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CHAPTER XI.
IN HONOR BOUND

“Thank you for the compliment,” Jack said; “but there are just six of us, all told; and each one is as much entitled to your praise as I am.”

“I object,” George broke in. “Lots of times the pack of us would have been in a bally lot of hot water only for the clever way you had of handling things.”

“And that’s no lie, either!” burst out Jimmy. “Whin there’s any credit flyin’ around loose, sure Jack desarves the lion’s share, so he does now.”

“Better and better!” cried the man who had given his name as Bliss. “Why, you’re as loyal a bunch of chums as I ever ran across. It’s a rare treat for my friend Carpenter here and myself to meet up with such fellows, eh, Bryce?”

The way he laid particular emphasis on that name every time he used it somehow gave Jack the impression that he did not wish the other to forget who he was! It was of course a queer feeling to have, but the boy could not get it out of his head.

“How about going back with us, Josh; feel equal to a little walk; or shall I come around after you in a small boat?” Jack asked.

“Rats! what d’ye take me for?” demanded Josh, indignantly. “Just because I’ve got a little puncture in my noggin is no sign I’m out of the running. Why, course I’ll go back with you, and right away, too.”

“What’s the hurry, boys?” asked Mr. Bliss, quickly.

“Well, for one thing,” Jack remarked, “we’ve got a couple of anxious chums in camp, who’ll be eating their heads off with curiosity to know what’s become of Josh.”

“That’s right,” declared the tall lad, chuckling; “and it’s a shame to keep poor old Nick away from his feed so long. Ten to one he’s as hungry as a bear right now, waiting for grub time to come around.”

“But won’t you stay and have a bite with us?” asked Mr. Carpenter. “We’re not extra fine cooks, but we’ve got lots of good stuff aboard.”

“That’s right kind of you,” George thought he ought to say; “but, considering the circumstances, I reckon we’d better be going, if Josh says he’s fit.”

“Well, I’ll show you I’m feeling just like myself, and not a bit weak, after bleeding like a stuck pig,” and the long-legged boy started to climb out of the cabin as he spoke.

“Please wait a minute,” Mr. Bliss interrupted. “If you must go, there’s no need of Josh getting himself all wet. You see, we’ve got it fixed so we can push ashore by a very little effort on our part, right alongside the roots of that tree; and where the water chances to be fairly deep. We had the boat in there when we brought your friend along, and it’ll be easy to get back again. Then a jump lands you, safe and sound.”

He snatched up a setting pole, the most useful thing that can be carried on a cruise along the shallow waters of the keys, and with very little effort managed to send the anchored boat into the tiny cove, his companion having loosened the anchor cable meanwhile.

Jack was the first to spring ashore, and the others followed quickly at his heels, with Josh bringing up the rear, and anxious to prove his words true about being in first rate condition.

“Glad to have made your acquaintance, boys,” said Mr. Bliss; “and if we happen to cross each others’ path again, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t be friends, is there?”

“Well, I should say our chum here is under heavy obligations to you, sir; and on his account, if no other, we’d feel inclined that way,” returned Jack.

“Shake hands on that, Jack,” Mr. Bliss remarked; and each of the four boys in turn did so, even carrying the friendly act out with the other skipper of the little power boat.

“The best of luck go with you all!” called out Mr. Bliss, waving his hand after them.

“Same to you, sir!” replied George, who had apparently quite gotten over the suspicions by which he had been almost overpowered earlier in the evening.

And presently, after they had pushed their way across the tongue of land lying between the two lagoons, they could only tell where the boat which they had just left lay, by the glowing light flooding out of her cabin.

Jack placed himself at one side of Josh, while George lined up on the other. But the lanky boy observed these movements with suspicion.

“Hey, what’s this mean?” he demanded. “Got an idea I’m apt to keel over any old minute, have you? Just because I did that silly thing once, now don’t you think she’s goin’ to get to be a habit with me. That’s a mistake, fellers. I’m tougher’n you reckon on, now. Come along, buck up, George, and hit up a faster pace.”

“Hold on, now,” said George, as he struggled with a vine that had caught him under the chin, and almost lifted him off his feet; “there ain’t any such hurry as all that, you know. It’s bad walking here, and I don’t feel like being strangled just yet awhile.”

“Yes, pull in your horses, Josh,” Jack remarked. “We’ll believe you’re all right without you being in such a rush about getting back to camp.”

Three minutes later Jack spoke again.

“None of you noticed that either of those gentlemen came ashore after we left, did you?” he asked, quietly.

“Why, no, of course they didn’t,” George remarked.

“For what are you askin’ that same question?” demanded Jimmy.

“P’raps I might give a guess,” remarked Josh, quietly.

“Well, I only wanted to make sure that anything we might say to each other wasn’t likely to get to their ears,” Jack went on.

“Say, now you’ve gone and got me guessing good and hard again,” remonstrated George. “You seem to just love to say things that sound so mysterious. Tell a fellow, Jack, there’s a good chap, why you don’t want them to hear us talking. Why, we hadn’t ought to have anything but good words to say about those gentlemen after the fine way they acted toward our chum here.”

“That’s true enough, George,” Jack went on to say; “and make up your mind I’m the last one to look a gift horse in the mouth to find out his age; but there were a few things about our two new friends that somehow made me sit up and take notice; and I wanted to ask Josh here what he thought.”

“I just expected you’d be up to that dodge,” the party in question observed, with a little chuckle, as of amusement. “I knew that if anybody could get on to their curves, Jack would.”

“Curves!” repeated George, wonderingly.

“Sure, he do be thinkin’ he’s playing baseball again,” laughed Jimmy.

“And from the way you talk, Josh,” Jack went on, paying no attention to these side remarks on the part of his other chums, “I can give a guess that you must have made some little discovery on your own hook that has told you our two friends might be playing a little game of blindman’s buff with us right now. How is that, Josh?”

“Jack, you’re the greatest feller I ever struck, to get on to anything,” replied the long-legged one, admiringly.

“That isn’t answering my question,” the other continued.

“Then I’ll say, yes,” Josh went on.

“Tell us what it was you heard,” George asked, once more fairly boiling with a desire to know everything connected with the mysterious passengers of the little power boat that had acted so strangely on the trip down the east coast.

“Hold on a minute,” said Josh. “This bandage is slipping down, so I’ll have to get you to fix it for me, boys. Hope the hole’s leaked all it’s going to, because I can’t afford to lose as much fluid as some fellers, Nick for instance. There, that feels all right. Now, what was you saying to me? Oh! yes, about how I happened to get onto the fact that the two gentlemen that took me aboard their boat might be somethin’ else besides what they said. Was that it?”

“Just what it was!” George came back, knowing how Josh always liked to beat about the bush more or less before telling anything he knew.

“Well, here’s the way it stands, fellers,” went on Josh. “You see, after they carried me on board the boat, I laid there like a mummy in a trance. But by slow degrees I began to come back again. And all the while my eyes must have been shut, I could hear some mumbling voices, though for the life of me I couldn’t make out who it was talkin’.”

“Oh! hurry up, old ice-wagon; get a move on you, and tell us!” exclaimed George, almost biting his tongue with impatience.

“I heard one man that I afterwards knew was Mr. Bliss say, as plain as anything: ‘I tell you, they’re nothin’ but boys, and they ain’t goin’ to give us away.’ And then the other one, he says, says he: ‘If I thought this one knew anything, I’d be tempted to let him lie there where we picked him up, that’s what. We can’t afford to take any chances, and you know it, Sam!’”

Jack gave a low whistle.

“And yet Mr. Bliss said his friend’s name was Bryce Carpenter,” he observed. “I had an idea all along, from the way he called that name, he wasn’t used to saying it. Sam came easier to his tongue. Now, we don’t know who Sam is, or what he’s done, but seems to me there’s something crooked about that yarn they set up, of a wager made with that Lenox fellow.”

“They never made such a wager,” declared Josh, stubbornly; “and right now the only thing they want to do is to get around to Tampa, where they expect to slip aboard a boat bound for Cuba. I heard some more talk before I opened my eyes and spoiled it all. If the one who calls himself Carpenter hadn’t got cold feet, their plan was to drop down the keys to Key West, and get across to Havana from there.”

“Well, what’s that to us?” remarked Jack. “They treated you white, Josh, didn’t they?”

“They sure did,” answered the other, warmly.

“All right,” Jack went on; “then it’s no business of ours who and what they are; and we’ll just have to forget them. But, listen, wasn’t that a shout ahead, there?”

CHAPTER XII.
AN INVASION OF THE CAMP

“I heard it, too, Jack!” exclaimed George; but neither of the others seemed to have noticed anything, though in the case of Josh, with his head tied up, this was really not to be wondered at.

“What sort of a sound was it, boys?” demanded the tall one.

“I thought it was a shout of some kind; how about it, George?” Jack replied.

“Same here. But then, perhaps it’s only Herb and Nick skylarking. Once in so often Nick gets a streak, and thinks he has to work off his high humor. But see here, Jack, I hope you don’t imagine some sort of trouble has dropped in on the two boys we left in camp less than an hour back?”

“Well, I don’t know,” Jack made answer, in a half-hesitating way. “But somehow it struck me that yell was more along the line of anger or fright than the result of high spirits or kidding.”

“But Jack, we don’t hear any more of the same sort?” George remonstrated.

“How’s that, then?” asked the other, as a plain whoop came faintly to their ears.

“Say, that’s Nick, all right,” Josh declared, stoutly. “I could tell his shout among a thousand. There never was one like it. I always said a wild Injun from the Crow reservation couldn’t begin to hold a candle to Nick, when it came to letting out a whoop.”

“But what would make him give tongue that way?” asked George, as he pushed on at the heels of the leader; for they were now following what seemed to be a trail through the undergrowth, where the trees grew sparingly.

“Troth, and I hope now, nothing has happened to Herb,” Jimmy remarked.

“Oh! let up guessing that way. Whatever could happen to either of them, tell me that?” George demanded. “We left the boys safe in camp; and they even said they believed they’d go aboard one of the boats, although making sure to keep the fire going, so we would see it, if we got mixed in our bearings, while skirting the short line. Maybe you’d expect an alligator to crawl in from the swamp, and try to make a meal off our chums?”

“Well, why not?” demanded Josh. “I reckon, now, they have just such reptiles in this region, don’t they, great big fellers, too, some call them crocodiles, I’m told. But there, Nick tunes up again, like a good feller.”

“There must be something wrong, or he wouldn’t show so much excitement. Make all the hurry you can, boys. We’re getting closer all the time; yes, and it seems to me I can almost make out what he’s shouting.”

“You’re right, Jack, for I’d take my affidavy I heard him say just then: ‘Get out, you robber! skedaddle, now!’”

“That sounds like some one had found the camp, and was trying to steal our belongings!” George exclaimed.

“Well, I hope they lave the boats, that’s all; for the walkin’ do be harrd, I’m tould, between here and Meyers,” Jimmy up and said, in his whimsical way.

“Good gracious! you don’t think, now, that anybody would be so mean as to try and crib our bully boats?” gasped George; and no matter what oceans of trouble his Wireless may have given him in the past, all was forgiven now, when danger lurked over the motor boat flotilla.

“Come along!” called Jack, over his shoulder; “the quickest way to find out what it all means, is to get there. Hit it up a little swifter, all of you! Put your best foot forward, and run!”

They accordingly did so. What mattered it if occasionally one of them did happen to trip, and come down with a hard thump; it was only a question of a few seconds for the unlucky one to scramble to his feet, and a few bruises more or less surely did not count.

In this fashion, then, they covered the remainder of the ground that lay between the camp and themselves.

Jack, being in the lead, was the first to glimpse what was going on. He held up a warning arm to head off the impetuous rush of his mates; and as they could plainly see his figure outlined against the bright background of the fire-lighted zone, George and Josh and Jimmy all drew up alongside the leader.

No one said anything. They were too busily engaged taking it all in, to express themselves in any way. And, indeed, it was a sight well worth observing, one that would return to them many a time, and always cause a smile to creep across each boy’s face.

For it was more humorous than tragical, though possibly one of the actors in the affair looked upon it in the light of a serious proposition.

First, there was Herb aboard the good old Comfort, and engaged in waving the ax, upon which he seemed to lay considerable dependence. He appeared to be defying some enemy, and promising all sorts of dire things if so be the boat was boarded.

But Nick’s clarion voice was proceeding from a higher place; in fact, it seemed to ooze forth from the branches of a small tree that happened to grow not far from where the camp-fire had been started.

A look upward disclosed the fat boy, perched among the branches of the said tree. He varied his outcries by waving the shotgun, which seemed to be utterly useless in so far as discharging it was concerned.

There was a black bunch of hair busily engaged in trying to tear open some of the provisions that the fat boy had “toted” ashore, in his desire to get supper started. It was, in truth, a bear, a hungry animal that had declined to gorge himself upon the remains of the jewfish, when other and greater delicacies were within reach.

It was breaking the heart of poor Nick to see this vandal threatening to dispose of all their precious food, so that they must go on scant rations the rest of the way to Naples or Meyers. No wonder that the hungry Nick whooped and yelled, calling the black pirate by all the hard names he could think up.

Now and then the animal would appear to be disturbed by all this racket. On such occasions he would shuffle over to the sapling in which the fat boy was perched, raising his snout to sniff the air, as though half tempted to make the climb, and punish his detractor as seemed most fitting.

Nick evidently became fearful each time that he was going to be in for it. He would howl worse than ever, and make all sorts of dreadful threats as to what he might do in case such a thing happened.

“Oh! ain’t you the lucky thing, though?” he bellowed, just as the others ranged up to take the whole picture in. “If I hadn’t been silly enough to go ashore, carrying Herb’s old gun, and forget to put any shells in the same, I guess you’d be a dead bear right now, old top! Here, quit shaking this tree, won’t you? Think you own the whole ranch? Reckon other people got some right to live. Just go back to your jewfish dinner, and all may be forgiven; but you let our crackers and cheese and bacon and hominy alone, hear that? Wow! there, he’s gone and busted the hominy sack! Look at the gump wasting all that fine food, would you? Herb, can’t you please get some of those bully old shells over to me somehow? I’d give a heap to tickle him between the sixth and seventh ribs, sure I would!”

Just then Jack gave a peculiar little whistle. Nick heard it, and immediately “perked up his ears,” as Josh called it. He could be seen to twist his head around, and try to locate the one who had given the well known signal.

“Hey, Jack! wherever are you?” he called, in perplexity.

Jack did not dare make any reply. He had seen the bear start at the sound of the signal whistle, just as if the sly beast understood that it must surely spell danger for one of his type.

“Get ready to back me up, George, Jimmy!” Jack whispered.

They understood that since Jack carried the repeating rifle, it ought to be his duty to fire first. Should he make a failure, then they could come in, to try and load the marauding bear with all the lead possible. If, after all, the beast managed to get away, he would at least surely carry the marks of the warm engagement with him the rest of his natural life.

By this time both Herb and Nick had discovered what was going on, and, naturally enough, they were deeply interested.

“Give him Hail Columbia, Jack!” called Herb, waving his ax above his head, as he stood there on the deck of the gallant old Comfort, looking as though ready to hurl defiance at all the bears in South Florida.

“Oh! be sure and pot him, Jack!” cried Nick, entreatingly. “I always wanted to see what real bear steak tasted like. And honest now, I reckon it’ll be sweeter because the old villain ran me up this tree. Get a bead on him, and make dead sure of your aim. Don’t I wish I had some buckshot shells up here? Wouldn’t I have enjoyed peppering him, though. Wow! give him another for his mother, Jack!”

Jack had waited until the bear turned, so as to expose his side. It was his desire to send the bullet so that it would strike just back of the foreleg, because he had always been told that that was the most vulnerable spot in which to hit any large animal.

When the opportunity came he sent in his card. Instantly there arose a tremendous commotion. The bear sent out a series of roars and whirled around, to fall down, and then struggle to its feet again, while Nick shouted in his excitement, and the other fellows added their voices to his chorus.

Jack coolly pumped another cartridge into the firing chamber of his repeating rifle, and stood ready to make a second try, if he found reason to believe such action were needed.

It was quickly proven to his satisfaction that nothing of the kind was required. The bear soon toppled over again, and from the way in which the poor animal kicked it was plain to be seen that the last stage had come.

“Bully! we’re going to have bear steaks all right!” laughed the pleased Nick; and then he added: “Say, Jack, do you really believe the old sinner’s kicked the bucket, or is he playing a little game to coax me down? I’m sore from hanging up here so long. Give him a punch and see if he moves, George. My gracious! what ails Josh, and where’d he get that nightcap he’s wearing?” – and, overcome by curiosity, the fat boy came sliding down the bending sapling, to land in a heap at its foot.

Herb too came ashore, filled with wonder, and eager to hear the story, which was told as they stood around the body of the bear that had invaded the camp, and sent Nick in hot haste “shinning” up a tree.

CHAPTER XIII.
JIMMY REFUSES TO GIVE UP THE GAME

They were now fully in the great Gulf of Mexico, and headed for Tampa. Nick had been able to enjoy bear steak to his heart’s content. The others pronounced the meat pretty dry, and poor eating; but when served in the shape of a stew, or hash, it answered the purpose. There was a whole lot, they decided, in knowing that it was the genuine article. Otherwise most of them would have declined to eat it, just as they would tough beef.

“Jack, is it true that there are ten thousand of these mangrove islands?”

“Well, you’ve got me there, Josh,” laughed the leader of the little expedition, as, several days after the adventure with the bear, the three motor boats glided in and out among the queer collection of islets that marks the southwestern coast of Florida.

“But that’s what they’re called on the map,” insisted Josh.

“Oh! you don’t suppose for a minute anybody in the wide world could ever count these mud flats, covered with the everlasting mangrove, do you?” Jack went on. “A few hundred, or even thousand more or less, wouldn’t matter.”

“For my part,” spoke up George, “there are just nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine too many. I could be satisfied with one island. Why, for two days now, we’ve been going in and out of these bally old bunches of mangroves, dodging storms, and fighting skeeters to beat the band.”

“You’d better be thankful,” declared Herb, “that after you led us in a trap, Jack took us out again, George. Only for him we might be lost right now, miles deep in these everlasting tangles. You notice that now we never get far away from a sight of the big water, don’t you? It seems a dangerous business for a small boat cruiser to wander into this nest down here. He’s apt to lose his head, and never come out again.”

“Do we pull up soon, Jack?” asked Jimmy, beseechingly.

“Why, yes, as the afternoon is going,” Jack replied; and then, as if noticing the eagerness plainly marked upon his shipmate’s freckled face, he went on: “But what’s in the wind with you, Jimmy? I can see that you’re thinking of some stunt.”

Jimmy laughed at that. The three boats were moving slowly on, close together, and he could easily send a significant look toward the complacent Nick.

“Oh, I know what ails him, all right!” cried the fat boy.

“Then suppose you tell us, Nick?” George demanded.

“Jimmy’s got an idea in his head that he’s going to knock my record for big fish all hollow, and this place strikes him as likely to pan out well. Haven’t I seen him watching those big tarpon jumping this very afternoon? I just bet you he means to make a try for one of them, as soon as we anchor for the night,” and Nick completed his assertion with a chuckle.

“And have ye any objection to my makin’ a thry, tell me that?” Jimmy demanded.

“Sure not,” Nick immediately replied; “only you’re bound to have all the trouble for your pains, Jimmy boy.”

“Ye think that way?” asked the other, suspiciously.

“Oh, for a lot of reasons!” came from the complacent Nick, ready to rest upon his honors. “First off, you’d have to fish in one of our little dinkies; and a tarpon is such a powerful fish, it’d drag you miles and miles before giving up. Remember, you’re not allowed the least help to land the game.”

Jimmy shook his head, and watched his rival from under his heavy eyebrows.

“Secondly,” continued the fat boy, airily, “the biggest tarpon ever captured never weighed as much as two hundred pounds, remember that, Jimmy. Jack, would you mind stating what we decided the weight of my jewfish was?”

“We agreed on two hundred and thirty as about the right thing,” came the reply.

“There you are, Jimmy,” mocked Nick. “Better forget all about tarpon, and turn your attention to, say, whales.”

“But, by the same token, they towld me whales never come this far south, and so I’ll never get square with ye that way,” grumbled Jimmy. “But never mind, me bhoy, sooner or later you’ll meet up with defate. I’m still studying the way I’m bound to bring ye to a Waterloo. The Brannigans never gave up, rimimber. When ye laste expect it ye’ll be overwhelmed.”

“Oh, I’m not going to lose any sleep over it. And while you’re worrying that poor head of yours, Jimmy, about the ways and means of capturing a three hundred pounder, I’m just going to keep on feasting on these fine oysters we’ve been picking up right along. Yum! yum! how I do love ’em, though!”

“Yes, we happen to know that,” remarked Josh. “Fact is, we’ve heard you make the same remark ever since we set out from Philadelphia on this cruise.”

“And if a fellow could see the piles of oysters Nick’s gobbled since that day, he’d be just staggered, that’s what!” George put in, sarcastically; for, as the fat boy sailed in his company, the skipper of the Wireless doubtless grew very weary of hearing constant reminders concerning feasts, past and to come.

“Well,” sang out Jack just then, “I don’t see any reason why we shouldn’t pull up here as well as anywhere. Good anchorage, with a chance for a breath of wind off the gulf tonight, that may keep the savage little key mosquitoes fairly quiet. What say, fellows?”

As they were all of a mind, the halt was quickly brought about. They anchored in the open; but in case of a sudden high wind arising that threatened to make things unpleasant for the small craft, it would be the easiest thing in the world to push around in the lee of the nearest mangrove island, which would serve as a barrier against the storm.

Jimmy was soon seen paddling away in the dinky belonging to the speed boat.

“Now what did he take your rifle for, Jack, if he expects to go fishing?” asked George, while Nick cocked up his ears, and listened as though interested.

“I asked him, and he only grinned at me,” Jack replied. “But I made him promise not to go beyond that big island you can see up the channel a ways.”

A short time later they heard a shot, followed by several others, that made them sit up and take notice.

“Say, he got a crack at something!” Nick remarked, uneasily, for he remembered how Jimmy had looked so queerly at him when departing, as though he had something in his mind.

“Well, we’ll soon know; and I can see him moving around in his boat up yonder right now. Seems to me he’s trying to get at something in among the mangroves. He must have made a kill of it,” Herb declared.

Ten minutes later and Jimmy was seen approaching, rowing steadily.

“Look at him, would you?” called out the anxious Nick; “he’s dragging something behind the boat, as sure as anything!”

Jack watched the performance for a minute or so, and then remarked:

“Looks to me like a big ’gator; and that’s what it is, boys.”

“Oh, my!” exclaimed Nick, bouncing up; “I wonder now does the silly believe an alligator would count against my fish? Jack, I appeal to you to give him the law as she’s written in our compact.”

But Jack refused to say anything prematurely.

“Wait till he makes his claim,” he replied, with a laugh, as he watched the sturdy labors of the Irish lad to rejoin them.

When Jimmy did arrive they saw that he had indeed managed to shoot an unusually large mossback ’gator, which he had possibly discovered sunning itself among the mangroves. As a rule the creatures prefer the fresh water, but may on occasion be found where there is a commingling of salt and fresh.

The exultant captor was grinning, as if hugely pleased. He nodded his head in the direction of the staring Nick, as he finally came alongside. Then they saw that he had been wise enough to take a rope along with him, which had been hitched around the body of the slain monster, just back of the short forelegs. Nevertheless, it had taken considerable of an effort to drag the saurian all the way from the place of the tragedy to where the three motor boats were anchored.

Jimmy wiped the perspiration from his red face, as he exultantly cried out:

“By the powers, can ye bate that, I’d loike to know, so I would? Two hundred and thirty, did ye till me; sure this one must weight all of twict that. I lave it to the umpire here to decide, contint to rest on me laurels.”

Nick began to show signs of tremendous excitement at once.

“How about that, Jack?” he pleaded. “He went and shot it with the rifle, don’t you know? I don’t call that fishing, now, do you?”

“I’ve heard of people who shoot fish with a rifle, lots of times,” commented Herb, just to excite Nick a little more.

“Yes, but don’t tell me an alligator is a fish!” exclaimed Nick, in great disgust. “Why, when I was in the lower grade in school they taught us to call it just a rep-tile!”

At that a shout went up from the balance of the voyagers.

“You’ll have to settle this right on the spot, Jack,” declared George.

“Get out the articles of war and read what it says; that’s the only fair way,” remarked Herb.

So Jack deliberately took out his notebook, and in a sing-song tone, assumed for the purpose, read as he had done once before at Jimmy’s request:

“‘Each contestant shall have the liberty of fishing as often as he pleases, and the fish may be taken in any sort of manner – the one stipulation being that the capture shall be undertaken by the contestant alone and unaided; and that he must have possession of the fish long enough to show the same, and have its weight either estimated or proven.’”

“Well, here it is before ye, and riddy to be weighed!” said Jimmy, stoutly.

“But Jack, what do you say, is an alligator a fish in the true sense of the word?” demanded Nick, stubbornly.

“As the umpire in this dispute,” said Jack, solemnly, “I am forced to disallow the claim Jimmy makes. No matter how he got his prize, we can’t swallow what he says about an alligator being a fish, even if it does swim under water; for it couldn’t live there at all, but has to come up on shore. So Jimmy, you’ll have to try again; and better luck to you next time!”