?" asked his wife.

"Yis, cushla, but you've forgot the kiss."

"Am I to kiss _all_ the divers we shall have to do with before sending
them down?" she asked.

"If you want _all_ the divers to be kicked you may," was the reply.

Molly cut short further remark by giving the order to pump, and affixing
the glass. For a few seconds the diver looked earnestly at the Chinamen
and at his better half, who may have been said to hold his life in her
hands. Then he stepped boldly on the short ladder that had been let
down outside the boat, and was soon lost to view in the multitude of
air-bells that rose above him.

Now, Rooney had neglected to take into his calculations the excitability
of female nerves. It was all very well for his wife to remember
everything and proceed correctly when he was in the verandah of the
pagoda, but when she knew that her best-beloved was at the bottom of the
sea, and saw the air-bells rising, her courage vanished, and with her
courage went her presence of mind. A rush of alarm entered her soul as
she saw the boiling of the water, and fancying she was giving too much
air, she said hurriedly, "Pump slow, boys," but immediately conceiving
she had done wrong, she said, "Pump harder, boys."

The Chinamen pumped with a will, for they also had become excited, and
were only too glad to obey orders.

A signal-pull now came for "Less air," but Molly had taken up an idea,
and it could not be dislodged. She thought it must be "More air" that
was wanted.

"Pump away, boys--pump," she cried, in rapidly increasing alarm.

Chok-foo and Ram-stam obeyed.

The signal was repeated somewhat impatiently.

"Pump away, boys; for dear life--pump," cried the little woman in
desperate anxiety.

Perspiration rolled down the cheeks of Chok-foo and Ram-stam as they
gasped for breath and turned the handles with all the strength they
possessed.

"Pump--oh! Pump--for pity's sake."

She ended with a wild shriek, for at that moment the waves were cleft
alongside, and Rooney Machowl came up from the bottom, feet foremost,
with a bounce that covered the sea with foam. He had literally been
blown up from the bottom--his dress being filled with so much compressed
air that he had become like a huge bladder, and despite all his weights,
he rolled helplessly on the surface in vain attempts to get his head up
and his feet down.

Of course his distracted wife hauled in on the life-line with all her
might, and Chok-fo