"Now," said Pete, "ef I could find the feller that's a-helpin' them scoundrels rob us folks, I'd help stretch him to the neardest tree." "So vood I," said Schroeder.

"I'd shtretch him dill he baid me my dree huntert tollars pack, so I vood." And Betsey Short, who had found the whole affair very funny, was transported with a fit of tittering at poor Schroeder's English.

Ralph, fearing that his silence would excite suspicion, tried to talk.

But he could not tell what he knew, and all that he said sounded so hollow and hypocritical that it made him feel guilty.

And so he shut his mouth, and meditated profitably on the subject of bull dogs.