a candle-box was placed, and within it, swathed in flaring red flannel, lay the last arrival at Roaring Camp. Beside the candle-box was placed a hat. Its use was soon indicated.

"Gentlemen," said Stumpy, with a singular mixture of authority and ex officio complacency, "gentlemen will please pass in at the front door, round the table, and out at the back door. Them as wishes to contribute anything toward the orphan will find a hat handy." The first man entered with his hat on; he uncovered, however, as he looked about him, and so, unconsciously, set an example to the next. In such communities, good and bad actions are catching. As the procession filed in, comments were audible-criticisms, addressed, perhaps, rather to Stumpy, in the character of showman: "Is that him?" "Mighty small specimen." "Hasn't mor'n got the color." "Ain't bigger nor a derringer."

The contributions were as characteristic: A silver tobacco box; a doubloon; a navy revolver; silver mounted pistol; a gold specimen; a very beautifully embroidered lady's handkerchief (from Oakhurst, the gambler); a diamond breastpin; a diamond ring (suggested by the pin, with the remark from the giver that he "saw that pin and went two diamonds better"); a slung shot; a Bible (contributor not detected); a golden spur; a silver teaspoon (the initials, I regret to say, were not the giver's); a pair of surgeon's shears; a lancet; a Bank of England note for £5; and about $200 in loose gold and silver coin. During these proceedings Stumpy maintained a silence as impassive as the dead on his left-a gravity as inscrutable as that of the newly-born on his right. Only one incident occurred to break the monotony of the curious procession. As Kentuck bent over the candlebox half curious, the child turned, and, in a spasm of pain, caught at his groping finger, and held it fast for a moment. Kentuck looked foolish and embarrassed. Something like a blush tried to assert itself in his weather-beaten cheek. "The dd little cuss; he said, as he extricated his finger, with, perhaps, more tenderness and care than he might have been deemed capable of showing. He held

that finger a little apart from its fellows as he went out, and examined it curiously. The examination provoked the the same original remark in regard to the child. In fact, he seemed to enjoying repeating it. "He rastled with my finger," he remarked to Tipton, holding up the member. "The dd little cuss!"

It was four o'clock before the camp sought repose. A light burnt in the cabin where the watchers sat, for Stumpy did not go to bed that night. Nor did Kentuck. He drank quite freely and related with great gusto his experience, invariably ending with his characteristic condemnation of the newcomer. It seemed to relieve him of any unjust implication of sentiment, and Kentuck had the weakness of the nobler sex. When everybody else had gone to bed he walked down to the river and whistled, reflectingly. Then he walked up the gulch, past the cabin, still whistling with remonstrative unconcern. At a large redwood

tree he paused, and retraced his steps, and again passed the cabin. Half way down to the river's bank he again paused, and then returned and knocked at the door. It was opened by Stumpy.

"How goes it?" said Kentuck, looking past Stumpy toward the candle-box. "All serene," replied Stumpy. "Anything up?"

"Nothing."

There was a pause-an embarrassing one-Stumpy holding the door. Then Kentuck had recourse to his finger, which he held up to Stumpy.

"Rastled with it-the d-d little cuss," he said, and retired.

The next day Cherokee Sal had such rude sepulcher as Roaring Camp afforded. After her body had been committed to the hill-side, there was a formal meeting of the camp to discuss what should be done with her infant. A resolution to adopt it was unanimous and enthusiastic. But an animated discussion, in regard to the manner and feasibility of providing for its wants, at once sprung up. It was remarkable that the argument partook of none of those fierce personalities, with which discussions were usually conducted at Roaring Camp. Tipton proposed that they should send the child to Red Dog-a

distance of forty miles-where female attention could be procured. But the unlucky suggestion met with fierce and unanimous opposition. It was evident that no plan which entailed parting from their new acquisition would for a moment be entertained. "Besides," said Tom Ryder, "them fellows at Red Dog would swap it and ring in somebody else on us." A disbelief in the honesty of other camps prevailed at Roaring Camp as in other places.

The introduction of a female nurse in the camp also met with objection. It was argued that no decent woman could be prevailed upon to accept Roaring Camp

when questioned he averred stoutly that he and "Jinny"-the mammal before alluded to could manage to rear the child. There was something original, independent and heroic about the plan, that pleased the camp. Stumpy was retained. Certain articles were sent for to Sacra

mento.

"Mind," said the treasurer, as he pressed a bag of gold-dust into the expressman's hand, "the best that can be got-lace, you know, and filigree work and frills-d-m the cost!"

Strange to say, the child thrived. Perhaps the invigorating climate of the mountain camp was compensation for ma

as her home, and the speaker argued that "they didn't want any more of the other kind."

This unkind allusion to the defunct mother, harsh as it may seem, was the first spasm of propriety, the first symptom of the camp's regeneration. Stumpy advanced nothing. Perhaps he felt a certain delicacy in interfering with the selection. of a possible successor in office.

But

terial deficiencies. Nature took the foundling to her broader breast. In that rare atmosphere of the Sierra foot-hillsthat air pungent with balsamic odor; that ethereal cordial at once bracing and exhilarating, he may have found food and nourishment, or a subtle chemistry that transmuted ass's milk to lime and phosphorous. Stumpy inclined to the belief that it was the latter and good nursing.

"Me and that ass," he would say, "has been father and mother to him! Don't you," he would add, apostrophizing the helpless bundle before him, "never go back on us."

By the time he was a month old, the necessity of giving him a name became apparent. He had generally been known as "The Kid," "Stumpy's boy," "the Coyote" (an illusion to his vocal powers), and even by Kentuck's endearing diminutive of "the "d-d little cuss." But these were felt to be vague and unsatisfactory, and were at last dismissed under another influence. Gamblers and adventurers are usually superstitious, and Oakhurst one day declared that the baby had brought "the luck" to Roaring Camp. It was certain that of late they had been successful. "Luck" was the name agreed upon, with the prefix of Tommy for greater convenience. No allusion was made to the mother, and the father was unknown.

"It's better," said the philosophical Oakhurst, "to take a fresh deal all around. Call him luck, and start him fair."

A day was accordingly set apart for the christening. What was meant by this ceremony the reader may imagine, who has already gathered some idea of the reckless irreverence of Roaring Camp. The master of ceremonies was

one

"Boston," a noted wag, and the occasion seemed to promise the greatest facetiousness. This ingenious satirist had spent two days preparing a burlesque of the church service, with pointed local allusions. The choir was properly trained, and Sandy Tipton was to stand godfather. But after the procession had marched to the grove with music and banners, and the child had been deposited before a mock altar, Stumpy stepped before the expectant crowd.

"It ain't my style to spoil fun, boys," said the little man, stoutly, eyeing the faces around him, "but it strikes me that this thing ain't exactly on the square. It's playing it pretty low on this yer baby to ring in fun on him that he ain't going to understand. And ef there's going to be any godfathers round, I'd like to see who's got any better rights than me.'

A silence followed Sandy's speech. To the credit of all humorists be it said that the first man to acknowledge its justice. was the satirist, thus estopped of his fun.

I

IT WAS while Sheriff Tom Keegan was escorting Pedro Vierra to jail that the latter-mentioned gentleman executed the master-stroke of his life. With all the cunning and agility of a panther, he caught the big sheriff unawares and knocked him flat. This action was indeed galling to Keegan, and when Pedro seized the sheriff's six-shooter and held it in the neighborhood of Keegan's brains, the while advising him "vamoose"-well, it was worse than galling.

to

Keegan, of course, "vamoosed," cursing himself for not having put bracelets on the bad man. But had not Pedro Vierra given his word of honor that he would come peacefully?

"That what I get for trusting the word of a greaser!" reflected Sheriff Tom stormily, and hot-footed it to town a mile away to arm himself and procure his horse, in order that he might properly search the countryside for one bad man, Pedro Vierra.

Meanwhile, Pedro, with a grin of selfapprobation planted upon his oliveskinned countenance, fled southward. Up in the brush-clad hills beyond the Rio Pequeno, he knew he could find refuge. until darkness fell. Then, under cover of the night, he would steal forth. For Pedro knew where a swift Indian pony was to be found, and once astride a horse -ah! Then, indeed, Pedro Vierra

would laugh at the disgruntled Keegan.

As he sped over the mesa, Pedro hummed-softly, of course, for one must not hazard chances. Instead of a fugitive, he might well have been a gay cavalier singing in love-hushed tones to the lady of his heart.

Pedro frowned. To his mind came the vision of a maid with luminous eyes of midnight darkness. She would wonder, his little Conchita: but he could not with safety get the word to her that he must travel afar. For Sheriff Tom Keegan would be on the lookout for a ruse-and as a rule, the sheriff was clever.

"But beside me he is as clever as the house-cat beside the lynx," boasted Pedro Vierra as he came to the Rio Pequeno.

He waded across, the waters barely coming to his knees, for it was August and the river was running low.

Pedro gained the opposite shore and briskly climbed the hill beyond; at length he paused about half way up the hillside, his sharp eyes searching about for a favorable hiding place-a place where he would be well screened, and at the same time see quite clearly the Rio Pequeno and the far-reaching mesa beyond.

With a little exclamation of satisfaction, Pedro crawled beneath a low-hanging madrone; the next moment he was calmly engaged in puffing contentedly at a cigarette.

"Dios!" he ejaculated at length. "After