ound, pulled off his coat,
and pulled down about a rod of stone wall, then quietly went to work
building it up again, as if that was his regular occupation.

Presently the sheriff came riding up on the spur, and reining in,
asked Obed if he had seen a fellow running for his life.

"Yes," said Obed, "I see him jest now streakin' it like a quarter hoss
in _that_ direction," pointing off. "But he was pretty nigh blown, and
I 'xpect you can catch him in about two minnits."

"Well, just hold my horse," said the sheriff, "and I'll overhaul him."

The sheriff scrambled over the stones and through the bushes in the
direction indicated, and the moment he was out of sight, Uncle Obed
jumped on the horse and rode off at the top of his speed. He rode his
prize to a town a good ways off, and sold the horse for a hundred and
fifty dollars.

For some similar exploit, he was arrested and committed to jail in
Essex county, to await his trial. But the prison being then in a
process of repair, Uncle Obed, with other victims of the law, was
incarcerated in the fort in Salem harbor. He made his escape, however,
by crawling through the sewer, as Jack Sheppard did from Newgate
prison. The sentinel on duty saw a mass of seaweed floating on the
surface of the water. Now, this was nothing extraordinary, but it
_was_ extraordinary for seaweed to float _against_ the tide. Uncle
Obed's head was in that floating mass. He was hailed and ordered to
swim back. He made no answer. A volley of musketry was discharged at
him, but no boat being very handy, he got off and made his escape,
very much after the manner of Rob Roy at the ford of Avondow.

Uncle Obed had a famous black Newfoundland dog, worth from sixty to
eighty dollars. When hard up, he used to take the dog about fifty or a
hundred miles from home, where he was unknown, and sell him. No matter
what the distance was, the dog always came back to his old master, who
realized several hundred dollars by the repeated sales of him.

Such were a few of the exploits of this departed worthy, actually
vouched for by contemporaries. His passion for stealing was
undoubtedly a monomania, for he was known in many cases to make
voluntary restitution of articles that he had purloined, and his
circumstances did not allow him the plea of necessity which palliates
the errors of desperately poor rogues in every eye except that of the
law.

THE CASKET OF JEWELS.

Mr. Luke Brandon was a Wall Street