le of swell outfits too.

We found a lot of empty check-books, an' used to play draw, settlin' at
night by check. It was purty good fun for a while--until we woke up.
Hammy owed me ten million francs an' Locals was into me for fifteen. I
offered to give 'em a receipt in full if they'd give me their interest
in the yeller pup. As long as the pup had three bosses he wouldn't mind
no one, an' I wanted to teach him somethin' besides eatin' an' sleepin;
but them two cusses wouldn't sell out at the price. When I saw that a
hundred an' twenty-five million dollars wouldn't buy two-thirds of a
seventy-five cent pup, I understood what the spell-binders mean by a
debased currency, an' I felt hurt an' lonesome again.

One day Hammy stacked himself in front of a window an' began to talk
about the gloomy ghastliness of solitude, until me an' Locals couldn't
stand it no longer, an' we heaved him out into a drift. Under ordinary
circumstances he would have rolled his eyes, pulled his hair, an'
ranted around about the base ungratitude of man; but this time he
looked up to the sky an' hollered, "Come out here quick! Hurry up! COME
ON!"

We went out, an' the' was somethin' a-floatin' away up yonder, lookin'
like a flyspeck on a new tablecloth. "What is it?" asked Hammy. "Is it
a bird?" asked Locals. Under such conditions I never say nothin' until
I have somethin' to say, so we stood an' gazed. In about ten minutes we
all shouted together, "It's a balloon!"

An' by jinks, that's what it was. We hollered an' fired off guns, an'
after a while it settled down an' lodged in a tree. The' was only one
man in it, but he was dyked out in Sunday clothes, an' purt' nigh froze
to death. We fed an' warmed him, an' he was about as much surprised at
us as we was at him. I was wearin' a Prince Albert coat an' a high plug
hat, Locals had on a white flannel yachtin' rig, an' Hammy was sportin'
a velvet suit with yeller leggin's an' a belt around the waist. After
we had fitted him out with a pipe he sez, "Gentlemen, I may possibly be
able to repay you at some future time. I am Lord Arthur Cleighton,
second son of the Earl o' Clarenden."

When he registered himself thus, I see Locals an' Hammy open their
eyes, an' I knew 'at we had landed somethin' purty stately.

"I am pleased to meet you, me lord," sez Hammy, in his most gorgeous
manner. "I am Gene De Arcy. You may have heard of my father, the
multimillionaire."

Locals, he looked at Lord Arthur, a