away. Now promise, Cynthia."

"Of course I'll promise, Neal. I wouldn't tell it for the world if you
don't want me to. But, oh, I wish you would tell the whole thing
yourself!"

But Neal was obdurate: and when he found how his brother-in-law received
his demand for fifty dollars he thought he had acted wisely.

"Of course it is not really my affair," said Mr. Franklin, "except that
I am your sister's husband, and have a right to advise her. The money is
hers, to do with it what she likes, and she can spend it all on you if
she wishes. But I think fifty dollars is a good deal for a school-boy,
with the allowance that you have, to owe. If you were my boy I should
look into the matter pretty carefully, you may be sure. However, I am
neither your father nor your guardian. But it is a bad precedent. If you
spend money in this way at school, what will you do in college?"

Hester expostulated with her brother, but wrote a check and gave it to
him. Neal was almost sorry then that he had not placed the sum at one
hundred.

He sent the check to Bronson, assuring him that he would pay him the
balance before long. This done, Neal became as gay and debonair as ever.
Cynthia, knowing the facts, wondered that he could so completely forget
the burden of debt that was still resting upon him. She thought that he
must have discovered some other way of settling the matter.

[TO BE CONTINUED.]

THE UNITED STATES NAVY AT THE BALTIC CANAL.

BY A JUNIOR OFFICER.

"General Signal 6421 from flag-ship!" cried the signal boy to signal
officer of the U.S.S. _San Francisco_, as our fleet approached the
entrance to Kiel Fiord.

"Report to the Captain that we are ordered by the flag-ship to take
position at head of column," replied the signal officer, referring to
signal-book.

Simultaneously the U.S. flag-ship _New York_ stopped her engines,
allowing the U.S.S. _San Francisco_ and U.S.S. _Columbia_ to steam
ahead, leading the column into the harbor of Kiel, Germany, in order
that they might be in proper sequence for picking up the buoys assigned
them during the festivities attending the opening of the large and
important canal connecting the Baltic with the North Sea. Ahead, beyond
the light guarding the entrance to Kiel Fiord, which is nothing more
than a long land-locked harbor five miles long by one and a half broad,
we could see ships and boats by the score.

We are entering the harbor. Ding! and the engines are stopped, l