low
of words.

"I wish, Arthur," she said, "that when you see I am engaged in a
conversation, you would wait at least a reasonable time before
interrupting it."

"A reasonable time!" said Raybold, with a laugh. "I like that! But I came
here to interrupt your conversation. Do you know who that fellow is you
were talking to? He's a common, good-for-nothing tramp. He goes round
splitting wood for his meals. Clyde and I kept him here to cook our meals
because we had no servant, and he's been in bed for days because he had no
clothes to wear. Now you are treating him as if he were a gentleman, and
you actually brought him to our table, where, like the half-starved cur
that he is, he has eaten up everything fit to eat that we were to have for
our supper."

"He did not eat all of it," said Corona, "for I ate some myself; and if he
is the good-for-nothing tramp and the other things you call him, I wish I
could meet with more such tramps. I tell you, Arthur, that if you were to
spend the next five years in reading and studying, you could not get into
your mind one-tenth of the serious information, the power to reason
intelligently upon your perceptions, the ability to collate, compare, and
refer to their individual causes the impressions--"

"Oh, bosh!" said her brother. "What I want to know is, are you going to
make friends with that man and invite him to our table?"

"I shall invite him if I see fit," said she. "He is an extremely
intelligent person."

"Well," answered he, "if you do I shall have a separate table," and he
walked away.

As soon as he had left Corona, the bishop repaired to the Archibalds'
cooking-tent, where he saw Matlack at work.

"I have come," he said, with a pleasant smile, "to ask a very great favor.
Would it be convenient for you to give me something to eat? Anything in
the way of meat, hot or cold, and some tea or coffee, as I see there is a
pot still steaming on your stove. I have had an unlucky experience. You
know I have been preparing my own meals at the other camp, but to-day,
when Mrs. Perkenpine brought me my clothes, she carried away with her all
the provisions that had been left there. I supped, it is true, with Miss
Raybold, but her appetite is so delicate and her fare so extremely simple
that I confidentially acknowledge that I am half starved."

During these remarks Matlack had stood quietly gazing at the bishop. "Do
you see that pile of logs and branches there?" said he; "that's