BACK IN SOUTH CHICAGO.
There was some great rejoicing on Carl's part when he learned what had
happened in Grand Haven and out along the trolley line to Grand Rapids.
"Ach, aber dot all sounds too goot to be droo!" exulted the Dutch boy.
"I vish I hat peen dere during der fragas. Ferral vas fooling mit me
ven he saidt dot Jerrold und I mighdt haf more drouples as der resdt
oof you. Dere don'd vas any tanger oof dot at any stage oof der game.
Prady gaptured! Hoop-a-la! Aber der pest oof all iss dot der Hawk is
pack vere she pelongs, und dot pooty soon, pympy, Modor Matt, Tick
Ferral und Carl Pretzel vill sail avay mit demselufs py Noo York. Der
palloon-house plot ditn't vork oudt like Prady t'ought."
"It would have worked out just as he planned," said Matt, "if it hadn't
been for Helen Brady."
"Yah, so! Miss Prady safed der tay for all oof us. Ven ve shdart for
Noo York now, Matt? Oof ve vaid too long, den meppy dose odder two
fellers, Vipple und Pete, vill hatch some more plots. I don'd like dot.
Der kevicker vat ve get avay, der pedder all aroundt."
"Carl's got the marlinspike by the right end, old ship," said Ferral to
Matt.
"That may be," answered Matt, "but I think we ought to find out
something more about what Helen Brady intends doing before we leave
Chicago."
"Right-o!" agreed Ferral. "I was forgetting about that. She's mighty
independent, though, and I doubt whether she'll let us do much to help
her."
"That's one of the things I like about Helen Brady."
Matt went over the Hawk and found that she would need more gasoline
before the trip back across the lake was attempted.
Jerrold was also wanting a supply, and he and Matt, leaving Carl and
Ferral in charge of both air ships, started for the nearest house to
find out where they could get the fuel of which they stood in need.
They found that gasoline was used for cooking, and for manufacturing
gas for lighting, in the house where they inquired. The man who owned
the place kindly offered to let the air ship owners have all they
needed.
In less than an hour Matt and Jerrold were back and filling their
gasoline tanks.
A little later Harris reached the scene. The sun was down and darkness
was coming on.
"I couldn't get away any quicker," explained Harris. "I am leaving
everything in good shape here, though. Harper is willing to go back to
South Chicago without any requisition papers, but I thought it best
to let him stay and take him across the lake at the same time we took
Brady."
"I should think that would be better," agreed Matt.
"Harper is ready to turn states' evidence against the gang in the hope
of getting a light sentence," went on Harris. "He claims to know where
some more stolen property has been secreted, so I suppose there will
be a few happy people in South Chicago if he proves that he knows what
he's talking about."
"The law will deal lightly with Harper, I suppose," put in Jerrold, "if
he does all that."
"I guess so, but the law will not let him off scot free. Harper will go
to the 'pen,' but he won't get anywhere near the sentence that Brady
will."
"How long will Brady go up for?"
"That's hard to say, but it will be long enough to keep him out of
mischief for twenty or thirty years."
"What is going to be done with Ochiltree?" asked Matt.
"Nothing. Ochiltree will be kept in the lockup until the officers in
this part of Michigan have had a chance to capture Whipple and Pete.
After that, Ochiltree will be turned loose."
"What are the chances for capturing Whipple and Pete?"
"Good. We have used the wires in every direction, and also coupled a
description of Grove with the descriptions of the other two."
"Why, shiver me," cried Ferral, "I hadn't thought about Grove! What
became of him, Harris?"
"Harper says that Grove was put down on the lake shore, just before
Brady and the rest started across. I don't know how true that is, and
I'm just telling you what Harper told me. But Harper's information has
panned out straight goods, so far. He says that Grove showed signs of
weakening, and that Brady, in a temper, cut loose from him. It may be
that Grove will join Whipple and Pete, somehow, and I thought it well
to telephone and telegraph his description along with the others. But
what are we going to do, Jerrold? Wait here until morning?"
"I don't think we'd better," said Jerrold. "The night bids fair to be
as calm as the day has been, and we can cross the lake easily enough
by moonlight. If we wait until to-morrow we may have a high wind, and
perhaps a storm. Air ships, and flying machines of every sort, ought
to be under cover in a time like that. We'd better make the most of the
good weather. Don't you think so, Matt?"
"You know more about air ships than I do, Mr. Jerrold," answered Matt,
"but, from my brief experience with the Hawk, I think a storm would be
bad business for an air ship. I've weathered out storms in balloons,
but it's possible, with just a plain gas bag, to get above the clouds
and the tempest. You can't safely do that with machines like ours."
"Well," said Harris, "if we're going to South Chicago to-night, the
quicker we start the quicker we'll get there. I'll confess I'm not in
love with the idea of hanging out on this beach all night with these
two air ships. We can't tell what might happen, with Grove, and Pete,
and Whipple at large."
"Then," said Jerrold, "we'll pull out at once. You start first, Matt,
and we'll follow."
"I'll ride mit my bards," said Carl, "und Harris can come mit you,
Misder Jerrold."
The ropes were cast off and Matt manoeuvred the Hawk upward and out
above the lake. When they had got a good "offing," as Ferral described
it, those in the car could look back and see the dark, weird shape of
the Eagle flinging itself upward against the lighter background of sky.
What little wind there had been, during the day, had gone down with the
sun, and perfect silence, save for the lapping of the waves, reigned on
every hand.
The Eagle soon overhauled the Hawk, and side by side the two air ships
made toward the Illinois shore.
Could anyone in a boat have seen the air ships, the sight presented
would have been strangely exciting. The spectacle would have been
prophetic, too, of man's coming command of an element heretofore out of
his reach.
As time passed, the moon arose as if out of the water, and a scene of
weird beauty unrolled to those aboard the Hawk and the Eagle.
"I vould radder be a sailor oof der air dan oof der sea," remarked
Carl, breaking a silence during which all hands had been enjoying their
novel surroundings.
"Why so, Carl?" came across from the Eagle, in the voice of Harris.
"Pecause," said Carl, "you got four vays to go insteadt oof two. In a
sea ship, you don't vas aple to go oop und town."
"Once in awhile, matey," laughed Ferral, "a sea ship goes down."
"Yah," averred Carl, "und she shdays town. Go on mit dot song vat you
vas singing mit yourseluf, Tick, der dime vat you vas coming py der
poarding house to see Matt. It vas a pooty fine song, I tell you dot."
Ferral had a fine voice, and he at once broke into "In Cawsand Bay
Lying," and followed it through from start to finish.
Harris thereupon tuned up, and when he got through Carl piped out in
German. This singing was kept up, off and on, during the entire trip
across the lake.
It was decided, just as the air ships were hoving over South Chicago,
that Matt and his chums should take the Hawk to the balloon house and
stow her away there. Harris would go on to Jerrold's place in the
Eagle, and then send a couple of policemen from headquarters to watch
the Hawk until the boys were ready to leave.
This programme was carried out without a break. It was about three
o'clock in the morning when the boys got their sand bags in place along
the bottom rail of the car and towed the Hawk into her old berth.
Half an hour after that a detail of two officers arrived and went on
guard. Matt, Ferral and Carl went into the small room at the back of
the balloon house, and two of them took possession of the cots and the
third had a bed made for him on the floor. It was Carl who stretched
out between the two cots, and it was he who remarked, just before he
dozed off to sleep:
"You fellers came pooty near daking a long shleep here, hey?"
"Stow it, matey!" cried Ferral. "I'll be dreaming about that now."
"Ach, donnervetter!" returned Carl, "dere iss pedder t'ings as dot to
tream aboudt, Ferral. For insdunce, tream oof der vay Matt shtruck
some shtreaks oof hardt luck, und den turned der hardt luck to goot
atvantage py gedding Prady gaptured."
"And recovering the Hawk," added Matt. "There's a silver lining to
every cloud, Dick."
"There's never a flat foot nor a shellback but will tell you same
thing, messmate," agreed Ferral heartily. "Good night, or good morning,
whichever you want. I'm ready to take my stretch off the land, and here
goes."
Two minutes later the fateful old balloon house was steeped in silence.
THE END.
THE NEXT NUMBER (11) WILL CONTAIN
Motor Matt's Daring Rescue
OR,
The Strange Case of Helen Brady.
The Disappearance of Helen Brady--The Important Letter--By the Old
Quarry--A Queer Situation--Pete and Whipple Make a Capture--Brady's
Proposition--A Surprise at Hooligan's--Back to the Canal--Brady
Returns With Hot News--The Mansion On the River--The Fight--Daring
Work--Helen's Ordeal--The Capture of Pete and Whipple.
MOTOR STORIES
THRILLING ADVENTURE MOTOR FICTION
NEW YORK, May 1, 1909.
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79-89 Seventh Avenue, New York City.
THE RED SPIDER.
"This," said Phil Clode, setting down his bag, "is the limit!"
Having given vent to which expressive remark, he laughed to himself
and gazed round upon the most desolate scene that it had ever been
his fortune to behold. Behind him stood a small, wooden erection, not
unlike an enlarged run, which was, however, dignified by the name of
station. For the rest, a clove-brown plain stretched away to infinity,
marred only by the shining ribbons of the railway track and an
occasional clump of cactus or greaseweed.
"The limit," the boy repeated solemnly. "Hullo! there's a man, or
something very like one. I will get a line on to his vicinity, and try
to extract a little useful information."
Picking up his grip, he hustled over to where a specimen of the cowboy
genus had lounged from behind the station, leading a broncho that
looked rather the worse for wear. Phil, as he approached, saw that
a bag branded with the sign "U. S. Mail" was slung over the beast's
saddle, and his eyes brightened. He knew that even in that deserted
region of Colorado any servant of Uncle Sam's could be trusted.
"Say," he sang out. "Can you give me any notion where I am, mister? I
was told to get off at Silver Bridge, and here I am right enough, but I
can't see much sign of the town."
"You on foot?" the other returned with undisguised astonishment. "You
must be stark----"
"Broncho waiting for me at Silver Bridge," Phil interrupted shortly. He
had urgent reasons for not wishing to talk about his private affairs.
"So?" the man muttered with a sidelong glance. He had a pleasant face,
rough but good humored, and the lad took to him instinctively. "You're
an Easterner, ain't yeh?"
"Yes, and proud of it."
"That's all right. I'm from the East, too, only I've been here so long
that yeh wouldn't think it. I guess yeh'd better hop up behind me,
pardner. Betsy's a game chicken--she's carried three before now."
"You going to Silver Bridge, then?" Phil queried as the cowboy stroked
the unprepossessing broncho fondly.
"I should smile. I'm cattle tender to the ore-crushing plant there."
Phil received this information with a start, but made no remark. In
silence he mounted behind the man, who gave his name as Idaho Bart, and
felt with some surprise the plain bumping rapidly away beneath them, as
the broncho, becoming a bunch of throbbing muscles, pounded eastward
with the regularity of tirelessness of a steam engine.
The mail rider did not seem disposed to let the silence continue. Out
West curiosity about another man's affairs is usually the signal for
gun play, but Idaho Bart proceeded to break the rule by a series of
interrogations of the most pointed and particular description.
Phil Clode, however, was old for his years, and he met him at every
point, giving a false name, and a reason for his arrival at Silver
Bridge that was so obviously wide of the truth that the mail carrier,
having turned in the saddle to fix him with a twinkling eye, emitted a
short laugh, and relapsed into taciturnity.
This muteness remained undisturbed until they were in sight of Silver
Bridge, the big ore-crushing town, the shares of which, back in Wall
Street, were at a premium. It appeared suddenly as they topped a
swelling hill that surrounded two sides of the city like a wall, and
Phil surveyed it with the curiosity of first acquaintance. It reminded
him of a battle ship out of action--of something Titanic which is
wrapped in incongruous slumber. Though only midday, not a sound rose
from the vast collection of shacks and wooden buildings. The mighty ore
crushers and distributors were idle, the men lounged listlessly round
the two hotels, and the river swirled past unstained by the red of
washed metal.
The river? In those two words lay the tragedy--the reason of the
inaction that spelled ruin to thousands, including the canvas-coated
men who diced and gambled and swore in the saloons. For the river was
now a mere meandering stream, and the power that worked the mills was
gone, leaving the great plant worse than useless, for it would cost
more than it was worth to entrain it to any place where there would be
the likelihood of a buyer.
"Looks pleasant, I don't think," Idaho Bart said bitterly as he watched
Phil's keen, dark eyes glancing over the drowsy, deserted streets,
splashed golden by the afternoon sun. "Two weeks ago yeh would have
opined that yeh were back in New York. Busy? I guess we had got the
Fountain of Youth faded to a Harlem ash can, when it came to hustling."
"And now the river's gone," the boy rejoined quietly. His remarks were
all couched to extract information without giving any in return.
"Say, that's a right hook on the jaw of truth! It's a lead-pipe cinch
that this is about the most mysterious thing that ever gave a whole
layout brain storm. The river stopped in the night, and we woke up to
find this here dribble. The men are going to pike out, if there don't
come a change 'fore Saturday."
Phil muttered something to himself.
"Why don't you find out what has dammed the source of the river?" he
asked a moment later.
"Say, yeh are a young green-growing thing, all ready canned and
labeled!" Bart sniggered. "Do you know that the source of Silver River
is up in Black Cañon?"
"What of that?" queried Phil ingenuously.
"Oh, come off! This ain't the season for spring chickens, I reckon.
I only know of three men what have been into Black Cañon, and come
out alive. Two o' them were engineers belonging to the United States
Reclamation Service, and they had the time of their lives. The other
was a Indian, and went in to escape the posse that was trailing him for
hoss stealing. He said afterwards that he wished he'd stopped and been
lynched."
Phil made no reply to these revelations, for they were now in the main
thoroughfare of Silver Bridge, and the ore-stained men were lounging
up with a tumultuous outcry for the mail. They also bestowed upon the
boy the benefit of their rather doubtful wit, but, finding that they
got rather better than they sent, soon betook themselves back to the
enticements of the saloons, leaving Idaho Bart to take the few official
letters up to the office.
"Say, kid, where are yeh going?" he drawled as he strode away with the
loping movement peculiar to the riders of the plains.
"To Mr. Allsoner," Phil returned carelessly, keeping pace with him.
He made a clucking sound in his cheek.
"If yeh are after a job, yeh'd better carry your store clothes away
along the shining homeward track right now," he said poetically. "Old
Allsoner's hoppin' mad, and he'll have yer scalp before yeh could say
Teddy."
"I don't want a job," was the irritating reply, and Phil grinned as he
noted the other's mystification.
The office of Mr. Allsoner, general manager of Clode's Silver Bridge
Reducing Company, Limited, was not an imposing structure. In fact,
it might well have been taken for a stack of damaged firewood by
the uninitiated, but Phil Clode did not make this mistake. Suddenly
shouldering his way ahead of Idaho Bart, he entered the office at a
run, and disappeared into the manager's private office--the most sacred
spot in the whole townstead--with a coolness that left the two clerks
in the outer department absolutely petrified.
Mr. Allsoner, however, was far from being petrified, and he had already
used more adjectives than could be found in any dictionary before he
looked up, started as though he could scarcely believe the evidence of
his senses, and ejaculated:
"Phil Clode!"
"Yes, it's me," was the ungrammatical rejoinder. "Father's got to
keep his eye on the market, or we'd go up in a balloon before an hour
was through, and there was nobody else to come. Mr. Allsoner, there's
treachery afloat."
The keen-eyed business man uttered an exclamation of wonderment, and
then, rising, locked the door.
"Spit it out," he said tersely.
"You know our river is stopped."
"I do."
"It's been dammed purposely."
The manager had just seated himself, but he leaped up again at these
quietly spoken words.
"Nonsense! The source is in Black Cañon."
He made his rejoinder with an air of finality, as though there was no
room left for argument.
"Nevertheless, father overheard a conversation between two Wall Street
brokers that convinced him that they have paid some bad man to dam the
river for a time. It's a certainty, not guesswork."
Mr. Allsoner stared at him in bewilderment.
"I may be dense, Phil, but I fail to see what good damming our river
would do to anybody."
"You are dense," smiled the boy. "Don't you see? Silver Bridge river
runs dry. Panic in Wall Street, and two-hundred-dollar shares sold in
bucketfuls, and bought by the men who have had the river dammed. Then,
after, say, a month, when they've got control of every share in the
market, down comes the river again, up go the shares to top notch, and
they've netted a cool million."
Silence reigned for a minute, while the manager reviewed this startling
idea. Then he murmured "Jove!" in the tone of one seeing visions.
"You couldn't tell me who's working the rig, could you?" he asked
facetiously. The realization that the stoppage was only temporary acted
like a tonic. "The boys would give him a lively time, if they got their
fingers in his wool. It would be a case of the nearest telegraph pole."
"The man mentioned," Phil answered in a cautious whisper, "was
nicknamed Red Spider."
"What! By heavens, you are right! Red Spider is an outlaw half-breed,
horse stealer, cattle runner, murderer, and everything else abominable.
He is known to have a cache up in the hills, too."
"Then catch Red Spider before eleven o'clock to-morrow. At that hour
there is a meeting, and the state of affairs here will become public
property. The river must be running before then."
"There isn't a man here that will go into the Black Cañon, and I don't
blame them," the manager declared hopelessly. "It's certain death."
"What Red Spider can do we must do."
"He's discovered some secret way. Besides, a cross between an Omaha
Indian and a Mexican produces something tougher than a white man."
"I start at midnight," said Phil Clode, strolling toward the door.
It was a few minutes after midnight when Phil Clode rode out of the
town.
He was alone. As one man the ore workers had jeered at the idea of
attempting to penetrate into the famous Black Cañon. They had already
been as far as possible, and found the river unstopped. It had failed
at its source, they argued. Such things had been heard of before. Mr.
Allsoner did not agree with this latter conclusion, but he was entirely
convinced that any attempt to enter the cañon would be futile, and he
did not scruple to tell Phil so.
The boy, however, although he pretended to accept the manager's
decision as final, secretly determined to make an attempt at solving
the mystery single-handed. He knew that the failure to resume
operations on the morrow would mean ruin to his father, and with the
impetuosity of youth he stigmatized the ore workers as a pack of
"superstitious grandmothers."
Once out of sight of the camp, he urged his game little steed to a
gallop, and set off to where the mountains rose stark and flat against
the mauve-colored rim of the horizon, keeping his course by the dried
river bed that led the way into the very heart of Black Cañon.
After about an hour's hard riding the track grew even too steep for
the broncho, and Phil, tethering the animal to a rock, made his way
forward on foot. Gradually the walls of rock rose up and encompassed
him, leaving only a strip of sky faintly seen above his head, and the
stillness became so unearthly that he paused occasionally to cast a
stone down a chasm for the mere pleasure of hearing it rattle.
Arrived at the entrance of the cañon, he halted and surveyed the way
for a few minutes. As Allsoner had told him, the river--now a morass of
horrible mud--entirely filled the gulch from side to side, rendering
progress without a boat an impossibility. The dam controlling the
flow, however, was built half a mile farther up, and this was reached
by a species of aërial railway, built on the plan of the old overhead
switchbacks, with a car slung to a double rope, worked by block and
pulley on the return journey.
It was certainly not an inviting mode of progression, but Phil did not
falter. Setting his teeth, he grasped the iron ladder that led up to
the summit of the first trestle, and mounted steadily. By the time that
he reached the top the wind was shrieking in his ears with demoniac
fury, and the trestle seemed to sway bodily before the furious gusts,
although only a mild and gentle breeze could be felt in the cañon below.
Buttoning his fluttering jacket tightly around him, he stepped
nervously on to the flat, swaying car, and fumbled with the two hooks
that held it in place, being secured to a couple of iron rings in the
top corners.
With a sudden swoop the frail craft left its moorings, and Phil found
himself spinning at a dizzy speed through space. Presently the slope
became less steep, and as his conveyance slackened speed he was able to
look about him.
Not that there was much to be seen, even though the moon rendered it
nearly as light as day. Before him the ropes ran on in an everlasting
stream, and on each side nothing was visible but the walls of rock,
smoothed in places by human handiwork to allow of the passage of the
traveling cradle. Occasionally the car would almost stop as it passed
with a shock over the platform of one of the trestles, and Phil found
that, by clutching the railings at the proper moment, he could arrest
it without feeling any particular strain.
He had closed his eyes, and was almost enjoying the rush through the
scented night air, when he felt a sudden shudder run through the car,
as if it had struck against something. Opening his eyes hastily, he
peered round, and then a terrified cry rose to his lips.
The swaying cradle had a new passenger, in the shape of a picturesquely
garbed Mexican, who glared upon the boy with fierce wolfish orbs, fiery
and bloodshot, as he flourished a long-barreled revolver in his face.
Phil did not need to inquire who the stranger was.
He guessed, and rightly, that it was Red Spider, the outlaw of the
plains, who stood before him.
"Carajo!" the man hissed gutturally, thrusting the firearm forward
until it snicked the boy's nose. "Whose baby are you? Why are you here?
Answer, or over the side you go!"
Leaning forward, he seized Phil's wrist in a vise-like grip, and forced
him slowly toward the edge of the car.
"Come to that, who are you?" the boy retorted pluckily. "You've got
less right than I have to be here, I guess."
The half-breed's teeth grated with fury at this impertinence.
"I am left here to guard the trestle railway," he yelled, with a curse.
"And my duty is to shoot brats who have no business here!"
He pushed the revolver into Phil's face, gradually forcing him nearer
and nearer to the edge of the vibrating car.
"You find so many boys trying to steal rides on the trolleys, don't
you?" that worthy choked, keeping his wits by a mighty effort of will.
He could see that they were rushing rapidly toward the last platform,
and, if he managed to cling on till then, he might manage to escape,
hopeless as it seemed.
Reaching out as the Red Spider made a vicious lunge, he caught hold
of one of the iron crossbars that secured the car to the rope, and
held on like grim death. The outlaw, with a shriek of fury, lifted
his revolver, and his finger was pressing upon the trigger when the
last platform stopped their progress with appalling abruptness. Phil,
clinging desperately as he was, narrowly escaped being flung off, and
the Mexican, unprepared for the impact, literally hurtled through the
air. Over the boy's head he flew, spread-eagled and screaming, and went
down--down--down, with the swiftness of a shot bird, and disappeared
into the purple mists that veiled the bottom of the cañon from sight.
A crash, a single soul-appalling scream, and Red Spider had vanished
forever from the sight of men.
Sick at heart, Phil Clode lay for a few minutes without tempting to
move. Then he rose cautiously, and, keeping his eyes averted from the
dreadful cañon, commenced the descent. Before he had reached the bottom
all his natural courage had returned, and he pressed on with renewed
energy, inspired by the idea that the outlaw might have left some trail
which would lead to his hiding place.
It was black as within a tomb now, for the rocky walls towered up and
up higher than the eye could reach.
The track was no more than a smear along the face of the cliff, and
Phil began to realize the difficulties that he was to encounter as
he proceeded inch by inch, clinging on with teeth and hands, with a
thousand-foot drop waiting below. The path, too, grew narrower, and
he was just about to relinquish his herculean task in despair when he
saw a gleam of light--lantern light--searing the eternal glooms like a
streak of fire, and not twenty yards ahead of him as he rounded a sharp
bend.
In another minute Red Spider's secret lay revealed.
A square of rock, fitted with powerful hinges, had been opened inward,
and the lantern set in the entrance as a guiding light when the
outlaw returned. Beyond, the path grew so narrow that it was a human
impossibility to scale it; below, until the mysterious catastrophe of
its cessation, lay the river, sliding and thundering in cascades and
waterfalls, and usually fifty feet or more deep. Phil realized that the
passage of Black Cañon was a thing to be dreamed of, and not attempted.
Taking up the lantern, he set off at a brisk pace up the sandy tunnel
at the entrance of which it was placed, keeping his eyes open for
pitfalls and fissures. The passage led to the right, and perceptibly
upward, and ere long he found himself walking parallel with what had
once been the river.
After an hour's hard walking he came suddenly into a spacious cave, and
found himself gazing once more at the oozing river bed, and at--Red
Spider's dam!
Yes, there it was, a great mass of blocks of stone, walling the cañon
from side to side, and cunningly diverting the foaming water into a
subterranean stream that had been uncovered and channeled for the
purpose. Picks and ropes, and blocks of stone, were strewn around in
every direction, and just over the mouth of the underground river hung
a platform of planking supported by countless ropes, and loaded with a
ton or more of cut rock.
Phil was not long in doubt as to its use.
With a little bubbling cry of joy he produced his clasp knife, and went
to work busily to hack the ropes in twain.
A score of them were severed, when an ear-splitting crack made him
start hastily back. Next instant the whole load of rock fell with a
mighty crash, completely blocking the entrance to the subterranean
stream that had been draining the life from the river.
Something had to give way, and Red Spider's cunningly constructed dam
was directly in the path of the river as it swelled, and rose, and
bellied upward. Then, with a roar louder than any thunder, it broke
the barrier away, and hurled itself into Black Cañon with irresistible
fury, to race and tumble down to where the Silver Bridge Reducing
Company's plant was waiting to sully its foaming waters with the red
stain of the ore.
PIGEON-WHISTLE CONCERTS.
A traveler in Eastern lands tells the following little story of the
Chinese and their most unique pigeon whistles.
"One of the most curious expressions of emotional life in China is the
application of whistles to a flock of pigeons. These whistles, very
light, weighing hardly a few grammes, are attached to the tails of
young pigeons soon after their birth, by means of a fine copper wire,
so that when the birds fly the wind will blow through the whistles
and set them vibrating, thus producing an open-air concert, for the
instruments in one and the same flock are all tuned differently. On a
serene day in Peking, where these instruments are manufactured with
great cleverness and ingenuity, it is possible to enjoy this aerial
music while sitting in one's room.
"There are two distinct types of whistles--those consisting of bamboo
tubes placed side by side, and a type placed on the principle of
tubes attached to a gourd body or wind chest. They are lacquered in
yellow, brown, red, and black to protect the material from destructive
influences of the atmosphere. The tube whistles have either two, three,
or five tubes. In some specimens the five tubes are made of ox-horn
instead of bamboo. The gourd whistles are furnished with a mouthpiece,
and small apertures to the number of two, three, six, ten, and even
thirteen. Certain among them have besides, a number of bamboo tubes,
some on the principal mouthpiece, some arranged around it. These
varieties are distinguished by different names. Thus a whistle with one
mouthpiece and ten tubes is called 'the eleven-eyed one.'"
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MOTOR STORIES
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No. 4.--Motor Matt's Race; or, The Last Flight of the "Comet."
No. 5.--Motor Matt's Mystery; or, Foiling a Secret Plot.
No. 6.--Motor Matt's Red Flier; or, On the High Gear.
No. 7.--Motor Matt's Clue; or, The Phantom Auto.
TO BE PUBLISHED ON APRIL 12th
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TO BE PUBLISHED ON APRIL 19th
No. 9.--Motor Matt's Air-ship; or, The Rival Inventors.
TO BE PUBLISHED ON APRIL 26th
No. 10.--Motor Matt's Hard Luck; or, The Balloon House Plot.
TO BE PUBLISHED ON MAY 3d
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TO BE PUBLISHED ON MAY 10th
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Transcriber's Notes:
Added table of contents.
Italics are represented with _underscores_, bold with =equal signs=.
Replaced oe ligatures with oe for the text edition (they are retained
in the HTML version).
Page 1, changed "who" to "whose" ("whose past record") and changed
"Motor Mart" to "Motor Matt" ("who aids Motor Matt").
Page 4, added missing italics to "helped the skipper sail the
_Christina_."
Page 8, changed "gratfying" to "gratifying."
Page 15, changed "dutsy" to "dusty" ("clothes were dusty").
Page 17, changed "intrrupted" to "interrupted" after "now I rise to
you."
Page 29, changed "wtih" to "with" ("with the regularity of
tirelessness").
End of Project Gutenberg's Motor Matt's Hard Luck, by Stanley R. Matthews