"Don't be provokin', Ephr'm--what makes you talk in that dou'fle way?"

"Wa'al, ma, the world hain't all squeezed into this yere little town of Crankett. I've been elsewheres, some, an' I've seed some funny things, and likewise some that wuzn't so funny ez they might be."

"P'r'aps ye hev, but ye needn't allus be a-settin' other folks down.

Mebbe Crankett ain't the whole world, but it's seed that awful case of Molly Capins, and the shipwreck of thirty-four, when the awful nor'easter wuz, an'--"

"Wa'al, wa'al, ma--don't let's fight 'bout it," said Ephr'm, with a sigh, as he tenderly scraped down a new ax-helve with a piece of glass, while his wife made the churn-dasher hurry up and down as if the innocent cream was Ephr'm's back, and she was avenging thereon Ephr'm's insults to Crankett and its people.

Deacon Ephraim Crankett was a descendant of the founder of the village, and although now a sixty-year old farmer, he had in his lifetime seen considerable of the world. He had been to the fishing-banks a dozen times, been whaling twice, had carried a cargo of wheat up the Mediterranean, and had been second officer of a ship which had picked up a miscellaneous cargo in the heathen ports of Eastern Asia.

[Illustration: JIM HOCKSON'S REVENGE.--"HE HELD IT UNDER THE LIGHT, AND EXAMINED IT CLOSELY."]

He had picked up a great many ideas, too, wherever he had been, and his wife was immensely proud of him and them, whenever she could compare them with the men and ideas which existed at Crankett; but when Ephr'm displayed his memories and knowledge to her alone--oh, that was a very different thing.

"Anyhow," resumed Mrs. Crankett, raising the lid of the churn to see if there were any signs of butter, "it's an everlastin' shame. Jim Hockson's a young feller in good standin' in the Church, an' Millie Botayne's an unbeliever--they say her father's a reg'lar infidel."

"Easy, ma, easy," gently remonstrated Ephr'm. "When he seed you lookin'

at his pet rose-bush on yer way to church las' Sunday, didn't he hurry an' pull two or three an' han' 'em to ye?"

"Yes, an' what did he hev' in t'other han'?--a Boasting paper, an' not a Sunday one, nuther! Millicent ain't a Christian name, nohow ye can fix it--it amounts to jest 'bout's much ez she does, an' that's nothing.

She's got a soft face, an' purty hair--ef it's all her own, which I powerfully doubt--an' after that ther's nothin' to her. She's never been to sewin' meetin', an' she's off a boatin' with that New York chap every Saturday afternoon, instead of goin' to the young people's prayer-meetin's."

"She's most supported Sam Ransom's wife an' young uns since Sam's smack was lost," suggested Ephr'm.

"That's you, Deac'n Crankett," replied his wife, "always stick up for sinners. P'r'aps you'd make better use of your time ef you'd examine yer own evidences."

"Wa'al, wife," said the deacon, "she's engaged to that New York feller, ez you call Mr. Brown, so there's no danger of Jim bein' onequally yoked with an onbeliever. An' I wish her well, from the bottom of my heart."

"_I_ don't," cried Mrs. Crankett, giving the dasher a vicious push, which sent the cream flying frantically up to the top of the churn; "I hope he'll turn out bad, an' her pride'll be tuk down ez--"

The deacon had been long enough at sea to know the signs of a long storm, and to know that prudence suggested a prompt sailing out of the course of such a storm, when possible; so he started for the door, carrying the glass and ax-helve with him. Suddenly the door opened, and a female figure ran so violently against the ax-helve, that the said figure was instantly tumbled to the floor, and seemed an irregular mass of faded pink calico, and subdued plaid shawl.

"Miss Peekin!" exclaimed Mrs. Crankett, dropping the churn-dasher and opening her eyes.

"Like to ha' not been," whined the figure, slowly arising and giving the offending ax-helve a glance which would have set it on fire had it not been of green hickory; "but--_hev_ you heerd?"

"What?" asked Mrs. Crankett, hastily setting a chair for the newcomer, while Ephr'm, deacon and sixty though he was, paused in his almost completed exit.

"_He's_ gone!" exclaimed Miss Peekin.

"Oh, I heerd Jim hed gone to Califor--"

"Pshaw!" said Miss Peekin, contemptuously; "that was days ago! I mean Brown--the New York chap--Millie Botayne's lover!"

"Ye don't?"

"But I do; an' what's more, he _had_ to. Ther wuz men come after him in the nighttime, but he must hev heard 'em, fur they didn't find him in his room, an' this mornin' they found that his sailboat was gone, too.

An' what's more, ther's a printed notice up about him, an' he's a defaulter, and there's five thousand dollars for whoever catches him, an' he's stole _twenty-five_, an' he's all described in the notice, as p'ticular as if he was a full-blood Alderney cow."

"Poor fellow," sighed the deacon, for which interruption he received a withering glance from Miss Peekin.

"They say Millie's a goin' on awful, and that she sez she'll marry him now if he'll come back. But it ain't likely he'll be such a fool; now he's got so much money, he don't need hern. Reckon her an' her father won't be so high an' mighty an' stuck up now. It's powerful discouragin'

to the righteous to see the ungodly flourishin' so, an' a-rollin' in ther wealth, when ther betters has to be on needles all year fur fear the next mack'ril catch won't 'mount to much. The idee of her bein'

willin' to marry a defaulter! I can't understand it."

"Poor girl!" sighed Mrs. Crankett, wiping one eye with the corner of her apron. "I'd do it myself, ef I was her?"

The deacon dropped the ax-helve, and gave his wife a tender kiss on each eye.

II.

Perhaps Mr. Darwin can tell inquirers why, out of very common origin, there occasionally spring beings who are very decided improvements on their progenitors; but we are only able to state that Jim Hockson was one of these superior beings, and was himself fully aware of the fact.

Not that he was conceited at all, for he was not, but he could not help seeing what every one else saw and acknowledged.

Every one liked him, for he was always kind in word and action, and every one was glad to be Jim Hockson's friend; but somehow Jim seemed to consider himself his best company.

His mackerel lines were worked as briskly as any others when the fish were biting; but when the fish were gone, he would lean idly on the rail, and stare at the waves and clouds; he could work a cranberry-bog so beautifully that the people for miles around came to look on and take lessons; yet, when the sun tried to hide in the evening behind a ragged row of trees on a ridge beyond Jim's cranberry-patch, he would lean on his spade, and gaze until everything about him seemed yellow.

He read the Bible incessantly, yet offended alike the pious saints and critical sinners by never preaching or exhorting. And out of everything Jim Hockson seemed to extract what it contained of the ideal and the beautiful; and when he saw Millicent Botayne, he straightway adored the first woman he had met who was alike beautiful, intelligent and refined.

Miss Millie, being human, was pleased by the admiration of the handsome, manly fellow who seemed so far the superior of the men of his class; but when, in his honest simplicity, he told her that he loved her, she declined his further attentions in a manner which, though very delicate and kind, opened Jim's blue eyes to some sad things he had never seen before.

He neither got drunk, nor threatened to kill himself, nor married the first silly girl he met; but he sensibly left the place where he had suffered so greatly, and, in a sort of sad daze, he hurried off to hide himself in the newly discovered gold-fields of California. Perhaps he had suddenly learned certain properties of gold which were heretofore unknown to him; at any rate, it was soon understood at Spanish Stake, where he had located himself, that Jim Hockson got out more gold per week than any man in camp, and that it all went to San Francisco.

"Kind of a mean cuss, I reckon," remarked a newcomer, one day at the saloon, when Jim alone, of the crowd present, declined to drink with him.

"Not any!" replied Colonel Two, so called because he had two eyes, while another colonel in the camp had but one. "An' it's good for _you_, stranger," continued the colonel, "that you ain't been long in camp, else some of the boys 'ud put a hole through you for sayin' anything 'gainst Jim; for we all swear by him, _we_ do. He don't carry shootin'-irons, but no feller in camp dares to tackle him; he don't cuss nobody, but ev'rybody does just as he asks 'em to. As to drinkin', why, I'd swear off myself, ef 'twud make me hold a candle to him. Went to old Bermuda t'other day, when he was ravin' tight and layin' for Butcher Pete with a shootin'-iron, an' he actilly talked Bermuda into soakin'

his head an' turnin' in--ev'rybody else was afeared to go nigh old Bermuda that day."

The newcomer seemed gratified to learn that Jim was so peaceable a man--that was the natural supposition, at least--for he forthwith cultivated Jim with considerable assiduity, and being, it was evident, a man of considerable taste and experience, Jim soon found his companionship very agreeable and he lavished upon his new acquaintance, who had been nicknamed Tarpaulin, the many kind and thoughtful attentions which had endeared Jim to the other miners.

The two men lived in the same hut, staked claims adjoining each other, and Tarpaulin, who had been thin and nervous-looking when he first came to camp, began to grow peaceable and plump under Jim's influence.

One night, as Jim and Tarpaulin lay chatting before a fire in their hut, they heard a thin, wiry voice in the next hut inquiring:

"Anybody in this camp look like this?"

Tarpaulin started.

"That's a funny question," said he; "let's see who and what the fellow is."

And then Tarpaulin started for the next hut. Jim waited some time, and hearing low voices in earnest conversation, went next door himself.

Tarpaulin was not there, but two small, thin, sharp-eyed men were there, displaying an old-fashioned daguerreotype of a handsome-looking young man, dressed in the latest New York style; and more than this Jim did not notice.

"Don't know him, mister," said Colonel Two, who happened to be the owner of the hut. "Besides ef, as is most likely, he's growed long hair an' a beard since he left the States, his own mother wouldn't know him from George Washington. Brother o' yourn?"

"No," said one of the thin men; "he's--well, the fact is, we'll give a thousand dollars to any one who'll find him for us in twenty-four hours."