clothes, Thomas, you can see as I'm telling the truth. However, they've just been and cut their own throats, for they've only made me more determined than ever to stick to my tee-totalism." "All right, Jim," said the other cheerfully; "they've outwitted themselves. I've an old coat and waistcoat as I've nearly done with, but they've got a good bit of wear in them yet. They'll just about fit you, I reckon. You shall go back in them, and keep them and welcome, and we'll make these as they've spoilt a present to the dunghill. I only wish all other bad habits, and more particularly them as comes through rum, brandy, and such like, could be cast away on to the same place. You did quite right, Jim, to come straight to me." "Ay, Thomas, I felt as it were best; for I were in a towering rage at first, and I think I should have half killed some of 'em, if I could only have got at them." "Ah, well, Jim, you just let all that alone. `Vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord.' We'll get our revenge in another way some day; we may heap coals of fire on some of their heads yet. But you leave matters now to me. I shall see Ned Taylor to-morrow myself, and give him a bit of my mind; and warn him and his mates that if they try anything of the kind on again, they'll get themselves into trouble." "Thank you, Thomas, with all my heart, for your kindness: `a friend in need's a friend indeed.' But there's just another thing as I wants to talk to you about afore I go. I meant to come up to-night about it anyhow, even if this do hadn't happened." "Well, Jim, let's hear it." "Do you remember Levi Sharples, Thomas?" "What! That tall, red-haired chap, with a cast in his left eye, and a mouth as wide and ugly as an ogre's?" "Yes, that's the man. You'll remember, Thomas, he was concerned in that housebreaking job four years ago, and the police have been after him ever since." "To be sure, Jim, I remember him fast enough; he's not a man one's likely to forget. I suppose a more thorough scoundrel never set foot in Crossbourne. It was a wonderful thing how he managed to escape and keep out of prison after that burglary business. But what about him?" "Why, Thomas, I seed him in this town the day before yesterday." "Surely, Jim, you must be mistaken. He durstn't show his face in Crossbourne for the life of him." "No, I know that; but he's got himself made up to look like another man,--black hair, great black whiskers, and a thick black beard, and a foreign sort of cap on his head,--and he's lodging at the Green Dragon, and pretends as he's an agent for some foreign house to get orders for rings, and brooches, and watches, and things of that sort." "But are you certain, Jim, you're not mistaken?"