ife that opened with a spring. "Yo' can have it faw
t'ree of dem."

"I don't reckon I need any knife," Bascom said.

"Aw," said the third schooner-man, impatiently, "a lot of dem is good
faw not'ing. He got to give us some. If he ain't got de sense to trade
faw dem we take dem."

He spread Bascom out swiftly with his hands, and sat down on him,
directing his mates to pile melons in their skiff. After the first
instant Bascom did not offer the slightest resistance. He lay gathering
breath against the weight of the man on his chest, and when he was quite
sure of himself he lit it out again in a terrific howl for help. The man
clapped a hand on his mouth, but Bascom had no need to speak again. A
posse of men and boys came dashing round the house, some of them putting
down the baskets, and others brandishing sticks as they ran.

The schooner-men jumped into their skiff, but Patrice and Rubier and
Noel and Sonny Ladnier rushed into the water after them, and brought
them back. A dozen hands rescued the stolen melons, while with Irish
expletives and Creole fierceness Patrice pounded the biggest man as a
preparation to bidding them good-by. The crowd was following his
example, and it would have gone hard with the strangers if Bascom had
not had a different mind.

[Illustration: "MAKE 'EM PICK YOUR FIGS!" HE SHOUTED, "MAKE EM PICK YOUR
FIGS!"]

"Make 'em pick your figs!" he shouted. "Make 'em pick your figs! They'll
look handsome in the trees! Make 'em pick for you!"

The cry found favor, and the verdict became, "If yo' want to go free yo'
got to pick de figs!"

When Captain Tony and the boss of the big farm approached the point, and
saw a strange schooner anchored there, the Captain felt anxious. "I hope
de boys not havin' troubl'," he said. "I don' see w'at dat boat wan'
stop dere faw."

As they landed, Bascom met them and explained. "I've got the crew of
that schooner pickin' figs for me, an' some of the boys from round here
is watchin' that they do it lively. They was honin' for some cracked
watermelons, an' I thought they'd better do a little work, seein' as
they got out of temper."

The boss was a Northern man. He looked at Bascom's agile weather-beaten
figure, and they all went round to see the force of overseers and the
three men in the trees. "That's about the way I have to work it," he
said. "More overseers than men; but how do yours manage to make the men
work so lively?"

"Ho!" said Bascom, "easy enoug