is friend
was wasting his strength and adding to his discomfort by useless
resistance to the fiat of destiny.

Richard profited by this hint; and when he became calm and reasonable,
the farmer relaxed his grasp, and permitted him to breathe with more
freedom.

"Who are they, Bates?" asked the farmer of his foreman.

"I don't know them; it is so dark I can't make them out," replied
Bates.

"We'll take them up to the barn, and see what they look like."

"They have been here before, I think," added the foreman. "I am pretty
sure I saw them the other night."

"No, you didn't," said Richard, testily. "I never was here before."

"Perhaps you never was, my boys; but when chaps like you go far enough
to steal, you don't stand about a lie or two to cover it up. Now, boys,
you may take up that bag, and carry it to the barn."

"I won't carry it," said Richard, promptly.

"Won't you?" And the farmer again applied the twisting process to his
cravat, till the boy's strength was almost gone from the choking
sensation.

"Let go of me! You'll choke me to death!" gasped Richard, who had never
before been so roughly handled.

"Will you carry the bag up to the barn, then?" demanded Mr. Batterman,
as he eased off the pressure upon the prisoner's throat.

"No, I won't!" replied Richard.

"Now, I think you will," said the farmer, as he resumed the torture.

"Come, Dick, we may as well do it. It is no use to kick; we are in for
it, and you had better make the best of it," interposed Sandy, who was
disposed to get off as cheaply as he could.

"I won't touch the bag! I'll die first!" gasped Richard, whose rage had
now reached the boiling point, and there was no more reason in him than
in a mad dog.

"He's a hard one," suggested Bates.

"But he shall come to it, or I'll break every bone in his body,"
answered the farmer.

Richard, insane with passion, and choking with rage as well as from the
discipline of Mr. Batterman, commenced a tremendous struggle for
freedom and self-preservation. He sprang towards his captor in an
ineffectual attempt to hit him, or to scratch out his eyes with his
finger nails. Failing in his efforts in this direction, he began to use
his heels as vigorously as a three-year old colt, and succeeded in
planting two or three hard kicks upon the shins of the farmer.

Mr. Batterman was a large and powerful man, and the efforts of Richard
were as puny as those of a lamb in the fangs of the lion. He foame