yes!" came the chorus, from three of
the party. But Hugh John, strong in the
indefeasible rights of man, only repeated, "_I_
said 'Bags Hatteraick!'"

"Well, then," I said, "for this time Hatteraick is
yours, but for the future it will be fairer to draw
lots for first choice."

"All right," growled Hugh John; "then I suppose
I'll have to put up with a lot more heroes!
Milksops, I call them!"

"Which book shall we have next?" said Sweetheart,
who was beginning to be rather ashamed of her heat.
"I don't believe that you could tell us _Rob Roy!_"

"Well, I can try," said I, modestly. For so it
behooves a modern parent to behave in the presence
of his children.

"_She_," said Hugh John, pointing directly at his
sister, "she read nearly half the book aloud, and
we never came to Rob at all. That's why she asks
for _Rob Roy_."

"But there's all about Alan Breck in the
preface--ripping, it is!" interpolated Sir Toady,
who had been doing some original research, "tell us
about him."

But Alan Breck was quite another story, and I said
so at once. _Rob Roy_ they had asked for. _Rob Roy_
they should have. And then I would stand or fall by
their judgment.

RED CAP TALES

TOLD FROM

ROB ROY

THE FIRST TALE FROM "ROB ROY"

FRANK THE HIGHWAYMAN

FRANK OSBALDISTONE had come back from France to quarrel with his father.
A merchant he would not be. He hated the three-legged stool, and he used
the counting-house quills to write verses with.

His four years in Bordeaux had spoiled him for strict business, without
teaching him anything else practical enough to please his father, who,
when he found that his son persisted in declining the stool in the dark
counting-room in Crane Alley, packed him off to the care of his brother,
Sir Hildebrand Osbaldistone of Osbaldistone Hall in Northumberland,
there to repent of his disobedience.

"I will have no idlers about me," he said, "I will not ask even my own
son twice to be my friend and my partner. One of my nephews shall take
the place in the firm which you have declined."

And old Mr. Osbaldistone, of the firm of Osbaldistone and Tresham,
merchants in London town, being above all things a man of his word,
Master Frank took to the North Road accordingly, an exile from his home
and disinherited of his patrimony.

At first he was gloomy enough. He w