em from whom I can borrow a stiver. Doesn't
one of you know anyone here who would lend us a few guilders?"

Each boy looked into five blank faces. Then something like a smile
passed around the circle, but it got sadly knotted up when it reached
Carl.

"That wouldn't do," he said crossly. "I know some people here, rich
ones, too, but father would flog me soundly if I borrowed a cent from
anyone. He has 'An honest man need not borrow' written over the gateway
of his summer house."

"Humph!" responded Peter, not particularly admiring the sentiment just
at that moment.

The boys grew desperately hungry at once.

"It wash my fault," said Jacob, in a penitent tone, to Ben. "I say
first, petter all de boys put zair pursh into Van Holp's monish."

"Nonsense, Jacob. You did it all for the best."

Ben said this in such a sprightly tone that the two Van Holps and Carl
felt sure that he had proposed a plan that would relieve the party at
once.

"What? what? Tell us, Van Mounen," they cried.

"He says it is not Jacob's fault that the money is lost--that he did it
for the best when he proposed that Van Holp should put all of our money
into his purse."

"Is that all?" said Ludwig dismally. "He need not have made such a fuss
in just saying THAT. How much money have we lost?"

"Don't you remember?" said Peter. "We each put in exactly ten guilders.
The purse had sixty guilders in it. I am the stupidest fellow in the
world; little Schimmelpenninck would have made you a better captain. I
could pommel myself for bringing such a disappointment upon you."

"Do it, then," growled Carl. "Pooh," he added, "we all know that it
was an accident, but that doesn't help matters. We must have money, Van
Holp--even if you have to sell your wonderful watch."

"Sell my mother's birthday present! Never! I will sell my coat, my hat,
anything but my watch."

"Come, come," said Jacob pleasantly, "we are making too much of this
affair. We can go home and start again in a day or two."

"YOU may be able to get another ten-guilder piece," said Carl, "but the
rest of us will not find it so easy. If we go home, we stay home, you
may depend."

Our captain, whose good nature had not yet forsaken him for a moment,
grew indignant.

"Do you think that I will let you suffer for my carelessness?" he
exclaimed. "I have three times sixty guilders in my strong box at home!"

"Oh, I beg your pardon," said Carl hastily, adding in a surlier tone,
"Well,