y chuckle at his
witty illustration of the phrase, as, with a strong muscular effort, he
raised up the struggling figure he had clutched hold of and proceeded to
inspect his capture--a lanky woebegone lad, whose rugged garments and
general appearance was by no means improved by the rough handling he had
received in the grip of the old sailor, who, as he now put him on his
feet and released him, repeated his original imperative inquiry, "Who
the dickens are you and what do you want here?"

"Please, sir, I ain't a-doing nothink," snivelled the lad, screwing his
knuckles into his eyes, as if preparing to cry, each word being
sandwiched between a sob and a sniff. "I--ain't--a-doing--nothink!"

"Doing nothing?" echoed the Captain indignantly, overcome apparently by
the enormity of the culprit's offence. "Why, you young scoundrel, here
you have been and gone and committed a burglary, breaking into a
railway-carriage like this, besides nearly frightening the occupants to
death; and, you call that nothing! Do you know, if I were on the Bench,
I could sentence you to penal servitude?"

"Oh, pray don't, Captain Dresser, please!" cried out Bob and Nellie
together, impressed with the terrible powers of the law as thus
presented to their view and the extent of the Captain's authority. "He
really did not mean any harm, poor fellow, I am sure he didn't!"

"Then what did he do it for?" asked the old gentleman snappishly, though
both could see, from the merry twinkle in his eyes, that he was not in
such a bad temper as he pretended to be. "What did he do it for?
That's what I'd like to know!"

But, even the stranger lad, who had so unceremoniously intruded into the
carriage, seemed to become aware as he confronted him that the Captain's
`bark was worse than his bite'; for, dropping his snivel and looking his
questioner manfully in the face, he at once went on to tell who he was
and explain the reasons for his unexpected appearance on the scene--his
earnest accents and honest outspokenness testifying to the truth of his
statement in the opinion, not only of Bob and Nellie, but of the whilom
grumpy old Captain as well.

The lad said that his name was Dick Allsop and that he belonged to
Guildford, the last station the train had passed, and the only one at
which it had stopped since leaving Waterloo. His father had died some
years before, but his mother had lately got married again to a regular
brute of a man, who behaved very b