ving
always been mightily taken with Sinbad the Sailor, felt that no other
name could be quite good enough for his new treasure. And Sinbad,
realizing that a call to repose had actually been given, curled up, in
as round a ball as he could, under Joel's chin, and both were soon sound
asleep.

It was near the middle of the night. Joel had been dreaming of his old
menagerie and circus he had once in the little brown house, in which
there were not only trained dogs who could do the most wonderful
things,--strange to say, now they were all of them yellow, and had
stumpy tails,--but animals and reptiles of the most delightful variety,
never seen in any other show on earth; when a noise, that at once
suggested a boy screaming "_Ow!_" struck upon his ear, and brought him
bolt upright in his bed. He pawed wildly around, but Sinbad was nowhere
to be found.

XI THE UNITED CLUBS

The whole dormitory was in an uproar. "_Ow!_ help--help!" Mr. Harrow,
having gone out after dinner, had retired late, and was now sound
asleep, so another instructor scaled the stairs, getting there long
before Mrs. Fox, the matron, could put in an appearance.

In the babel, it was somewhat difficult to locate the boy who had
screamed out. At last, "In there, Farnham's room," cried several voices
at once.

"Nightmare, I suppose," said the instructor to himself, dashing in.

But it was a real thing he soon saw, as a knot of boys huddled around
the bed, where the terrified occupant still sat, drawing up his knees to
his chin, and screaming all sorts of things, in which "wild beast" and
"cold nose" was all that could be distinguished.

[Illustration: JUST THEN SOMETHING SKIMMED OUT FROM THE CORNER.]

"Stop this noise!" commanded the instructor, who had none of Mr.
Harrow's pleasant but decided ways for quelling an incipient riot. So
they bawled on, the boy in bed yelling that he wouldn't be left alone.

Just then something skimmed out from the corner; the boys flew to one
side, showing a tendency to find the door. Even the instructor jumped.
Then he bethought himself to light the gas, which brought out the fact
that there certainly was an animal in the room, as they could hear it
now under the bed.

"Boys, be quiet. Mrs. Fox's cat has got up here, probably," said the
instructor. But the boy in the bed protested that it wasn't a cat that
had waked him up by thrusting a cold nose in his face, and jumping on
top of him. And he huddled worse