him acquainted with the outside boss of the mines, going even as far as to ask for work for the “young man,” who, he said, “was jist stharvin’ for somewhat to lay his honest, hard-workin’ hands to!” The boss could do nothing, however; and, after examining the slopes and walking through some of the gangways, talking with a miner here and there, they revisited the upper air. Again it was discovered the Germans held the ascendency in numbers and power, and managed to keep it; hence, there was no opportunity for securing employment. He must seek elsewhere for a body of the Mollie Maguires—the Donaldson mines were not their abiding-place. The next point on the list for examination was Middle Creek, two miles distant, over the mountain, from Tremont, where the men were equally unlucky, finding no work. A walk back, through rough roads, over brambles and stones, and dodging laurel and alder bushes, gave the pedestrians appetites for their suppers when they reached Tremont. Delaney here separated from McKenna, after a few farewell glasses, and started for Pottsville, at which place he said he was due, and had friends and relatives. During the succeeding Wednesday the detective remained in Tremont, and, after dinner, enjoyed a walk on the railway track, the weather being fine, continuing an intimacy previously begun between himself and the switch-tender, an aged Emerald Islander, who was found sitting nigh the entrance to his little box, or cabin—short, stumpy, gray-haired, brown-faced, roughly clad, but honest and sturdy-looking withal—smoking his pipe contentedly, and receiving pleasurably the cool breeze sweeping up the valley. Mike Fitzgibbons, the switchman, was a genuine specimen of the hard-working, steady, reliable Irish peasantry, and he was never known to neglect a duty. “An’ how is business wid ye the day?” asked McKenna, as he came up to the old man’s station, preparing his tobacco meantime, and signaling by a significant motion, easily understood by smokers, for a light for his cutty-pipe, which was old and black, as well as fashionably short in the stem. The switchman tendered his doodeen, which, having been employed, the stranger returned to its owner, with thanks. “Arrah! an’ about all days are the same to the likes o’ me! I am to the fore all the time when I’m not slapin’ an’ atin’ wid Betty and the childer. I jist mind the trains, to prevint misadventure. Sure, the Company gives me fair wages, promptly paid, for that same!” “Thrue for ye,” answered McKenna; “an’ hev ye any objection to me takin’ a seat by ye, on the settle forninst the wall, while I have a puff at me pipe?”