orice-water," said Shank, with the look of one who expects
approval. "I made it myself!"

Nauseous in the extreme, it might have served the purpose of an emetic
had not the digestion of the boys been ostrich-like, but, on hearing how
it came into existence, Charlie put it a third time to his lips, took a
good gulp, and then, nodding his head as he wiped his mouth with his
cuff, declared that it was "wonderful."

"Yes, isn't it? There's not many fellows could make stuff like that."

"No, indeed," assented the other heartily, as he attacked the bread and
cheese. "Does your father know you made it?"

"Oh yes, and he tasted it too--he'd taste anything in the shape of
drink--but he spat it out, and then washed his mouth with brandy an'
water. Mother took some too, and she said she had tasted worse drinks;
and she only wished that father would take to it. That made father
laugh heartily. Then I gave some to little May, and she said it was `So
nice.'"

"Ay. That was like little May," remarked Charlie, with a quiet laugh;
"she'd say that a mess o' tar an' shoe-blacking was nice if _you_ made
it. But I say, Shank, let's see you swim. I'd give anything if I could
swim. Do, like a brick as you are. There's a fine deep hole here under
the bank."

He pointed to a pool in the river where the gurgling eddies certainly
indicated considerable depth of water, but his friend shook his head.

"No, Charlie," he said, "you don't understand the danger as I do. Don't
you see that the water runs into the hole at such a rate that there's a
tree-mendous eddy that would sweep any man off his legs--"

"But you're goin' to swim, you know," interrupted his friend, "an' have
got to be off your legs anyhow!"

"That's all _you_ know," returned the other. "If a man's swept round by
an eddy, don't you know, he'll be banged against things, and then the
water rushes out of the hole with _such_ a gush, an' goes thunderin'
down below, over boulders and stones, and--an'--don't you see?"

"That's true, Shank; it does look dangerous, even for a man that can
swim."

He put such emphasis on the "man" that his comrade glanced sharply at
him, but the genuine innocence of our hero's face was too obvious to
suggest irony. He simply saw that the use of the word _man_ pleased his
friend, therefore he used it.

Conversation was cut short at this point by the sudden appearance on the
scene of two strangers--a kitten and a dog.

The assertion