to follow a trail they were teaching him
to trace their own footsteps; that when the time came he would pay them
off roundly for having taken him prisoner.

He was so brave, resolute, stout-hearted, and strong that they set a
much higher value upon him than upon his comrade Eastman; for when their
friends sent money to Montreal to ransom them, they asked only sixty
dollars for Eastman, while John had to pay one hundred. So much for
being brave! The money was paid, and the two men were sent to Montreal,
and from there to Albany. As they came through Lake Champlain, John
Stark looked out upon scenes with which he was to become familiar in
after-years, and which we shall read about at another time.

[Illustration: THE RIVALS.]

LIL'S FUN.

BY MRS. W. J. HAYS.

"Boys have the best of it always!" said Lil, flinging herself in the
hammock with a sigh, as she saw her two brothers, several cousins, and
their comrades, in battered hats, turned-up trousers, and dingiest of
jackets, going down through the maples with their fishing-poles over
their shoulders.

"I think so too," said Ollie, spreading out her dainty dress, and
picking a daring grasshopper off her silk stocking. "It's just too mean
that we can't have some fun. They say we are always in the way, that we
can't even bait our own hooks--it _is_ horrid to stick those nasty worms
on!--but I can catch fish as well as any one, and if boys are around,
why shouldn't they make themselves useful? And they say we scream so,
and make such a fuss about every thing," went on Ollie, in the same
injured tone.

"Everything is better for boys than for girls. All the stories are
written for them; they can ride, and drive, and play ball, and swim, and
skate, and--"

"Lil! Lillie!" called a soft sweet voice, "are you in the sun? Your
complexion will be ruined."

"There! didn't I say so?" was the somewhat incoherent reply. "Isn't it
always the way? See how we are watched: don't go in the sun, you'll be
burned; don't do this, don't do that--all because you're a girl. I'm
tired of it.--Aunt Kit, I'm not in the sun.--I wish I was," was added
_sotto voce_.

"Country girls' mothers are not so particular," said Ollie. "Look at
those Pokeby girls in their calicoes; they climb trees like monkeys, and
they have lots of good times."

"Let's go over and see them; it is not far. Come, Ollie."

"In my new dotted mull and silk stockings?" cried Ollie, in amazement.
"Aunt Ki