pretty fair appetite, but am not quite up to
that."

"Nonsense, Luke, you've only got to try. A man has no notion what 'e
can do till 'e tries."

"Ah, that's true," said Ned Spivin, checking a lump of salt beef on the
end of his clasp-knife half way to his mouth; "did I ever tell 'ee,
lads, that little hanecdote about a man we called Glutton, he was such
an awful eater?"

"No, never heard on it," said several voices.

"Well, then, this is 'ow it was," said Spivin, clearing his voice. "You
must know, I was once in Callyforny, where all the goold comes from. Me
an' most o' my mates had runned away from our ship to the diggin's, you
see, which of course none on us would have thought of doin'--oh dear
no--if it hadn't bin that the skipper runned away too; so it was no use
for us to stop behind, d'ee see? Well, we was diggin' one day, in a
place where there was a lot o' red Injins--not steam engines, you know,
but the sort o' niggers what lives out there. One o' them Injins was
named Glutton--he was such an awful eater--and one o' my mates, whose
name was Samson, bet a bag o' goold-dust, that he'd make the glutton eat
till he bu'sted. I'm afeard that Samson was groggy at the time.
Howiver, we took him up, an' invited Glutton to a feast next day. He
was a great thin savage, over six futt high, with plenty breadth of beam
about the shoulders, and a mouth that seemed made a' purpus for
shovellin' wittles into. We laid in lots of grub because we was all
more or less given to feedin'--an' some of us not bad hands at it.
Before we began the feast Samson, who seemed to be repentin' of his bet,
took us a-one side an' says, `Now mind,' says he, `I can't say exactly
_how_ he'll bu'st, or _when_ he'll bu'st, or what sort of a bu'st he'll
make of it.' `Oh, never mind that,' says we, laughin'. `We won't be
par-tickler how he does it. If he bu'sts at all, in any fashion, we'll
be satisfied, and admit that you've won.'

"Well, we went to work, an' the way that Injin went in for grub was
quite awful. You wouldn't have believed it if you'd seen it."

"P'r'aps not," said Zulu, with a grin.

"An' when we'd all finished we sat glarin' at him, some of us half
believin' that he'd really go off, but he took no notice. On he went
until he'd finished a small leg o' pork, two wild-ducks, six plover,
eight mugs o' tea, an' fifteen hard-boiled eggs. But there was no sign
o' bu'stin'. Glutton was as slim to look at as before he be