"Oh, bother your name! Go ahead." "I aint got nothing to say." "Go ahead and say it." The captain was rather taciturn, but was finally induced to tell his story. [B] The main incidents of Jim Bagley's story are true, having been communicated to the writer by Jim himself, a wide-awake boy of fifteen, who appeared to possess decided business ability and energy. The name only is fictitious. "My father and mother are dead," he said. "I used to live with my sister and her husband. He would get drunk off the money I brought home, and if I didn't bring home as much as he expected, he'd fling a chair at my head." "He was a bully brother-in-law," said Jerry. "Did it hurt the chair much?" "If you want to know bad, I'll try it on you," growled the narrator. "Good for Captain Jinks!" exclaimed two or three of the boys. "When did you join the Hoss Marines?" asked Jerry, with apparent interest. "Shut up your mouth!" said the captain, who did not fancy the joke. "Go ahead, Jinks." "I would not stand that; so I went off, and lived at the Lodge till I got in here. That's all." Captain Jinks relapsed into silence, and Tim McQuade was called upon. He had a pair of sparkling black eyes, that looked as if he were not averse to fun. "Maybe you don't know," he said, "that I'm fust cousin to a Markis." "The Markis of Cork," suggested one of the boys. "And sometimes I expect to come in for a lot of money, if I don't miss of it." "When you do, just treat a feller, will you?" said Jerry. "Course I will. I was born in a big castle made of stone, and used to go round dressed in welvet, and had no end of nice things, till one day a feller that had a spite ag'in the Markis carried me off, and brought me to America, where I had to go to work and earn my own livin'." "Why don't you write the Markis, and get him to send for you?" asked Jerry. "'Cause he can't read, you spalpeen! What 'ud be the use of writin' to him?" "Maybe it's the fault of your writin', Tim." "Maybe it is," said Tim. "When the Markis dies I'm going back, an' I'll invite you all to come an' pass a week at Castle McQuade." "Bully for you, Tim! Now, Dutchey, tell us your story." Dutchey was a boy of ten, with a full face and rotund figure, whose English, as he had been but two years in the country, was highly flavored with his native dialect. "I cannot English sprechen," he said. "Never mind, Dutchey. Do as well as you can." "It is mine story you want? He is not very long, but I will tell him so goot as I can. Mine vater was a shoemaker, what makes boots. He come from Sharmany, on der Rhein, mit my moder, and five childer. He take a little shop, and make some money, till one day a house fall on his head mit a brick, an he die. Then I go out into der street, and black boots so much as I get him to do, and the money what I get I carry home to mine moder. I cannot much English sprechen, or I could tell mine story more goot." "Bully for you, Dutchey! You're a trump."