CAPTAIN JACK'S CHRISTMAS GIFT.

It was just in the holiday season when Bob and Tommie were delighted to receive a visit from their old friend Captain Hawkins from the sea-shore.

"Just thought I'd run up to town for a few minutes," he said, as if it were necessary for him to explain his presence in town. "You see, I've got a few nevews an' several thousand gran'children what likes to hear from me about Christmas-time, so I goes about Bemberton-by-the-Sea, and all I can find in the shops down thereabouts is the same old things they've had for the last forty year."

"My! Captain Hawkins," said Bob. "Forty years? Are your nephews and grandchildren as old as that?"

"Well, pretty nearly," said the Captain, with an uneasy laugh. "Pretty nearly; and when you get to be forty you get kind of tired o' tin pails and wooden spades and little red jumpin'-jacks an' doll babbies and lemon drops. You boys don't understand that, but wait till you get to be forty year old, and see if I ain't tellin' you the solemnest kind o' truth."

"I guess you're right," said Bob. "I gave my daddy a fine old Jack-in-the-box once, and he laughed like everything at first; but he didn't play with it much, and finally it came back to me again. Pop's pretty nearly forty."

"Yes, an' I guess he laughed like sixty when he saw that Bob-in-a-box."

"Jack-in-a-box," said Bob, with a smile.

"All the same," retorted the old Captain. "Jack-in-a-box, Tommie-in-a-box, or Bob-in-a-box! I never could see why they took the trouble to specify, and if I'd ever have had any children o' my own the Jack-in-a-box would ha' been named after 'em."

"But, Captain, you were just speaking of your grandchildren," said Tommie. "How can you have any grandchildren if you haven't had any children?"

"Oh, that's easy," replied the Captain. "I've adopted 'em. Whenever I see boy or a girl that strikes me as being grand I adopt 'em and call 'em my grandchildren. I guess I've got most a million of 'em scattered round."

"And you've come up to get a million Christmas presents for 'em?" cried Bob, in ecstasy.

"Yep—only there ain't more'n ten of 'em," said the Captain, "that expects anything. I'm goin' to spend ten cents apiece on 'em, but first I've got to get the other eight."

Bob looked at Tommie and Tommie looked at Bob. They were really puzzled to think what the Captain could mean.

"The other eight?" asked Bob.

"Yes," said Hawkins. "You boys ain't the only grandchildren I've got. I love you, but you ain't the only ones I love. There's at least eight more. And what do you suppose I'm goin' to give you all for Christmas?"

The boys gave it up.

"Well," said the Captain, in a whisper, "as I was a-comin' up Broadway a-lookin' into the windows, all of a sudden I see a hoss-car goin' along without a hoss, and I says goodness gracious that's funny. A hoss-car without a hoss, an' what was queerest of all, no trolley! Boys, it scaret me. Me who was never scaret before was scaret then. So I says to a policeman, 'Great scott! Mr. Constable, say, what makes that car go so fast?' 'It's the cable,' says he. My goodness thinks I, I'm sorry for the man that has to pull it, but I jumps aboard one of 'em, pays my five cents, and I have the finest sail from Forty-second Street to the Battery you ever see. No wind, no steam, nothin' in sight to move you, but movin' just the same, just as if you was on a sled slidin' down a hill. It was fine. Goin' around by Fourteenth Street you got lurched like as if you was at sea, an' then with a clear track and no squalls we just bounded down past Canal and Wall streets to Bowlin' Green, and back as slick as anything. And I says to myself, Cap'n Hawkins you've struck it. Don't give the boys no pails, no Jims-in-the-boxes, no spades, no nothin', but get the whole ten of 'em together and give 'em a ride on the cable-car whether you're sorry for the feller that pulls the rope or not. So I'm goin' back to Bemberton for the other eight, and when you boys are free I want you to join us for a sail from Central Park down and back, eh?"