ed. These, with his tufted nose and his tragic
attitude, gave him an appearance so grotesque and hideous that Zoe,
after springing to her feet and throwing her arms wildly aloft, fell in
a dead faint into Sampey's arms.

Bat gloated over his rival; Castellani was dumfounded. Presently
Sampey's nerve returned with his wits.

"Well," he remarked, contemptuously, drawing Zoe closer and holding her
with a tender solicitude--"well, what of it?"

His insolence enraged Hoolagaloo. "H--hwat of eet! Santa Maria! Da
scound! Ha, ha! Da gal no marry you now!"

Sampey deliberately moved Zoe so that he might reach his watch, and
after looking calmly at it a moment he said:

"Muggie and I have been married just thirty hours."

The announcement stunned the Wild Man. Castellani himself had a hard
mental struggle to realize the situation, and then, with his accustomed
equanimity and his old-time air of authority, he said:

"Well, phat is oll the row aboot, annyhow? D'ye want to shpile th'
mon's thrick, Misther Bat? An' thin, Misther Bat, it's a domned gude
wan, it is; an' more'n thot, me gintlemanly son-in-law is me partner,
too, Misther Bat, I'd have ye know, an' he's got aut'ority in this
show."

That finished the Wild Man of Milo. He staggered out, shaved his nose,
bought an axe, and fled to the mountains to chop wood again, leaving
the Mysterious Man with the Spectre Eyes to become the happiest husband
and the most prosperous freak and showman in the world.

The Faithful Amulet

A quaint old rogue, who called himself Rabaya, the Mystic, was one of
the many extraordinary characters of that odd corner of San Francisco
known as the Latin Quarter. His business was the selling of charms and
amulets, and his generally harmless practices received an impressive
aspect from his Hindu parentage, his great age, his small, wizened
frame, his deeply wrinkled face, his outlandish dress, and the barbaric
fittings of his den.

One of his most constant customers was James Freeman, the
half-piratical owner and skipper of the "Blue Crane." This queer little
barkentine, of light tonnage but wonderful sailing qualities, is
remembered in every port between Sitka and Callao. All sorts of strange
stories are told of her exploits, but these mostly were manufactured by
superstitious and highly imaginative sailors, who commonly demonstrate
the natural affinity existing between idleness and lying. It has been
said not only that she engaged