vine-clad shores of that
luxuriant land. Who is this that, wrapped in Persian rugs, and dressed
in the most expensive manner, calmly reclines on the quarter-deck of
the schooner, toying lightly ever and anon with the luscious fruits of
the vicinity, held in baskets of solid gold by Nubian slaves? or at
intervals, with daring grace, guides an ebony velocipede over the
polished black walnut decks, and in and out the intricacies of the
rigging. Who is it? well may be asked. What name is it that blanches
with terror the cheeks of the Patagonian navy? Who but the Pirate
Prodigy--the relentless Boy Scourer of Patagonian seas? Voyagers
slowly drifting by the Silurian beach, coasters along the Devonian
shore, still shudder at the name of Bromley Chitterlings--the Boy
Avenger, late of Hartford, Connecticut.

It has been often asked by the idly curious, Why Avenger, and of what?
Let us not seek to disclose the awful secret hidden under that youthful
jacket. Enough that there may have been that of bitterness in his past
life that he

"Whose soul would sicken o'er the heaving wave,"

or "whose soul would heave above the sickening wave," did not
understand. Only one knew him, perhaps too well--a queen of the
Amazons, taken prisoner off Terra del Fuego a week previous. She loved
the Boy Avenger. But in vain; his youthful heart seemed obdurate.

"Hear me," at last he said, when she had for the seventh time wildly
proffered her hand and her kingdom in marriage, "and know once and
forever why I must decline your flattering proposal: I love another."

With a wild, despairing cry, she leaped into the sea, but was instantly
rescued by the Pirate Prodigy. Yet, even in that supreme moment, such
was his coolness that on his way to the surface he captured a mermaid,
and, placing her in charge of his steward, with directions to give her
a stateroom, with hot and cold water, calmly resumed his place by the
Amazon's side. When the cabin door closed on his faithful servant,
bringing champagne and ices to the interesting stranger, Chitterlings
resumed his narrative with a choking voice:--

"When I first fled from the roof of a tyrannical parent, I loved the
beautiful and accomplished Eliza J. Sniffen. Her father was president
of the Workingmen's Savings Bank, and it was perfectly understood that
in the course of time the entire deposits would be his. But, like a
vain fool, I wished to anticipate the future, and in a wild mome