om. "Bob Jennings is a
thousand miles from here by this time. He has gone to China, and will
not be back for three years."

As Tom said this he settled back on his elbow, and proceeded to give the
governor a history of all that had happened in the village since the
night the Crusoe men made the attack on the Storm King. He told how
Harry Green had taken him and the rest of the band to the academy as
prisoners of war; repeated what the principal had said to them;
explained how Bob had lost his boat, and found a friend in the man who
had paid him the forty dollars in gold by mistake; and how he had
obtained a berth on board the Spartan, and gone to sea, leaving his
mother well provided for. He wound up by dwelling with a good deal of
emphasis upon the resolve he had made to pay off Harry Green for what he
had done, and hinted, mysteriously, that the first lieutenant would live
to regret that he had ever presumed to act contrary to the wishes of Tom
Newcombe. Sam could scarcely believe some portions of the story that
related to Bob Jennings. He was sure that the fisher-boy had given one
of the gold pieces for the Go Ahead No. 2; and, even if he had not, the
governor could not understand how a boy so hard pressed as Bob had
been--who had more than once been at a loss to know where his next meal
was coming from--could resist the temptation to use a portion of the
money, especially when he knew that the man who had paid it to him would
never be the wiser for it. Sam acknowledged to himself that the truth of
the old adage he had so often heard Bob repeat--that "honesty is the
best policy"--had been fully exemplified.

"Now, that's what comes of bein' born lucky," said he, after he had
thought the matter over. "That ar' Bobby Jennings is a gentleman, now,
an' goes about holden' up his head like he was somebody; while I am a
rascal an' an outlaw, not darin' to show my face outside this yere cove,
an' livin' in constant fear of Mr. Grimes, an' the State's prison. This
is a hard world, Tommy."

"O, now, have you just found it out?" drawled Tom. "If you had seen as
much trouble as I have, you would have come to that conclusion long ago.
I heard Harry Green say, one day, that it was the very best world he
ever saw, and that it could not possibly be any better. If I was as
lucky as he is, I would say so too. He holds high positions among those
Spooneys at the academy, every body in the village speaks well of him,
and he gets along