since—since Wednes-
day afternoon.”

“That’s the trouble,” Frank answered.
Pink, that the luck is too good to last.”

This remark of Merriwell’s proved to be prophetic. A
blow between the eyes was dealt Merry less than an
hour after supper.
close to being one.

The blow arrived by messenger from the Ophir Mine,
and was neatly wrapped up in a note written by Burke,
the superintendent. Merriwell was alone on the veranda
at the time the message came to hand, and he drew up
close to a lighted window so that he could see to read it.

At first he was dazed, and could hardly believe that he
read aright. After rubbing his eyes, he perused the note
a second time. Then it was that the dread news burst
upon his realization like a thunderclap.

“Blazes!” he gasped, crushing the note in his hand and
looking around despairingly. ‘‘What the mischief are we
going to do now? On the last day, and in the afternoon,
too! Why in the deuce couldn’t——” He bit his words
short and tossed his hands deprecatingly. “But it couldn’t
be helped, it couldn’t be helped!” he muttered. .

“I’m afraid,

 

Gloomily enough, he walked to a chair at the far end

of the veranda and slumped down into it. Who'd have
thought, that such a thing could happen? The Ophir
club, it seemed absolutely certain, was going to meet its

‘Waterloo! There did not appear to be a possible way

out of that tangle of hard luck.

W hile F rank was sitting there among the deep shadows.
of the véranda and floundering helplessly in a mire of re-.

It wasn’t a knock-out, but it came.

 

 

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and that he’s out of the game for good.

in front of Lenning. That fixed it.

flections, a horseman galloped up to the hitching pole in
front of the hotel, swung to the ground, buckled his reins
around the pole, and then bounded lightly up the veranda
steps.

The light from a window, shining over him, showed that
he was a mere lad. His face was open and frank, and a
mat of thick, curly hair fringed the bottom of his cap.

He paused on his way across the veranda to the hotel
entrance. The figure in thé chair, at the far end of the
veranda, had caught the newcomer’s eye. Muttering an
exclamation, he started toward the youth with the bowed
head and hopeless air.

“Hello, Chip, old pal!” the lad cried. “What are you
doing out here all by your lonesome?”

Merriwell, at the sound of that voice, was on his feet
in a twinkling.

“Darrel, by Jove!” he exclaimed, happily surprised.
“What brings you to Ophir, Curly?”

“Business,” laughed Darrel. “I’ve got a letter for you
from Colonel Hawtrey.”

“T hope there’s no bad news in the letter. Hang it all,
I’ve had enough bad news for one night!”

“Nothing serious, Chip?” queried Darrel solicitously.

“T guess it wouldn’t strike you as being serious,” Merry
returned, with a short laugh. “Say, Curly, how’d you
like to have Ophir present you with that game to-
morrow?”

“T wouldn’t like it. I don’t want Ophir to present us
with anything but the hardest game we Gold Hillers ever
played. Do that, Chip, and I’ll be blamed if I care who
wins. But read this letter,” Darrel broke off, handing the
missive to Merriwell. ‘‘When you have done that, we’ll
hold a powwow. I’ve got something to tell you, pard,
and like enough it will surprise you. I don’t think the
colonel has written anything that will give you much of
a jolt.”

“Tve had my one big surprise for to-night, Curly,”
said Merriwell, with a rueful laugh, “so I guess that any-
thing you can spring won’t take me off my feet.”

He withdrew to the window to read the colonel’s letter.

When he had finished, he turned back to Darrel, with a |

low whistle, which proved that there must have been some-
thing surprising in the letter, after all.

CHAPTER VII.
HATCHING A PLOT.

“You know what there is in this letter, Curly?” Frank
asked.

“Pretty nearly,” was the reply. “Uncle Alvah is afraid,
from something he has heard, that you’re going to have
Jode Lenning in your team. If that is your plan, he sin-
cerely hopes you’ll reconsider ; for the move would arouse
resentment in Gold Hill, and might lead to the canceling
of the game. You know, of course, that Lenning’s past
record is all against him, that he’s a vicious young scatmp,
and so forth, and so forth. Isn’t that about what the

colonel wrote to you, Chip?”

* “Just about,” Frank answered glumly.

“I heard, although I don’t know how straight I got it,
that some of the Ophir chaps refused to play with Jode,
Is that right?”

“There were objections when I tried to get Lenning on
our nine, and Blunt and Handy aired their grievance right
Lenning. couldn’t
go on when he saw how those two felt about it.”

NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY.

 

“What’s the naatter with Blunt and Handy?” demanded
Darrel, his voice quivering witla anger. “Are they so all-
fired righteous that they can’t associate with a fellow who's
trying to live down his past?”

/Darrel’s attitude set Merriwell to wondering. He had
suffered at his half brother’s hands more than any one
else, and yet here he was, apparently championing his
cause and taking his part.

“It’s hard to tell what’s biting Blunt and Handy, Ellis,:
said Frank. “Looks like they’re trying to make out that
they’re ready for harps and halos, while they’re only
convincing people that they’re snobs, with little, two-by-
four dispositions that are anything but heavenly.”

“Well, even at that, the feeling against Jode is pretty
general, isn’t it?”

“There are more than Blunt and Handy against his play-
ing ball to-morrow, but the rest have the decency to keep
their objections to themselves.”

“Tsn’t there any possible chance for getting Jode into
the game, Chip?”

Darrel spoke earnestly, almost eagerly.

“Do you mean to say, Curly,” asked Merriwell, “that
you'd liké to see him play against Gold Hill?”

“T’d like to see him give a good account of himself on
the diamond. He has squared away, and is trying to make
something of himself. I think it would help him to brush
up against fellows who used to be his friends, and corral
a little of the good feeling that breaks out in a snappy,
well-fought game of ball.”

“Well, Pll be darned!” muttered Merriwell. “What
would the colonel say if he heard you talk like that?”

“T don’t know as that would make any difference. I
think a heap of the colonel, Chip, but I haven’t reached
the point where he does my thinking for me. I’m not
sore at Lenning. We have had our differences, and I’ve
managed to come out on top. Jode is the under dog, and
now that he’s trying to be white, I’d like to help him.”

“Put it there, Darrel!” cried Merriwell heartily, thrust-
ing out his hand. “I wish Blunt and Handy were here
to absorb your sentiments. Hearing you talk like that
ought to make them feel pretty small.”

“The colonel wanted me to come over to Ophir to-
night,” went on Darrel, “in order to get that letter into
your hands. You know the sort of a fellow Uncle Alvah
is. He’ll crowd a chap mighty hard if he’s given half a
chance. He’s more bitter against Jode than he ever was
against me—and I reckon you know what that means.

I’ve argued with him to give Jode another chance, but.

he’s as hard and set in his way as the rock of Gibraltar.
You can’t budge him. There’s only one thing that might
pull him over a little in Jode’s direction, Chip.” '

“What’s that?”

“You know how- wrapped up the colonel is in every
sort of sport? Well, his biggest favorite of all the sports
is the national game. He’s the most inveterate fan that
ever came down the pike. What’s more, he’s too good a
sportsman to be much of a partisan. Naturally, he likes

to see the Gold Hill fellows win; but to-morrow, if an ’

ee chap makes a star play, you'll find the colonel
cheering himself blue in the face. Simmer the thing
right down, and it’s the game itself he loves—the man in
the box with the clever ‘wing,’ the chap who makes a
running catch with all the odds against him, the fellow who
steals and slides to the bag, keeping the base on a close
decision. You understand what I mean, Chip, a heap bet-
ter than I can tell it. That’s what gets under the colonel’s

/

     

——

   
   
   
  
   
    
   
   
 
   
   
   
   
   
   
  
    
  
   
  
  
  
   
   
  
   
   
    
  
    
    
    
   
  
     
   

      
       
       
       
     
     
       
       
 

NEW TIP
skin. A little, snappy baseball, and he’s sure to bring his
best side uppermost.”

“IT don’t get you exactly,” said Merriwell. “What has
the colonel’s love for baseball to do with Jode?”

“Tf Jode’s in the game, and makes good with a few star
plays, it will start the good suggestions to working in his
favor. See what I mearr?”

By a queer twist of the imagination, Merriwell began
thinking of the thermometer which Clancy, had manipu-
lated on the veranda of the Ophir House, two or three
days before. The colonel’s very words, in commenting
on the thermometer incident, recurred to Frank: “Start
a train of suggestions properly, and, if they lead in the
right direction, you can mold nearly any one to your
will.” Was that foolish little joke of Clancy's to bear
fruit in the affairs of Jode Lenning?

“T see what you mean, all right, Curly,” said Frank,
' “but Lenning has told me that he doesn’t care to curry
any favor with the colonel. He has decided to make his
fight single-handed, without putting himself under obli-
gations to any one. Good idea, too, strikes me.”

“What he’d do in that ball game, Chip,” declared Dar-
rel, “is part of his fight. He’d not only impress the colo-
nel, but a rush of true sportsmanship over the diamond
would blot out all the hard feelings Jode’s old friends are
holding against him. Just one snappy double play, in the
last of the ninth, with the score tied and the bases full,
might make or mar Lenning’s whole future. Maybe it
seems foolish to talk like that} but human nature is a queer
problem, Chip. I’ve studied it a little, and there are times
when it only takes a mere trifle to start a flood of senti-
“ment moving in a right or wrong direction.”

“T think you’re right about the things that are liablé
to happen during a ball game, Curly,’’ Merriwell answered,
“but would luck favor Lenning? Is he a good enough
player so that he could confront an issue like that and
make good ?” ‘

*“Jode? Why, he’s one of the best ball players in this
part of Arizona, An all-around player, Jode is. I’ve
known him to pitch a no-hit game, to put up one of the
smoothest performances as backstop that I’ve ever seen,
to play first, and short, and all around the diamond in a
way that made everybody sit up and stare. He knew that
baseball was the colonel’s favorite game, and he studied
and worked to perfect himself in it.”

“More to make a hit with the colonel than anything
else?” '

*T suppose that was his real motive at that time. Since
then, though, everything has changed.”

“Well, admitting all that this game might mean to Len-
ning, how are we to get him into it?”

“That’s what I came over here to talk with you about.

_ By all means, Jode must play, Couldn’t you make a de-

cided stand in his favor? If you threatened to quit, your-

_. self, unless Jode was given a chance on your team, I think
_ all the objections would melt away. Don’t you?”

“T don’t want to get any player into the game by making
threats,” demurred Merry. “That’s not my style, any-
how, Curly. And, even if I took such a stand, Lenning
himself wouldn’t put up with it. There’s such a feeling
against him that he’s made up his mind to stay out of
_ the game. Up to now, I’ve given him a whole lot of credit
_ for that,” ee ireee ay te ;

“Somehow,” insisted Darrel, “we’ve got to have Len-
ning play.

TOP WEEKLY.

Frank walked back and forth the length of the shadowy
veranda, racking his brain to evolve some expedient or
other that would fit the case. Suddenly the message from
Burke occurred to him, and he whirled on Darrel and
thrust the crunipled note into his hand.

“Read that, Curly,” said he. “Maybe it opens up a
situation which can be used to help Lenning. I’m giving
you a lot of information about our troubles, but I guess it
won't hurt our chances much. The whole thing is a
mighty delicate matter, and will have to be handled with
gloves.”

“T’'ll handle it,” returned Darrel, “if you give me a tip
as to what to do.”

He stepped over to the lighted window and slowly read
the message which had caused Frank so much chagrin
and disappointment. Darrel turned from the window with
a puzzled face.

‘“What’s the idea?” he asked. “I don’t exactly grasp
it, Chip.”

“Why, I had thought that, if it could be arranged, a
substitute——”

“Strike me lucky!” gasped Darrel. ‘“That’s just the
thing, by George! Say, Chip, that idea is a, humdinger!”

“T don’t know about that. The success of it hangs on
a good many contingencies. You'll first have to win over
Lenning to the scheme

“Leave that to me. He works nights, doesn’t he? I'll
go over to the mine and see him the moment I leave
hete.” .

“Then, again,” said Merriwell gravely, “there’s a sug-
gestion of trickery about the move that I don’t like.”

“Trickery nothing! It’s strategy, that’s all. Consider
the motive, Chip. The play is being made for a good
purpose—a purpose that could not be accomplished in any
other way.”

“Well, it’s up to you, Curly. You belong with the
other team, and if you’re willing to put the deal through
I don’t see why I should object.”

“Don’t worry about that. I’ll have a good, long talk
with my half brother, and I’ll bet I can make him see
things as I do.”

Darrel was full of generous enthusiasm. With a final
word for Merry, he darted down the veranda steps, un-
hitched his horse, mounted, and bore away in the direc- |
tion of the Ophir Mine.

The plot had been hatched, and Darrel had gone ac-
tively to work to carry it out. Were they right or wrong
in taking the stand they had done? Merry fretted over
that part of it for a little while, and came to the conclu-
sion that if Darrel, the captain of the Gold Hill team,
thought the proceeding was justified, then no one else had
any reason to complain, bh

Half an hour later, as Merriwell crawled into bed, he |
was taking an optimistic view of events to come, The dis-
appointment that had come to him with Burke’s message
would be obliterated by the success of Darrel in carrying
out their plot. And, somehow or other, he had a feeling
that Darrel was going to be successful.

CHAPTER VIII.
THE DAY OF THE GAME.

The whole of Saturday, Frank and his chums had
planned to devote to that contest with Gold Hill. Morning
dawned bright and cloudless ; but that 1s not saying much, —
for bright and cloudless mornings prevail in southern

 

 

 
   

 

icattle ranges and the mining districts.

 

Arizona for three hundred and sixty days out of every
year,

This was a land in which summer sports were to be
enjoyed the whole year round. For those who liked that
sort of thing the climate had its appeal, but Merriwell
and his friends were beginning to think that the rigor of
frost and snow, at the usual time, would form a pleasant
change in that monotonous round of balmy weather.

Saturday was free from the grind which, for five days
in the week, the professor insisted on during the hours
from eight to twelve. Nearly the whole forenoon, there-
fore, Merriwell was free to spend on the clubhouse
grounds,

All his players had presented themselves, with the ex-
ception of Mexican Joe. It was around Joe that the plot
which concerned Lenning was to revolve, and the absence
of the catcher caused Frank some apprehension.

There was a little practice on the diamond, but not
enough to tire the players, and some time before noon,
Merry, Clancy, and Ballard were back at the hotel. Al-
ready people were beginning to arrive in town for the
game. They came afoot, on horseback, and in buck-
boards and mountain wagons.

There were miners and ranchers, Indians, Mexicans,
and Chinamen. The Bar Z Ranch, where Blunt worked,
sent a big delegation of cowboys—and they were all there
to root for Barzy.

News of the game had traveled like wildfire over the
Young Merriwell
had been pretty much in everybody’s eye during the time
he had sojourned in Arizona, and much of the outpour-
ing wasdue to a desire to see the lad who had proved
himself such a worthy chip off the old block.

‘As a sporting event, the baseball game promised to
be Merry’s farewell performance. This, in itself, was a
powerful lure in gathering the crowds.

As early as one o’clock the movement set in from
Ophir toward the clubhouse and the athletic field. The
game was not called until three, but the eagerness of the
people to secure good seats led them to make an early
start for the grounds,

“There'll be some crowd on hand to see us land on
the Gold Hillers, Chip,” remarked Clancy, as they stood
on the hotel veranda and watched the flow of people along
the main stteet of the town.

“Or to see the Gold Hillers land on us,” Frank
laughed.

“Not at all, not at all,” insisted the red-headed chap.
“Tt would be too awful if we got stung at this athletic
game just before we shook the Arizona dust from our
brogans for good. Here, where we have been consistently
victorious, we must wind up our activities with a success
that will, eclipse all the others. Victory shall perch on
the Ophir banners, to the end that finish coronat opus may
be justly exemplified. I repeat, friends and fellow citi-
zens, that———”_.

“Choke off that old windjammer, Chip!” begged Bal-
lard, coming out on the veranda at that moment with his
suit case. “He’s got a notion that he’s making a public
speech.” 7
“T’ve got other notions, Pink, if it comes to that,’ said

Clancy, giving his chum a look of intense disapproval.

“One of them is that you're little Billy Buttinski, and

_ spoil many a good thing because you're jealous.”

“Jealous—of you? Why, you red-headed snipe
“Tut, tut!’ interposed Clancy, waving his hand re-

 

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ee ie ee

    
  

strainingly, “men have been shot for less than that. But
don’t push me too far, Pink, don’t push me too far.”

Ballard was about to reply, keeping up his end of the
good-natured give and take, when he caught sight of some
one hurrying toward the hotel along the sidewalk.

“Here’s our prize greaser, fellows!’ he announced.
“Wonder why he wasn’t around this morning?”

‘Knows he didn’t need the practice, I guess,” answered
Clancy. “If the rest of us can measure up to the
standard set by him and Chip, Gold Hill won’t get a score
across the pan.”

Frank got his eyes on the approaching backstop and
watched him keenly and Critically, The appearance of
the lad was the first intimation he had had of the success
of Darrel in carrying out the plot of the preceding even-
ing. Now, as his eyes followed the catcher along the
sidewalk and to the steps of the veranda, Merriwell ex-
perienced a thrill of profound satisfaction. Darrel, it
was evident at a glance, had done his work wonderfully
well.

Clancy and Ballard had not been taken into Merry’s
confidence regarding that note which had arrived from
Burke. Had they been with Frank at the time of its
receipt, very likely they would have been given the whole
disturbing message. Later, after his talk with Darrel,
Frank was glad that his chums were in ignorance of
Burke’s note. Now he was purposely keeping them in
the dark. ‘

“Howdy, Joe!’’ shouted Clancy.
husky as a keg of nails.”
The other’s swarthy face parted in a! genial smile; but,

“You're looking as

true to his taciturn disposition, he had nothing to say in

reply.

“Think we’re going to win, Joe?” queried Ballard, by
way of testing the catcher’s confidence.

The other ducked his head emphatically.

“That’s right, Joe,” grinned Clancy, “I wouldn’t talk
if it’s painful. If you’d only learn the deaf-and-dumb
alphabet you could express yourself with your hands. I
believe you'd be a fluent talker if you’d use your fingers.”

The catcher continued to grin expansively, but could
not be coaxed into doing any talking.

Merriwell had been watching Clancy and Ballard with

2)

sharp eyes while they were concerning themselves with

the backstop. An expression of humorous relief crossed
his face, and he reached out, caught the newcomer by the
arm, and drew him to one end of the veranda. From
the motions the two indulged in, Clancy and Ballard could
see that they were going over the signals.

“I don’t see the use of that,” grunted Clancy. “Joe had
’em down pat yesterday afternoon, and it’s a cinch he
wouldn’t forget ’em this quick.”

“Nothing like being sure,” said Ballard.

For nearly half an hour, Merriwell and the catcher
continued to go through their signals and to converse in
low tones. At the end of that time, Mr. Bradlaugh came
along in his car to take the lads to the grounds.

“All aboard, my lads!” he shouted.

As they piled into the car, Frank noticed that Mr.
Bradlaugh was eying the catcher with a strange, dubious
expression. [or a moment Frank experienced a thrill
of dismay, but he was reassured the next moment whe
Mr. Bradlaugh remarked: |

“Joe wil: show them to-day what a real high-class fel-
low behind the bat can do in helping to win a game. I

+

 

   

       
   
   
   
 
   
    
  
  
  
  
   
  
  
  
  
   
  
   
  
   
   
  
    
  
   
  
  
    
 
   
  
 
    
 
  
      
         
       
     
       
       
     
       
 

14 NEW

hear that you’re more than pleased with your catcher,
Merriwell?”

“T am,” Frank answered, with emphasis.

When the car reached the grounds, grandstand and
bleachers were crowded. Automobiles were lined up be-
yond the stand, and every point that commanded a good
view of the diamond was filled.

Gold Hill was well represented, and more than half of
the grand stand was occupied by stanch supporters of the
rival team. Gold Hill and Ophir did a lot of friendly
joshing back and forth, and the yells and cheers rang in
Frank’s ears as he got out of the car and hurried to the
dressing room in the gym.

All the rest of the men who were to play with the
Ophir team, or to sit on the benches as substitutes, were
clad in their uniforms, and were waiting for Frank and
those with him to arrive. They were greeted warmly,
and Blunt slapped the backstop on the shoulder as he
passed him with his dingy old suit case.

“We're expecting great things of you, you old greaser
wonder!” exclaimed the cowboy.

“That’s what, Joe!” seconded Handy.

“And you’re not going to disappoint us,” added Reck-
less. “I know that just as well as I know that I’m
alive.”

The catcher’s reply was a wide smile, hut not a word.

As ‘he passed on and vanished into the dressing room,
~ Merriwell also smiled—but it was a smile of another sort.

While Merry was getting into his baseball togs, a din
of frenzied cheering was borne to him from the grand
_ stand and bleachers. He knew, from the mere volume
of sound, that the Gold Hill team had appeared from

_ their dressing rooms under the grand stand, and had scat-

tered over the diamond to warm up.

A few moments later, Merry stepped out among his
players, gathered them around him, and calmly scruti-
nized their flushed and eager faces.

“We've had two days of practice, fellows,” said he,
“and we’re going up against a team that has been in
harness for weeks. But don’t let that bother you. It’s
- the spirit you put into your work. that counts. Be on

your toes every minute. Come on!”

He flung open the gym door, bounded through it, and
started at a trot toward the ball field. The backstop was
at his side, and close at his heels trailed Clancy and Bal-
lard. After them came the rest of the team.

A broadside of cheers went up ftom the spectators.
Gradually the volume of sound separated into staccato
notes and pauses, and clear and high rolled the chant,
“Merry, Merry, good old Merry!”

Frank flushed. He wondered what that crowd would
think if it knew what “good old Merry” had up his
sleeve?

Off to one side, Darrel and Bleeker were working out.
Both waved their hands in friendly greeting to Merriwell,
as he and his swarthy-faced catcher began their prelim-
inary practice.

While passing the balls to his companion, Merry was
taking note of the work of the Gold Hillers. It was
snappy, and quick, and true, and the way the horsehide
flashed around and across the diamond was enough to
_ make the Ophirites wonder a bit how that game was going
_ to come out. “*

‘Darrel called in his men, and Frank sent the Ophir
players into the field. Then began an exhibition which

“a

a41P* TOR WEEKLY:

was not calculated to inspire much confidence in the Ophir
partisans. Blunt muffed a throw from the home plate,
Spink juggled a fly that had been lifted right into his
hands, and Brad and Handy crashed together in trying
to smother a low drive, and caused a ridiculous flurry be-
tween third base and second. Everybody seemed bent on
showing just what a poor performer he could be, on
occasion, and there were more jeers than cheers while
Ophir was warming up.

Frank was thankful to have the comedy of errors cut
short by the umpire, who had produced the little paste-
board box and was shaking the new ball out of it. The
backstop was getting into his chest protector and turn-
ing his cap, preparatory to putting on the mask. An-
other moment, and Frank was in the pitcher’s box and
the umpire had tossed him the white sphere. ‘Play ball!”
came the command.

GHAPTER FX:
POOR SUPPORT. »

Frank was perfectly cool and composed, and never
more thoroughly master of himself than when he stepped
into the box. He knew that fate had played him up
prominently while he had been in that part of the coun-
try, and that what fate had failed to do the florid imagina-
tions of a good many people had been quick to accom-
plish.

Many of the spectators, no doubt, expected to find in
young Merriwell a pitcher who was half a wizard and half
a magician. . Frank realized that onlookers of this class
were due for a severe disappointment. He was glad of
it, for he had no patience with the wild stories about
him which had been flying over that section of the
country.

Bleeker was the first man to toe the plate for the Gold
Hillers. Clancy, from first, had to do all the ragging,
for the backstop remained as silent as usual.

“Now for the first victim, Chip. This is Bleek. You
know Bleek? Well, he’s going to look pretty bleak when
you get through with him. Start the circus!”

“Don’t be hard on your old friends, Chip,” grinned
Bleeker.

There was an air of jaunty confidence about Bleeker
which suggested three-baggers and home rufs. Frank
believed that this was a good place to take a reef in
Bleek’s aspirations.

He led off with a jump ball, and the speed behind it
made the spectators jerk themselves together wonder-
ingly. The sphere spanked into the backstop’s mitt with
a report like that of a rifle. Somewhere, on its erratic
course Bleek had taken a swat at the deceptive object.

“Strike!” shouted the umpire.

A chorus of jeers went up from around the diamond.
Bleek, hardly realizing what had happened, stood looking
foolishly at the end of his bat.

“Wake up, old man!’ warned Darrel from the bench.
“Mind your eye, and don’t reach for the wide ones.”

From ‘the way Merry startedethe next ball it looked —

like it was going to be another lightning express, but when
it crossed the plate it was jogging along like a slow
freight. Bleek, expecting something speedy, smashed at
the sphere before it was within a yard of him.

“Strike two!” barked the umpire.

A roar of laughter floated out over the field from thee

Ophirites in the grand stand and on the bleachers,

 

     

 

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cuffed it down and snapped it to first.

NEW

    

“What’s the use?” “He can’t see
‘em !”

“Pound it on the nose the next time, Bleek!”
Gold Hiller.

“Kall it! Kult it!”

“Baste it out!”

Bleeker nerved. himself for a supreme attempt, but in
vain. Merry handed him an inshoot which found the
hole in his bat, and he tramped to the benches with a
flush of chagrin.

“Merry’s certainly all to the mustard,” he grunted, as
he dropped down among his teammates, ‘“He’s got some
fancy capers that will fool the best of ’em. If Hotch con-
nects with the ball it will be an accident.”

“Watch Merriwell, fellows,’ urged Darrel. “See how
he does it, then maybe you'll be ready for him when you
go in for your own stickwork.”

Obedient to orders, the Gold Hill players studied Merry
and tried to get “wise” to his curves. But, just as they
thought they had discovered something, they saw some-
thing else that proved the supposed discovery wasn’t any
discovery at all.

Hotchkiss, second baseman for the Gold Hillers, was
the next man up. He was a left-handed batter, and
Frank, who could pitch equally well with either hand, fell
back on his left wing. .

“Jumpin’ tarantulers!’’ boomed a cowboy.
him, will ye? He’s usin’ his south paw!”

The first was a lightninglike bender, which coaxed a
strike out of Hotch.

“That’s the way to start °em, Chip!” cried Brad.
two, three—that’s the style.”

“Darn it, Chip,” cried Hotch, “why don’t you gi’ me
? Ain’t you a friend o’ mine?”

yelled some one.

begged a

“Watch

“One,

a chance?

The catcher signaled for a wide one, but Motch was
making good use of his eyes, and allowed it to pass.

The third cut a corner of the plate. Hotch fouled it
back of third base, and had the second strike called on
him.

The next signal called for a drop. Frank started it
pretty high, and Hotch grinned and shook his head.
Then he looked dazed when the umpire called him out.

“Rotten |” grunted Hotch, throwing himself down be-
side Bleeker. “That last ball was over my shoulders.”

“You're wrong, Hotch,” answered Bleek. “It was
lower than that. Now, El,” he shouted, as the captain of
the team went to bat, “lace it out. For the love of Mike,
show Merriwell we’re alive.”

Darrel just managed to do that. He connected with
the second one over, and Merry smothered it without
leaving his tracks.

The Ophirites began to whoop and howl. Their boys
were making good, and they jubilated as only miners and
cowboys can.

The first man to face Ellis Darrel for Ophir was the
backstop. He stepped into the batter’s box with a smile,
and cheerfully rapped out the first one over. A fellow
named Dart, who played shortstop for the Gold Hillers,
The ball beat
the catcher by a yard,

“Tough luck, Joe,”
ping to the plate.

commnisserated Clancy, , himself step-
“Now,” he called, “put one over, Dar-

_rel, and*I’ll show you what I can do.”

Darrel had good control and plenty of speed. Clancy
decided to let the first ball pass, and then listened while
the umpire called a strike on him.

Bie AGE: WEEKLY.

your toes, everybody.

  

“Don’t go to sleep, Red,” laughed Bleeker.

“Just getting waked up for. the next one,’
Clancy.

“Here she is.”

Clancy sawed the air, and spank went the ball in Bleek’s
mitt.

“Not waked up yet?’ jeered Bleek.
How long are you going to wait?”

“T guess I’ve waited long enough,
his bat met the next one on the nose.

It sailed over Darrel’s head, was muffed by Hotchkiss
at second, then picked up and sent to first like a streak
of greased lightning. It looked, from where Merriwell
sat, as though Clancy had beat it out. But the umpire
decided otherwise, and the crestfallen Clancy jogged
away to the bench.

Merriwell was next.

“Be easy with this one, El,” suggested Bleeker.

“It would be a feather in my cap if I could fan him,”
laughed Darrel.

“That’s been done a good many times, Curly,”
well grinned.

The first ball was a strike. It looked a little wide to
Frank, and he did not reach for it.

The second ball was a wide one, and so was the third.
The fourth ball was just about where Frank. wanted it,
and he smashed it for a couple of bases.

“Whoop!” roared Barzy Blunt; ‘‘we’re off, we're off!
Three tallies, pards!
less than three runs this inning.”

Ballard was the next one up.

chuckled

“Well, well!

32

said Clancy, and

Merri-

Merriwell stole third,

and he’d have got home if Ballard had given him a

chance. But Ballard fouled once back of the home plate,
and then struck out.

“That’s awful, Chip,” groaned Ballard,
pitcher’ s box on his way to center field.

“Never mind, Pink,” answered Frank. “We're hitting
Curly, and next time we’re at bat I believe we'll dé some-
thing.”

Lenaway, left fielder for the Gold Hillers s, was the next
man to confront Merry.

“Remember what you did before, Chip!” called Clancy.
“Don’t try to hog the whole game yourself. Start a man
this way and give me a chance to limber up. Start some-
thing, old man.”

Lenaway swung at the second ball. He must’ have
caught it on the handle, for it dropped in front of the
plate and rolled briskly down toward Clancy, just inside
the path.

“Tt’s mine, Chip!” yelped Clancy, and darted at the
rolling sphere.

The red-headed chap booted the ball, and by the time
he had laid hold of it, Lenaway was roosting comfort-
ably on first. Frank had run to cover the base, He now.

passing. the

went back to the miound, wondering what in the mene fe.

had got into Clancy.

“Wow!” cried Lenaway. “You can handle a paddle, g
Red, a heap easier than you can field a grounder.” .

“Don’t talk to me,’ ’ grunted Clancy, in a spasm of self-
reproach, “I’m sore enough.”

“Well, return the ball so I can take a lead.”

“There it goes,” and Clancy tossed the sphere to Merry.

“Now, then,’ shouted Darrel, coming down to the
coaching line back of first, “nobody down, fellows! On

    

I'll not be satisfied with anything —

Ginger up, and we’ll make a show-
 

 
  
 

 
   
 

 

  

ing. Go down toward second, Len—go on! I’m here
to keep you out of danger.”

Dart, the shortstop, picked up a bat and stepped to
the plate. Merry got him for three balls and two strikes,
and then Dart lined one out toward Brad. It was an
easy one, but Brad’s fingers were all thumbs, and the
ball went through him like a sieve. The fielder raced in
and picked up the ball, whipping it over to second just
an instant too late. Dart reached the bag, and Blunt,
apparently, forgot that Lenaway was on third.

“The ball, Barzy!” cried Merriwell.

Sudden realization of the fact that the man on third
had taken a dangerous lead toward home startled Blunt.
He threw to the plate instead of to Merry, and he threw
wild. While the catcher was chasing the ball Lenaway
got across the first score, and Dart went to third.

There was much glorying in the Gold Hill section of
the grand stand. No one out, one run, and a man on
third! Certainly the prospects were gratifying.

Mingo, the Mexican first baseman, follgwed Dart to
bat. Merry struck him out, and then cepstiteealy fanned
Rylman, the third baseman. Doolittle, right fielder, belied
his name, and hoisted a fly to Spink in left field. Spink
played beanbag with it, dropped it, picked it up, then
dropped’ it again. During the farce, Dart darted home
and Doolittle gained second.

Stark, center fielder, fanned, and Dooiittle died on
third. But ragged support had given the Gold Hillers
_ two runs. The swarthy-faced backstop pulled a long
face and Merriwell walked to the bench, trying to figure
out the errors inthe first half of the second. They were
so many that he had to give it up.

CHAPTER X.
WORSE—AND MORE OF IT.

Colonel Hawtrey was flying around the Gold Hill sec-
tion of the stand, now and then rising in his seat to cheer
or to hand a little good- natured raillery to his friend, Mr.
Bradlaugh.

“Thought you had some ball players over here, Brad-
laugh,” he shouted, while runs were crossing the pan for
Gold Hill.

“So did I,” laughed the general manager. “The game’s
young yet, colonel. Wait till we’re a little farther along.”

“You fielders have got to take a brace,’ Merry was
saying to some of his teammates. “Clancy, I’m surprised

at you! Brad, I wonder how yout father enjoyed that
play of yours? Now, then, all get together and do some-
thing.”

Brad, who was first at bat, tried hard to retrieve him-
self. Perhaps he tried too hard, for overanxiety is worse
than not being anxious enough. Yet, be that as it may,
his little pop-up was bagged neatly by Dart, and Brad

_ turned from the path to first and made for the bench.

Then Blunt tried for a hit, but Darrel was pitching
- ball, and nothing happened. Handy followed, and
_ managed to get to first, but Spink spoiled all his chances

by getting a grounder to Rylman and being thrown out
at first.

Bleeker was up again in the first half of the third.
_ Frank had made up his mind, by then, that he and the
backstop would have to do most of the work, and he
was pitching ball that made the fans open their eyes.
He did not allow a.man to reach first, but struck, them out
as fast as they came to the plate.

NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY.

-clared Colonel Hawtrey,

 

In this round, which added a goose egg to the Gold
Hill score, Ellis Darrel was included.

Reckless, in the last half of the third, aroused Ophir
hopes by dropping the ball into left'field. Lenaway made
a grand effort to get under it, Wut it slipped over the ends
of his fingers.

“Now, Joe,” begged Blunt, as the catcher picked out his
bat, “bring Reckless in, and come in yourself.”

The backstop smiled genially, and proceeded to sacri-
fice Reckless to second. He almost got to first on the
bunt, but was called out by the umpire.

“Now, do your prettiest, Clan,” urged Merry.
never have a better chance to do something.”

“Watch me, that’s all,” grinned *the red-headed chap.
“FHere’s where I make up for some of my errors.”

Then an awful thing happened. Clancy hit a long fly.
The coacher thought the fielder couldn’t possibly get it,
and started Reckless to third. But the fielder, making a
magnificent running catch, took the ball in out of the
wet and whipped it to second.

That was all; and the best chance Ophir had yet had
to score was lost. The Gold Hillers began to sing, and
some of the more demonstrative marched in a procession
around the grand stand, using their megaphones to “rub
it into” the Ophirites.

The score remained two to nothing. By magnificent
work, Merriwell and his swarthy backstop continued add-
ing ciphers to the Gold Hill score, but they were not able
to get any runs for themselves.

“Something’s bound to happen yet, colonel,” said Mr.
Bradlaugh, in the second half of the eighth. “TI shouldn’t
wonder if the balloon would go up about here.”

“The score would have been twenty to nothing,’ de-
“if Merriwell and that Mexican
catcher hatin’t stood like a wall between our boys and
first. By Jove! I never saw steadier or more clear-headed
work, and right in the face of the worst support I ever
heard of. You can thank your battery, Bradlaugh, for
getting off easy this afternoon.”

“Perhaps,” answered the general manager hopefully,
“we'll be able to thank our battery for more than that.”

“T can admire your grit, anyhow,” laughed Hawtrey,
“even if I can’t applaud. your judgment. You are right
about one thing, though, sradlaugh : A game is never
finished until the last man is out.”

The Gold Hillers, who had hoped to roll up a big
score, Were now contenting themselves with merely hold-
ing their opponents. Two runs would be enough. They
would win one of the hardest games ever contested on
the Ophir diamond.

“We've got to have three tallies, fellows,’ was the
word Frank was circulating among his men. “All to-
gether, now! We've fooled with these Gold Hill chaps
long enough.”

Frank was cheerful, even sanguine. Even when Dar-
rel fanned the first three men.to come to bat, Merriwell
continued to cheer up his discouraged teammates.

“We're going to win,” said he confidently. “I’ve got a
hunch to that effect.”

“Pretty soon it will be too late to start,”
gloomily.

“It’s never too late to start,. Pes so long as the under
dog has a chance to bat.”

‘Well, we’ve only got one more chance.”

“That will be enough—providing we improve it.”

“Vouw'll

returned Blunt

During the first half of the ninth, Gold Hill came within

 

 

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a hair’s breadth of getting another run.

-he was either nervous or discouraged.

NEW

 

A throw to the
plate, relayed to Merriwell and passed to the backstop,

~ who made a marvelous catch and tagged out the runner,

was all that prevented the score from coming in.
“Who made that throw from deep center?” shouted
Colonel Hawtrey, rising in his seat.
“Ballard, Merriwell’s chum,” some one replied.
“Bravo, Ballard!” cheered the colonel. “Now you’re
playing ball! And you Mexican boy, down there!”
The Ophir catcher, with a queer movement, turned

-and looked up at the colonel.

“That was fine, do you hear?” went on the colonel en-
thusiastically. “I must shake hands with you for that.”
The backstop turned on his heel and walked to the

_ benches with bowed head.

“It’s about over, Bradlaugh,” said the colonel, lifting
his voice high in order to be heard through the buzz of
conversation that surrounded him. “So far as results are
concerned, we could just, as well leave now.’

“Don’t be in a rush,” answered Mr. Bradlaugh. “TI
still think something is going to happen that will turn
the tide in our favor.”

“Hope springs perennial in the breast of the baseball
fan,” laughed Hawtrey.

“Merriwell gets to bat in the last half, °
thing.”

“How do you figure that ?” demanded Hawtrey. “Spink
is first up, then Reckless, then Mexican Joe, then Clancy.
Merriwell comes after that. What chance has Merriwell
got to do any stickwork? Three will fan before his turn
at the plate—Darrel will look out for that.”

“Maybe Darrel will slip up in his calculations,”
general manager doggedly.

He'll do some-

said the

With his hands thrust deep into his pockets, Mr. Brad- ,

laugh sat in growing hopelessness while Spink and Reck-
less fanned. It looked as though it was all over. Many
of the Gold Hillers in the automobiles began to toot their
horns triumphantly, and to prepare to leave. Those in
the grand stand and on the bleachers were already con-
-gratulating each other.

With two out, the swarthy Beckaics was leading the
forlorn hope. What could he accomplish, in the face of
defeat that seemed absolutely certain?

There was nothing about the catcher, as he picked up
his club and stepped to the plate, which suggested that
He was there to
do his best, and thoughts of failure did not seem to bother
him in the least.

No one, not even the Ophirites, had much to say to
the backstop. It seemed, to almost every one except Mer-
*riwell and the catcher, as though the game was irretriev-
ably lost. Merry and the catcher, however, were still

‘hoping against hope.

Darrel, perhaps too confident of victory, allowed a
ball to cross the plate just about where the catcher wanted
it. With a crack that sounded like the report of a rifle
he lifted the horsehide far out between left and center.

The smack of bat against ball at once claimed the atten-
tion of the crowd.
tho who were on the point of tiaiag stood in their

acks and faced around to follow proceedings on the
diamond.

“It’s only a flurry,” the Gold Hillers said to each other.
“There are two out, and not a ghost of a chance for Ophir
tying the score. They’ re dying hard, though.”

Stark, in center field, managed to pick up the ball and

DP! POP: AEE RY.

‘Darrel shot a ball across the plate.

to fling it in. He was so quick with it that the catcher
was prevented from making a try for third.

Clancy was the next batter. His flagging hopes had
been revived. After him came Merriwell. If Clancy
could only make good use of the swatstick, a whole chain
of gorgeous possibilities would flash through the murky
skies that encompassed Ophir.

“Keep your nerve, Clan,” called Merry. “Remember,
it’s all up to you. Lace it out, old chap. Not that way,”
he added, with a laugh, as the nervous Clancy swung at
the sphere and missed.

Clancy ground his teeth, and into his wildly’ beating
heart there entered the determination to do or die.

Again Darrel sent the ball at him. The bat moved a
little in his hands, but did not come down.

‘ “He had a.notion!’’ some one yelled, as the umpire
called a ball. “Coax him again, Darrel. He can’t get
a hit!”

Once more Darrel “wound up,” and let the ball go.
This time,'to the dismay of the Ophirites, Clancy cracked
it out. It sped hotly past the pitcher, and was finally
scooped up by short.

The complexion of affairs had changed. The back-
stop was on third, and Clancy was hugging first. Handy
went down to the coaching line. Merriwell, a smile on
his face, stepped to the plate.

“All I want is a good one, Curly,
sew up the game right here.”

A wild commotion broke out among the spectators.
Those who had started to leave sat down again, and
some who had left crowded back into the grand stand.

Was it possible, every onlooker was asking himself, that

>

said he, “and we’ll

Ophir could snatch victory from the jaws of defeat in

such a spectacular manner ?

Merriwell was at the bat. Here was the point that
aroused the wildest fears of Gold Hill, and the fondest
hopes of Ophir.

CHAPTER XI.
WON IN THE NINTH.

Nerves, everywhere around the ball field, were drawn to
breaking tension. On Merriwell alone depended the for-
tunes of the day for Ophir.

It was the last half of the ninth inning. There were
two out and two on bases. A hit by Merriwell would
certainly bring in the catcher, and, if the hit happened
to be a two-bagger, a couple of scores might be put
across the pan.
the Ophirites' allowed them to go.

Ellis Darrel was keyed up to the highest pitch of
achievement. If he could strike out Merriwell—some-
thing which he had not been able to do so far—the dan-
ger point would be safely passed. He made up his mind
that he would fan him.

It was something which Darrel hated to do. There
was no one whom Darrel thought more of, or to whom
he owed a greater obligation, than Frank Merriwell,
junior.

With face a little white and eyes gleaming restlessly
It was not the sort
of a ball Merry wanted, so he let it pass.

A discontented murmuring came from the wild-eyed
Ophirites as the umpire called the strike.

There was silence in the crowded grand stand, over
the bleachers, and among the automobiles, All eyes were

: /

 

pela a ke Sos

 

This is as far as the wildest dreams of

 
  
 
  
   
  
   
  
    
  
   
  
  
  
  
  
   
  
   
  
  
  
   
  
  
   
    
  
  
  
   
  
   
 
  
  
   
   
 
  
  
  
  
    
   
   
       
      
      
     
         
      
   
   
        
 
  
   
 

18

fixed, as by a weird fascination, on the trampled ball
field, holding the players steadily under gaze, and keep-
ing nervous track of the base runners and of the lithe,
slender figure holding the bat.

Darrel let fly with another ball.
third one delivered was also too far off to-count.
next one

Merriwell, with a terrific swing, met it.squarely, With
a.smack that could be heard for half a mile in the quiet
air, the bat started the ball skyward.

Wild cheers broke from the crowd, and the hardest
cheering* was done by Colonel Hawtrey. What did he
care how that magnificent hit might benefit Ophir at
the expense of Gold Hill? He had just witnessed the
finest example of pluck in the face of overwhelming
discouragement which it had ever been his lot to
observe.

“Go it, Merriwell!” shouted the old colonel, hopping
up and down and thrashing his arms in the air. “See
how many bases you can tear off before the ball comes
in.”

It was wide. The
But the

 

“There’s the greaser, spilling over the home plate!”
howled a delirious voice. 5

“And here comes Clancy! Hoop-a-la! Watch him
go. That red head looks like a comet.” «

Blunt was standing up on the players’ bench, roaring
at the top of his voice. What'fie said, however, was lost
in the general hubbub.

While Claney was covering the ground as though it
burned his feet, the fielders were scrambling to get the
ball. Farther and farther out they went, clear down into
the distant oval.of the cinder track.

Clancy came home—the score was tied.
ball was not coming back.

“Come in, Merry!” howled a hundred frantic. voices.
“Come in! ‘You’ve knocked out a home run!”

This was really the case. The voices of the coachers
were drowned in Merriwell’s ears, and he had to keep
track of the ball himself. He was disposed to play
safe. In the face of the general yell for him to get in

the winning tally, however, he plunged for home with all
the speed that was in him. By then the ball was com-
ing, and those who had shouted for Merry to finish his
circle of the bases were beginning to feel sorry that their
ardor had carried them away.

The ball was relayed from second by a_ beautiful
throw. Bleeker nabbed it and reached for Merry. But,
at that moment, Merry’s feet were on the plate.

“Safe!” bellowed the umpire.

That was the signal for bedlam to be turned loose.
There was still a chance for Ballard to bat, but the
game was won, and what was the use of prolonging the
agony ?

Spectators scrambled into the field and a rush was

-made for the panting and dusty Merriwell. Those who
could not get near Merry rushed at Clancy, and those
who failed to reach Clancy made a set at the swarthy
_ backstop.

It was remembered that honors were due equally to
the three lads who had brought in the runs. It was the
eatcher who had started the batting rally, and had he
not got a hit there would have been no chance for
Clancy. and Merriwell.

_ Colonel Hawtrey was one of those who had failed to
eome close to Merry and Clancy and had turned to the
backstop.

Still the

 

NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY.

“My boy,” said he, his voice a-thrill with excitement,

“you started a bit of the finest and most sportsmanlike ,

work I have ever seen pulled off on a ball ground. I
wish to congratulate you, and .

The colonel paused. The streams of sweat, which
were pouring down the backstop’s face, were leaving little
gutters of white in the swarthy hue of his cheeks.

‘You're not a Mexican!” exclaimed the colonel.

“No,” agreed the youth, standing his ground. “I never
said I was a Mexican, colonel.”

“That voice!” gasped Hawtrey, recoiling. ‘That a

He suddenly ceased speaking. His face hardened and
his eyes became two glowing points of white-hot steel.

“I know you!” went on the colonel savagely. “You
couldn’t get into the game by fair means, and so you
disguised yourself, smearing your face with some kind
of stain to make you look like a Mexican. You double-
dealing scoundrel! You i

Just at. this point Darrel stepped to the front and
thrust an arm affectionately through that of his half
brother.

“Don’t blame Jode for it, colonel,” said Darrel.
the one who engineered the scheme.”

“And I’m the one who helped you,”
up on Lenning’s other side.

Colonel Hawtrey passed a dazed hand across his fore-
head.

“Do you mean to say, Ellis,’ he muttered, “that you
—you admit having deceived me?”

 

 

 

“Tm

said Merry, moving

“T admit persuading Jode to fix himself up as Mexican

Joe,’ answered Darrel. “It was his only chance to get
into the game, you see. He had to come in as Mer-
riwell’s substitute, although posing at the same time as
Mexican Joe.”

“Why did you want him in the game?” ‘demanded the
colonel.

“We wanted to see him do some good work and win
back your friendship and that of a few of the lads who
have turned against him.”

“Perhaps he has succeeded,” said the colonel coldly, ~

“but it is a case of double-dealing which I will not
countenance.” aa

Hawtrey, elbowing the crowd aside, started toward the
clubhouse,

“IT say, colonel!” called Mr. Bradlaugh.

“Tm going to town, Bradlaugh,” said the colonel,
without looking back. “If you want to see me, it will
have to be at the Ophir House.”

“Don’t fret, boys,” said Mr. Bradlaugh to Merry, Len-.
ning, and Darrel. “He'll feel better after a while. I'll
see what I can do with him.” oe

With that Mr. Bradlaugh hurried after his irate friend.

CHAPTER XII,
THE PLOT THAT FAILED,
“You can see what’s happened, Darrel,” said Lenning,
turning with a weary air to his half brother. ‘The

colonel is down on me worse than ever; and he’s down
on you, too.” .

   

Merry, Darrel, and Lenning were surrounded by a _

crowd about equally composed of Gold Hill and Ophir
players. The revelation that had stripped the mask from

the supposed Mexican Joe, leaving in his place the friend- —

less Jode Lenning, had come as a stunning surprise.

“I'd like to know something about this, Chip,” said |

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i Ballard.

; “Tt strikes me that you haven’t been square
> 4 e with us.”
©. | “He was as square as he could be, Pink,” answered Dar-
a _ rel. ‘After the plot was hatched he couldn’t very well
| give it away, could he?”
4 ; “Where the deuce is Mexican Joe?” asked Clancy.
i

“T got a note from Burke last evening,” Merriwell ex-
| claimed, “which informed me that Joe had been called
_ suddenly back to the bedside of his sick ‘relative. That
| put me strictly up against it, till Darrel blew in and

| but without telling any one the difference.”
t “T had a hard time getting Jode’s consent,” said Dar-
| rel, “but finally, more to please Chip and me than any-
ye _ thing else, he agreed. I secured that stain for him in
town, and B urke got him some clothes that looked enough
- Tike the greaser’s to pass muster. He was a pretty close
i imitation of the real thing, eh, fellows?” Darrel laughed,
' slapping his half brother heartily on the back.
aq . “JT should say so!” exclaimed Clancy. “Why, we had
| the real Mexican with us for a couple of days, and yet
I couldn’t see any difference between the two.”
Nor I,” “said Ballard. “Lenning was a dead ringer

- for Mexican Joe.”

“What was the plot aimed at, Chip?” asked Blunt.

“It was aimed at you fellows and the colonel. We

thought Lenning would make such a good record in the

- game that he would win the approval and good will of

the colonel and the, boys from Gold. Hill and Ophir.
Ba But,” Merry finished regretfully, “I guess we made a

| miss of it, and that the plot failed.”

aa “Not much it didn’t fail—that is, not entirely,” Blunt

_ resumed. “Lenning has shown himself a good deal of

| aman, by jumping into this thing like he did, and I for

4 + one feel as though I had made a blamed fool of myself.”

He turned to Lenning. “Will you shake hands,” he asked.

A gratified smile wreathed itself about Lenning’s lips.

“You bet I will, Blunt!” he exclaimed. “The plot
certainly worked out all right if it gave me Barzy Blunt
for a friend.”

“Shucks!” grunted Blunt, deeply iiched: “T reckon
~ I acted like a coyote, t’other day, when I allowed I
ed wouldn't haye, you in this nine of Chip’s. I’m sorry I

tuned up like I did.”

“Just forget it, Blunt,’ smiled Lenning.

“T feel a good deal the same as Barzy does,” spoke
up Handy. “If it hadn't been for you, Lenning, drop-
ping into our tedm as a substitute for the Mexican, I
reckon we would have lost out. Will you shake with

me?”
oN And, beginning right there, Jode Lenning held an im-
promptu reception. Reckless was next to grip his hand
after Handy had released it; then came Clancy and Bal-

lard, and every player that was left in both teams.
- “T guess you fellows didn’t fall down on that plot, after

all,” laughed Clancy. “You made good on the diamond,
Lenning, and that has shown a few of us what pesky
idiots we were.’
“JT want you to understand, fellows,”
his voice trembling and his eyes misty, “that I appre-
ciate your show of confidence in me. I have turned over
a new leaf, and I’m not particularly anxious to curry
any favor with Colonel Hawtrey. I gave him cause to
treat me as he did, and I don’t want him to think
Tm sneaking around, trying to get him to take me back
and help me. I wouldn’t go back if he offered to take

 

 

   
  
   

 

 

  

said Lenning,

  

  

  

ae 2 _ suggested that Lenning be substituted for Mexican Joe, ©

NEW TIP TOP ‘WEEKLY. : 19

me. I’m earning my way now, and I want to be inde-
pendent.”

“That’s the talk!” approved Barzy Blunt.

“Come on over to the gym, fellows,” called Merry,
“and let’s get under the showers. I think we'll all feel
better for a bath and a rubdown.”

“Tt’s like going home, EI,” Lenning whispered to Dar-
rel, with a catch in his voice.

Silently Darrel’s arm went around his half brother and
tightened affectionately.

The plot may have failed in so far as it coacuitied
Colonel Hawtrey, but in other ways, equally far-reaching,
it had been a success

THE END.

“Frank Merriwell, Junior, Justified; or, The Lad Who
Cleared His Record,” is the title of the story that will ap-
pear in the next issué of this weekly. The stage between
Gold Hill and Ophir is held up and robbed. Suspicion
points to Jode Lenning, who, with the aid of Chip Mer-
riwell, has been trying his hardest to be square and clear
up his unenviable record. Jode is thus put in a bad
light, and you will read with the greatest interest to learn
how he clears himself, and, when, later on in the story, a

chance is given him to show that he has fought down and

conquered his yellow streak, how he rises to the situa-
tion. The issue is No. 20, and it will be out Decem-
ber 7th.

Bob Storm in the Line;

By ENSIGN LEE TEMPEST, U. S. N.

 

SYNOPSIS OF PRECEDING CHAPTERS.

Bob Storm is a. plebe at Annapolis, He incurs the enmity
of “Handsome” Cantrell, an upper classman, by turning the ~
laugh on Cantrell when the latter tries to haze him. Though |
he has never played football before, Bob makes the plebe team.

CHAPTER VIL.
HOLDING HIS END.

When, on Saturday afternoon, the plebe and youngster
elevens trotted onto the football field in all the glory of
their canvas war dress, they found that quite a crowd
had gathered to witness the first game of the season.

Bob Storm’s classmates were massed over toward the
Severn; they were making the afternoon hideous with
their vigorous class yells. From behind the opposite side
line, the youngsters howled back sarcastic remarks anent-
plebeians, and called upon their champions to swab all
such from the earth.

Here and there were splotches of color where laughing-

eyed Annapolis girls stood, bewitching the surrounding
solid walls of middies. ~

After a short while of warming up, Captains Craddock
and Winston met and tossed a coin. The plebes won,
and selected the northern goal, with a slight wind in their
favor. There was a leisurely line-up for the kick-off.

Then, with the thump of Crab Craddock’s toe against
the leather, the game was on! The ball sailed up and
then sailed down; landed plump in the arms of the plebe
full back, Bucky Hart. He punted it back on the wind.

Van Slyke, the youngster left half, caught it near the

      
   

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See ater

= ete caper ate ns en

center of the field and tucked it carefully under his arm

for a run. k

Bob Storm, as left end, was first down the field under
the ball. As he charged down upon Van Slyke, he thrilled
with the excitement of his first game. It was a sensa-
tion new to Bob; but as it was the stirring sensation of
battle, he loved it. At last, he thought, he was playing
football !

Van Slyke retreated from Bob toward his own goal.
Then he tried a head-on rush, hoping by his speed to
carry Bob off his feet; but Bob tackled him hard, and
clean, and low, throwing him toward his own goal for a
gain of a yard at least.

“Good work, Storm!” said Winston, when. he came up.
“That’s football you’re playing!”

And his captain’s words were music to the plebé left
end.

“Line up, men—line up!” The seven men in the plebe
line crouched low; the youngster fotwards faced them.
“18-29-43!” sang Pin Pennell, the youngster quarter.
The signal was for full back between center and right
guard. He opened his hands, received the ball, shoved
it against the pit of Crab Craddock’s stomach. And The
Crab went through the hole in the plebe line prepared
by center and right guard, like a circus performer through
a paper hoop. Bucky Hart pulled him down, but not
before he had made a good gain.

There was a quick line-up. This time, Right Half
Cantrell took the ball, and, with Pin: for interference,
darted around right end. Bob got by Pinnell and was
on the point of tackling Cantrell, when that youth put
out an open hand and shoved his face away. A yard
or two farther on, Cantrell was brought down by Ralph
Stafford.

So far, the youngsters had gained considerable. Now,

by a tackle-back play and a fake kick, they advanced the
ball down the field to the plebe thirty-yard line. The
youngster rooters were jubilant; a score seemed next in
order, But at the following down, Cantrell struck the
turf so hard when Winston tackled that the ball was
jarred from his hand, and before the youngsters could
recover it, Ralph Stafford swooped down on it, and, by
dashing, dodging, plunging, with Bob for interference,
carried the pigskin for a gain of twenty yards,

_ The plebe rooters rooted—and had reason to—for the
first time. If it did nothing else, the run revived the
' spirits of the plebe eleven. They had been swept by the
heavy youngsters down their own field; but now, with
the ball in their possession, they believed they might go
in and score. It looked that way when, by end runs and
the old, old crisscross, they brought the ball to the young-
ster twenty-yard line.

“Now we score!” said Left Tackle Hal Riggs to Bob.
“Sure! It'll be a touchdown for us! ~ But, say, didn’t
we fool them on that old crisscross! They’re a lot of
soreheads now!” | .

And, of a certainty, the confident plebes faced a dis-
_ gusted team, The youngsters thought, by all right and
reason, they should have scored before this.

“Look at Storm smile, Pin!” snapped Cantrell. ‘“He’s
got the swell head already !” LI

“Hold them, fellows!’ breathed Captain Craddock.
“Don’t let ’em score !” if
. Cantrell scowled beneath his leather head harness.
“Hold them?” he muttered to Pin, just before him. “No!

 

NEW. TIP® TOP: WEEKLY.

We've got to go through their line—get the ball from
them! It’s time we scored—not they !”

And when Quarter McCray snapped the ball to Ralph,
he sprang like a tiger at the plebe line, through the line,
at Stafford! Down went Ralph; out of his hands rolled
the ball! And Cantrell got it! He dodged Full Back
Hart, and, in so doing, ran plump into the arms of Bob
Storm, who had run back.
ously at Bob—and then he was prone on the ground!
Bob had spoiled what would have been, quite likely, a
long run, if not a touchdown!

“That’s the, way, Storm!” from his captain.

They lined up quickly. _ Cantrell received the ball. He
darted around right end. And again Bob Storm bulked
up before him. An ugly light shot to Cantrell’s eyes—
and he struck out with a clenched fist at Bob’s face!
A deliberate foul, Bob missed receiving it, missed know-
ing of it, even, in crouching beneath it for the tackle.

“You’re holding your end, Storm!’’ said Captain Win-
ston, when the smoke had cleared away, and Cantrell,
scowling angrily, had picked himself up from the ball.
“They won't score this half! We’re holding them, boys!”

The youngsters changed their tactics. They dropped
end runs. Craddock pressed the pigskin against his groin
and bent his body over it for a break through the line,
But the plebes were fighting, and, instead of finding a
nice hole prepared for him, The Crab found a swaying
human hedge.
ried the ball clear to the center of the field, where he was
tackled from behind by Bucky Hart.

After that run, the plebes lost heart somewhat. They
were swept back across their own field by the steady bat-
tering of the youngsters. Their own goal was looming
large and larger at every down; but the best they could
do was to keep their opponents from immediately scoring
a touchdown,

On their own twenty-five-yard line they pulled them-
selves together. The youngsters, trying another line buck,
found a human line of surf breaking toward them—and
they were pulled down for three yards lost! Then Can-
trell attempted an end run, to find that here, too, the
plebes were fighting tooth and nail.
feet | 3

The game had become spirited beyond the ordinary.
The plebes were desperately on the defensive. And, with
the goal not thirty yards away, they were stopping every
attempt of their heavier opponents to score.

But the youngsters knew a way out of the difficulty.
If they could not earn five points by a touchdown, they
could at least gain four from a kick from placement.
Handsome Cantrell, their crack half, dropped back; little .
Pin Pinnell lay on his stomach on the ground, cocking the
ball as Cantrell directed; the two lines drew away.

Then Cantrell ran forward; Pin slipped his nether
hand from under the ball; and the toe of Cantrell’s shoe
caught it just under the lacing. As if shot from a mor-
tar, the pigskin slid up on a long arc—and then down
over the white crossbar of the goal! Score: Youngsters,
4; Plebes, o.

When the air waves stirred up by the cheering of the

 

youngsters had settled somewhat, the teams were seen ° -

lined up for the kick-off. Bucky Hart did the honors -
for the plebes, whose turn it was. Right Half Cantrell

caught the ballon his own fifteen-yard line. Tucking it
neatly under his arm, he started for a run, with the whole —
field before him, But Bob Storm was in his way, first —

 

Cantrell’s eyes flashed furi- .

Te eu neF

Te

However, he hurdled the hedge and car- 4

He gained but four ©

  

 

 

  

 

  

 

  
  
 

   
   
   
 
 
 

  
      
    
   
   
  
   
  
     
     
  
  
  
  
 
        
      
         
    
   
         
      
     
      
     

 
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‘rest.

- sively.

off. Cantrell’s eyes narrowed, and, as he leaped aside
from Bob, he shoved out a hand. It was closed! And
it caught Bob sharply on the point of the jaw! He reeled
back, dazed!

When Bob became aware of things about him, he saw
Cantrell far down the field, with both teams hotfooting
it after him. Although he had no interference, he was
several yards ahead of the nearest plebe, Ralph Stafford;
so his touchdown was a foregone event before it hap-
pened!

Then how the youngsters cheered: “Cantrell! Can-
trell!” they yelled; and then: “Craddock!” when the
youngster captain made the score 10 to O against the
plebes by kicking a goal. When the whistle sounded the
end of the first half, it could hardly be heard for the
shouting.

A disgruntled .band, the plebe eleven trotted, weary-
legged, off the gridiron for the ten-minute intermission of
Their ears were ringing, as a sea shell, with the
cheers of the victorious youngsters.

“You’d think the game was already won,” said Bob dis-
gustedly.

_ @“It looks that way,” Ralph returned, without spirit.

“Well, if that’s so, I wouldn’t want to win it by the
methods Cantrell has. He wouldn’t have got by me for
that touchdown had he not slugged m r

“Slugged you, Bob! Jemima!—why didn’t you peach
to his umps?”

“Well, he didn’t call it, so I guess it passed him. And
what would have been the use? It was my word against
Cantrell’s, as you fellows didn’t appear to see \it. So:
‘I’m playing football,’ says I; ‘not evening up scores with
Mr. Cantrell. Time enough for that when the game is
over,’ ‘I says.”

Ralph didn’t attempt to conceal his admiration. “You
must have some hold on yourself, old man! I would
have slugged him back, first chance!”

 

CHAPTER VIII.
“NO GENTLEMAN !”

“Men, we've got to win!” shouted Jack Winston de-
cisively. He stood, waving a towel, on a chair in the
steam-choked room.
were being vigorously rubbed down by willing class-
mates, answered—if they answered at all—only with a
grunt, “We’ve got to win!” repeated Winston, more de-
cisively,

“Can’t win!” spoke up one plebe; and that was the
opinion of most.

“We've got to!” reiterated Winston, even more deci-
“Fellows, aren’t you going to take a brace! Are
you going to let those youngsters toy with us, as though
we were babes, and then give us the big laugh?”

“Not much!”

“That’s the talk, Storm!
play football—eh, men?”

“Sure!”’ chorused the ten—and felt better.

We'll show them we can

And de-

termined if they did not score they would at least hold

their heavier opponents to their present tally, the plebes
trotted out to the gridiron. The youngsters were there

. before them, smiling, confident, eager to begin the last

half and “swab the-earth” with them.

The kick-off fell to the plebes—and the soaring ball to
the youngsters, Cantrell, smiling superciliously, started
unning down the field with the leather beneath his arm,

NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY.

But the ten white-bodied boys, who

   

21

to all intents and purposes bent on going through the
entire plebe eleven, and, then and there, scoring a touch-
down.

But smiling Mr. Cantrell went down in the center of

the field—thrown by Bob Storm’s hard, determined tackle.

And the ball broke from his hands and rolled toward
Ralph Stafford, who was up and away with it before any
one realized what it was all about.

With Bob for interference, down the field ran the boy
with the precious ball—straight for the distant goal.
Wabbles Ford, the youngster right tackle, loomed up be-
fore them; but Bob blocked him off, and the boy with
the ball went by. Up came Half Back Van Slyke—to be
knocked aside by an open-handed blow from Ralph.

They were far, down the field, in fact, putting the fif-
teen-yard line under foot, when Full Back Craddock un-
fortunately got in their way—and Ralph went down. But
he had covered almost half the length of the gridiron,
and -was well pleased with himself when, bruised and ach-
ing, he picked himself up.

The field rocked with the wild huzzas of the plebes
beyond the side line, And, as the plebe eleven lined up
for the scrimmage, there was a broad, happy smile en-
graved on the face of each.

“Now, boys, we’re going to score!” cried Winston.

“Hold.them, men!” from Captain Craddock. “Play
close.”

McCray, the quarter back, sang out the signal for
a line break. He snapped the ball to Full Back Bucky
Hart. And Hart went through the youngster line for
ten yards!

“Good work!”
score!”

Five yards to the goal line! The youngsters, all con-
tempt for their opponents gone, lined up quickly, deter-
mined the plebes would not score, however near the
goal was. The plebes were just as determined, on the
other hand, and, as the odds this time were in their favor,
they carried out their determination,

Bucky Hart plunged into the youngster line again with
the weight of his team behind him, and rode over the
desperate youngsters and through the goal posts for a
touchdown! Ralph Stafford capped the climax to his
brilliant run by kicking a goal; and the score looked bet-
ter to the eyes of the plebes. It read: Youngsters, 10;
Plebes, 6.

But when, a short time later, Bob got the ball on a
fumble and carried it to the youngster thirty-five-yard
line, the plebes got too joyous to be careful. And on
the next line-up the now fighting youngsters broke
through their line for a desperate line break and got
the ball when Quarter Back McCray fell over back-
ward,

With the ball in their hands and a determination in
their hearts “to show those swell-headed plebes,” the
youngsters sent Cantrell around right end for a gain
of three yards. Then Craddock, thin but heavy, shot
through the plebe line, like a planet on a joy ride, for
fifteen yards.

A tackle-back play and two line bucks brought the ball
into the plebe country. Here the heavier team fell to
line bucking exclusively. They had found that the plebes
were no match for them in this.

The plebes, as they saw this, gréw hopeless. Their
light forwards went down like paper men before the
youngsters’ onrush. They could not hold the heavy

Winston shouted. “Now we _ sure

    
    

      
       
      
a aa teas te

youngsters. And back, back, back they retreated; fight-
ing all the time, be sure, but shoved right across their
own field.

At last the coveted goal loomed up ten yards away—
overhead, the dispirited plebes would have said. A try at
goal seemed next in order, but the youngsters wanted all
the points they could possibly get, and preferred to earn
the more valuable touchdown.

“Hold ’em, men! Only three minutes more to the
game! Don’t let ’em score this half!” and Captain Win-
ston, as he ran to his place in the line-up, patted several
of his forwards, who were bearing the brunt of the bat-
tle. But it looked like a forlorn hope: the goal but ten
yards away; the other team too heavy for them; their
own lack of hope and fighting qualities.

The little time remaining for play, that seemed the
only salvation to most of them. And yet how much and
how many things can happen in three minutes.

The youngsters smiled. Craddock received the ball.
With it pressed against the pit of his stomach, straight
into the plebe line he dashed. His whole team was be-
hind him; yet he did not go through. The plebes were
fighting—desperately—at the last ditch! He made to
hurdle the unyielding line. He rose; his knees were
pinned together; and he fell headlong. The ball rolled
off to the side—and toward the goal!

For a breathless instant, while the two teams struggled
in a mass, the pigskin wabbled peacefully toward the
goal. .Then Bob Storm, who as end rush was compara-
tively free, sprang for it. Cantrell and Hitchcock, the
youngster right guard, did likewise; but Bob was slightly
before them. Quick as a flash, with the ball hugged
tightly to his breast, Bob was away, with the whole fight
and field before him—away for the far-away goal!

Cantrell sprawled on the ground, grasping at empty air.
Bob dodged around Hitchcock, and at the next chalk line
met with Half Back Van Slyke. Van Slyke dived for
a tackle; Bob leaped aside; and Van Slyke’s hands just
brushed his shoes, as he sped onward. Pin Pinnell
spurted across to stop him; but, by an open-handed lunge
and a quick dodge, Bob got by him.

But the fairy tales had nothing on Bob. With danger
after danger surmounted, there was yet a new peril for
him to overcome. It rose, tall and thin, in the shape of
Crab Craddock, thé youngster full back. He, crouch-
ing, bestrode Bob’s way to that far-distant goal like a
hurdle, and, as with a hurdle, Bob, as he shot through
the air for a tackle, leaped up and over him!

Bob had carried the ball thirty yards! He had got by
tackler after tenacious tackler. Behind him lay twenty-
one startled middies; before him—far, far before him
—rose the goal. Bob ran for dear life in that direction.

He heard some one pit-patting after him. Although he
did not know it, it was Cantrell. And behind Cantrell,
according to their fleetness of foot, raced the entire field.
But the real race, Bob knew, was between him and his
nearest pursuer—Cantrell.

He passed the fifty-five-yard line, the center of the
field. With all the speed in his clean-limbed body, he
sped down the youngster end of the gridiron toward the
white posts of the goal. His long, well-muscled legs beat
over chalk line after white chalk line, and, with his body
swaying freely to their motion, he looked, perhaps, like a
Greek runner in some Olympic long ago. And close and
closer behind him ran Cantrell.

ean

no
7

NEW TIP TOP. WEEKLY.

4
On either hand was a hushed crowd and breathless. -

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Even the rooters forgot to root. Youngsters, plebes,
upper classmen, maidens—everybody—was intent on the
race down there on the “checkerboard.” They saw Can-
trell gain slowly on speeding Bob. They saw the thirty-
yard line shoot under Bob’s feet, with Cantrell but two
yards behind!

Bob could hear Cantrell breathing behind him—he was
that close! And he was coming closer! Bob, as he real-
ized it, began sprinting. Chalk line after chalk line sped
dazzlingly under him; but the crowd was a blur; the
white goal posts were the only distinct things in Bob’s
He felt himSelf grabbed from

eyes. He ran, ran, ran!
behind! He had instinct enough to throw himself for-
ward! His head hit something with a sickening thud;

and then, simultaneous with the sharp blast of a whistle—
darkness!

When Bob came to, he found himself lying against one
of the goal posts. There was a pain in that side of
his head, and, when he felt for the source of it, Bob
found alump., His teammates were crowded about, look-
ing down at him with joy plainly printed on their faces.
And Captain Winston was bending over him, sponging
his head with cold water.

Then Bob became aware of a deafening din. “Storm?
Storm! Storm!” it came in many varieties, and, judging
from it, Bob knew he had scored a touchdown. He re-
membered having heard the terminating whistle just as
he lost consciousness and before a goal could be kicked ;
so the score stood: Plebes, 11; Youngsters, 10. And,
after all, he thought, the plebes had won!

When Bob got to his feet, “You did the trick, Storm!”
cried Winston. ‘You won for us! Shake, old man;
you're a star!”

“You’re the candy, Bobby!” from smiling Ralph.

“IT. thought Cantrell had you every minute,” put in
Bucky Hart. “But then I didn’t know Bob Storm!”

“Yo’re the kid with the lump, Sto’m!” drawled Page
jokingly.

“Fellows, let’s put him on our shoulders!” cried little
Porter McCray; and, despite Bob’s struggles, it was
done. Around and around the field they carried him.
Plebes galore fell in behind, cheering madly for Bob.

The Annapolis maidens, from the side lines, waved
handkerchiefs at him, and even the youngster eleven, blue
though they felt at being defeated, cheered Bob. All, that
is, but Handsome Cantrell. Bob, as he smiled down on
his former opponents, saw Cantrell sneer and turn his
back toward him. ‘“He’s jealous,” Bob thought.

When Bob got into his uniform it was dusk. He and
Ralph, before dinner formation, returned to the field
where they had won so great a victory. They found
groups of middies still here, discussing the game. Pass-
ing one group, the third classmen composing which they
could barely make out in the twilight, they saw Cantrell
speaking excitedly; and, pressing closer, they heard him
say:

“I'd cheer for him and hand him the palm, if he were
a gentleman. But he’s no gentleman; and this is a school
for gentlemen!”

“Oh, come, Hans!” said one of his hearers, who stood
so high over the others that Bob instantly recognized him
for Crab Craddock. ‘Don’t bea snob. Storm’s all right;
he’s a cracky football player!”

Ralph saw what was coming, and tried to lead Bob
away. But Bob refused to budge.

“He’s all right now,” he heard, in Cantrell’s sneering

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NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY. 23

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voice. 3ut what was he before he came here? Only

a common bluejacket in the navy! And before that he
was a drifter, a waif, a nobody’s child. ;

 

Cantrell looked up into the white, but determined, face
of Bob Storm! He fell back. And, without a word,
30b strode after him, came close to him, brought an
open hand across his sneering mouth in a resounding
smack !

At that, Cantrell recovered from his surprise.
“You gutter pup!

He went
I'll show
you, you cur!”

Bob put up his hands in fighting position, drew back
his right foot, and: “Come on, you cad!” he challenged.
But-before there could be a fight the middies intervened.
They held back both Bob and Cantrell.

“No fighting here,” said Craddock. “You'll get caught
sure. Wait till to-night, ‘Then «ve’ll pull it off in apple-
pie order.” Heturned to Bob. “I'll call you, Storm.”

“All right, Mr. Craddock,” returned Bob grimly, “I'll
be ready.”

“You'd better, you dog!’ yelped Cantrell.

Bob laughed. But as he passed out of the throng, Pin
Pinnell whispered to him:

“Get a nap, if you can, Bob.

You'll need all your
strength.

Cantrell’s our best boxer!”

CHAPTER IX.
A COWARD’S TRICK.

Taps had sounded; the midshipman in chatge of the
third floor had made his rounds of inspection, when Crab
Craddock slipped into Room 120. Bob, fully dressed,
sprang up from his bed.

“Oh,-it’s you, Crab?”

“Ssh! warned Craddock. ‘Remove your shoes.”
This done, he led the way down the stairs and out of the
building. Once on the moonlit sward, they skulked under
the elms toward the Severn. Before a boathouse on the

bank The Crab halted.

The door opened in answer to his knock ; then hurriedly
closed behind them. All was pitchy dark within. But of
a sudden, from every which way, matches were rasped
and lanterns lighted. And Bob saw that he was sur-
rounded by more than a score of plebes and youngsters,
with here and there an upper classman.’ Bunk O’Connor
was one of the latter. He came across the length of the
room, rubbing his hands gleefully together, - ~

“How are you for the scrap, Ty? Pretty tired after
the game to-day ?”

“No, sir; I’ve taken a nap, and feel pretty fit.”

“That’s good. This fellow, Cantrell, is a wonder with
his mitts. But I’ll see you get fair play; I referee. Your
roommate will second you. And now have you any-
thing you want done before we get down to business?”

“No,-sir. _ Only let’s begin, and have it over with.”

All precautions had been taken to prevent their being
discovered. Blinds had been drawn on the windows and
blankets hung over these. Sentries and outposts had
been set, and the lanterns were in a position to be ex-
tinguished at a moment’s notice.

Bob began to strip himself of his coat and upper un-
dergarments. Ralph came to him with a pair of five-
Bob sat, in his corner, on
Porter McCray’s knee while he laced them on. Cantrell,
from diagonally across the cleared space of floor, sneered

at him. And big Bunk O’Connor, the referee, stood in
the center between them.

“Are you ready, men?’ he asked. Then, in answer,
rose to their feet. “Let ’er go!” and he leaped to one
side.

The two white-bodied boys stepped toward each other.
Bob, as they met in the center of the ring, extended his
right glove for the formality of a handclasp; but Cantrell
only sneered contemptuously at him, and brought his arms
up into fighting pose. They circled. Then Cantrell
feinted with the right, stepped in, let loose a stiff left
jab at Bob’s cheek bone. Bob ducked the blow, at the
same time coming in and trying to land both hands on
Cantrell’s midsection; but Cantrell showed sqme clever
footwork in getting. out of range.

About the open space the two boys flitted, their bare
chests heaving in the uncertain light, their eyes gn each
other’s, their gloved hands moving bewikderingly. They
circled. They advanced. They retreated. Feinting,
swinging, jabbing, they boxed. Now one would lead.
And then the other. And seldom indeed was one hard
hit.

Always Cantrell sneered.
artist. But Bob did not sneer. His lips were taut, grim,
white. His brown eyes bored Cantrell through. He
wasted nota blow. But fought on, cold and grim, making
every movement count.

The blue-coated middies craned their necks. Haudly a
sound came from them. Not only had they been warned
against making any noise, but they were too admiration
struck to give vent to their feelings.

Suddenly Cantrell, after several attempts, landed a
straight left on Bob. He landed another and another,
and while Bob, considerably jarred up, was attempting to
parry a third, he changed and came close with a heavy
right just over Bob’s heart. Bob’s teeth snapped on the
grunt that the blow shoved up into his mouth. And, his
body crouched, his gloves shielding his head, he hastily
backed away. Cantrell followed. At that moment, Bunk
walked between the pursued and pursuer to signify that
the first round was ended.

Cantrell went to his corner, smiling. Bob was a trifle
dazed. Ralph jumped out and led him to McCray’s knee.

“You’re doing fine, Bob, old man,” and Ralph patted
Bob’s. white shoulder.
sponging Bob with cold, refreshing water, then drying
him off to a glow.

“You had the best of that round, Bob,’ Mac whis-
pered.

Bob smiled slowly. “I doubt it,” he said. “He’s a
clever boxer, and has got steam ‘in his- punches.”

“This isn’t his first fight,’ from a listening youngster.

“Nor mine,” replied Bob.

The one-minute spell of rest ended, Bob got to his
feet and started leisurely forward. Cantrell, the sneer
deep on his face, rushed across the diagonal of the ring,
as if intent on finishing Bob then and there.

Bob let him come on. Then he stepped aside, driving;
as he did so, a left swing full into Cantrell’s stomach.
Cantrell stopped very abruptly. The sneer left his face
as though Bob’s glove had erased it. He turned, and,

crouching low, went after Bob. Bob waited. They met.
And the long room resounded with the spat of glove on
glove, the thud of leather on quivering white flesh. Can-
trell did not smile as he went to his corner!

From that on, Bob slowly but surely got the better of

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24 NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY.

the exchange of blows. Now and then a smash from
Cantrell rattled him a bit, but more and more it became
a chance blow. And more and more he proved himself
Cantrell’s master: he ,was. faster; he hit cleaner; his
stamina and wind were far superior; above all, he kept
power over himself.

For, in the fifth round, Cantrell was fighting furiously,
wildly, viciously. But all Bob did was to dance away,
and box on. He did not increase his pace one iota. It
would all come in good time, he thought. And, mean-
while, Cantrell’s arms beat the air like flails. He sucked
his breath hatd and fast—grin. testimony to surreptitious
cigarettes. And Bob studied him.

It was in the midst of the seventh round that Bob’s eyes
snapped. He heard Cantrell curse. He knew, then, that
he had Cantrell. He opened up, as the saying has it. He
jabbed Cantrell sharply with his left glove just under the
right eye.

Cantrell’s head was jerked back, like a reed before a
gust of wind; he came to a standstill in his wild rush;
from his eyes one could see that his thoughts were wool-
gathering. It was at that moment that Bob, grimly calm,
brought his right glove up sharply, stiffly, for five inches
—no more—to the point of Cantrell’s jaw. And Cantrell
went down—down like a water-logged timber!

Not a sound from the crowd. Only Bunk O’Connor’s
husky: “One!” “Two!” “Three!” “Four !’—Cantrell
opened his eyes—“Five!” “Six!” “Seven!’—he got to
his knees; and at “Nine!” tottered to his feet.

Bob walked slowly across ‘the ring. He was giving
Cantrell a chance to recover. He heard a wild yell. And
then Cantrell was at him, had closed with him, had struck
him, in the clinch, below the belt! ‘Poor Bob, as he
Then, before the crowd
could reach him, he sank, with a groan, to the floor!

CHAPTER X.

THE CHEEKY PLEBE SALUTES,

“Foul!”

Plebes, youngsters, upper classmen crowded about the
prostrate boy, and lifted him tenderly to Bunk O’Con-
nor’s knee, where they threw a coat about his quivering
shoulders. But Bob hurled the coat off and stood up.

“T think,” he said from between white lips, “I can
go on.”

But at that he tottered and sank back to O’Connor’s
knee.

“Go on with the fight?”

“Not much!”

“You won by a mile!”

“You had a lead as long as a main to’ bowline.”

The youngsters had had their heads together. Now,

‘James Craddock, better known as The Crab, the presi-

dent of the class, elbowed up to Bob’s side.

“Mr. Storm,” he said, “speaking for ihe third class,
“I wish to apologize to you for the cowardly conduct of
one of our members. I hope you realize that we had
no knowledge of his intention to commit such a despicable
trick.

“For myself, I want to say I think you’re all right—a
gentleman through and through!’’—he emphasized the
“gentleman.” “I want to shake with you, Bob! ‘And in
the future you shall not only be let alone, as far as run-
ning by us goes, but you need not salute nor say sir to
any one of us!” ot gee

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While Craddock, Pin Pinnell, Wabbles Ford, and other
third classmen were wringing his hand, Bob thanked them.

‘“What’s more,” he ended, “you can run me all you
like, as lang as it’s in fun!’ And he saluted, thereby
showing the youngsters that he would stick by the custom,
and, while he was a plebe, obey all third classmen.

“Oh, you Bob!” yelled a youngster. And the crowd
laughed, and echoed his words.

Cantrell was nowhere to be seen. He had quietly and
quickly put on his duds and sneaked ‘off.

“He’s lucky if he isn’t sent to Coventry,’ remarked
Ralph, as some time later he got into bed.

“Well, I hope the fellows aren’t too hard on him,” said
Bob, from his cot. ‘He won’t trouble us any longer.”

And then silence reigned in Room 120 until reveille
and gun fire at six o’clock in the morning.

TO BE CONTINUED.

 

 

THE PHANTOM ENGINEER.

By HERO STRONG.

“Whenever I tell the story,” said Alf Whitney, throw-
ing away his half-smoked cigar, and putting his long legs

on the top of the table, in a way some men have when

a story is to be forthcoming, “everybody winks at every-
body else, as much as to say, ‘Alf had taken too much
whisky that time,’ or ‘Alf was asleep and dreamed the
whole thing.’ But I tell you, comrades, though you are
at liberty, to disbelieve what I tell you, it is true; and
that’s all I know about it. I’m no long-headed metaphysi-
cian to reason it all out—I only know what happened,
and it’s that I’m going to tell.”

We gathered closer around the red-hot stove in the
barroom of the Anderson House, for it was a biting cold
night, and the snow was too much for our train, destitute
as we were of a snowplow, and we had given up the at-
tempt to push through to C that night, and retaken
ourselves to the hospitalities of the Anderson.

It had often been whispered among the railway em-

 

ployees, that Alf Whitney had once had something strange’

happen to him. He was a young man yet, though the
oldest and most skillful engineer on the road—noted for
his skill and judgment, no less than for his sturdy en-
durance and his bravery, which nothing ever overcame.

I suppose you people who ride in Pullman cars, rocked

in velvet cushions, and look at the scenery, rushing past,

through plate-glass windows, heavy with gilt and rose-
wood moldings, never think much of the man upon whom

your safety depends—the man who, with his hand upon -

the lever which controls thetmonster that is bearing you
along, stands tireless at his post, through cold and heat,
through storm and sunshine, smutty, grimy with smoke,
greasy and weather-hardened, but oftentimes the bravest
and noblest man among you all. | But this is a digression.

We all hastened to assure Alf that we were ready to
believe whatever he might say; and he, smiling a little,
as if he doubted the sincerity of our assurances, began
his story. I give it in his own words, which are much
better than mine would be.

“Six years ago, one dark, stormy night, Jack Horton
lost his life in a smash-up at Rowley Bend. Jack was
an engineer, and as fine a fellow as ever trod the
ground. He was handsome, too, and notwithstanding

     
   
  
  
   
    
  
 
 
 
   
  
  
 
   
  
   
   
   
  
  
   
 

 
  
  

 

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his dirty occupation, a great favorite with the ladies; for

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‘| never stirred from his post.

NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY. 25

and cinders washed off, and his other clothes on, he was
the best-looking, as well as the best-mannered young
man anywhere in this vicinity.

“He was engaged to marry Esther Clay; and Esther
was a beauty without anything by way of art to help her—
a sound-looking, wholesome, healthy young girl—none of
your die-away kind, fainting at the sight of a spider, and
going into tantrums over a cow a mile off. She was
just the kind of woman I could worship, and not put
myself out any to do it, either!”

_ “Why didn’t you go for her after Jack was dead?”
asked Tom Barnard carelessly.

“Hush! she is dead!” said Alf, in a subdued voice; and

| the unwonted pallor that settled round his mouth gave

mea slight clew to the reason he had never married. And
afterward I knew that Esther Clay, dead, and pledged
through all eternity to another, was more to him than
any living woman! :

After a little he went on:

“When Jack was killed, it was the breaking of an axle
_ that caused the mischief; and, of course, this axle broke
on just the worst part of the road. They always do.
_ You all know Rowley’s Bend? You all know just how
high the grade is there, and just how rough and jagged
the rocks lie all along the embankment, clear down to the
_ river. No need to dwell on this. The train pitched
_ down in the dark, head first, and Jack, true to his duty,
It was a good while before
we could get to him, the broken timbers of the ‘piled-up
_ cars so completely caged him in. She came there before
we had taken his body out, and I shall never forget how
she went down into the ruins where even the bravest of
us hardly dared to venture, so insecure was the footing,

1 and worked with her white, slender hands, until the blood

_ ran frem their wounds. She never minded it a particle,
_ but worked on, with a face as pale and rigid as marble.
_ But I am making a long story, and dwelling too much
- ondetails. Jack was dead when they found-him, and she
lived just a month afterward. And though everybody
_ lamented at her funeral, and said it was ‘so sad,’ I do not
_ think it was sad, for when two people love each other,
truly and loyally, and one of them dies, it seems to me
Heaven’s special mercy, if the other is suffered to go
along.
“Jack and I had always been great friends; and once
_ when we were talking about the supernatural nonsense

| that so many believe in, Jack said to me laughingly :

““If I die first, I'l! keep watch over you, old fellow;
_ and when I see you running into danger, I’ll whistle the
brakes down. Now remember! After he died these
careless words of his kept coming back to me, and try
as I would not to remember them, the more they were
_ present to my mind. :

“Tt was nearly two years after Jack’s death that I was
taking the ten-fifty accommodation out to L——. It was
a dark, drizzly night, and the headlight on the front of
the engine pierced but a short distance into the gloom and
fog ahead of us. I was running carefully, as I always
run on such nights, and had nearly reached Carney’s
Ford when I saw something on the track before us; I
whistled to down brakes, and reversed the lever. The
train slackened, and I could see distinctly ahead cf us
the tall figure of a man. But we got no nearer to him,
for though he seemed-to be only walking, his speed was
lly equal to ours. We should never overtake him’ A

ra

cold shiver ran through me as I noted this fact. No mor-
tal man could walls like that.

“ ‘Richards,’ said I to the fireman, who, ghastly and
trembling with fear, was gazing at the strange apparition,
‘it must be Old Nick himself, with the seven-league
boots on!’

“As I spoke, the figure turned toward us, and then I
saw that in his hand he carried a red lantern, the well-
known signal of danger. He lifted it, swung it slowly
round his head once, and, as he did so, the blood-red
light fell full on his face—the face of Jack Horton. For
a moment he stood motionless, then he was enveloped in
a pale, azure flame, which died out instantly, and left—
nothing!

“All this, which it has taken me so long to describe, took
place in an instant of time, and, by the time the phantom
had vanished Richards and I had managed to stop the
train. We got off and went ahead. The red lantern
had not signaled ‘danger’ for nothing. A heavy stick
of timber was spiked across the track, and, had we gone
on at full speed, it would have sent us to swift destruc-!
tion.

“The company ferreted out the rascal who had done

this vile thing, and he is serving out a long term in the
State prison now. I have seen him and talked with him,
and he swore to me, with a voice that trembled even
then with horror, that after he had spiked down the tim-
ber and had hidden himself in some bushes near by to
watch the result, he had seen a tall man, with a red lan-
tern in his hand, start up in front of the engine and walk
as nothing human could walk, until he reached the very
spot where the danger lay. ;

““And then,’ said the miscreant, ‘he changed into a
blue flame, and vanished, and I knew that my plan was
upset, and that for once Satan had gone back on them as
he’d set to work.’ ”

“Well,” said Tom Barnard, ‘what else ?”

“That is all,” said Alf, lighting another cigar.

“But what was the fellow’s object in seeking to disable
the train?”

“Plunder. He had ascertained that a carrying com-

pany would have-a large sum of money on board that.

night, and he was not averse to turning an honest penny.”
“But the phantom—how do you explain it?” persisted
Tom.

a Oe

BIG ECCLESIASTICAL JOBS.

St. Paul’s Cathedral undergoes an annual cleaning,
when all the windows are polished up, and men remove
dirt from under the great dome and other ordinarily in-
accessible places.

Nobody knows exactly what it costs to thoroughly |

do up the Vatican, which gigantic job was undertaken

when the staircase leading to the Cortile was added to

it at the command of Pope Pius IX. When the “spring
cleaning” had been determined on, the contractors found
that they had a harder and longer job than they had bar-
gained for, as several of the rooms and galleries had
not been turned out for over four centuries.

No fewer than two thousand, five hundred male and
two thousand, five hundred female workers were requisi-
tioned, as well/as seven hundred overseers; but when it
was seen that a larger staff was required, volunteers were
called for, and hundreds of well-to-do Romans offered

: =~ ":

“T don’t explain it,” said Alf quietly. he

nies 0a

“S Me ds i ie ok eee ba fae tnt See te eet
ay aaa: Cilicia Maat Na hate ii ach din tt Maa iil nadia

 
their services free, gratis, and for nothing, out of sheer
love for the ancient structure. The women workers
.were told off to clean the wallpaper of the rooms, amount-
ing in all to three-quarters of a million square yards, and
they removed the grime of ages by rubbing breadcrumbs
over the surface. Thousands of loaves of bread were
rubbed away to powder before the work was completed.
Workmen were in the Vatican for eight months, and
during that time they used many tons of paint, while
eighty bales of flannel were hardly sufficient to supply
them with washing-down cloths. The charwomen wore
out two thousand scrubbing brushes, and used up no less
than one hundred tons of soap and thirty tons of soda.

HOW THE JAPANESE PROPOSE.

In the house wherein reside one or more daughters of
a marriageable age, an empty flowerpot of an ornamental
character is encircled by a ring and suspended from the
window or veranda by three light chains. Now, the
Juliets of Japan are, of course, attractive, and their
Romeos as gallant as those of other lands. But, instead
of serenades by moonlight, and other delicate ways of
making an impression, it is etiquette for the Japanese
lover to approach the dwelling of his lady, bearing some
choice plant in his hand, which he proceeds to plant in
the empty vase. This takes place at a time when he is
fully assured that both mother and daughter are at home.
This act of placing a pretty plant into the empty flower-
pot is equivalent to a formal proposal to the young lady
who dwells within. The youthful gardener having set-
tled his plant to his mind, retires, and the lady is free
to act as she pleases. If he is the right man, she takes

every care of his gift, waters it, and tends it carefully’

with her own hands, that all the world may see, in a
word, that the donor is accepted as a suitor. But if he
is not a favorite, or if stern parents object, the poor plant
is torn from the vase, and the next morning lies limp and
withered on the veranda or on the path below.

 

FACTS LITTLE KNOWN.

France is far and away ahead of all other countries
in the production of autocars. One factory in Paris
employs one thousand hands, another eight hundred.

It costs about twenty-five thousand dollars to scrape the
barnacles off one of the British men-of-war and repaint
her. The -operation has to: be repeated twice a year in
the case of nearly every vessel,

Joseph H, Choate, America’s former ambassador to
England, says he owes his success as a lawyer to the fact
that he never neglected a case, no.matter how unimportant
it was,

In the first four weeks after the opening of the electric
railway at Cairo it is said that no less than eighty persons
_were killed, Even now the death roll averages about
four persons a week. . |

While London has a lower death rate than any other
English town of over two hundred thousand inhabitants,
it varies very much in the different districts, being as low
as thirteen and three-tenths in Hampstead and as high

- as twenty-seven and eight-tenths in Limehouse,

_ The English is the best-lighted coast in the world, Of
the three hundred and thirty-five lighthouses in existence,
fifty-six are scattered ound England's rocky coast, some

. i

gs

NEW TIP TOP’ WEEKLY:

    

of the lights being so powerful that they are visible
twenty miles out at sea.

It has been calculated that something like one billion, —
two hundred and fifty million pints of tea are imbibed
yearly by Londoners, and that the teapot necessary to con- i°

tain this amount, if properly shaped, would comfortably
take in the whole ‘of St, Paul’s Cathedral.

An eminent German physician declares that as long as |
a bicyclist, after a long tour, has a good appetite, does
not feel a desire to go to sleep at once, and is not annoyed
by heavy dreams on the night following, he may consider
that he has not made too great a demand on his physical
resources. 13

What public opinion amounts to in Russia may be a%
gathered from the recent census of that empire, which ;
shows that in a population of one hundred and twenty-
nine millions there are only seven hundred and forty-
three newspapers, or one to every one hundred and
seventy thousand people. Of these, five hundred and
eighty-nine are in Russian, sixty-nine in Polish, forty-one
in German, nine in French, five in Armenian, and two in
Hebrew, No English paper appears in the list.

 

 

TONS OF GOLD DUST.

The annual river floods bring down millions of tons
of mud and sand from the mountains, and this mud and |
sand, which is charged with gold, both “fine” and in
flakes, is deposited to a depth of six inches or more on |_
the banks of gravel. It is in the winter that the gold is
washed, and it is said that seyen men can work about
twenty tons of the “pay dirt” in a day, in favorable
localities.

 

LEGENDS ABOUT THE ROBIN.

A good many superstitious ideas are prevalent in dif-
ferent localities with reference to the robin. In some
parts of Scotland the song of this interesting little bird
is held to augur no good for the sick person who hears
it, and to those superstitiously inclined much anxiety is —
sometimes caused when its notes are heard near a house |
where any one happens to be ill. There is a legend |
connected with the robin which I have somewhere seen. ‘ ~
It is said that far, far away there is a land of woe, dark-
ness, spitits of evil, and fire, Day by day does this little
bird bear in his bill a drop of water to quench the flame.
So near the burning stream does he fly that his feathers a
are scorched, and hence he is named bronphuddu (burned
breast), There is also a legend which attributes his red —
breast to his haying tried to pluck a spike from the crown
of thorns with which our Lord’s head was encircled,

  
  
  
  

 
         
     

 
    
    
 

 

  

THE HIGHEST PEAK ON THE CONTINENT. __

The controversy concerning the loftiest elevation of —
land in North America must finally terminate in award-—
ing the palm to Mount St. Elias, if the cragged and
snawy brow of the monarch might appropriately bear
that adornment of tropical growth, According to the
results of careful triangulations made by, Doctor Dall
this peak reaches an altitude of about nineteen thousand —
feet; but, of course, it is impossible to fix the exact
height until the summit of the mountain can be reached. —
Its precise location varies materially from that given
previous to the last survey, es

 
 
  
  
  
   
  
  
  

    
  

   
   
 

Majot General Wood Points Out Pacific
Coast Peril.

“The military situation on the Pacific

coast is very undesirable at present,” de-|

—clared Major General Wood, speaking at
the Portland, Ore, Commercial Club.
“Your assurance of protection in the event
of invasion by a hostile power is very small,

“Either we must increase the army or
we must get troops from the interior sta-
tions. We don’t want to ask Congress to
increase the army. Public sentiment would
not permit it.”

General Wood said that three large posts
would be éstablished on the Pacific coast,
one at Vancouver Barracks, Wash., one in
San Francisco, and the third in southern

| California.

Town Loses All its Records by Fire.

Roseville, Kan., has no records of any
kind. The situation was brought about by
the fire which destroyed the town hall a
‘year ago and burned all the originals of
the city ordinances. Now the council is
trying to find copies of all the ordinances
passed since the town was founded and re-
enact them.

Fertile Indian Reservation to be Opened for
Settlement.

A striking era in the evolution of the
American Indian was marked on the Fort
Peck reservation, in Montana, October 1,
wnen the first county fair‘ever held by In-
dians was opened, - At this unique agri-
cultural exposition there are exhibited some
unusual specimens of grain and grasses,
which later in the season will be entered
at Eastern land shows, in competition with
the prize products of the white man.

The opening of Fort Peck reservation
marks the last big opening of agricultural
‘land in the United States. Six new towns
will be started in this big area. It will
be opened for settlement next spring.

The total acreage of the reservation is
2,068,693. The land allotted to the Indians
is 723,693 acres. The land that is thus
left vacant and is soon to be opened for
settlement covers 1,345,000 acres.

“On the supposition that the unoccupied
land were devoted to the growing of wheat
on the summer-fallow plan, which would
mean that one-half the area would be in
crop at one time, and the further supposi-
tion that the wheat would yield 25 bushels
per acre, which is a moderate estimate for
yields on land thus prepared, the aggre-
gate production would be _ 19,312,500
bushels,” Thomas Shaw, agricultural expert,
estimates. Professor Shaw further says:
“If this land were entirely devoted to the
growing of barley on the summer-fallow
plan the yield would be 30,900,000 bushels,
-as barley grown on such land should aver-
age 40 bushels per acre. If the entire afea
were devoted to the growing of oats on the

same lines the total production would be
38,625,000 bushels, as 50 bushels per acre
would not be an extravagant estimate for
_ land thus farmed.
_ “There is another way of showing the im-
mensity of the possible production of this
fertile tract of land. On the supposition

 

NEW: TIP TOP “WEEKLY.

NE Woe TEMS OF INTERES

 

that one-fourth of the entire acreage was
devoted to the growing of fodder corn,
the yield the moderate estimate of 2%
tons per acre of cured fodder would amount
to 840,625 tons. If winter wheat were
drilled in the fodder at the same season,
which is August, and if the yield were the
same as on the summer fallow, which would
be reasonable to look for, the production in
wheat would amount to 8,406,250 bushels.
If one-tenth of the land were devoted to
the growing of flax and the yield were 10
bushels per acre, the flax crop would
amount to 1,345,000 bushels. If one-tenth
of the land were also devoted to the grow-
ing of barley, putting the yield at 30 bushels
per acre, which would be high enough for
land not summer fallowed, the production
would be 4,035,000 bushels. If one-tenth
of the land were devoted to the growing of
oats at 40 bushels per acres the yield would
be 5,380,000 bushels. This would still leave
one-fifth of the land for other kinds of
production, such as alfalfa, vegetables, and
pastures.

Messenger “Boy” 74 Years Old,

As the result of a shortage of boys in
Minneapolis, because of which a number
of firms have taken to hiring aged men to
perform the duties once done by lads, J.
W. Cope, aged 74, is the oldest messenger
“boy” in Minneapolis, if not in the entire
country.

Cope, who was first lientenant in the One
Hundred and Twenty-ninth Indiana Infan-
try in the Civil War,\ is running around
for a local telegraph company, which has
had difficulty within the last few months in
filling its messenger ranks. He seems to
like his job, and the company regards him
as an excellent “boy,” as he does not have
the habit of reading while on duty, and
does not smoke cigarettes.

John Fingal, aged 40, also has taken upon
himself the duties of and the uniform of a
messenger “boy.”

Town Washed Away.

A waterspout passed through Castella-
mare, on the southern coast of Sicily, re-
cently, devastating the town in a few min-
utes.

The streets were covered with water to a
depth of four feet. Houses collapsed, and
the open spaces were filled with men,
women, and children struggling in the flood.
Some of them were drowned and others
rescued, with difficulty. A number of per-
sons lost their lives through being buried
in débris.

Troops were sent from Trapani to as-
sist in restoring order and providing shel-
ters for the survivors.

A New Way to Kill Rats,

Twenty-two rats caught in a wheat barrel
in the pigeon coop of Mrs. Elizabeth Rime,
of Caldwell, N. J., were asphyxiated by
Mrs, Rime, who used a mile or two of gas
at 80 cents a thousand feet.

When Mrs, Rime found the rats in her
pigeon loft she slapped the cover on the
barrel before the vermin could get out. She
was afraid to leave the barrel while she
got help in killing them, so she nailed the

 

cover down and trundled in with its squeal-
ing load to her kitchen.

Boring a hole in the top of the barrel
she fixed a gas tube in the hole. After she
had let the gas flow through the tube for
an hour she made an examination.

The rats were dead.

Sell Radium in Bottles to Cure Rheumatism,

In the medical exhibition in Westminster,
London, there is a dark room where an exX-
pert, rather bleached in appearance from
living so much without light, shows you
some of the wonders of radium.

When your eyes have got used to the
woolly darkness of his cave he will hand
you a commonplace cardboard box and tell
you to stare intently at the lid. You do
so, and soon the thing becomes luminous,
breaks out into shifting radiations as if it
contained some wonderfully heatless coal
of fire. The expert says it looks like a
snowstorm, and so it does if you can
imagine flags of rosy snow drifting and
circling round a center. Then he opens the
door and lets in the disillusioning daylight,
and taking off the lid you find inside the
box nothing but a tiny drop of water, a
new and fascinating branch of radium
therapy.

‘You can buy it in bottles—radiogen water
—and drink it for the cure of rheumatism,
gout, and similar ailments.

The theory, of course, is that the thera-
peutic virtue of the waters of Bath, Bux-
ton, and other wells mainly is due to their
radio activity. It has been observed that
the workmen in the mines in Bohemia and
in Cornwall, where radium ore is dug,
rarely suffer from rheumatism or neuralgia.
So you can drink radium as medicine, as ©
well as use it as a searchlight in surgery.

Great Finnish Runner Makes New Marathon
Record.

Willie Kolehmainen, the winner of the
1912 Scottish Marathon, emblematic of the
championship of the world, added to his
already long list of records the fastest time
ever made by any runner when he defeated
Hans Holmer, the holder of the world’s —
best record, recently at the historic distance
of 26 miles 385 yards in the American
professional championship Marathon at the
Eastern Motordrome track in Vailsburg,
Newark, when he covered the route in
2:29:39 1-5, the former mark having been
aan aT;

Holmer ran second to the wonderful
Finn, who, as a matter of fact, had a pre-
vious victory over the West Farms lad in
the Edinburgh race in January of this year
by a margin of one yard, Holmer’s record
was made January 3, 1911, and it was stated
that he had made a trip from abroad for
this race. It developed, however, that he
had not sufficient time in which to fit him-
self—he had been home but two weeks—
and, although he showed the way for
twenty miles, he was unable to carry his
pace through. Kolehmainen shook off the
record holder beginning the last five miles
of the contest, and set out to make the
wonderful mark which he attained when
he finished his grueling race.

The mark beaten was made on the Pow-

 

 
28

derhall Grounds, at Edinburgh, Scotland,
that track being an ellipse of a quarter mile,
while the course of the recent event was a
complete circle measured eighteen inches
from the pole, as provided by the rules.

While no comparison can be made be-
tween track and road running, which is the
method pursued, as a rule, by amateurs and
the vogue in Olympic competitions, it is
pointed out that Johnny Hayes, the Ameri-
can lad who won the London Olympic race
at the distance, was timed in 2:55:18 2-5,
which performance tends to convey to a cer-
tain degree the difference between the abili-
ties of the amateur and professional runner
at the distance.

For twenty miles Holmer and Koleh-
mainen ran evenly, with first Holmer and
then the Finn pacing. But at this mark
Kolehmainen began to give the dust to the
former champion, and in one of the finest
exhibitions of long-distance running that
this country has seen, drew away until at
the finish he was two and three-quarters
laps ahead of Holmer, nine laps ahead of
Karl Nieminen, countryman of his; nine
and three-quarters laps ahead of Thure
Johanson, the Swedish record holder, and
fourteen laps ahead of Pat Dineen, of
Boston.

Both of the leading runners were in fine
condition apparently. At no time in the
long grind did either Holmer or Koleh-
mainen show any signs of distress, and they
ran in perfect form throughout. Koleh-
mainen at the end of the contest seemed
fully as fresh as when he started off, and
some of the officials had to jump out at
the end of the race to stop him from con-
tinuing nearly halfway around the track
at the same speed as his final spurt. Johan-
son found more difficulty in keeping up to
the killing pace which the leaders set, and
in the final five miles wabbled, but managed
to stick it out for a fourth place after hold-
ing third place with apparent ease up to the
twenty-one mile mark. Karl Nieminen
came up running strong. near the end of
the contest, and managed to overtake and
pass Johanson, and make a fair attempt to
cut down the distance which separated him
from Holmer and second place. But in
the excitement of the breaking away of
Kolehmainen the other runners were well-
nigh forgotten.

_ Finger-print Signatures in this Bank,
- The latest financial wrinkle in Hacken-
sack, N, J., banking circles is to have your
finger prints taken before you draw money
from the bank. This is no police record,
but a new plan for the identification of
depositors, which has just been installed in
- the Hackensack Trust Company. It is to
be used when customers cannot write, or
when the signature is not legible. The
polite clerk at the Hackensack Trust Com-
pany’s finger-print window will give you a
lightly inked glass,
“Ink your fingers here,” he will request.
_ The patron inks his finger tips, then
resses them on a sheet of paper, and the
ak has the finger signature, which never
varies, and cannot be forged.

Gains 1,000 Per Cent in Oil Investment,

An insight into the actual increase in
value of Standard Oil securities during
past years was obtained recently through
the filing in the supreme court of the ref-

-eree’s report of J. Campbell Shomaae of

_ the status of the fortune left by Albert ©.

 

NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY.

Bostwick, the broker and clubman, who
died on November 10, Igtt.

In 1890 Jabez A. Bostwick, at one time
a Standard Oil man, created a trust fund
for the benefit of his son Albert C. Bost-
wick, consisting of Standard Oil securi-
ties, which were then valued at $296,171.90.
When his son died, twenty-one years later,
these samé securities were shown to have
yielded $2,795,958.48—an increase of nearly
1,000 per cent.

The report showed that during Mr. Bost-
wick’s life he drew from this trust fund
$1 ,642,227.53, and that there had been turned
over to his heirs $1,642,611.88, accruing
from the selfsame source.

The heirs of Mr. Bostwick are his wife,
Mrs. Dorothy S. Bostwick, and four chil-
dren,

Says Disease and Poison Ate Spurs of Genius.

Poets, authors, statesmen, and inventors
are spurred to great achievements by poison
and disease, is the opinion of Doctor
Charles B. Reed, a professor in the medi-
cal school of Northwestern University,
Chicago,

The scientists declare that poisons and
disease that destroy the body illuminate
the mind; that human intellect is most bril-
liant when life is ebbing.

Scores, of examples are cited by Doctor
Reed to prove his assertion. He has a
long list of men whose intellectuality, he
says, was thus stimulated to brilliancy in
literature and art. Religion is the most
effective and universal “systematizer,” he
declares, and prayer is another.

“These are the natural stimulants to su-

periority in intellectuality,” asserted Doc-|C

tor Reed. “I have found that poisons in
the form of either drugs or disease have
much the same effect upon the mind.”

Coffee, he said, may be taken as a type
of these substances. Its essential qualities
are so well defined, he declared, that one
critic has asserted the ability to trace
throughout the works of Voltaire those por-
tions which came from coffee inspiration,

Balzac also is known to have been de-
voted to the stimulant. Tea acted simi-
larly for De Quincy and Doctor Johnson,
according to Doctor Reed.

Maeterlinck was cited as an example of
the stimulus given by tobacco. De Quincy,
Doctor Reed said, cemented his mental fac-
ulties for many years with opium, as did
Coleridge and many others, Poe, Burns,
De Musset, and Gluck were a as ex-
amples of the qualities of alcohol.

At 81 Gives Health Rules,

Five golden rules of health were given
to a reporter by Frederic Harrisdn, author,
critic, bibliophile, ex-professor, barrister,
historian, traveler, and amateur gardener,
on his eighty-first birthday, which he cele-
brated recently at his home at Hawkhurst,
Kent, England. These rules were:

(1) Abstain fronr tobacco, spirits, made
dishes, and all such dreadful things. I
am satisfied with a little bit of mutton and
rice pudding. Hi

(2) Rise from a meal with an appetite. I
believe people eat too much,

(3) Walk every day for two hours. This
I am going to do as soon as | get through
a pile of letters and telegrams from Flor-
ence and Rome, I am too old to play ten-

nis and golf and too slow.

(4) Sleep eight hours, People cannot

‘sleep who smoke themselves black in the

 

face, eat too much, and have not walked
enough.

(5) More important than -all, be content
with what you have got. Take things
quietly.

Mr. Harrison rose to greet the reporter
with a merry laugh.

“I am happy to say,” he remarked, “that
Iam very well, very busy, very lively. I
am singularly blessed in that I have all
my senses just as clear as twenty or twenty-
five years ago. My hearing is as good. As
for glasses, I do not need them,”

Walks on Beans to Pay Bet.

To pay for his faith that the Giants
would win the world’s championship,
Walter Stone, of Phillipsburg, N. J., is
walking about with four white beans in
each shoe. He works for W. P. Gavin,
grocer, who was sure that destiny intended
the pennant for the Red Sox. They got
into an argument about it, and wound up
with an agreement that the man whose
favorites lost should torture himself by way
of penance.

Uncle Sam Buys British Shells for Navy.

Beekman Winthrop, acting secretary of
the navy, has settled the controversy over
the award of shell contracts for the current
year. The Hadfield Steel Foundry, of
Sheffield, England, gets a contract for 500
twelve-inch projectiles at its bid of $187
each, deliveries to be made in New York
City. The statutory requirements as to
observing the eight-hour law were stipu-
lated in the contract. The American bid-
ders, with the exception of the Midvale
ompany, will make the balance of the
5,500 shells required, or 5,000. The Mid-
vale Company’s bid was not considered be-
cause the company was in arrears in de-
liveries of shells now under contract,

Brave “Newsie” Died that Girl Could Live. —

Willie Rugh, the crippled newsboy, of
Gary, Ind., who offered his withered leg

for amputation, that the life of Miss Ethel —

Smith, whom he had never seen before,
might be saved, died recently. As death
stiffened his fingers, a rose, given him by
the girl for whom he was sacrificing his

life, fell from his hand upon the coverlet 4

of the hospital cot.
“I am glad,” he
minutes before the end.
that I’m jes’ glad.” ,
A moment later, when his foster mother,

had whispered a few
“Tell her that—_

Mrs, H. C, McCabe, knelt beside the bed |
and hid her face in the edge of the boy’s
pillow, he reached out a weak hand and ~

stroked her hair. vi
“Don’t cry, mammy,” he begged. “I neyer

‘mounted to nothin’ before, and now you. 4

know I done som’pin’ fer somebody.”

pe

 

a bala

PRGA

Conscious to the last, he kept smiling

while Mrs. McCabe and the nurses and the ~

surgeon in the room turned their faces
away to hide their tears.

Miss Smith was burned in.a motor-cycle .
Doctor J. A. Craig, her physi- —

accident, _
cian, realized that a large area of skin must

be grafted upon her body if her life was
So great was the amount —

to be saved,
needed that the surgeon despaired of filling
the need. Then Willie Rugh offered to
give his withered leg for the grafting. The
grafting was successfully performed after
the lad’s leg was taken off just below the
hip. Cas Bre
\\tiss Smith was discharged from the

Ne

ie
b*5

*

 
 
 

   

 

 

lked i hospital, cured. But the anesthetic given to
~ Rugh before the operation had been too
tent much for his weak lungs. Pneumonia de-
ings veloped, and caused his death.
1* A memorial tablet is to be erected in
rter a Gary in his honor, and a funeral, such as
_ Gary never before has seen was held there.
that The burial was at Briarbluff, Ill, and a spe-
Sem cial train carried the mourners.
all Upon the memorial tablet will be in-
nty- | scribed Willie’s words: “I’m glad just to
As 4%: be a little help.”
q Z
ae A Noiseless Hotel Key.
ke The man who gets in late at the Hotel
ints Biltmore, in New York, which, though not
hip, d \ as yet visible, except that a hole is there,
_ is | is announced for a sure opening October 1
i | of next year, isn’t necessarily going to wake

up everybody on his floor when he tries
to find his keyhole, so Manager Bowman
has announced. Somebody has invented a
noiseless lock, which is going to be put on
every chamber door in the building, and
Mr. Bowman gave a private demonstration
of the lock in the offices he shares with
Proprietor Baumann.

So far there is no door to fit it to, but

the lock is rigged upon what may be
imagined as such. It is the biggest door
lock out, according to Mr. Bowman, and
it requires three different keys to make the
lock do all ithe tricks that may be required
Ot it.
First, there is the key which is given the
occupant. He opens the door and goes in,
and if he turns the bolt after him, three
little black dots appear outside, and the
porter, or the chambermaid, can’t get in.
But if the latter sees three little white dots
he or she inserts another sort of key wrong
side up and opens the door. Then if the
visitor wants to leave some valuables in his
room he goes down and tells the chief clerk,
and the latter takes key No. 3, goes up,
turns it, and nobody who has not this
master key can get in.

Outside there is a leather pad, with a big
metal ring around it. The latter will show
in the dark, and the nervous seeker for
the hole in the door may play around in
it for five minutes without striking his key
against anything that will sound.

“T regard this,” said Mr. Bowman, “as
an insurance policy on sleep for the nerv-
ous.”

 

Thorpe Says New Football Rules Help the
Game.

_. Headed by Glen Warner, trickiest of all
football coaches, and Captain Jim Thorpe,
America’s greatest athlete, the Carlisle In-
_ dian football team, with twenty-two in the
squad, stopped off in Scranton, Pa,, re-
cently, for an hour, having dinner at the
Lackawanna station dining room while en
route to Syracuse, where they met the
Syracuse Uniyersity team. There were
‘several real hunkies in the squad, but tow-
ering above the tallest of them was Cap-
tain Jim, the athlete who led the United
States forces to a world-famed victory in

i- G
t the recent Olympic games. At first sight
era _ Thorpe doesn’t look the réle that he has
it won, that of being the best all-round ath-

ete that has ever been developed. He
appeared more the student than the athlete
while he was finishing.a hearty meal with
a plate of ice cream,
_ But when he got up from the chair and
_ started for the special car that the eleven
traveled in, the straightening out process

 

NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY.

showed his marvelous development. Thorpe
walked across the platform with a long
stride, and the minute that he came in sight
there was no mistake made in the recog-
nition of him by the throng, which mainly
comprised employees in the voffices of the
Lackawanna company.

Thorpe hasn’t any special form of ath-
letics that he looks upon as a favorite.
“Whatever branch of athletics I am engaged
in is my favorite. I like football as well
as baseball; running as well as jumping,
and hurdling as well as tossing the shot or
throwing the weight.”

The star athlete sort of regrets that they
haven’t got baseball at the Indian school in
Carlisle now. When he had the chance he
showed himself a real star at the diamond
game just as he has‘on the gridiron.

“Jumping from one form of. athletics
to another panned out fairly well in every
branch that I got interested in; when I find
football or baseball injuring me for track
work or field events, I’ll have to think a
while’ before I would decide which sport
to sacrifice.”

Thorpe tips the scales at 190 pounds,
which he declares is his best football weight.
He is in athletics for the love of them;
without them he doesn’t know what he
would do with his strength, he says.

“Living right, training right, with a
natural love for athletics will always get
a man somewhere in the athletic world,
even if he doesn’t land on the top of the
heap, Athletics teaches a man a lot of
good things, so far I am satisfied with the
good that they have done me.”

Discussing the new rules, Coach War-
ner said that he hasn’t had enough oppor-
tunity to judge just what they are going
to mean to his eleven. They look to be
good and should make the games faster,
especially the big,games, where the elevens
are fairly evenly matched, he said.

Treasury Firm on Pea Duty.

The treasury department has declined
to accede to Germany’s vigorous represen-
tations against the American government’s
intention to impose a countervailing duty on
split peas and flour imported from. that
country. The United States hold to its
view that Germany grants a bounty of ex-
portations of these commodities by means
of an “import certificate.” Germany pro-
tests that the “import certificate’ is not
a bounty,

German competition in the split pea trade,
according to officials, is destroying the
American industry in that produce, espe-
cially in the Central West and Michigan.

Record Javelin Throw.

A new world’s record for throwing the
javelin has been established by the famous
Swedish athlete, Eric Lemming. He hurled
it 62.57 meters, beating the previous record
of 61 meters, held by the Finn, J. Saar-
isto.

Lemming won the javelin throw at the
Athens, London, and Stockholm Olympic
games.

Drive Well 5,200 Feet Deep in Seatch for

William Richards, of Mayburg, Forest
County, Pa/ is putting down an oil well
near that place, and has already reached a
depth of 5,200 feet and intends ‘to push on

 

still farther. It h&s taken two years to
reach this depth, he states. All the equip-

a

 

 

29

  

ment had to be extra heavy, he says, and
the nervous strain on the men, drilling at
such a depth, is very great, as everything
is under severe ‘tension.

The main obstacle struck so far is not
hard rock, but in fact the absence of rock
or sand—that is, the caves. These are
huge pockets or voids in which the tools
and casing are easily lost unless special
precautions are taken. The method is to
reenforce the hole by letting down quan-
tities of cement.

The geological strata encountered on the
way down into the earth, are interesting,
Mr. Richards says that at 4,200 feet the
well began caving badly, but that though
they found caves for 300 feet they were
able to shut them all out with cement. He
concludes :

“We have so far about 700 feet of flint
rock, very hard to drill, with streaks of
limestone and sand, down to the salt beds,
where we found 50 feet of solid rock salt,
then shale, limestone, sand to 50 feet, salt
again, broken up with soft rock and caving,
which we are cementing now.

“This cave is about 80 feet and much
harder to handle than those in the well
above. It may be that the salt has some
influence on the cement, but we expect to
overcome it and drill on down through the
Clinton sand and three Medina sands, ex-
pecting by all the calculations we can’ make
to finish up and drill through the last
Medina sand at 5,500 feet, if the well is dry.
Then below that is the Trenton rock, which
has yielded such vast quantities of oil and
gas in Ohio and Indiana, but that would
take us, say, 8,000 feet here.”

' Volcano Stromboli Belching Bowldets and

Fire.

Stromboli, a voltano in Italy, is again
in violent eruption and no fewer than half
a dozen craters are belching. forth flame
and white-hot cinders within a circuit of
400 yards,

Boiling water and huge molten rocks are
being hurled into the air to an enormous
height from other apertures. The whole
of the elevated region of the island is
buried under ashes to a depth from six
feet to eight feet. The streets and roofs
of the houses in the village of San Vin-
cenzo are covered with about fifteen inches
or twenty inches of fine volcanic dust, and
Fraglioni is smothered three feet deep with
sand and small glasslike stones.

Terrible distress prevails among the
population, whose sole means of livelihood
are the vast vineyards, which are now
mostly overwhelmed and devoured by hail-
stones of fire.

Some idea of the force of the eruption
may be gathered from the circumstance
that on a vineyard situated a mile away
the active craters not only littered ashes,
but vomited bowlders measuring more than
two cubic yards, many of which penetrated
deeply into the soil,

Not Enough Troops to Man’ New Guns,
aie Geaceal Weaver.

A splendid and expensive system of coast
defense fortification is almost completed,
and there are not enough soldiers by 3,352
to provide for even one manning detail, ac-
cording to General Y. M. Weaver, chief
of the coast artillery, in his annual re-
port.

General Weaver declares that unless the
necessary trained troops are provided for

   

 

  
     
        
       
      
      
     
  
30

this purpose the vast expenditure for coast
defense already made will be worse than
wasted, since the people will have been
lulled into a false sense of security. There-
fore he wants to inerease the regular ar-
tillery by 675 officers and 14,584 men and
the coast artillery militia by 902 officers
and 21,204 men,

A Bold Smuggler of Chinamen.

Burt G. Blowers, of Buffalo, who was
sentenced in New York recently to a peni-
tentiary for four months for violating the
Chinese exclusion law, passed through Buf-
falo about August I9 in an automobile with
four Chinamen tied up in bags in his car.
The police were not notified to be on the
lookout for Blowers so no notice was taken
of his car, even if it was seen when pass-
ing through this section.

Blowers with his Chinamen left Buf-
falo in an automobile and the Buffalo po-
lice were after him. It was known that the
car with the chinks was run to Rochester
and from that city on the State road to Ba-
tavia and then passed eastward through
Avon, Lima, Canandaigua, Penn Yan, EI-
mira, Binghamton, and on east to New
York. Blowers and his car were observed
by a vigilant policeman under a subway in
New York. When the policeman went to
investigate he found a number of sacks
lying in the car. He felt of one and a
human being grunted and kicked at the
cop. He opened the mouth of the sack and
was shocked to find a live Chinaman in-
side. Blowers was found eating in a
restaurant a short way off, and he and the
Celestials were locked up. When arraigned

_in Federal court Blowers entered a plea
of guilty.

Government Warns of Cholera and Smallpox
Dangers.,

Cholera in Japan and smallpox ineSpain
were reported to the public health service
at Washington. Guards have been thrown
out to prevent the importation of either to
this country.

In Kobe, Japan, steerage passengers and
crews bound for the United States are to be
detained seven days. Cholera has reap-
peared there and in the vicinity. In Al-
meira, Spain, an outbreak of smallpox has
raised a bar against landing of tourists.

Two Prominent Men Plan to Walk from
New York to Chicago,

No definite time has been set for the
walking tournament from New York to
Chicago, which President F. T. Underwood,
of the Erie Railroad, and President John
T. Finley, of the New York University,
have agreed to take,

The men, made the agreement on the bat-
tleship Virginia at a luncheon given by
Admiral Winslow recently. Mr. Finley and
Mr. Underwood each have circled Manhat-
tan Island on foot and taken long walks
in different parts of the United States.

Chicago, each insists, has been an ob-
jective point for years. Mr. Underwood
suggested that a special train on the Erie
accompany them,

“Meals,” he said, “thus could be served
and sleeping accommodations provided.

-Getmany Plans to Monopolize Trade in Oil.

A government bill aimed at the Stand-
ard Oil Company is announced in the semi-
official German newspaper, Nord Deutsche
_ Allgemeine Zeitung. The bill is intended t-

 

Naw iP LOP WHERLY:
bar that company from the wholesale busi-
ness in illuminating oils in Germany, which
is to be entrusted to a national stock com-
pany, operating under government super-
vision. Thegnew company is to be em-
powered to acquire the existing wholesale
oil plants and stocks, by appropriation, if
necessary. ;

The capital of the new company is to
be furnished partly by the big German
banks and partly by open subscription. The
banks are to be given registered shares
and an increased voting power, to prevent
any attempt to obtain foreign control. The
life of the corporation is fixed at 330 years.

As an additional precaution the bill is
to contain elaborate provisions to prevent
the augmentation of prices. If the “fixed
maximum price should be exceeded, the
company’s dividends cannot exceed the legal
rate of interest and the dividends are to
be increased proportionately as the price
sinks below the maximum, thus forcing
the company to make all efforts to reduce
prices.

The imperial government is to receive
4-5 of the profits, when the price is be-
low the maximum, and is not to participate
when it is above. This provision is made
so as to eliminate one factor tending to
excessive prices. :

1911 Gold Yield $95,890,000.

An official estimate of the production of
gold and silver in the United States in
I9II, made in a joint statement of the bu-
reau of the mint and the geological sur-
vey, placed the totals at 4,687,052 fine
ounces of gold, valued at $95,890,000, and
60,399,400 fine ounces of silver, valued at
$32,615,700.

The value of the gold produced was
greater than in any year except 1909, which
was $99,673,400. hese figures compare
with $96,269,100 in gold and $30,854,500 of
silver in IQIO.,

Say We Celebrate Our Birthdays One Day

Too Late. “a

Scientists, those kill-joys. who have
haunted mankind since thinking first be-

came a profession, now have figured out |

that commonly accepted birthdays are a day
late, and are therefore base frauds and de-
ceptions.

Incidentally, by their cold-blooded com-
putations, they have proved that a man
completes his year at the end, and not until
the end of the day before the one he has
always considered his birthday.

The question arises: When is one to
cram in a birthday party, which means so
much to the married man’s house-slipper
supply ?

With the ordinary day-late birthday
celebrations declared by science to be im-
positions upon invited friends and prema-
ture affairs likewise tabooed, the birthday
party “fiend” finds himself in a hopeless
position, ‘ ;

Mathematics in one of its higher forms
is responsible for the attempted enlighten-
ment of a deluded people that for years
has been rejoicing over birthdays.  Poli-
ticians leagued themselves with scientists
in making this a “discovery.” They were
trying to figure out when a man had a right
to vote.

“When is a man twenty-one years of
age?” was the questiom with Chicago eldc-
tion officials which brought on the scientific
research, William H. Stuart, clerk of the

election board, was confronted by a first
voter whose birthday falls on the day after
election day, and who claimed the right to
vote on November 5.

Charles H. Mitchell, attorney for the
board, held that the first voter was right;
that he would attain ‘his majority the day
before his “birthday,” and that if properly
registered he could vote on that day.

Decisions of American courts by the
score were cited, but it remained for the
expert mathematicians to endow the young
man with suffrage and take away his birth-
day at the same time.

“Figuring it out by mathematics a per-
son attains his majority at the end of the
day previous to his twenty-first birthday.
By that method of reasoning all birthday
celebrations are held a day late, the day
after the year in life is completed,” said
Hiram B. Loomis, principal of the Hyde
Park High School, an authority on mathe-
matics.

And to a man Chicago’s other mathe-
matical experts bore out that theory.

Christian Science Fund Declared Void by
Coutt.

A trust, estimated at $2,000,000, created
by the will of Mrs. Mary Baker Eddy,
founder of the Christian Science Church,
for the benefit of the denomination, was
declared void by the Massachusetts supreme
court recently. The court holds, however,
that a charitable trust has been created, and
that new trustees may be appointed to ad-
minister it.

The trust was to have been administered
by the directors of the mother church in
Boston, but the court decided the trust pro-
visions were nullified under the statute
limiting the amount of the income from
bequests to religious orgarlizations to $2,000
annually.

The court dismissed the bill brought by
the contestants of the will, who alleged
that the teachings of Christian Science
were against public policy. The contestants,
however, are given 30 days in which to
pring in additional evidence to support their ©
claim.

Nicaragua Nips Honduran Revolution.

An uprising against the Honduran gov-
ernment started by participants in the
Nicaraguan revolt, came to a sudden and
bloody end before the expedition got out
of Nicaragua. The refugees, 200 in num-
ber, under José Rafael Osorio, a Honduran,
were overtaken by Nicaraguan government
troops at Somotaillo as they approached the
Honduran border. Forty were killed, many
others, including the leader, were wounded.
All gave up their arms and the movement.
was abandoned.

The failure of the movement against
Honduras is believed to relieve the menace
N>f another revolution in that country, and

ragua.
_ Leon is quiet and the payment and dis-
charge of the troops engaged in putting
down the rebellion continues. ws

Edison’s Son Preparing to ‘Take Father’s

ce, ;

Charles Edison, twenty-two years old, —
son of Thomas Edison, the famous in-

ventor, is preparing to take up the work
of his father when the wizard*of electricit
lays down for all time his wonderful wor

 

—which includes the invention of the elec-

 

to mark the end of disturbances in Nica-
by
ay

tric light, the phonograph, storage battery,.
and many other electrical devices that are

a boon.to mankind.

The son, studying quietly and most un-
ostentatiously, is in his fourth year. in the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology pre-
paring himself for the heavy burdens he
must one day assume as his father’s assist-
ant and ultimate successor,

That young Edison should have escaped
notice for nearly four years in his stay in
3oston is almost unaccountable. But it
apparently illustrates the make-up of the
youth, for he has shunned publicity.

Wins by Two Lengths.

Ernest Barry, of England, the world’s
champion sculler, easily defeated Edward
Hanlan Durnan, of Toronto, in a race for
the sculling championship of the world over
the Putney to Mortlake course on the
Thames, in England, recently,

3arry won. by two lengths.
Was 22 minutes 31 seconds,

His time

Indiana Saves Feathered Game.

A fine example of the great results to
be obtained through careful and conscien-
tious conservation of game has just been
brought to light in Indiana, in which State
a residence hunters’ license law is supplying
funds necessary to carry out a construc-
tive policy in game propagation and pro-
tection. This State started late to care

for the game that survived the whole-

sale slaughter of market hunters, and as
the land is flat and suitable for farming in
nearly every section of the State, the Penn-
sylvania plan of forest reserves and’ game
preserves within the forest cannot be tried.
Still the State commission of fisheries and
game, backed by public sentiment, is doing
a great work. :

When George W. Miles, veteran sports-
man and naturalist and a member of the
Indiana commission, rose in the conyention
of wardens and commissioners, held in
Denver recently, and announced that there
were at least 10,000 prairie chickens in
northern Indiana, many people doubted him.
It was generally supposed by hunters and
naturalists all over the country that the
prairie chicken, which once flourished as
far east as Ohio, where it met the do-
main of the vanished heath hen, a former
native of this State, was extinct east of

the Mississippi River.

Doctor William T, Hornaday, of New
York, the famous naturalist, was attracted

by this statement, and when he was at the
conservation congress in Indianapolis he
investigated, \ The story was found to. be

true in every detail, and Indiana bids fair
to again be a sportsmen’s paradise for the
pursuit of the prairie chicken,

The history of Indiana’s success in this
matter is a story of thoroughly conducted
constructive work. Three years ago the
prairie chicken was supposed to be all gone,
but a few flocks and families were found
by game wardens and sportsmen in the

_ marshes and along the river valleys in the
northern section of the State, |
ditch stand to preserve this species of game

In a last-

bird in the Hoosier State, a law was passed

_ establishing a closed season on the prairie
chicken or pinnated grouse for six years,
_ Then everything possible was done to in-
sure the propagation of this bird.

_+ The results have been unexpectedly suc-

cessful, Not less than 10,000 are in the

_ State, and the number is estimated by game

.

 

NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY.

wardens as anything from 30,000 to 100,000,
They are scattered in a long strip from east
to west. across the northern part of the
State, and are invading sections where they
have been extinct for 30 years. A farmer
in Fulton County recently reported a flock
of nearly 100 on his farm of 320 acres.
None had been found in this county for
many years past.

With three years of the closed season
still to run, by the time shooting is allowed
there will be several hundred thousands of
these birds in Indiana, and if proper care is
used in their hunting this State will never
be in danger of losing the prairie-chicken
hunting, which proved so popular a sport
many years ago, until the market hunter
and game hog cleaned them out.

Indiana game authorities this winter will
adopt the tactics put in operation by the
Pennsylvania game commission and _ its
servants. When snow is on the ground
some of these coveys will be trapped, and
fine specimens will be taken farther south,
where they will be turned loose in suitable
cover, Here they will propagate and spread
over the lands from which they vanished
decades ago, In this manner they will be
spread over the central and southern parts
of the State, and the entire commonwealth
will share in the benefits to be derived from
this feathered game, The. suggestion was
made by State Game Commissioner John
M. Phillips, who has found it useful in
spreading native game into sections for-
merly barren.

The prairie chicken, one of the most
numerous of the grouse family, is fairly
numerous in Missouri, the Dakotas, and
other Western States, and in Canada, and
is everywhere well protected, so that the
damage done in the old free-shooting days
is being repaired slowly. . Now, if the
States east of the Mississippi can bring the
prairie bird back, sportsmen will rejoice.

Pennsylvania sportsmen will undoubtedly

benefit by the changes as soon as an open
season is declared, for many will go to
Indiana for a few days’ sport with this fine
game bird.

Intoxicated Bees Go to School, Sting. Teacher
and Pupils,

Intoxicated bees recently went on a ram-
page at Grand Rapids, Mich., the objects of
their maudlin outbreak being Miss Helen
Sauers, a teacher, and several pupils in the
North Division Avenue School; all of
whom were stung. ;

Swarms of the bees first attacked work-
men in the Grand Rapids brewery plant
and drove them from the vat room, The
insects lined around the vats in large num-
bers, sipping the brew. A long string of
them then flew to the schoolroom, the
windows of which were open, and at-
tacked the teacher and the pupils, all of
whom got swollen faces and arms.

Bee keepers say the, insects would not
have attacked without cause unless they
were intoxicated.

_

Says Rubber Company Has Killed 30,000

Peruvian Indtans.

Addressing Yale students, Herbert Hen-
son Cannon, of Westminster Abbey, said
that the British government reports show
that 30,000 Peruvian Indians have been
slaughtered by a rubber company which
enslaves them and compels them to bundle
rubber for it. :

“Ninety per cent ‘of the entire population

; a

 

31

bear cruel scars to attest to the brutality
of the directors of the rubber monopoly,”
he added, “and hundreds of the poor In-
dians have been flogged to death for trivial
causes,

“Little children have been thrown into
forests and allowed to die; little boys have
been slowly roasted to death, and girls and
boys have been tossed to the dogs to eat.
The horrors of the brutal tyranny of the
rubber masters cannot be exaggerated,

“Whole villages have been wiped out.
There were 50,000 natives in this region ten
yeats ago; only about 10,000 can be found
now, The paths through the forests where
these poor workers have been murdered
resembles a battlefield.”

This Part of the Country to be in Frigid
Zone 15,000 Years Hence.

In 16,912, fifteen thousand years’ from
now, people living north of the Mason and
Dixon line will be Eskimos.

At least, this is the belief expressed by
Doctor Frederick A. Cook, explorer and
scientist, in an interview.

“Yes, sir, fifteen thousand years from
now they'll be wearing furs and eating
blubber instead of bonbons in this part of
the country,” said Doctor Cook.

“Instead of traveling to his ladylove’s
igloo in a 16,912 touring car or aéroplane,
the gay Lothario of that day will drive
to her ice-packed domicile in a sled drawn
by dogs, and will spend the evening of
two long months’ duration before her fire
of blubber oil,” said the doctor. :

“This change in climatic condition will
be due to a variance in the ellipses of the
earth around the sun, shooting this planet
out of its present orbit and ,away from
the source of heat, changing the entire solar
system and transforming this into a glacial
state such as exists around the north pole.
The discovery was made by Doctor Cook
while in the polar region, he states. Every
thirty thousand years the territory between
the Mason and Dixon line and northern-
most Canada is covered by a sheet of ice,
and the temperature drops to thirty de--
grees below zero, where it remains for a
thousand years. We are now between two
such glacial periods,’ Doctor Cook de-
clared.

Bell Boy Saves Circus Rider’s Life,

“Billy”? Winters, a famous girl circus
rider, tried to die in a room at the Com-
mercial Hotel, in. Chicago; recently. A
heroic bell boy and the pulmotor saved her
life.

Harry Jones, the bell boy, smelled the
escaping gas at the door of ‘Miss Winters’
room, ;

When he found he could not foree open
the door of the room he obtained a ladder,
climbed the elevated structure at the rear
of the hotel, and then placed the ladder
on the structure so he could reach the win-
dow ledge, and climbed into the room. He
filled his lungs with pure air, and then
dashed across the room and unlocked the
door. The near victim of the gas fumes
was carried out and taken to St. Luke’s
Hospital, and a pulmotor reyived her,.

Building Business Holding Own for Year.

Building business throughout the country
for the first nine months of this. year
shows an increase for four and two-fifths
per cent over the same period a year ago,
according to reports compiled in forty-six |

 
cities by the American Contractor. For

_ September, the business in the forty-six
cities dropped 7 per cent below that of last
September. Scranton, Pa., showed a gain
of 67 per cent for the month, and a loss
of 14 per cent for the nine months, the loss
being occasioned directly by the laborers’
strike of last spring.

Gains of over 50 per cent in September
were made in the following cities: Birm-
ingham, 95 per cent; Cleveland, 55 per
cent; Memphis, 133 per cent; Pittsburgh,
65 per cent; Scranton, 67 per cent, and
Worcester, 71 per cent. For the nine
months’ period, Toledo takes the lead over
all the other cities with an increase of
60 per cent.

Railway Reports Show Gain in All Earnings,

The Wall Street Journal has received the
returns for August, 1912, of, 102 roads
operating in the United States. The oper-
ated mileage covered by these roads for
August, 1912, equaled 194,871, as com-
pared with 191,492 miles for August, 1011,
an increase of 3,379 miles. The total oper’
ated mileage in the United States is ap-
proximately 250,000 miles.

Ninety-one roads reported increases in
gross aggregating $22,681,660, and eleven
reported decreases aggregating $170,038.
In net earnings seventy-three roads re-
ported increases totaling $11,128,847, and

twenty-nine roads reported decreases total-.

ing $1,791,792.

Build 1,000-foot Pontoon Bridge in Eight and
One-half Houts.

Out across the swinging brown current
of the Missouri River a bridge crept forth,
traveling span on span, over boats that
made it look like a gigantic water centipede.
The boats took the place of piers. The
bridge was a pontoon bridge. It was slung
deftly across’ the river near Fort Leaven-
ieiocth, 980 feet from shore to shore, by
E Company, of the engineering corps, all
between the hours of 9 1n the morning and
5:30 in the afternoon.

“Just for practice,” Captain Dillon said,
as he rolled a cigarette and watched the
anchoring of the boats that would carry
the last few links, “We had a lot of trou-
ble getting the anchors to hold in this
swift current and on a treacherous river
bed. We should build this bridge in six
hours, I think. It will take us eight and
a half.”

Still (considering the time ordinarily
spent on much shorter structures over
streams) eight hours and a half appears
to be a very moderate limit in which to
construct a fine, solid causeway nearly a
thousand feet long, capable of bearing in-
fantry, cavalry, baggage trains, and even
field artillery.

Captain Dillon did not fancy the feat at
all remarkable.

“By putting in two more span timbers,”
he said, “the bridge would carry siege guns
with a weight of eight thousand pounds on
each pair of wheels. Five longitudinal
timbers to the span will carry anything
_ under that class of ordnance. That’s what
we have used here.”

‘The method of pontoon-bridge building
is simple. That might be inferred by the
space of time in which 77 private and 16
noncommissioned officers of the engineers
hitched it together. Captain Dillon said
‘that M Company .had made a neat little
‘record a while back, building a pontoon

9

 

NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY.

bridge 200 feet long in precisely sixteen
minutes, But that was in still water, in
a lake near the post. And still water is
a long way removed from the powerful,
sullen heave of the Big Muddy rounding
a bend.

Two classes of boats were used in the
bridge. Near either bank the collapsible
canvas pontoons were used; boats that can
be knocked down and carried by cavalry,
yet capable of sustaining a bridge that will
carry everything except heavy artillery.
The main portion of the bridge rested on 32
wooden boats. Starting at the shore, the
boats were poled and paddled out and
anchored in position. Then the beams or
“baulks” were laid, from the short supports
to the “saddle” of the first boat, then to
the second, then to the third, being cov-
ered with planking or “chesses” as fast as
each span was finished. The position of
each boat was corrected accurately, before
being spanned, by lengthening or shorten-
ing the anchor cable. The structure, as a
whole, was slightly “bowed” upstream, so
that the terrific pressure of the current
might not force it into a “sag,” but in-
stead would tighten it as a unit.

And as at the building of Solomon’s
temple, the sound of a hammer was not
heard. Nota nail or a spike or a bolt was
used in that pontoon bridge that would
carry tons. Every joint was “lashed,” tied,
if you please, with new manila rope, twisted
loosely and then brought to the proper ten-

|sion by a stout stick, like a broom handle,

twisted in the loop and “locked” against
the planking. Solid as the structure ap-
pears under foot, it is elastic by its con-
struction, and may rise or fall with the
river without damage.

72 Dancing Masters Make War on Ragtime
in Chicago Halls.

The playing of ragtime music in dance
halls is a thing of the past in Chicago, for
the following sign has been agreed upon by
owners of dance halls as a fitting one for
their establishments : a

“Notice—No ragtime music played in
this hall.”

The above legend emblazoned in red
letters of large dimensions will soon greet
the dance-hall patron as he comes from the
box office and steps out on the ballroom
floor. The good, old ragtime which has
helped to enliven so many dances received
its deathblow when seventy-two dancing
masters, operating, as many dance halls,
decided to permit only the old-time waltz
and two-step to be executed upon their
waxed floors.

This marks the last step in the fight
which the dancing masters have made
against “the suggestive dance.” At the
meeting there was not a dissenting vote.

“We have entered into a finish fight with
the ragtime dance,” said President R. G.
Huntinghouse. “At the present time there
are few persons who can really dance.”

Exports Break Records,

Despite’ the existence of political unrest,
the imports and exports of the United
States for the month of September and for
the nine months ended with that month es-
tablished new records, according to a re-
port by the bureau of foreign and domestic
commerce. The imports for September ag-
aseeenee $144,862,343, the previous record
gure being in September of last year,
when they totaled $125,171,644. In the

 

nine months ended with September the im-

ports reached the sum of $1,333,125,577, as |

against the previous record for the corre-
sponding months of 1910 of $1,172,362,400.

Scarcely less gratifying were the figures —

dealing with the exports for September, the
total for that month being $196,943,811, as
against $1093,632,232 for September of last
year. For the nine months ended with
September the goods shipped abroad were
valued at $1,588,721,077, upward of

value of those that left American ports
during the same period of last year, which
established a new record.

Fearing Burglats, Irish Immigrants Leap

from ‘Third-story Window,

John and Hugh O’Donahue, brothers,
who arrived in this country from Ireland
recently, jumped out of a third-story win-
dow in Chicago, and ran a mile in their
nightclothes before they thought it safe
to stop. They had been confronted by a
holdup man with a revolver in their lodg-
ing house.

_ Two policemen who saw. the brothers —
jump from the window captured a man —

supposed to be the robber. He had in his
pockets considerable English
which the men identified as theirs. A larger

sum that was hidden under the mattress —

was untouched.

Many Births in New York City.
While New York City showed a net gain
in native population of 5,734 in August
last, according to the bulletin of the State
department of health, the rest of the State
gained only 2,227. For the month New
York. City’s deaths were 5,781 and her

births 11,525. They were distributed thus: —

Births Deaths
++0++5,787 2,024
» vegeink ohane waa gy kta eaeee
PROORAIEL “uses eethanenbaees Ve 3,817
NGONE’ 6 a5 se baie 5
Richmond

The urban births outside of New York

Boroughs
Manhattan
Bronx

eeeeeeeeeeeee

currency —

one })
hundred million dollars. more than the 4

City numbered 4,274, of which 1,077 are a

credited to Buffalo, leaving 3,197 distributed
among 50 other cities. The rural localities,
which are credited with 2,331,688 popula-—
tion, report, 3,421 births. The number of

deaths in the cities were 2,766, while in

the rural localities there were 2,702.

Of the total deaths,
old age, 36 to homicides, 113 to suicides, 12
to sunstrokes, 135 to railroad accidents, and
30 to horses and vehicles. “Other acci-
dental traumatisms” caused the death of
134 persons.

Wilbur Wright’s Estate.

Wilbur Wright, the aviator, who died last
summer, according to an accounting filed
in the probate court, left an estate of
$279,298.40.
ville Wright, his brother, who gets the
major part of the estate.

Twelve years ago Wilbur and Orville
Wright were conducting a bicycle repair
shop, and were barely able to make ends
meet.

The entire estate goes to his brothers,
sister, and father. His
Reuchlin and Larin Wright, and sister, |
Katherine, each get $50,000. One thousand
dollars is given to Bishop Milton Wright,
the father.
$126,875.75, goes to Orville.

The account was filed’ by Or- —

The remainder of the estate,

125 were due to

*

two brothers, —

 
 
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667—F rank Merriwell’s Diplomacy.
668—F rank Merriwell’s Encourage-
ment.
669—F rank Merriwell’s Great Work.
670—Dick Merriwell’s Mind.
671—Dick Merriwell’s “Dip.”
672—Dick Merriwell’s Rally.
673—Dick Merriwell's Flier.
674—F rank Merriwell’s Bullets.
675—F rank Merriwell’s Cut Off.
676—F rank Merriwell’s Ranch Boss.
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586—Dick Merriwell’s Distrust.
587—Dick Merriwell, Lion Tamer,
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589—Dick Merriwell’s Debt.
590—Dick Merriwell’s Camp Mates.
591—Dick Merriwell’s Draw.
592—Dick Merriwell’s Disapproval.
593—-Dick Merriwell’s Mastery.
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595—Dick Merriwell’s “Double 68S0O—Frank Merriwell’s Zest.

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596—-Dick Merriwell’s Vanishing. 682—Frank Merriwell’s Pupil.
597—Dick Merriwell Adrift. 683—F rank Merriwell’s Fighters.
598—Dick Merriwell’s Influence, 684—Dick Merriwell at the ‘“Meet.”
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600—Frank Merriwell’s Annoyance. 686—Dick Merriwell in the
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602—Dick Merriwell Held Back. 687—Dick Merriwell’s Colors.
603—Dick Merriwell in the Line. 6S88—Dick Merriwell, Driver.
604—Dick Merriwell’s Drop Kick. 689—Dick Merriwell on the Deep.
606—Frank Merriwell’s Auto Chase. 690—Dick Merriwell in the North
607—Frank Merriwell’s Captive. Woods.
608—Dick Merriwell’s Value. 691—Dick Merriwell’s Dandies.
609—Dick Merriwell Doped. 692—Dick Merriwell's Skyscooter.
610—Dick Merriwell’s Belief. 693—Dick Merriwell in the Elk
611—Frank Merriwell in the Mar- Mountains.

ket. 694—Dick Merriwe]1 in Utah.
612—Frank . Merriwell’s Fight for 695—Dick Merriwell’s Bluff.

Fortune. 696—Dick Merriwell in the Saddle.
613—Frank Merriwell on Top. 697—Dick Merriwell’s Ranch
614—Dick Merriwell’s Trip West. Friends.
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616—Dick Merriwell in Mystery sake,

Valley 699—F rank Merriwell’s Hold-back.
617—Frank Merriwell’s Proposition. 700—F rank Merriwell’s Lively Lads
618—Frank Merriwell Perplexed. 701—Frank Merriwell as Instructor.
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620—Dick Merriwell’s Gallantry. 708—Dick Merriwell’s Quirt.
621—Dick Merriwell’s Condition. 704—Dick Merriwell’s Freshman
= Ay 22—Dic k Merriwell’s Stanchness, Friend.

38—Dick Metriwell’s Match. 705—Dick Merriwell’s Best Form.
6: 34. —Frank Merriwell’s Hard Case. 706—Dick Merriwell’s Prank.
625—Frank Merriwell’s Helper. 707—Dick Merriwell’s Gambol.
626—F rank Merrtwell’s Doubts. 7TO8—Dick Merriwell’s Gun.
627—F rank Merriwell’s “Phenom.” 709—Dick Merriwell at His Best.
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63 rriwéll’s Money. 13—Dick Merriwell’s Standard.
632—Dick Merriwell Watched. 14—Dick Merriwell’s Sympathy.
633—Dick Merriwell Doubted. 15—Dick Merriwell in Lumber
634—Dick Merriwell’s Distrust. Land.
635—Dick Merriwell’s Risk. 16—F rank Merriwell’s Fairness.
oer. Pe Merriwell’s Favorite. 717—FI*rank Merriwell’s Pledge.
657—F rank Merriwell's Young 718—Frank Merriwell, the Man of

‘lippers. Grit
39—F rank Merriwell’s 1 rank

Breakers, j Blow.
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641—Dick Merriwell’s Desperate 21—Frank Merriwell’s Ingots.

y, »)
9

Mara-

Record 719—Fr ’ Merriwell’s Return

Work. —F rank Merriwell’s Assistance.
642—Dick Merriwell’s Example. 8—Frank Merriwell the
643—Dick Merriwell at Gale’s Ferry. Throttle.
644—Dick Merriwell’s.Inspiration, 724—Frank Merriwell,
645—Dick Merriwell’s Shooting. : Ready.
646—Dick Merriwell in the Wilds. 725—Frank Merriwell in Diamond 7
647—Dick Merriwell’s Redomrade. Land.

649—F rank Merriwell in th® Saddley 726—Frank Merriwell’s Desperate
651—F rank Merriwell’s Red Guide, Chance.

652—Dick Merriwell’s Rival. rand. Merriwell’s Black Ter-
653—Dick Merriwell’s Strength.
654—Dick Merriwell’s Secret Work.
656—F rank Merriwell’s Red Visitor.
657—Frank Merriwell’s Rope.
658—F rank Merriwell’s Lesson.
659—F rank Merriwell’s Protection.
660—Dick Merriwell’s Reputation.
661—Dick Merriwell’s Motto.
662—Dick Merriwell’s Restraint.
663—Dick Merriwell’s Ginger.
664—Dick Merriwell’s Driving.
665—Dick Merriwell’s Good Cheer,
666—Frank Merriwell’s Theory.

at

the Always ‘

727

7—F

728—Fr rank “Merriwell Again on the
Slap
729—Frank Merriwell’s Hard
730—Frank Merriwell’s
731—F 1 rank Merriwell’s Duplicate,
732—Frank Merriwell on Rattle-
snake Ranch.
8—Frank Merriwell’s Sure Hand.
—Frank Merriwell’s Treasure
Map.
rank Merriwell,
the Rope.

Game

735—r Prince of

36—Dick
the

37—Dick Merriwell’s Control.

38—Dick Merriwell’s Back Stop.

39. —Dic k Merriwell’s Masked *En-

emy.

—Dick Merriwell’s Motor Car.
Dick Merriwell’s Hot Pursuit.
—Dick Merriwell at Forest Lake
—Dick Merriwell in Court.

—~Dick Merriwell’s Silence,
—Dick Merriwell’s Dog.

Dick Merriwell’s Subterfuge.
—Dick Merriwell’s Enigma.
$—Dick Merriwell Defeated.
9—Dick Merriwell’s “Wing.”
50—Dick Merriwell’s Sky Chase.
51—Dick Merriwell’s Pick-ups.
52—-Dick Merriwell on the

ing R.
—Dick Merriwell’s Penetration.
Dick Merriwell’s Intuition.
Dick Merriwell’s Vantage.
-Dick Merriwell’s Advice.
7—Dic k Merriwell’s Rescue.

—Dick Merriwell, American.

b—pick Merriwell’s Understand-

ir 1g.

760—Dick Merriwell, Tutor.

761—-Dick Merriwell’s Quandary.

762—Dick Merriwell on the Boa rds.
763—Dick Merriwell, Peacemaker.

764—F rank Merriwell’s Sway.

765—Frank Merriwell’s Compre-

; hension.
766—F rank Merriwell’s
Acrobat.
767—Frank Merriwell’s Tact,

768—F rank Merriwell’s Unknown.

769—F rank Merriwell’s Acuteness.

770—Frank Merriwell’s Young

Canadian.

71—F rank Merriwell’s Coward.

72-—F rank Merriwell’s Perplexity.

73—Frank Merriwell’s Interven-
tion,

Merriwell,
Varsity.

Captain
-Dick
Pitcher.

806-

“1-1-1

SO8
809—F rank
ence.
ank
Warriors.
811—F rank
812—Frank
813—F rank
814—F rank
Aviators.

4

t 810—Fr

0-
1
42—
43-
44
45
16
17
48
4§

816—Dick Merriwell,

SSSI NII ete 9 aod

tock-

821—Dick Merriwell,

824—Dick
Coach.

a = aISk “1-1 es

828—Dick
bility.

832
Young 833-

834
835
83
>

§37—Dick Merriwell

slue.
839—Dick Merriwell’s
840
841-

ponents.

-Frank Merriwell’s Succor.

Frank Merriwell’s Wit.

Frank Merriwell’s Loy alty.

-Frank Merriwell’s Bold P ‘lay.

Frank Merriwell’s Insight.

-Frank Merriwell’s Guile.
—Frank Merriwell's Campaign.

~Diek
Clew.

843—

845

847—Dick Merriwell

74
75
76-
7—
1 ae
9
0-
i vics.

‘

(

if
7
7
Ss
8
8

tional Forest.

849—Dick Merriwell
783—Frank Merriwell’s Tenacity. ish St

ish Stadium.

of 805—Dick Merriwell’s College
Merriwell’s

Merriwell’s

—Frank Merriwell’s Daring Deed g49_ re k Merriwell’s Sixth
Merriwell’s

Mate.
Young

S807—Dick Merriwell’s Prodding.
I’rank Merriwell’s Boy.
Merriwell’s

Interfer-

Young

Merriwell’s Appraisal.

Merriwell’s

Merriwell’s Lads.
Merriwell’s

Forgiveness

Young

815—F rank Merriwell’s Hot-head.

Diplomat.

817—Dick Merriwell in Panama.
818—Dick Merriwell’s Perseverance,
819—Dick Merriwell Triumphant.
820—Dick Merriwell’s Betrayal.

Revolutionist.

822—Dick Merriwell’s Fortitude,
823—Dick Merriwell’s Undoing.
Merriwell,

Universal

825—Dick Merriwell’s Snare.

826—Dick Merriwell’s Star Pupil.
827—Dick Merriwell’s Astuteness,
Merriwell’s

Responsi-

829—Dick Merriwell’s Plan.
830—Dick Merriwell’s Warning.
831—Dick Merriwell’s Counsel.
—Dick Merriwell’s Champions.
—~Dick Merriwell’s Marksmen.
—Dick Merriwell’s Enthusiasm.
—Dick Merriwell’s Solution.
6—Dick Merriwell’s Foreign

Foe.

and the Car-

lisle Warriors.
838—Dick Merriwell’s Battle for the

Evidence,

—~Diek Merriwell’s Device.
—Dic k Merriwell’s Princeton Op-

Sense,
Strange

844—Dick Merriwell Comes Back.
—Dick Merriwell’s Heroie Crew
846—Dick Merriwell Looks Ahead.

at the Olym-

2—Frank Merriwell in the Na- 848—pibk Merriwell in Stockholm.

in the Swed-

784—Dick Merriwell’s Self-sacrifice. 850—Dick Merriwell’s Marathon.

785—Dick Merriwell’s Close Shave,
786—Dick Merriwell’s Perception.
787—Dick Merriwell’s Mysterious
Disappearance,
788—Dick Merriwell’s
Work
@)—Dick Merriwell’s Proof,
90—Dick Merriwell's Brain Work.
791—Dick Merriwell’s Queer Case.
792—Dick Merriwell, Navigator.
7§ ee ll’s Good Fellow-

794—Dic k  Merriwell’ s Fun.
795—Dick Merriwell’s Commence-
ment.
796—Dick Merriwell
Point.
797—Dick Merriwell, Mediator.
798—Dick Merriwell’s Decision.

Detective 2

2
0

Shave.

ing Orders.

Marathon.

Bar Z Ranch.
11—Frank Merriwell,
vil.

rl

Six-in-hand 799—Dick Merriwell on the Great 12—Frank Merriwell, Jr.’s,

Lakes.
er eae Merriwell Caught Nap- 13—Fr: ine Merriwell,
ance,
801—Dick Mere iwell in the Copper 14—Frank Merriwell,
Country. mage.
802—Dick Merriwell Strapped. 15—F
803—Dick Merriwell’s Coolness,

804—Dick Merriwell’s Reliance. Play.

4—Frank Merriwell, J
5—Frank Merriwell,
6—Frank Merriwell, Jr.’
7—F rank Merriwell, Jr.,

8—F rank Merriwell, J1
9—Frank Merriwell, Jr.’

at Montauk 10—Frank Merriwell, Jr.,

rank Merriwell, J
16—Frank Merriwell,

NEW TIP TOP WEEKLY
1—F rank Merriwell, Jr

Frank Merriwell,
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A

Struggle.
r.’s, Skill.

Jr., in Idaho,
8, Close

on Wait-

:
wie
8,

Danger.
Relay
at the
Jr.’s, Golden
Compet-
Jr.’s, Guid-
Jt 8, Scrim-

r.. Misjudged

JTé8, Star

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