fellows of the
tavern. They saw the bag, the lantern, then Nicholas. Laden though he was
with gold until he could hardly budge, these pirates, for such they were,
got him up-stairs, forced him to drink hot Hollands to the success of
their flag, then shot him through the window into the creek. As he was
about to make this unceremonious exit he clutched something to save
himself, and it proved to be a plucked goose that the pirates had stolen
from a neighboring farm and were going to sup on when they had scraped
their gold together. He felt the water and mud close over him; he
struggled desperately; he was conscious of breathing more freely and of
staggering off at a vigorous gait; then the power of all the schnapps
seemed to get into his head, and he remembered no more until he heard his
wife shrilling in his ears, when he sat up and found himself in a
snow-bank close to his house, with a featherless goose tight in his
grasp.

Vrouw Van Wempel cared less about the state of her spouse when she saw
that he had secured the bird, and whenever he told his tale of the
pirates she turned a deaf ear to him, for if he had found the gold why
did he not manage to bring home a few pieces of it? He, in answer, asked
how, as he had none of his own money, she could have come by the goose?
He often told his tale to sympathetic ears, and would point to the old
mill to prove that it was true.

THE WEARY WATCHER

Before the opening of the great bridge sent commerce rattling up
Washington Street in Brooklyn that thoroughfare was a shaded and
beautiful avenue, and among the houses that attested its respectability
was one, between Tillary and Concord Streets, that was long declared to
be haunted. A man and his wife dwelt there who seemed to be fondly
attached to each other, and whose love should have been the stronger
because of their three children none grew to years. A mutual sorrow is as
close a tie as a common affection. One day, while on a visit to a friend,
the wife saw her husband drive by in a carriage with a showy woman beside
him. She went home at once, and when the supposed recreant returned she
met him with bitter reproaches. He answered never a word, but took his
hat and left the house, never to be seen again in the places that had
known him.

The wife watched and waited, daily looking for his return, but days
lengthened into weeks, months, years, and still he came not. Sometimes
she lamented that she had spoken hasti