ness I have on me hands that won't kape nohow."

Leaving Paulina in some surprise, the blunt seaman put his hands in his
pockets, and went off whistling in the direction of Algiers. Turning
aside before reaching the town, he ascended the Frais Vallon some
distance, meeting with a few Arabs and one or two soldiers, none of
whom, however, took much notice of him, as his stalwart figure and
eccentric bearing and behaviour had become by that time familiar to most
of the inhabitants of the town. It was known, moreover, that he was at
the time under the protection of the British consul, and that he
possessed another powerful protector in the shape of a short, heavy
bludgeon, which he always carried unobtrusively with its head in the
ample pouch of his pea-jacket.

As he proceeded up the valley, and, gradually passing from the broad
road which had been formed by Christian slaves, to the narrow path at
its somewhat rugged head, which had been made by goats, he grew more
careless in his walk and rollicking in his air. At last he began to
smile benignantly, and to address to himself a running commentary on
things in general.

"You've got a fine time of it here all to yersilf, Mister Flaggan. Ah,
it's little the Dey knows what yer after, me boy, or it's the last day
ye'd have to call yer own. Well, now, it's more like a drame than
anything I knows on. What wid Turks an' Moors an' Jews, an' white
slaves of every lingo under the sun, I can't rightly make out to
remimber which it is--Europe, Asia, Afriky, or Ameriky--that I'm livin'
in! Never mind, yer all right wid that blissid cownsl at yer back, an'
this purty little thing in yer pokit."

He became silent, and seemed a little perplexed at this point, looking
about as if in search of something.

"Coorious; I thought it was here I left it; but I niver had a good
mimory for locality. Och! the number of times I was used to miss the
way to school in Ould Ireland, though I thravelled it so often and
knowed it so well! Surely an' it worn't under this rock I putt it, it
must have bin under a relation. Faix, an' it was. Here ye are, me
hearty, come along--hoop!"

Saying this, he gave a powerful tug at something under the rock in
question, and drew forth a canvas bag or wallet, which had the
appearance of being well filled.

Slinging this across his shoulder, Ted Flaggan pursued his way,
moralising as he went, until he came to a rugged hollow among the hills,
in which wa