o the counter
and sitting comfortably on it with his legs dangling in mid air; "we
haven't seen you for ages."

"Are you going out this evening?" enquired Dudley, as he proceeded to
follow Roy's example.

"To be sure, when my work is done," responded the old man pushing up his
spectacles and regarding the boys with kindly eyes; "these light
evenings are my delight, as you know. If you sit still till I have
finished this clock, I will show you a treasure I found yesterday."

"Can you mend everything?" asked Roy, curiously; "I never knew you
understood about clocks."

"I've learned to mend most things," was the answer; "it isn't given to
every one to make, and I'm one of the menders in the world not the
makers. There's one thing I can't mend--and that is broken hearts."

There was silence: Roy broke it at last by saying with knitted brow,
"I'd rather be a maker than a mender, but lots of people aren't either."

"Quite right," nodded the old man; "most folk are breakers."

"I wish I was as clever as you," said Dudley; "you mend umbrellas, and
kettles, and plates, and windows, and gates, and all sorts. How did you
learn?"

"Well, I ain't ashamed of owning that my father was just a travelling
tinker, and when I was a little fellow I used to go round with him and
see him do most things. It was from travelling through the country I
learned to love it so. And my father, he was a thoughtful man, and when
I used to ask where the tin came from, and where the iron and where the
lead, he took to learning of it up so that he could answer me; and then
I came to find that most of our comforts come from underground, and so I
fell to digging. Ah, youngsters, earth is a wonderful treasure house!"

The clock was done. Old Principle put it carefully by and then mounted
on some wooden steps, and took down a tin saucepan. The boys knew the
shelf well; as though apparently it was just a row of tinware for sale,
many a pot and pan held treasures that geologists would have given a
great deal to possess.

Now when old Principle held out a peculiar shaped stone with loving
pride, Roy and Dudley pressed forward to look at it.

"I know, it's a Roman hammer," shouted out Dudley.

"It's a Saxon jug," suggested Roy.

"It's part of a jaw of a mammoth many thousands of years old, and there
are two teeth in perfect preservation," old Principle said solemnly.

"Where did you find it?"

"Ah, you must come and see! In a cave that I have onl