ar-rooms of Sunburst and
Viking, in which he was ably seconded by Phil Boldrick, an eccentric,
warm-hearted fellow, who was so occupied in the affairs of the villages
generally, and so much an advisory board to the authorities, that he had
little time left to progress industrially himself.

Once when a noted bully came to Viking, and, out of sheer bravado and
meanness, insulted Roscoe in the streets, two or three river-drivers
came forward to avenge the insult. It was quite needless, for the
clergyman had promptly taken the case in his own hands. Waving them
back, he said to the bully: "I have no weapon, and if I had, I could not
take your life, nor try to take it; and you know that very well. But I
propose to meet your insolence--the first shown me in this town."

Here murmurs of approbation went round.

"You will, of course, take the revolver from your pocket, and throw it
on the ground."

A couple of other revolvers were looking the bully in the face, and he
sullenly did as he was asked.

"You have a knife: throw that down."

This also was done under the most earnest emphasis of the revolvers.
Roscoe calmly took off his coat. "I have met such scoundrels as you on
the quarter-deck," he said, "and I know what stuff is in you. They call
you beachcombers in the South Seas. You never fight fair. You bully
women, knife natives, and never meet any one in fair fight. You have
mistaken your man this time."

He walked close up to the bully, his face like steel, his thumbs caught
lightly in his waistcoat pockets; but it was noticeable that his hands
were shut.

"Now," he said, "we are even as to opportunity. Repeat, if you please,
what you said a moment ago."

The bully's eye quailed, and he answered nothing. "Then, as I said, you
are a coward and a cur, who insults peaceable men and weak women. If I
know Viking right, it has no room for you." Then he picked up his coat,
and put it on.

"Now," he added, "I think you had better go; but I leave that to the
citizens of Viking."

What they thought is easily explained. Phil Boldrick, speaking for all,
said: "Yes, you had better go--quick; but on the hop like a cur, mind
you: on your hands and knees, jumping all the way."

And, with weapons menacing him, this visitor to Viking departed,
swallowing as he went the red dust disturbed by his hands and feet.

This established Roscoe's position finally. Yet, with all his popularity
and the solid success of his work, he sho