overed himself first, and essayed an extravagant
compliment.

"I'll trouble you for that thar harpin," said Miggles, gravely. Half
a dozen hands were eagerly stretched forward; the missing hairpin was
restored to its fair owner; and Miggles, crossing the room, looked
keenly in the face of the invalid. The solemn eyes looked back at hers
with an expression we had never seen before. Life and intelligence
seemed to struggle back into the rugged face. Miggles laughed again--it
was a singularly eloquent laugh--and turned her black eyes and white
teeth once more toward us.

"This afflicted person is--" hesitated the Judge.

"Jim," said Miggles.

"Your father?"

"No."

"Brother?"

"No."

"Husband?"

Miggles darted a quick, half-defiant glance at the two lady passengers
who I had noticed did not participate in the general masculine
admiration of Miggles, and said gravely, "No; it's Jim."

There was an awkward pause. The lady passengers moved closer to each
other; the Washoe husband looked abstractedly at the fire; and the
tall man apparently turned his eyes inward for self-support at this
emergency. But Miggles's laugh, which was very infectious, broke the
silence. "Come," she said briskly, "you must be hungry. Who'll bear a
hand to help me get tea?"

She had no lack of volunteers. In a few moments Yuba Bill was engaged
like Caliban in bearing logs for this Miranda; the expressman was
grinding coffee on the veranda; to myself the arduous duty of slicing
bacon was assigned; and the Judge lent each man his good-humored
and voluble counsel. And when Miggles, assisted by the Judge and
our Hibernian "deck passenger," set the table with all the available
crockery, we had become quite joyous, in spite of the rain that beat
against windows, the wind that whirled down the chimney, the two ladies
who whispered together in the corner, or the magpie who uttered a
satirical and croaking commentary on their conversation from his perch
above. In the now bright, blazing fire we could see that the walls were
papered with illustrated journals, arranged with feminine taste and
discrimination. The furniture was extemporized, and adapted from candle
boxes and packing-cases, and covered with gay calico, or the skin of
some animal. The armchair of the helpless Jim was an ingenious variation
of a flour barrel. There was neatness, and even a taste for the
picturesque, to be seen in the few details of the long low room.

The meal was a