priced wines and
luxuries. The assessments of this band is going to be low, and the diet
plain. Who says Brother Dutton ain't the man for the place? Is it you,
Mr. Riley, I see raising your fist agin him? Oh, only to ax a question.
Well, one thing at a time, Brother Riley. Does the meeting _h_endorse
Mr. Willum Dutton for recording seckitary?"

The meeting did, vociferously and with cheers. Daisy ran and got her
slate for the recording seckitary, who thereupon (after first inscribing
the names of the office bearers in a shaky print) began to draw a
wonderful picture of a pirate ship.

"Afore listening to the plans of our valued president," said Mr. Bob, "I
propose myself to _h_offer up a few general remarks on 'Ope! Me and 'Ope
is old friends, genelmen. We set sail together from the port of London,
'Ope and I, when I was a bright-faced boy that 'igh! We've bunked in
together, fair weather and foul, coming on this thirty year. We 'ave set
in our time, me and 'Ope, on the bottom of a capsized schooner, ore
laden out of Mazatlan, with our tongues 'anging out like the tails of
some vallyble new kind of a black dorg. 'Ope and I took the Chainy
coast once on a chicken coop. 'Ope and I, when we 'ad the dollars, blew
them in right royal. 'Ope and I, when we 'adn't none, tightened our
belts and cheered each other _h_up. Looking back over all them years, I
want to stand _h_up and testify right 'ere to the best friend of the
sailorman, bar none, and p'r'aps the _h_only one he ever truly 'ad--and
that's 'Ope, God bless her!"

Amid the ensuing uproar, which jarred the walls of that prim missionary
residence like an explosion of dynamite, spilling plates off dressers
and cock-billing texts, and arresting the astonished clock at four
forty-six, little Daisy was trying to nerve herself to address the
assembled company. The unforeseen docility of the band had put new ideas
in that sleek, baby-seal head. Odds and ends of tracts and storybooks
recurred to her. Infantile ambitions awoke and clamored. But it was
daunting, just the same, to confront those rows of eyes, and those great
big, unshaved, shaggy-looking faces, all keenly waiting for her to
speak.

"Now, then, little lady," said the vice president, "'ere's your Band of
'Ope, a-panting to set its 'and to the plow!"

Daisy cleared her throat. Pride and timidity struggled with each other
in that eager little countenance. Had it not been for an encouraging
squeeze from Mr. Bob, w