d see these fish. Some very fine ones. Going? Indeed? Saw
you in church last Sunday. Hope I'll see you there again to morrow.
Good-afternoon, my dear young friends."

"Good-afternoon, sir."

They walked away a little rapidly, but with a vivid and decidedly
pleasant impression that they had given the pale-faced, earnest-eyed
minister an extraordinary amount of comfort.

"The fish ain't worth much," said Ford. "It couldn't have been just
them!"

No, indeed, it was not, and they failed to make it out to their
satisfaction; but it might have helped them if they had seen him hand
the fish to "Mary," and say,--

"There, what do you think of that? The very boys I told you of."

"The ones you saw on the green, fighting?"

"Exactly. I must see Dr. Brandegee. They can't be altogether bad."

"Bad? No! There must be something about it. The doctor always knows. He
will be able to explain it, I know."

Great was the confidence of the Grantley people in Dr. Brandegee, as to
any and all things relating to "his boys;" and that of Mrs. Fallow was
none the less when her husband returned from his evening call.

"Defending that colored boy? You don't say. The dear, brave little
fellows! Fighting is dreadful. Did any of them get hurt?"

"Hurt, dear? No; and they gave those young ruffians--H'm! Well--David
had to do a great deal of fighting, Mary, but we must not approve
too."--

"My dear! I say they did right."

And the little woman's tired face flushed into sudden beauty, with her
honest enthusiasm over "those boys."

They had not reached the end of their day's experiences, however, when
they left the minister's gate, or even when they arrived at their own.

At that very moment Mrs. Myers was once more standing in the kitchen
doorway.

"Dick, as soon as you've had your supper, you may take one of those
strings of fish over to Deacon Short's, and another to Mrs.
Sunderland's. You may clean all the rest."

"Yes'm," said Dick vaguely, "but dar's on'y one string."

"Only one? Where are all the rest, I'd like to know?"

Dabney and his friends were around the corner of the house now, and her
last question was plainly directed to them.

"The rest of what, Mrs. Myers'?"

"Why, the fish. What have you done with them?"

"Oh! they're all right, Mrs. Myers," said Ford. "Fish are good for
brains. That's what we've done with 'em."

"Brains? What"--

"Exactly. Next to us three, the men that work their brains the hardest
aro