"--And the robbers took him to set the brakes so they could run away with the ingine and express car. But this smart young gentleman disconnected the coil of the brakes, and everything about this train is just the same as if it was nailed to the tracks. The ingine can spit sparks, but she can't turn a wheel, and I'm thinkin' they'll be monkeyin' with her until the Stoneville Light Infantry comes along and bags 'em every one!" A silent hand-clapping greeted this; then all the passengers, keeping perfectly still, waited for their rescuers to arrive. Meanwhile a great noise and whacking went on outside, as the robbers vainly struggled to make the engine move. Laurie sat, his arm about his father's neck, and although he said but little, every glance was an appeal for forgiveness. Blundon had made him out something of a hero in resource, and his father's proud recognition of it was plain to all. After fifteen minutes' waiting, under high tension, Blundon, peering closely into the surrounding darkness, uttered a suppressed chuckle. "They're comin'," he said. "The robbers don't see 'em; they are too busy with the ingine." A pause followed, unbroken by a word; then a yell, as the robbers realized they were surrounded. The passengers locked up in the drawing-room car could see little of the scuffle, but they heard it, and in a few minutes the door was wrenched open, and an officer in uniform announced that the robbers were captured, and called for the engineer to come and take charge of the engine. * * * * * Laurie and Blundon both wear watches with inscriptions on them--gifts from the railway company. Laurie is living in his father's house, and has altogether given up his dream of inventing a new brake, and is reading law very hard, much to his father's delight; and people say, "Did you ever see a father and son so fond of one another as Mr. Vane and that boy of his?" And Laurie has several times asked his father, dryly, if he was really sorry that his only son had studied up the subject of air-brakes when he ought to have been in the class-room. Laurie has promised Blundon that once in two years at least he will go to Mudhole Junction. They have had but one meeting as yet, since Laurie left, when Blundon sagely remarked: "Mr. Vane, sir, I think you did a sight better in holding that train down to the track with them ordinary brakes than you ever will with any of your own. But the best thing you did, after all, was to ask your father's pardon, and you ought to have done it a year before, Mr. Vane, sir." A NEW USE FOR APES.