!" cried Tucket. "Look out, Manly!
it'll blow us all into the next Fourth of July."

Frank laughed, as he began to undo the package. The first wrapper was of
brown paper with these words written upon it, in large characters:--

"FRANK MANLY, _Drummer_.
_Inquire Within._"

Beneath that wrapper was another, and beneath that another, and so on,
apparently an endless series. The boys all gathered around Frank, looking
on as he removed the papers one by one, until the package, originally as
big as his head, had dwindled to the dimensions of his fist.

"It's got as many peels as an onion," said Tucket.

"Nothing but papers. I told ye so!" said Jack Winch.

But Frank perceived that the core of the package was becoming
comparatively solid and weighty. There was certainly something besides
paper there. What could it be? a stone? But what an odd-shaped stone it
was! Stones are not often of such regular shape, so uniformly round and
flattened. He had almost reached the last wrapper; his heart was beating
anxiously; but, before he removed it, he thought he heard a peculiar
sound, and held down his ear. A flush of delight overspread his
countenance, and he clasped the ball in both hands, as if it had been
something precious.

"O, boys!" he exclaimed, looking up eagerly for their sympathy, "where
_did_ it come from? Atwater, did you see any body?"

Nobody. It was all a mystery.

"Boys, it's for me, isn't it?" said Frank, still hugging his treasure, as
if afraid even of looking at it, lest it should fly away.

"Come, let's see!" and Winch impatiently made a snatch to get at it.

Atwater coolly took him by the arm, and pulled him back. Then Frank,
carefully as a young mother uncovered the face of her sleeping baby,
removed the tinsel paper, which now alone intervened between the object
and his hand, and revealed to the astonished eyes of his comrades a tiny,
beautiful, smiling-faced silver watch.

"O, isn't it a beauty?" said Frank, almost beside himself with delight;
for a watch was a thing of which he had greatly felt the need in beating
his calls, and wished for in vain. "Who could have sent it? Don't you
know, boys, any of you?" he asked, the mystery that came with the gift
filling him with strange, perplexed gladness.

"All I know is," said Tucket, "I'd be willing to have six candles, all
lit, knocked down my throat, and eat taller for a fortnight, ef such a
kind of a