beckoned to Mr. Appleboy. "Come up here!" he directed.

Timidly Mr. Appleboy approached the dais.

"Don't do it again!" remarked His Honor shortly. "Eh? Beg pardon, Your Honor, I mean

"I said: "Don't do it again!" repeated the judge with a twinkle in his eye. Then lowering his voice he whispered: "You see I come from Livornia, and I've known Andrew for a long time."

As Tutt guided the Appleboys out into the corridor the party came face to face with Mr. and Mrs. Tunnygate.

"Huh!" sneered Tunnygate. "Huh!" retorted Appleboy.

TOGGERY BILL

'Twas the saying of an ancient sage (Gorgias Leontinus, apud Aristotle's Rhetoric, lib. iii. c.18) that humour was the only test of gravity, and gravity of humour. For a subject which would not bear raillery was suspicious; and a jest which would not bear a serious examination was certainly false wit.

-SHAFTESBURY, Essay on the Freedom

of Wit and Humor, Sect. 5.

CALL a man a rascal, a wife beater, a murderer even, and he may yet smile; but deny his sense of humor and he will brain you upon the spot. And this, methinks, is strange, since to achieve greatness readily one should be unburdened by a sense of humor. The great have no time for trifling. They are men of single purpose, of one idea; they are not to be diverted at a crucial moment by the whimsical discovery that their adversary resembles a rabbit. There is much significance in the double meaning of "divert"-namely: To turn aside or to change one's aim or end; and to amuse or entertain. To have a sense of humor, to be amused-diverted-is to be turned away from following the star of one's destiny. Can there be any doubt about this? As Jeremy Taylor says in Holy Living and Dying, "If our thoughts do at any time wander, and divert upon other objects, bring them back again with prudent and severe acts." Had little Iky Newton, when struck upon his noodle by the famous apple, abandoned him

self to childish merriment would the Law of Gravitation have been discovered? Never! No, greatness and humor rarely bed together.

Why, then, do we cherish and pride ourselves upon it? Because we realize that just as no man can expect to be great who has a sense of humor, so no man can be truly bad who has one. For a sense of humor is what is known as a saving grace-diverting us from the evil as well as from the good.

All of which, in a way, is neither here nor there, for this story concerns the saving of a human soul-at least temporarily-and the humor of the situation was only a by-product, as it were. For Mr. Ephraim Tutt had been summoned to a certain town in the Mohawk Valley to defend one James Hawkins, otherwise known as Skinny the Tramp, charged with the murder of The Hermit of Turkey Hollow, and it was during the trial and while waiting for the verdict that Mr. Tutt discovered Willie Toothaker and saved him from the vengeance of Toggery Bill, the local magnate and merchant prince who dwelt at the Phoenix House and posed as the leading citizen of Pottsville.

"How are y', stranger?" he condescended through his tilted cigar to Mr. Tutt as the latter climbed out of the decrepit jitney that had borne him from the "deppo." "Y won't find this dump so bad. I've managed to wiggle along in it for nearly eleven years." He removed the cigar. "Here, Willie-fetch in the gent's bag!" There being no immediate response, Pottsville's leading citizen raised his voice to a bellow.

"Here you! Willie! Willie Toothaker! Gol durn the boy, where is he!"

"Pray do not trouble yourself, sir," said Mr. Tutt, ascending to the veranda occupied by the leading citi

zen.

"No trouble, I assure you," protested the latter. "Permit me to introduce myself. My name's Gookin -William Gookin-proprietor of the principal gents' furnishing, haberdashery and novelty store of Pottsville.

He bowed grudgingly as if fearful that he might do the new guest too much honor.

"Tutt is my name," responded the lawyer dryly, "Ephraim Tutt."

"I guessed as much," said Mr. Gookin. "We folks up here read the papers and we've heard of you. Come to defend Skinny the Tramp, have y'? Well, he needs the best he can get."

Mr. Gookin pushed open the screen door for Mr. Tutt to enter. "Dinner's ready-don't pay to hold the vittles waitin' too long! Here you, Betty-where's your ma ?"

Mr. Tutt found himself confronted by a tiny girl in a blue-calico dress matching her eyes, with two enormous flaxen braids which, separated by her thin little neck, hung forward over her tiny bosom and swung heavily about her waist. She was earnest and wondering.

"Ma's out!" she apologized, panting. "Lemme take your bag, sir. You're to have Number Five."

"That the room with the broken pane?" inquired Gookin authoritatively.

"Yes, sir, only Willie fixed it with a piece of paper." "Hm!" ejaculated Gookin. "Where is Willie? Why ain't he here attendin' to his business?"

"He's out with the wasps," explained Betty timidly. "He's made 'em an electric chair."

Mr. Tutt peered curiously at his small companion. A lawyer retained in a murder case does not enjoy having electric chairs referred to thus casually.

"Electric chair for the wasp?" demanded Mr. Tutt. "Yes, sir!" burst forth the child. "He's perf'c'ly wonderful! Ma told him to smoke 'em out, but he had a much better idea. You see they go in and out by a hole, and Willie borrowed a storage battery from the garage and rigged up some wires in front of the holepositively and negatively, he says-and fastened 'em. to the battery so when one of the wasps goes in he makes a contract and electrocutes himself."

"Gosh! That boy do beat all!" quoth Gookin, momentarily forgetting grammar in scientific interest. "I should like to know Willie," affirmed Mr. Tutt. "Oh, you'll know him!" she cried eagerly. "Everybody knows Willie. You'll just love him!"

"I'm sure I shall, my dear," returned the old lawyer, laying his hand on the yellow head. "And now will you show me to my room? No, I'll carry the bag!"

"Love him-hell!" snorted Mr. Gookin as he watched the odd pair climbing up the stairs.

"Here's your room, sir."