“Well, I call them fine,” said Evan, biting into his second one. “A cruller by any other name would taste as good.” “Suppose you toss a couple over here,” suggested Malcolm, “if you don’t want them all.” “I do want them all,” was the reply, “but being generous I will allow you one.” “You’ll allow me a couple more presently,” responded Malcolm. “Say, I should think there would be a big waste in making them this way; with holes in the middle, I mean.” “Waste? Why?” asked Rob. “Well, what becomes of the piece that’s cut out?” The others laughed and Malcolm looked surprised. “What’s the joke?” “Why, they take the dough that’s cut out and make more crullers, you idiot,” said Rob. Malcolm considered a moment. “Oh,” he said. “I never thought of that. I had an idea they threw that away.” “Wasn’t there a story,” asked Evan, “about a man who got it into his head that if he could make the holes in doughnuts larger he’d make more money on them?” “There was――and is,” answered Rob gravely. “There is also a conundrum about the reason why a miller wears a white hat. But if you had any respect for age you’d let them both alone.” “Say, Rob,” said Jelly, “I should think you’d invent a cruller with a little box in the middle to hold raspberry jam. That would be swell, wouldn’t it?” “Why raspberry?” asked Evan. “Oh, I like raspberry best,” answered Jelly calmly. “In that way you’d be economizing space, Rob. It always make me feel badly to see all that empty place in the middle.” “Well, you won’t have any empty place in your middle,” said Rob scathingly. “No wonder you’re fat, Jelly.” Mr. George Washington Jell sighed comfortably. “Well,” he replied, “I’d rather be a little bit fat and have enough to eat, Rob.” “How about football, though?” asked Malcolm. “I thought you told us that Hopkins thinks you’re too fat?” “Oh, I’ll soon train down,” answered Jelly, reaching for another doughnut. “In a week or two I’ll be twelve pounds lighter.” “Mercy!” Rob held up his hands in awe. “Why, we’ll hardly know you! Think of Jelly losing twelve pounds, fellows!” “Twelve pounds of Jelly,” murmured Malcolm. “You’ll be a regular skeleton, Jelly.” “You’ll get rid of another pound or two going down the mountain,” observed Evan. “Mal, did I ever tell you about a fellow I knew back home who had a cocker spaniel?” asked Rob. “No, I don’t think so. What about him?” “Well, it was a fine dog and he wanted to enter him at the dog show.” Rob pushed his tin plate aside and stretched himself comfortably. “But when he had the dog weighed he was eight pounds too heavy. The show was to open the next morning and he didn’t know what to do. He tried starving the dog and in the evening he weighed him again, but he was still seven and a half pounds too heavy.” “This is a pathetic tale,” muttered Malcolm. “Well, he didn’t know what to do――” “You said that before, Rob.”