bridge, and pulling
off his black kid gloves, which had suffered considerably during the
progress of the fight. Having rolled them up into a ball, he jerked them
contemptuously into the river.

"There goes the first pair of gloves as ever I had on, and the last as
ever I mean to wear," he said, spreading out his brawny hands to the
sharp night breeze.

Young Thorpe heaved a few last expiring gasps of laughter; then became
quiet and serious from sheer exhaustion.

"Go it again," said the man of the skull-cap, staring at him as gravely
as ever, "I like to hear you."

"I can't go it again," answered Zack faintly; "I'm out of breath. I say,
old boy, you're quite a character! Who are you?"

"I ain't nobody in particular; and I don't know as I've got a single
friend to care about who I am, in all England," replied the other. "Give
us your hand, young 'un! In the foreign parts where I come from, when
one man stands by another, as you've stood by me to-night, them two are
brothers together afterwards. You needn't be a brother to me, if you
don't like. I mean to be a brother to you, whether you like it or not.
My name's Mat. What's your's?"

"Zack," returned young Thorpe, clapping his new acquaintance on the back
with brotherly familiarity already. "You're a glorious fellow; and I
like your way of talking. Where do you come from, Mat? And what do you
wear that queer cap under your hat for?"

"I come from America last," replied Mat, as grave and deliberate as
ever. "And I wear this cap because I haven't got no scalp on my head."

"What do you mean?" cried Zack, startled into temporary sobriety, and
taking his hand off his new friend's shoulder as quickly as if he had
put it on red-hot iron.

"I always mean what I say," continued Mat; "I've got that much good
about me, if I haven't got no more. Me and my scalp parted company years
ago. I'm here, on a bridge in London, talking to a young chap of the
name of Zack. My scalp's on the top of a high pole in some Indian
village, anywhere you like about the Amazon country. If there's any
puffs of wind going there, like there is here, it's rattling just now,
like a bit of dry parchment; and all my hair's a flip-flapping about
like a horse's tail, when the flies is in season. I don't know nothing
more about my scalp or my hair than that. If you don't believe me, just
lay hold of my hat, and I'll show you--"

"No, thank you!" exclaimed Zack, recoiling from the offered hat.
"I d