make no such promise, for--"

"Why, Bill, what are you talking about?" inquired Harry. "You rattle
it off as if we knew all about it."

"Haven't you heard any thing about it, either?" inquired William, in
surprise. "I was certain that they would ask you to join. Well, the
amount of it is that Charley Morgan and a lot of his particular
friends have been organizing a company for the purpose of thrashing
the Hillers, and making them stop robbing hen-roosts and orchards and
cutting up such shines."

"Yes," chimed in James Porter, "there are about thirty of them, and
they say that they are going to whip the Hillers out of the village."

"Well, that's news to me," said Frank.

"For my part," said Thomas Benton, "I, of course, know that the
Hillers ought to be punished; but I do not think it is the duty of us
boys to take the law into our own hands."

"Nor I," said James Porter.

"Well, _I_ do," said Harry, who, as we have said, was an impetuous,
fiery fellow, "and I believe I will join the Regulators, and help whip
the rascals out of the country. They ought, every one of them, to be
thrashed for stealing and--"

"Now, see here, Harry," interrupted George. "You know very well that
such a plan will never succeed, and it _ought_ not to. You have been
taught that it is wrong to take things that do not belong to you, but
with the Hillers the case is different; their parents teach them to
steal, and they are obliged to do it."

"Besides," said Frank, "this summary method of correcting them will
not break up their bad habits; kindness will accomplish much more than
force."

"Kindness!" repeated Harry, sneeringly; "as if kindness could have any
effect on a Hiller!"

"They can tell when they are kindly treated as well as any one else,"
said George.

"And another thing," said Ben. Lake; "these Regulators must be a
foolish set of fellows to suppose that the Hillers are going to stand
still and be whipped. I say, as an old sea-captain once said, when it
was proposed to take a man-o'-war with a whale-boat, 'I guess it will
be a puttering job.'"

"Well," said James, "I shall do all I can to prevent a fight."

"So will I," said Frank.

"_I_ won't," said Harry, who, with his arms buried almost to the
elbows in his pockets, was striding backward and forward across the
steps. "I say the Hillers ought to be thrashed."

"I'm afraid," said William, without noticing what Harry had remarked,
"that our interference will be the