smith. "It ought to be
somethin' we never had before."

"Why not wait till Christmas and git good and ready?" said Jim.

The argument was that Christmas was something more than four weeks away.

"We've got to have a rousin' big Christmas fer little Skeezucks,
anyhow," suggested Bone. "What sort of a celebration is there that we
'ain't never had in Borealis?"

"Church," said Keno, promptly.

This caused a silence for a moment.

"Guess that's so, but--who wants church?" inquired the teamster.

"We might git up somethin' worse," said a voice in the crowd.

"How?" demanded another.

"It wouldn't be so far off the mark for a little kid like him,"
tentatively asserted Field, the father of the camp, "S'pose we give it
a shot?"

"Anything suits me," agreed the carpenter. "Church might be kind of
decent, after all. Jim, what you got to say 'bout the subject?"

Jim was still patting the timid little foundling on the back with a
comforting hand.

"Who'd be preacher?" said he.

They were stumped for a moment.

"Why--you," said Keno. "Didn't you find little Skeezucks?"

"Kerrect," said Bone. "Jim kin talk like a steam fire-engine squirtin'
languages."

"If only I had the application," said Jim, modestly, "I might git up
somethin' passable. Where could we have it?"

This was a stumper again. No building in the camp had ever been
consecrated to the uses of religious worship.

Bone came to the rescue without delay.

"You kin have my saloon, and not a cent of cost," said he.

"Bully fer Bone!" said several of the men.

"Y-e-s, but would it be just the tip-toppest, tippe-bob-royal of a
place?" inquired Field, a little cautiously.

"What's the matter with it?" said Bone. "When it's church it's church,
and I guess it would know the way to behave! If there's anything
better, trot it out."

"You can come to the shop if it suits any better," said the blacksmith.
"It 'ain't got no floor of gold, and there ain't nothing like wings,
exceptin' wheels, but the fire kin be kept all day to warm her up, and
there's plenty of room fer all which wants to come."

"If I'm goin' to do the preachin',' I'd like the shop first rate," said
Jim. "What day is to-day?"

"Friday," replied the teamster.

"All right. Then we'll say on Sunday we celebrate with church in
Webber's blacksmith shop," agreed old Jim, secretly delighted beyond
expression. "We won't git gay with anything too high-falootin', but
we'd ought to