walk all the way, and we
expected to do so, and they will plague us, and say we couldn't do it."

"Your satchel is to be sent by express, is it, Fritz?" asked Mrs.
Steiner.

"No, Aunt Fanny. While you were talking to Uncle Braun and the new
cousin, papa said that he would stop here on his way from Cassel and
bring it home with him, and he will bring the bird cage and bird for
sister. So we will have only our knapsacks as we had when we came. He
said for me to put the tin horn and the grater in the satchel and not
come through our village looking like a traveling tinker. I told him not
to tell anybody about my being arrested, for the Trojans might hear it
and would plague me."

The next morning at eleven the boys set out for home, Mrs. Steiner
accompanying them to the depot. The fates seemed to favor Fritz, for
when they reached the platform an old lady called from the car window,
"You can bring your dog in here if no one else objects; I am a friend to
dogs," and another lady and an old gentleman in the compartment agreed
that they had no objection to having Pixy for a fellow traveler.

The triplets bade Mrs. Steiner good-bye and thanked her for her kindness
to them, and she in turn invited them to come to visit her whenever
their parents were willing.

"Your dog is young, I think," remarked the old gentleman.

"Yes," replied Fritz, "he is young, but he is very smart."

"Indeed!" commented the old gentleman. "In what way has he given
evidence of his intelligence?"

"He earned five hundred marks on Saturday."

The old gentleman frowned, but Fritz, not noticing it, continued, "and
he found a cousin of my father, who lives in England."

"Indeed! Then if your dog has such keen scent as to reach to England,
perhaps he will go a step farther and tell us whether the old man in
the moon smokes cigars or a pipe."

"But I am telling you the truth!" insisted Fritz.

The old gentleman paid no attention to him, but, taking up his paper,
commenced reading attentively.

"Fritz, you ought to tell him how Pixy earned the money and found the
cousin," whispered Paul.

"No, he won't listen," replied Fritz. And he was right; the old
gentleman believed that the boy was treating him with disrespect by
telling him such a wild story.

When the train reached Umstadt, and the boys came in sight of the Swan
inn, they saw the landlord on the stone steps, his thumbs in his vest
pockets and his fingers moving as if playing the pian